Netflix Stranger Things season three will take viewers back to “the summer that changed everything” – 1985 – on July 4, and Netflix teamed up with Coca-Cola to ensure a key element of that year, New Coke, makes an appearance.
In the summer of 1985, Coca-Cola changed the formula of its beloved flagship beverage, and let’s just say New Coke had a short-lived run.
Executives from Netflix visited the Coca-Cola archives in Atlanta last year to study New Coke packaging, memorabilia, advertising, and more to ensure the script accurately reflected historical events and that all props and visuals stayed true to the time period. New Coke will appear in several episodes.
In addition, New Coke will be available this summer as a very limited promotional run.
“In a world of shifting media consumption, we continue to challenge ourselves to find creative and meaningful ways to participate in non-advertising platforms like Netflix to engage with the millions of fans who subscribe to streaming content services,” says Geoff Cottrill, senior vice-president of strategic marketing, Coca-Cola North America. “We’re excited to partner with Netflix and play a key role in recreating the summer of 1985 in a uniquely Coca-Cola way.”
“New Coke was always going to play a role this season,” the Duffer Brothers, the showrunners and creators, said in a joint email interview with The New York Times. “It was one of the first ideas in our Season 3 brainstorm. It was the summer of ’85, and when you talk about pop culture moments, New Coke was a really big deal. It would have been more bizarre to not include it.”