Coca-Cola and Christmas marketing

Coca-Cola's iconic red-and-white logo is almost as Christmasy as can be. At holiday time, the brand uses special marketing to encourage consumers to try, buy and enjoy its soft drinks for parties and for any occasion.

At right, Coca-Cola's photo of its famous truck criss-crossing the UK during holiday season. The field marketing tour began in Inverness and ends in Leicester Square, London, two days before Christmas.

At each stop, consumers can enjoy free samples of Coke soft drinks amidst a wintery season backdrop, complete with festive lights. To increase anticipation and bring consumers to the lorry stop, Coke used the hashtag #holidaysarecoming and promoted the tour on its website and via publicity. Coke's UK FB page has more than 94m likes and its Twitter account has 126k followers, adding up to a huge audience for social media marketing.

This year, Coke is celebrating another marketing milestone: The 100th anniversary of its instantly recognisable contour bottle, which was introduced in 1915.

Now Coke has launched another packaging innovation: a bottle label that converts to a holiday bow. The idea is to encourage consumers to leave Coke bottles on the table and 'unwrap' the novelty bow as part of their holiday meals.

The strapline for this year's UK holiday campaign is: 'Bring happiness home'.

For more images of Coke's Christmas adverts of the past, see its online gallery here.