Comment by hyperman1

I always assumed this to be marketing, as reversing the formula has been easy since the '90s. I know someone with acces to a university lab, and he reverses and recreates popular tastes as a hobby. Also, in double blind taste tests, pepsi tends to win from Coca.

Their real genius was always marketing, associating sugar water with freedom, free time, summer AND christmas, ... Not to look down on them, good marketing is both very hard and very powerfull.