Pepsi may be losing in the cola wars to rival Coca-Cola and another surprising entrant, but at one Southern California Costco, Pepsi appears to be reigning supreme.
At least, that’s according to creator Melanie (@melanieedianaa). She posted a TikTok clip that earned more than 1.8 million views as of Monday. The video, taken at a Costco, shows a soda aisle with sections of Coca-Cola products largely intact. However, Pepsi shipments have been nearly cleared out.
“Local Costco is not playing any games,” the creator included in the caption, including a #pepsihalftimechallenge hashtag, seemingly in reference to Sunday’s Super Bowl.
There, Pepsi did have visibility as the longtime halftime show sponsor, but as ESPN reported in September 2022, Apple Music took over the sponsorship starting with the 2023 event and has continued in that role, including for Sunday’s show featuring Kendrick Lamar (with a guest spot by SZA, and narrated by Samuel L. Jackson as Uncle Sam).
But there’s another reason for rejecting Coke. According to Yahoo!, there’s currently an effort by Freeze Latino Movement to boycott American products, including Coca-Cola, to protest the Trump Administration’s deportation efforts.
As a Coke-centered Daily Dot story published Sunday assessed, “Last year, people started boycotting companies that donated to President Donald Trump’s campaign. Those boycotts have only grown as numerous big companies—including Target, Meta, Walmart, Amazon, and McDonald’s—rolled back their diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives.”
The story added, “Coca-Cola was added to this list, not for ending its DEI work, but because of rumors that they fired a slew of Latino workers in Texas and allegedly reported them to ICE, Yahoo reported“—though Distractify countered by asserting there’s no actual evidence to back up this claim.
How is Pepsi doing?
Pepsi has long been number two behind Coke for American consumers, but that has changed recently.
According to a CNN article from last June, “After years of slowly gaining market share, Dr. Pepper inched ahead of Pepsi as the number two soda brand in the country in 2023, according to market share data from Beverage Digest, a trade publication.”
“Coke is the leader by a comfortable margin,” it went on to say. “Last year, it captured 19.2% of the soda market in the United States by volume, Beverage Digest’s data shows. Dr Pepper and Pepsi both had 8.3%, with Dr Pepper technically ahead. After that came other brands owned by Coca-Cola: Sprite came in at 8.1% and Diet Coke at 7.8%.”
The article assessed that Pepsi may be focused on other brands in its portfolio.
“Unlike Coca-Cola and Keurig Dr Pepper, Pepsico has a massive food business — its sprawling portfolio includes Quaker, Frito-Lay and more,” it noted. “And when it comes to beverages, Stanford noted, it seems to be focused on its zero sugar lines rather than classic Pepsi.”
Viewers had varying opinions on the boycott
“My Costco doesn’t sell Diet Pepsi!” one lamented. “I used to be an avid Diet Coke fan! I’m trying to buy DIET PEPSI!”
“I went to Kroger earlier today and in the soda [aisle] there [were] hella boxes of coca on the floor stacked up and barely any Pepsi,” another reported.”
“Pepsi and Coca-Cola are the same evil corporation,” another opined. “They both need to be boycotted.”
@melanieedianaa local costco is not playing any games👏🏼 @Costco Wholesale @Pepsi 💙 #costco #pepsi #pepsihalftimechallenge ♬ sonido original – yeseli
Finally, one predicted, “Everyone people will eventualy forget and go back to Coca-Cola. Just give it some time. People are sheep and this boycotting is just a trend right now.”
The Daily Dot has reached out to the creator via TikTok comment and Costco via email.
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