[kall]

Heh.

We've had 1.5L bottles for aaaages.

3 for $4 at Foodtown.

Originally Posted by NY Daily News

Here's the skinny on the new Coca-Cola bottle.

The world's largest soft drink maker is turning to a new 1.5-liter bottle to fizz up its products - and to give consumers a better grip on the Real Thing.

The slimmer plastic bottles started appearing on store shelves in the New York area last week - making the fat and familiar 2-liter bottle a bit harder to find.

"It's a bottle you can handle," said Harriet Tolve, a Coca-Cola spokeswoman.

But plenty of New Yorkers weren't buying Coke's spin that the Smooth Serve bottle makes for a better pour - especially when some stores price it as high as the 2-liter container.

"I would rather have hard to pour than less money and less soda," said Steve Fernandez, 62, of Manhattan, who was shopping at Moe's Deli on Ninth Ave., where the new bottles sold for just 10 cents less than the 2-liter bottles.

Tolve said Coke drinkers had pushed for a smaller, easier-to-handle bottle whose contents would not go flat as fast.

At Evergreen Supermarket in East Harlem, shoppers shunned the new bottles after the 2-liter containers sold out.

"When the customers saw them, they wouldn't even touch them," said store manager Manuel Rivera. "Now I'm out of 2-liter bottles but I can't get rid of the smaller ones."

Marketing experts said companies frequently crank out products in smaller quantities - yet with little change to prices.

"It's a very common way to more subtly make a price increase," said Allen Adamson, managing director of Landor Associates, a branding and consulting firm.

But the quaint-sized soda bottles found some new fans as well.

"The new one's a little easier to hold," said Takiyah Pennix of Deer Park, L.I. "It's cute, too, and not as gaudy as that big one."

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