Pepsi is bringing sexy back.

So Pepsi isn’t sexy enough. Oh, okay. I get it now. From Ad Age, news that Pepsi’s new CMO Jill Beraud has been brought in from Victoria’s Secret. Fear not, she’s got that coveted ‘Rock Star CMO’ cred for getting Victoria’s Secret back on the Super Bowl. (*pauses, slams head against desk until bloody*) Is it really that hard to sell Victoria’s Secret? Gimmee that budget, please: Super models + power strut + push-up bras + 90 million viewers = SCORE!

According to CEO Indra Nooyi—and some of the finest marketing speak known to brandkind—the implication here is that Pepsi just needs more sophistication, more sexin’ up, if you will.

Yikes.

As soon as I hear phrases like best practices and Pepsi enterprise, I cringe. Yes, mega most brands live for internal marketing synergistic speakage, and that the Pepsi brand is also more than just soda, (Frito-Lay, Gatorade and Tropicana), but looking at all the moves they’ve made so far is like the perfect case study of how to run things backwards:

Claim to be hip > overpay for generic logo and label redesign > underutilize social media networks to get the word out > fire your ad agency which had helped build you for nearly 50 years > bring in their sister agency > bring in new CMO for all the brands.

Yeah. I can see now see how sexy is the real problem.

Sophisticated and sexy may fly on the coasts, but remember: who really drinks Pepsi? Manhattan socialites? Diet Pepsi or lonely Max drinkers, maybe. Sophisticated don’t fly in flyover country though, as much as the brand clicks its heels together and wishes it so. I’m the first one to appreciate what design can do for a product, but Pepsi’s about taste, not slick packaging.

I mentioned before one specific thing they should try to do if they’re concerned about reaching a younger audience, (let alone a wider one). It’s what I’d do right from the start. If sales are the bottom line...

Get into more fast food restaurants.

The one place the iTunes crowd from all their song download spots hangs out and they’re in only a few chains? Makes no sense.

Hard thing to try and pull off? Yep. After all, when it comes to most fast food places, Coke is it. (Ouch.) But why not go after them? From what I can see, Coke has had their run for a long time in Burger King, Wendy’s etc. Forget sexy, time to get down to business and get in there.

On a local level, distributors just want to move as much as product as they can. You do that by getting into... as many chains as you can. From there, all the scratch and win sweepstakes, celeb/movie promotional tie-ins and such will naturally flow from that. The chains don’t care, they’ll serve customers whatever brand gives them the better deal.

The ones Pepsi’s already in? Promote it better. When’s the last time Pepsi did something cool with Pizza Hut? Taco Bell? Forget it. Mountain Dew gets all the love there. Focus back on the core brand for a change.

There’s a lot of increased competition from soda alternatives, Vitamin waters, flavored teas six ways to sundown, and 75 flavors of GatorPowerVita-ades. Doesn’t it make sense to get in front of as many new people as possible? Unless sleek packaging’s all they care about.

In that case, oops, they’ll do it again this year with another Britney Super Bowl spot.

Tags: Pepsi, #ideas4pepsicooler

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