ATLANTA – Last week at the NACS Show, The Coca-Cola Company announced a plethora of new products and solutions for convenience stores, including new Sprite Cherry and Sprite Cherry Zero.

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports that Coca-Cola plans to introduce the new soft drink flavors in early 2017, after data showed that the combo of sprite and cherry is one of the most popular options customers mix-and-match at Coke’s proprietary Freestyle fountain units. The machines track the flavors customers pick and forward the data digitally to Coca-Cola.

“We’re always looking for new innovations,” Coca-Cola spokesman Scott Leith told the news source, adding that the Sprite-plus-cherry combo was a hit with people using Freestyle machines among the more than 150 possible flavor options.

Seen at the NACS Show
Additional products launched by Coca-Cola during the NACS Show were Gold Peak Diet Green Tea, Gold Peak Slightly Sweet Tea, FUZE Tea “Sweet and Lightly Tart” Flavor Fusions and Gold Peak RTD Tea Lattes, Gold Peak RTD Coffee and Dunkin’ Donuts RTD Coffee.

At the Coca-Cola booth, attendees explored an innovative foodservice zone, an array of proprietary merchandising solutions, as well as a complete virtual convenience store that highlights insights and best practices for each area of the store.

“At The Coca-Cola Company, we are committed to providing our retail partners with not only leading brands and innovative beverages, but also shopper solutions that strengthen performance in all areas of the store,” said Diane Wallace, vice president of retail marketing for Coca-Cola North America. “We strive to equip our convenience retail partners with practical tools and insights they can leverage to grow their business.”