Coca-Cola apologizes for offensive bottle cap message

Well well well. The company whose marketing campaigns were once hailed as brilliant must have laid off their intelligent personnel, because in their latest effort they have pulled a really bad act, to the point that a person has to wonder about the high level of stupidity and immaturity displayed in their latest promotional offering for bottled vitamin water.

It seems that the promotion was designed to combine various random words from the English and French languages in the hope of producing "some interesting combinations". (I don't know if there was a prize involved.) Who designed it? A kid in the eighth grade? In any case, whoever chose the words without screening them first using even a dribble of common sense would have immediately deleted certain words from the list and anticipated certain possible outcomes.

A reporter who investigated whether the offensive bottles were still on the shelves read a bottle cap this morning and discovered the word 'douche'. In the French language that word means shower, but in English those same letters mean something else entirely, an insult, and anyone working in a bilingual English-French promotional campaign project ought to know that. I wonder what other gems are included in this pathetic act.

Soft drink giant Coca-Cola is apologizing after an Edmonton woman found the words "You Retard" inscribed inside a cap on a bottle of Vitamin Water recently.

"Very, very unfortunate that this happened," said spokesperson Shannon Denny. "We apologize to our consumers for this."

"The chances were so slim through this random process," said Denny adding that not anticipating the potential word pairings was a mistake.

Mistake? Ha! Non-anticipation of the results speaks loudly about the incompetence of the planners of this juvenile campaign. How can Coca-Cola defend that? Only the non-bilingual and incompetent would speak this way, Coca-Cola. Anyone knowing two languages quickly learns that certain words spelled the same way can have a different meaning in each language. You just did not hire the right people for the job.

It did not sit well at all with the Edmonton family who found the term very offensive, especially even more since they have a child with cerebral palsy who has been subjected to cruel taunts. They wrote a letter to Coca-Cola to express their outrage. Good for them, but I wish it had not fallen to them to straighten out this company.

"Retard" is a French word meaning late.

"The promotion has been cancelled," Denny said. "We are stopping production of all of the bottles using those caps with words. And any caps we have within our inventory are being destroyed."

So all offending bottle caps that have gone out in their distribution chain will not be recalled, the reporter was pointing out as she showed us the word 'douche' printed on a bottle she found in a store.



(If you can find any note of apology on their site please let me know in this thread.) I could not find any apology on their web site, so any apology to their customers through a buried article rings a little shallow, doesn't it? Saving face and CYA practices still rule the greedy corporations. Thus I will not be winning any popularity contest with them for exposing their campaign, but stupidity and ignorance must be denied, so saith ATS.

Story and video report here

What do you think ATS?

O grow a sense of humour.


Its freaking funny and if I got a funnny one I would laugh my ass off.


Sheesh when people get all upset and offended over what a freaking bootle cap says you know humour is dead!

People are far too serious these days!

I retard what? The thought is incomplete.

Whoever claimed offense is just looking for a payday.

Already posted: www.abovetopsecret.com...

reply to post by TokiTheDestroyer


Thanks for pointing it out. I missed it completely.

why don't people just shut the hell up and stop whining about being offended by every little bloody thing?!

What? Did everyone graduate from the Kissinger school of insensitivity? Where I live, we don't find humour in denigration or unkindness. And yes, I love humour.

aboutface
What? Did everyone graduate from the Kissinger school of insensitivity? Where I live, we don't find humour in denigration or unkindness. And yes, I love humour.

Its a bottle cap with some words on it. Randomly distributed.


Now unless bottle caps have somehow devopled intelligance then its impossibe for it to be offensive.

I mean its just a bottle cap

A inert object.

If you take what some words say on bottle cap as a personal insult then you have to be rather tightly strung and I suggest chilling out! You will live longer and not get upset every 5 minutes.

Hmm, for some reason my previous post was deleted, so I'm reposting.

I found this funny. I don't know why people are making such a big thing out of it.

ETA that this thread is a repeat of a previous thread. No wonder my post is missing. It's in the original thread.


I believe we're supposed to search for previous threads.

reply to post by aboutface


Seriously? She was offended? I guess there must be some truth to that bottle cap after all...

:: Insert rolling eyes here ::

reply to post by aboutface


Well well well, the company whose marketing campaigns were once hailed as brilliant must of been right because your on here posting about the inoffensive bit of gibberish printed on there bottle tops!!!!!!!!

reply to post by fenian8


That's the point. In elementary school and high school, children call each other names. One such name is retard. Now in order to get through those juvenile years with some sense of sanity, a child is told to laugh it off. The usual result is that the one who is called the name usually resorts to calling back some other insult. This is how kids survive and we all know that.

However when people begin to grow up and join society, they begin to acquire maturity which tells them that the greater society does not accept total insensitivity to the child and family who is grappling with developmental difficulties. A society is judged by how it treats the weakest among us.

That there have been children and families hurt by rudeness and insensitivity is well known and mental health professionals and legal authorities are fighting to end bullying. No matter how some may wish to laugh it off, it speaks loads to where they lie in their social development.

Coca Cola apologized because they know that it is offensive.

reply to post by aboutface


But it is a bottle cap!

Not a HUNMAN!

A radomly distributed bottle cap!

It incapale of knowing the customer that buys it!

It really is just some random printed words

"You Retard" for drinking this crap!

So they put the truth out a bit too eh. Most masons and elites do force themselves to display truth. So along with fleecing consumer for money, they inform the customer, You Retard for buying our poison!!!! That is so funny!

reply to post by thisguyrighthere


exactly just what i was going to type (say)

2nd line for the record

reply to post by crazyewok


Yes, It is a collection of random words and not personally aimed at anyone. On that I agree with you. I know that there was no intent to offend either.

The problem lies in the business decision and lack of judgement in putting out a campaign that can include combos offensive to society, no matter how trivial some may consider it to be. It is a multinational company that has historically stepped on norms of society in order to get the big bucks. When they cross the line, people have every right to expose their actions and to make them follow the norms society has established.

reply to post by Unity_99


That's one way of looking at it, haha. However the family who bought it has an autistic child with physical and developmental disabilities and it really offended them. The community that cares about all of its members also really cares about this family. To tell Coca cola that it is not okay for their ineptitude to be offensive to some one is just fine.

reply to post by aboutface


Yes, but the company wouldn't have known that a family with a health challenged child would buy it, the message was a general one, so they may have felt offended, but its everyone that should for I believe they were telling the consumer they were retarded to buy their poisons, its an escalation of truth out to wake people up more. It reminded me a few years ago with all the sex scandals in the Church and it was during some special event in the Church year, when there was some legal matter against them. So the pope, or his office/secretary, issued a statement, that he couldn't understand why during this time of the year, anyone would be so cruel as to do this now (paraphrased, it was on some thread here I beleieve that I first read it). So, because the world didn't make sense, the papal office turned to conspiracy theories to make sense of it.

That was an enormous thump on the head. A big poke to the public with a stick, saying, wake up guys. The world doesn't make sense, why aren't you researching it!!!!

reply to post by Auricom


Yes she was offended. If you had a child with developmental issues who is constantly being bullied, that would certainly trigger a response, whether you yourself at present might not react in that way. Your reaction of rolling the eyes is a judgmental one. You obviously cannot yet place yourself in the shoes of another.

As we mature, we begin to consider the rest of our community and the injustices poured upon some. We don't remain juvenile forever. At some point we have to think a little deeper as a functioning member of society.