Nick Martell

Instead, after Pilates, you're checking your aura ring

to see your blood sugar levels.

As one marketing executive put it, besties, diet is a radioactive term for anyone under the age of 40.

Diet is like Voldemort.

You don't say it.

And that's why over Thanksgiving, your parents' fridge was filled with soy sauce packets and two liters of Diet Coke.

Meanwhile, your roommate has a jar of hot honey in their fridge and a 12-pack of zero-sugar Pepsi.

Gets me every time it's a giveaway.

So Jack, what's the takeaway for our buddies over Thanksgiving?

In the soda wars, man.

If a brand is a book, we very much judge it by its cover.

Okay, so Yeti's Diet and Zero Sugar, they're almost identical products and yet totally different performance and totally different customer bases.

I think it's crazy how we consumers can be so turned off by the word diet, even though it's 95% the same as the word zero, which we love.

But the truth is, because of consumer psychology, psychonomics, we don't drink liquid, we drink the label.

And that actually goes way beyond just soda.

It's a reminder to all of us that for quick consumer decisions like what soda to grab,

We make surface level decisions.

Yeah, like you watch a YouTube video based on a tiny thumbnail picture, or you buy a lip gloss brand based on its weight when you hold it in your hand.

The truth is we're uninformed on these things.

So if a brand is a book, we have to judge it by its cover.