Dr. Pepper is one of those "other" soft drinks (birch beer, grape, RC, Mountain Dew, Squirt, etc.) that spent part of their commercial budget just explaining what the heck the drink was. I think Mountain Dew may have had it the hardest if you were outside of West Virginia - the epicenter of Mountain Dew. Dr. Pepper is most popular in the state of Texas (by far). It was so popular with President Johnson, he had a soda fountain installed in the White House that served nothing else.
When you boil it all down (to play off the first ad in the series), Dr. Pepper is basically a spiced up cherry cola. It's "zing and zow" comes from the stronger syrup used and extra carbonation, not caffeine (which is still there, but not any higher than Coke or Pepsi).
Dr. Pepper narrowcast its ads mostly to teenagers, perhaps even more so than Coca Cola. They aimed for the same demographic Pepsi does.
First, back to the "Now Crowd" with some ad spots from the 1960s. Were your kids dressed in a suit and tie to drink soda?
And as usual with ads from the 1960s, only white people drank Dr. Pepper.... If it isn't sexism that drives me bonkers, it's the fact ads stayed lily white in this country until the 1970s.
In the Style of Ray Conniff....
