You will discover « the enemy of Coca-Cola » au Montenegro with the Cockta. A drink which has the merit of being better for your health than the famous Coca-Cola.
Exactly 68 years ago, the Yugoslav analogue of the popular American soft drink was put on the Yugoslav market.
Unlike the American drink, it did not contain anything harmful to human health in its recipe.
Cockta was created in 1953 by Emerik Zelinka to replace Coca-Cola in the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.
It contains no caffeine or phosphorus and is made up of a blend of eleven plants including rose hips.
The name “Cockta” (or Kokta) is derived from the word cocktail.
The drink was first presented to the public on March 8, 1953 in Planica in Slovenia. In the first year, around one million liters of Coctka were produced. It was packaged in 0.25 liter bottles.
During the first 14 years of its existence, sales increased by 25% per year.
In 1967, approximately 80 million bottles of this drink were produced and sold.
For two years this drink was exported from Yugoslavia to the Netherlands. In the late 1960s, due to the arrival of foreign drinks on the Yugoslav market, demand decreased.
In 1975, for the first time, the drink was distributed in one-liter bottles. In the early 1980s, Cockta reached sales of 37 million liters per year.
By the mid-1980s, sales began to decline again. The decline was caused, among other things, by the collapse of the Yugoslav market, the appearance of numerous plagiarisms in the countries of the former Yugoslavia. In the mid-1990s, the filling of “Kokta” was taken over by the company “Slovenijavino” and sales of this drink began to grow again. In 2000 the company “Kolinska” became the new owner of Kokta.
It was a French friend who made me rediscover Cockta.
At the time of independence, in 1991, this drink had almost disappeared, but a certain form of nostalgia allowed it to regain its popularity. As a result, Cockta’s sales are about to equal those of Coca-Cola in the small Republic of Slovenia where it originated.
Cockta is also on the rise in Montenegro and Serbiain particular. In Montenegro, you can very easily find Cockta in stores.
Personally, I don’t like Coca-Cola, and it was a Frenchman who introduced me to this healthier version of “Coca-Cola”, Yugo version… by explaining to me that he preferred to buy Cockta for his son in order to protect him from the junk present in Coke from the USA.
This is how I started to become interested in this drink and to consume it on certain occasions. This drink is not very well known outside of Montenegro, Serbia and the former Yugoslav republics today. You therefore have to come and spend time with us in Montenegro to be able to enjoy it.
That said, I think there is enormous potential to export this drink in a global context where people have understood that consuming healthier is not just a trend but simply a primary need!
PS: Thank you / Hvala in Milan, French expatriate in Serbia who participated in writing the article and who has spent all his summers in Montenegrofor more than 10 years……
