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 Main | Archive | Issue 7/2009 |
50 Years of Pepsi in Russia
Column: Embassy Life
U.S. President Barack Obama had just recently left Moscow, and the U.S. Ambassador’s residence was already summing up the results. Not the results of the visit, though, but those of the 50th anniversary of the 1959 American National Exhibition in Moscow’s Sokolniki Park, the first-ever in the Soviet Union. “For millions of Russians it was a chance to see first-hand many sides of life in America, including science, technology and culture – everything from sophisticated computers and household appliances to the simple pleasure of a glass of Pepsi-Cola,” said the invitation to the reception and the opening of a photo exhibition.
At the reception at Spaso House on July 9, the accent was placed on the last-mentioned aspect of the American way of life. A 50-year-old Pepsi advertising poster and a beautiful Chevrolet automobile of about the same age were at the entrance of the exhibition. Along with the hosts, Ambassador John Beyrle and Mrs. Jocelyn Greene, the present face of PepsiCo, Indra Nooyi, the company’s charming and elegant chairperson and CEO, welcomed the guests with company paper cups of the drink that has played a role in the history of American-Russian relations.
The photo exhibition displayed in one of the rooms of the residence provided key information.
It was the year 1959. At the height of the arms race and against the backdrop of tests of ever more powerful atomic and hydrogen bombs, N.S. Khrushchev, the secretary general of the Central Committee of the Soviet Communist Party, proposed having a “peaceful competition” to U.S. President Dwight Eisenhower. A program of exchanges was drawn up. On July 25, 1959, an American National Exhibition was opened in Sokolniki Park. Along with the other leaders of the country, N. Khrushchev came to the opening of the exhibition in person. U.S. Vice President Richard Nixon was in “collusion” with PepsiCo’s young vice president, Donald M. Kendall. The future President promised his acquaintance that he would bring the Soviet leader over to the Pepsi-Cola kiosk. But would Khrushchev drink the overseas beverage? Kendall thought up a ruse: he didn’t just ask Khrushchev to taste his drink but offered him a choice between an American and a “Soviet” Pepsi (the syrup was dissolved in Moscow water). Khrushchev, naturally, picked the Soviet beverage. He drank the first six out of the 3 million cups drunk during the exhibition. The journalists, of course, caught the moment on film and the famous photograph was in papers all over the world the following day.
A legend, Donald M. Kendall, who now looks like a biblical prophet at age 88, told about those days. He wittily and humorously recalled his meetings with many American and Soviet leaders. He voiced hope that “with the departure of the Bush administration that I dislike,” U.S.-Russian relations would begin improving.
The U.S. Ambassador’s remarks were also full of optimism. He highly assessed the results of the recent Moscow visit of U.S. President Barack Obama and expressed the hope that the initiative and ingenuity of U.S. businessmen would play a positive role at the present stage of Washington-Moscow relations.
A.A. Bessmertnykh, a former foreign minister of the Soviet Union, said that in many countries, including Russia and the United States, it is “the Pepsi generation” that is ruling now. This beverage has become a symbol of globalization.
Indra Nooyi, for her part, said that only 15 years after Khrushchev tasted PepsiCo, its first plant opened in Novorossiisk. There are currently eight state-of-the-art plants operating in Russia. Even in 2009, at the height of the global crisis, PepsiCo is opening two new plants: one of Russia’s largest beverage bottling plants in the Moscow Region and a salty snacks plant in the Rostov Region.
The guests took home keepsakes as they left the exhibition: a lavish photo album about the 1959 exhibition and, of course, a bottle of Pepsi.
Yury Tavrovsky.
Photos by the author.
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