You saw 1000 'product placements' for coke without being aware of it in films other things. Taste is associated with familiarity and comfort.
I respectfully disagree, I used to work in F&B industry. And product marketing and placement has absolutely no affect on how one think something taste is good or bad. It does however remind anyone next time the walk into store they should buy coke, which does affect sales number. But not taste difference.
My 7 years old nephew hasn't watched a single Coca Cola coke in his life time, but he prefer coke over Pepsi. While my friends daughter ( and her mum ) prefer Pepsi.
Yes it odes.
"My 7 years old nephew hasn't watched a single Coca Cola coke in his life time"
1) It's ridiculous to say a 7 year old 'has never seen an add for coke'.
How would you possibly know that? Unless they are living as the Amish, that kid as seen ads.
2) That someone will prefer one drink over another is not relevant to the argument.
Nobody is making the claim that 'ads make you do stuff'. No Coke ad is going to 'force Pepsi drinkers to like Coke'.
Ads are influential. They root the product in feelings, emotions, those have impact, which is why advertising is there.
3) Your nephew was probably drinking code from some age, maybe as a treat. It was Coke and not some Italian cola, because Coke has such a powerful market position.
In Italy, they drink Brio and it's quite good, you can't even get it here, if you could, people would drink it.
Coke spends billions on ads because they work not because they don't.
>2) Coke, a sugary drink, is largely kept alive by smart marketing, that involves mostly advertising in the end.
Not sure I agree. I haven't seen any Coke Cola Ads for years, not online digital Ads and I rarely consume any traditional media. But I will still buy Coke Cola every once in a while.
They are also on all of the convenience store with decent positional shelf space or visual merchandising. Something I learned that no one on HN actually knows anything about during the discussions of App Store.
Edit: All of my friends can taste the difference between Coke and Pepsi. It is just different. So I was surprised to read comments and youtube video about "blind tasting" on the two. No, I didn't drink Coke because of Ads, I drink it because it taste better. (And some people prefer Pepsi )