Coca-Cola is celebrating the return to the gridiron with its “Fan Work Is Thirsty Work” campaign, including limited-time team packaging for 25 college and NFL teams and more fan-focused activations, the company announced.
“Football fandom is about so much more than what happens on the field. It’s the traditions, rituals, and energy fans bring to every game-day moment,” says Stacy Jackson, VP, Coca-Cola Trademark at Coca-Cola North America. “With ‘Fan Work Is Thirsty Work,’ we’re celebrating that passion and showing up with an ice-cold Coca-Cola wherever fans are putting in the work throughout the season.”
25 teams featured on Coca-Cola football packaging
The promotional packaging spans 13 college and 12 pro football teams in select markets, across both Coca-Cola Original Taste and Coca-Cola Zero Sugar products.
“The packaging uses the iconic Coca-Cola red as its foundation, with prominent Coca-Cola branding complemented by team-specific elements, including logos, helmets, wordmarks, and team colors,” a Coca-Cola spokesperson tells Packaging World. “On 20oz bottles, Coca-Cola leads the label with team branding incorporated beneath it. On 12oz 12 packs, team-specific elements take on a larger presence across the package, while Coca-Cola remains prominent on the primary label.”
The limited-time Coca-Cola 12-pack design for the Texas Tech Red Raiders.Coca-Cola
Team branding is more prominent on the top panel, with Coca-Cola’s logo and “Original Taste” descriptor smaller and set to the bottom corners of the space. Alongside a large, stylized team name, the designs often include the team’s location, such as Seattle for the Seahawks, or identifier, such as Red Raiders for Texas Tech, in smaller type. The top designs may also include another football helmet, a team-themed football, and the team’s logo.
The portfolio of team-themed cases also includes some rivalry designs, where classic matchups like USC and UCLA or Georgia and Georgia Tech are featured on the same package.
For the 20oz bottles also updated for the campaign, each team’s helmet and team-color stripes featured below the Coca-Cola logo and “Original Taste” on the label.
Technical specs behind the team packaging
The large role of team branding and team-to-team variation in the “Fan Work is Thirsty Work” campaign represents a shift from how Coca-Cola has approached similar packaging before.
Coca-Cola’s 20-oz bottles like this Las Vegas Raiders example feature team graphics beneath the brand mark.Coca-Cola
“In the past, we have created very standardized templates that allowed teams to insert their logos into a smaller, pre-approved space,” the spokesperson says. “Our new design solution amplified the presence of each team and created a dynamic where each design was still following a template but was bespoke to each team.”
Both the 20oz bottle labels and 12-pack paperboard are printed using flexography, with each format limited to six colors. Managing the campaign requires 44 12-pack paperboard layouts, 22 for Coca-Cola Original Taste and 22 for Coca-Cola Zero Sugar, along with 30 PET bottle layouts, also evenly divided between the two products.
Even with that level of packaging variation, the promotional packaging is produced using Coca-Cola’s standard operating process. “Coca-Cola works with its network of bottling partners to produce the limited-time team packaging for participating markets,” the spokesperson says.
The team specific packages are available in select markets based on team and location, rather than national distribution. The retail packaging is available now and is expected to remain in stores throughout football season, the spokesperson says.
Connecting the pack to digital experiences
Also included on the promotional packaging is a scannable code, connecting fans with personalized team experiences and opportunities to win game-day tickets, merchandise, digital gift cards and other prizes.
Some rivalries like USC vs UCLA are featured in the limited-time packaging.Coca-Cola
Through the scannable QRs, “Coca-Cola can learn more about fan interests, including football and team affinities, and use those insights to deliver more relevant, personalized experiences and communications,” the spokesperson says.
The campaign’s “Friday for the Win” component adds new prizes every Friday leading into the weekend’s games, winnable through the scannable QRs. The prizes will cover different teams throughout the season, and fans who sign up can receive an SMS notification for each Friday prize drop.
Football campaign extends to foodservice
Beyond the retail-level limited-time packaging, Coca-Cola’s campaign extends to participating foodservice locations.
Fans who buy a Coca-Cola Original Taste or Coke Zero Sugar at these locations can receive an exclusive Coca-Cola Football cup or scratch card with access to more chances to win prizes.
The football cup is a 32oz plastic format printed flexographically in three colors. Its graphics are consistent with Coca-Cola’s “national” brand equity version football graphics rather than individual team designs like the retail packaging.
More fan engagement in the campaign
The packaging rollout is just one piece of Coca-Cola’s broader football-season marketing effort.
The brand is also taking the campaign directly to fans through a 74-stop tour tied to college campuses and select professional football tailgates. Coca-Cola will also have a presence through Big Noon Kickoff, Coca-Cola bowl Season, and a Yahoo! Sports College Fantasy Football integration.
The campaign extends to social media as well, where Coca-Cola plans to work with creators and fans from partner schools on social media content tied to select matchups. Television and digital advertising round out the campaign, placing the limited-time packaging within a varied marketing effort for the 2026-2027 football season.
The broader fall sports campaign also extends to hockey. Coca-Cola plans hockey-focused activations in select U.S. markets, while Canada will receive its own hockey-specific promotional packaging during the season.
“The limited-time packaging brings Coca-Cola and team fandom together, giving fans another way to celebrate their favorite teams throughout football season,” the spokesperson says. “Across the collection, the packaging brings Coca-Cola and team identities together while remaining unmistakably Coca-Cola.”
