Everyone is drinking it, everyone is speaking of it -- the new "Cola Turka" launched in the midst of Turkey's sizzling summer has been an overnight success with some suggesting that a diplomatic spat between Ankara and Wash-ington has helped the new cola take on its better-known US rivals.
"We didn't chose to take advantage of the political situation," says Eda Gokkan, in charge of the new soda's advertising campaign at Young and Rubicam.
"We're just trying to sell the Turkish life-style," she said.
But the cola's launch two weeks ago coincided with an outbreak of nationalist sentiment in the wake of the arrest by US forces of 11 Turkish soldiers in northern Iraq, according to the sales manager of a supermarket in the center of Istanbul who gave her name as Didem.
"Because of the war in Iraq, 90 percent of Turks have turned against the United States and many chose to buy local rather than US products," she said.
The cola's successful launch "is the result of an la turca reaction'" to the arrest of the Turkish soldiers in northern Iraq on July 4th, the mass daily newspaper Milliyet proclaimed.
The soldiers were released 60 hours later, but the whole episode was viewed as a national humiliation and it sparked a diplomatic row with Washington.
No reason was officially given for the arrests, but US forces said the Turkish soldiers were acting "suspiciously," adding that explosives were found at their Sulaymaniyah headquarters.
Some papers have since high-lighted instances of shopkeepers who are refusing to sell US products, including the more famous US colas.
Hurriyet newspaper, quoting a survey by the Roper ASW institute, said the sales of US products had dropped by 13 percent in Turkey in the past few months.
A tongue-in-cheek TV ad has also helped "Cola Turka," a product sold by the Turkish Ulker food group, gain national attention.
Starring US comedian Chevy Chase, the TV spot shows Americans adopting Turkish customs as they drink the new cola, from throwing water after a departing car to ensure its smooth journey to growing big moustaches.
"This isn't Turkish propaganda, but rather positive nationalism," says Serdar Erener, one of those responsible for advertising the new product.
Early sales reports suggest Cola Turka has gained a 25 percent market share in a country which consumes 1 billion liters of colas a year, with Coca Cola holding the lion's share.
With the cola war now in full swing, the Vatan daily wondered about the implications for domestic politics, since the son of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan is a local distributor for the new Cola Turka, while the son of former prime minister Mesut Yilmaz, a political rival, is a distributor for Coca Cola.
The combined effect of the monsoon, the outer rim of Typhoon Fengshen and a low-pressure system is expected to bring significant rainfall this week to various parts of the nation, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The heaviest rain is expected to occur today and tomorrow, with torrential rain expected in Keelung’s north coast, Yilan and the mountainous regions of Taipei and New Taipei City, the CWA said. Rivers could rise rapidly, and residents should stay away from riverbanks and avoid going to the mountains or engaging in water activities, it said. Scattered showers are expected today in central and
COOPERATION: Taiwan is aligning closely with US strategic objectives on various matters, including China’s rare earths restrictions, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said Taiwan could deal with China’s tightened export controls on rare earth metals by turning to “urban mining,” a researcher said yesterday. Rare earth metals, which are used in semiconductors and other electronic components, could be recovered from industrial or electronic waste to reduce reliance on imports, National Cheng Kung University Department of Resources Engineering professor Lee Cheng-han (李政翰) said. Despite their name, rare earth elements are not actually rare — their abundance in the Earth’s crust is relatively high, but they are dispersed, making extraction and refining energy-intensive and environmentally damaging, he said, adding that many countries have opted to
FORCED LABOR: A US court listed three Taiwanese and nine firms based in Taiwan in its indictment, with eight of the companies registered at the same address Nine companies registered in Taiwan, as well as three Taiwanese, on Tuesday were named by the US Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) as Specially Designated Nationals (SDNs) as a result of a US federal court indictment. The indictment unsealed at the federal court in Brooklyn, New York, said that Chen Zhi (陳志), a dual Cambodian-British national, is being indicted for fraud conspiracy, money laundering and overseeing Prince Holding Group’s forced-labor scam camps in Cambodia. At its peak, the company allegedly made US$30 million per day, court documents showed. The US government has seized Chen’s noncustodial wallet, which contains
SUPPLY CHAIN: Taiwan’s advantages in the drone industry include rapid production capacity that is independent of Chinese-made parts, the economic ministry said The Executive Yuan yesterday approved plans to invest NT$44.2 billion (US$1.44 billion) into domestic production of uncrewed aerial vehicles over the next six years, bringing Taiwan’s output value to more than NT$40 billion by 2030 and making the nation Asia’s democratic hub for the drone supply chain. The proposed budget has NT$33.8 billion in new allocations and NT$10.43 billion in existing funds, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said. Under the new development program, the public sector would purchase nearly 100,000 drones, of which 50,898 would be for civil and government use, while 48,750 would be for national defense, it said. The Ministry of
RSS