The Discontinued Pepsi Flavor You Probably Forgot Existed

The Cola Wars of the 1990s saw beverage empires experiencing a rebirth by creating unheard of flavors they thought could win consumers over to their brand. Some were well received, but infamous failures like Crystal Pepsi and New Coke are remembered best. As these companies marched into the new millennium, you would think they would have learned from the past mistakes, but PepsiCo had more blunders in store.

Vibrantly colored beverages gained widespread popularity during the '90s, and PepsiCo acquired the now elusive SoBe drinks in 2000 to try and get in on that game too. A year later, Pepsi-owned Mountain Dew Code Red became one of the top three soft drinks sold in convenience stores after its release in 2001. However, the soda conglomerate wanted a similar product under its signature blue and red banner. PepsiCo researched what teenagers thought would make a welcome addition to the company's soft drink family and eventually landed on Pepsi Blue, an electric-blue, berry-flavored soda with a striking resemblance to window cleaner.

Right out of the gate, Pepsi Blue was riddled with controversy. The intense sweetness was off-putting to many adults, but perhaps more offensive to some was the drink's inclusion of Blue 1,  a dye banned in some countries abroad over health concerns, among its list of ingredients. This alone may have been enough to ruin the latest brainchild of the beverage giant, but the company double-downed in the cringiest way possible, which landed one foot in the grave for Pepsi Blue.

Released one day before Vanilla Coke, Pepsi Blue was marketed aggressively by PepsiCo to compete with Coca-Cola's newest beverage. The vibrant blue soft drink was featured in movies like "Garfield: The Movie" and "The Italian Job," as well as the X Games and commercials featuring Brittney Spears in her prime. However, these marketing efforts weren't equating to sales, so the business tried thinking outside the box in what would become a lesson for what not to do in Marketing 101.

Social media wasn't what it is today, which made it more challenging to communicate with potential customers than in contemporary times. The soda mega-corporation, however, thought they had found a way to influence consumers directly through online forums. Marketing operatives working for the beverage conglomerate began posting undercover in online forums to talk up the newest edition to the Pepsi line-up.

However, folks weren't as gullible as PepsiCo apparently thought they were. The secret agents' covers were quickly blown, and when people discovered the company was using shady marketing tactics to drum up excitement over its sugary product, the backlash was savage. The customer fallout resulted in Pepsi Blue going the way of the discontinued TaB soda in 2004, although the beverage did have a short-lived revival nearly two decades later.

Despite the presence of Blue 1 and the company's marketing shenanigans surrounding Pepsi Blue, there is still a dedicated fan base for the drink. In 2021, the soda enterprise keyed in on this demographic during the post-2020 nostalgia trend and brought back its iconic neon blue beverage for a limited run. The comeback was well-received by fans who had longingly begged for its return, but that wasn't enough to keep it on the shelves for long.

Those who want to experience the taste of the berry-flavored soda today are out of luck in the U.S. (unless you have $10,000 dollars to spend on an unopened bottle on eBay). However, the discontinued beverage is still sold in the Philippines. After bungling its marketing campaign much like the discontinued Kudos snack bars did in the 1990s, Pepsi has since continued to push the boundaries of flavored soft drinks since the discontinuation of Pepsi Blue with products like "Cocoa" Cola, which had notes of chocolate and marshmallow, and a warm apple pie flavor that was released before Thanksgiving in 2020. One can only guess what flavor the beverage titans will come up with next, but whatever it is, the company will assuredly be hoping to avoid the self-inflicted catastrophes that derailed Pepsi Blue.