I was 11 years old when Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace was released in theaters. While I'm 37 now, one of the most vivid things I remember from that time, besides seeing the film, was the Pepsi promotion for the film.
For those who don't remember or weren't around at that point, the Pepsi promotion saw the Pepsi Company release cans of Pepsi, Mountain Dew, Diet Pepsi, and Pepsi One during the release of The Phantom Menace. Each can had a character from the film on it, along with a small blurb about them. The company even created Marfalump, a mascot to help promote it. There were 25 cans in total to collect, with one of them being a gold Yoda can.
PepsiCo and Star Wars collaborated on the creation of this alien, Marfalump, as part of the Phantom Menace ad campaign.
— insane moments in star wars history (@insanestarwars) January 31, 2024
Marfalump canonically lives in Iowa, and loves Star Wars and Pepsi.
(1999) pic.twitter.com/nBCXhZUtlP
Being an 11-year-old Star Wars fan, I wanted to collect all the cans. Over the course of 1999, I was able to collect most of them, except for the Darth Maul can. Even though I failed to collect a full set, there's a new Star Wars pop can and bottle collecting journey on the horizon.
Star Wars x Coca-Cola: Cans and AR
Star Wars and Coca-Cola recently announced a new collaboration called "Refresh Your Galaxy." Similar to The Phantom Menace promotion from 1999, Coca-Cola will be releasing cans and bottles of Coca-Cola with one of 30 different limited-edition character designs from across the Star Wars franchise. If the limited-edition cans and bottles weren't cool enough already, Coca-Cola is also incorporating Augmented Reality (AR) into the promotion.
People who get a limited-edition can or bottle can scan it to send messages to other people, including friends, and others with whom the person is close. Honestly, this sounds pretty cool, and I think it's also cool that people who either missed out or weren't around during the 1999 promotion will be able to collect their own limited-edition cans and bottles.
How to collect Star Wars Coca-Cola cans
The 30 characters will be spread across different Coke products, with the characters Kylo Ren, Lando, Ahsoka, Darth Maul, Padme, Boba Fett, Poe Dameron, Din Djarin, Cassian Andor, General Grievous, Emperor Palpatine, Obi-Wan Kenobi, and K-2SO are all collectible via original taste Coke products.
For you Zero Sugar Coke fan out there, you'll be getting the characters Darth Vader, Princess Leia, Anakin Skywalker, Luke Skywalker, Yoda, Han Solo, Chewbacca, BB-8, Finn, Rey, C-3PO, with an Imperial Stormtrooper rounding them out.
If you've been meaning to take a trip to either Walt Disney World or Disneyland, this might be a good time because you can only get The Mandalorian, Grogu, Chewbacca, and a First Order Stormtrooper from either of those locations.
All in all, this is a pretty cool collaboration that Star Wars and Coca-Cola are doing, and I'm looking forward to trying to collect all of them. A trip to eBay might be in the cards for some of the more elusive ones, though.