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Cola corporates Pepsi, Coke to clash for attention, sales during Asia Cup cricket

Soft drink giants Pepsi and Coca-Cola have targeted the Asia Cup cricket tournament beginning tomorrow in Bangladesh capital Dhaka for an advertising war. The cola rivals say the tournament will be a boon for Bangladeshi drinkers who will be inundated with a variety of gifts.

Soon after Pepsi -- owned by the private Transcom Limited -- colourfully repainted its vehicles with new campaign slogans ahead of the ten-day tournament, Coca-Cola announced in a blaze of publicity its "Reignition programme" called "Coca-Cola Enjoy."

"We will launch a special programme just before the tournament starts and I will not divulge what we are going to do, because then the surprise will not be there," Coca-Cola's general manager in Bangladesh, AFM Zakaria, told AFP.

"The tournament is a property of Pepsi as it is called the Pepsi Asia Cup, but we will launch a vigorous media campaign with advertisements on television especially," he said from the company's suburban Mirpur bottling factory.

However Pepsi's marketing manager Adnan Anwar dismissed his rivals' latest marketing campaign saying that "Coke was dead in the media and the market".

Zakaria however remained confident that Coke would take the lead in the soft drinks war, saying "in Bangladesh soft drink means Coke and that is the unique edge we have in marketing over others."

But he downplayed the rivalry between the competing brands saying "there is no clash with Pepsi, only competition".