Crystal Pepsi
It's from 1992, before you were born.
- Maker
- PepsiCo
- Type
- Clear cola
- Debuted
- 1992
- Note
- famous 1990s flop
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About
As of 2026, it's 34 years old.
Crystal Pepsi is the patron saint of the well-funded flop. In 1992, riding a bizarre craze for 'clear' products being somehow purer, Pepsi launched a see-through cola with a Super Bowl ad and a Van Halen song — and then watched everyone get confused by a transparent drink that still tasted like cola.
It vanished within about a year, a textbook marketing disaster. And yet its failure made it immortal: it's remembered far more fondly than most things that actually succeeded.
Crystal Pepsi proves the strange truth that sometimes the best way to live forever is to fail spectacularly and look great doing it.
Crystal Pepsi through the years
Launches with a Super Bowl ad
Discontinued
Confused shoppers send sales tumbling within about a year.
Returns for a limited run
Nostalgia brings it back decades later.
