Title	ALI COLA. THE COLA IN SKIN COLORS.
Brand	ALI COLA
Product/Service	COLA
Category	B06. Use of Ambient Media: Small Scale
Entrant	LOVED Hamburg, GERMANY
Idea Creation	LOVED Hamburg, GERMANY

Name	Company	Position
Armin Jochum	thjnk AG	CCO
Mieke Haase	loved gmbh	Managing Director
Karl Wolfgang Epple, Matthäus Frost	thjnk AG	Creative Director
Matthäus Frost	thjnk AG	Art Direction
Karl Wolfgang Epple	thjnk AG	Copywriter
Ilker Yilmazalp, Philipp Stamer	loved gmbh	Account Manager
Teresa Köster	thjnk AG	Editorial Department
Dirk Weyer	-	Photographer
David Kowalski	-	Post Production
Louisa Bartholdi, Manuel Caliebe, Hilko Wiegmann	thjnk AG	Final Artwork

The Campaign

Our idea was no advertising campaign, but PR via a product innovation: the world’s first cola that comes in different skin colors. They look different, but they all taste the same. Just like people: We look different outside – but we’re all the same inside. An entertaining pro-tolerance statement. No special edition, but a serious relaunch, challenging the cola industry and the people’s prejudices towards things (and people) that look different.

Creative Execution

The relaunch of the cola started with changing the product to six different skin colors. Since the design idea of skin colors is the focus, the packaging is reduced to the minimum. No conventional large labels, but only a white neck label without any frills. We decided to use the product itself as a small-scale media, so we made the skin-color as visible as possible and used the label to communicate that the drinks have social thinking at its core – by using different pro-tolerance messages on the labels. The relaunch was accompanied by a print and out-of-home campaign portraying people with different skin color, different sex, old, young, tattooed, etc. raising their ALI COLA bottles to eachother. The campaign parallelly conquered Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, engaging people to post their own photos and ideas using the hashtags #toleranzschmeckt and #cheerstotolerance. Press and blogs discussed the topic and product worldwide.

Press, blogs, influencers, 2.5m contacts in the first week, and thousands of comments proof that we struck a chord. ALI COLA polarizes – showing the relevance for a pro-tolerance statement. ALI COLA was covered in hundreds of reports, including Germany’s popular science entertainment programme “Galileo“. It was covered worldwide, even in Thailand. ALI COLA is measurably successful: Online sales increased by +890%, leading to more donations to the NGO Kiron. The relaunch doubled the brand awareness in only 3 months. Instagram Followers increased by 2,000%, Facebook Likes by 350 % (rated 4.7 stars). We asked those who know ALI COLA, how important tolerance is to them. After the relaunch 85,3 % find it very important (extremely important +5.1%). ALI COLA hits a nerves, moving tolerance back into the people’s consciousness. An issue that is now more important than ever, particularly regarding Europe’s refugee crisis, German right-winged party AfD and Trump.

ALI COLA–The cola in skin colors – is not only an advertising campaign, but an idea that shows how creativity and channel strategy can collaborate to bring a brand to life. ALI COLA is a pro-tolerance statement in rough political times, creating an innovative product and a cultural moment when it’s most needed. It engages people to discuss the topic and change their beliefs on people with different skin color. The product itself is the core: We use traditional bottles as a channel to communicate our pro-tolerance statement in an innovative way: Skin-colored liquid and small labels showing pro-tolerance messages.

Insights, Strategy and the Idea

ALI COLA mainly targets the German society. It’s primary aim is to change the way Germans think about foreigners and people with different skin colors. Since Germany is the second most popular migration destination in the world, one out of five Germans has at least partial roots outside of Germany. Over the past two years Germany has welcomed more than 1 million asylum-seekers – an immigration wave that has changed Europe’s largest economy. Of course, it also raised racism and prejudice. Since Germany has a very dark past considering racism, our society has a special responsibility to be a role model for Europe.