The Coke Wars: “One Sip Of Freedom”
The Turkish Patent Institute (TPE) has not approved applications for beverage brand name “Cola Kurda” because it found resemblances to the emblem of the separatist Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) in the product’s name and colors. The most recent patent application was made by Ramazan Aslan, who named the beverage “Cola Kurda” and used yellow, green and red colors in its emblem together with a star symbol — bringing to mind the colors used by the PKK.
The Aksam daily stated yesterday that Aslan had applied to the TPE in 2007, but that the TPE had refused the application because “it was against the public order and general ethics.” To Turkey’s dismay, Cola Kurda has been offered in Iraq and on Kurdistan Airlines, which is operated by the regional Kurdish administration in northern Iraq….
Meanwhile, the Tobacco and Alcohol Market Regulatory Agency (TAPDK) has been evaluating an application for the Kurdish “Roj Beer.” A patent for the beer has not been given yet because the brand name and brand colors are also seen as allusions to the PKK, and because the product slogan, “One sip of freedom,” is found to be disturbing.
The Turkish nationalist response to Coca Cola was Cola Turka. It came on the market about a decade ago, produced by Ulker, which is a company with a self-consciously Islamic identity.
Photo by Jenny White
Patents or trademarks? Which is meant in the piece?
The piece is funny in a way. Who’d have thought Cola Turka snipe at American giants was setting a ‘bad’ precedent?
Nihat, our press corps don’t know enough to differentiate between the two — just be thankful they don’t call it copyright.
I think Cola Turka came out in 2003 and rode the anti-American wave w/o being blatantly anti-American. Their commercials with Chevy Chase getting Turkified were succesful and somewhat fun (they are on youtube, if you missed them). But there were snipes like this too.
As for Ulker having an Islamic-identity, I think recent evidence of that was their puchase of an international chocolatier known for resisting the inclusion of liqueur in their products. I mean the one named after a famous hijab-wearing housewife.
Bulent, yeah, I had caught (and enjoyed) Chevy Chase commercials at the time.
Back to the subject, I actually find the Cola Kurda mark an ingenious and refreshing challenge to Turkish political landscape. I wish there had not been as much violence committed so far, and we could’ve all laughed at things like this and moved on.
Also, I hear that change, sometimes, comes from unexpected directions. This was on NPR yesterday: apparently, Chinese spectators were pissed off by their national soccer team’s wrteched performance (at the Olympic games I guess), and reportedly chanted in unison demanding that the communist party chief (!) overseeing soccer activities be sacked. The observer speaking at NPR added that such protest in China against a party chief would be inconceivable in other contexts, and continued with what I said I heard at the top of the paragraph