|
|
<< Back to The Sleuth Files
Super Secrets Under Lock & Key
By:The Sleuth |
Deep in a bank vault somewhere in Atlanta, Georgia there is a piece of paper with 17 or 18 mostly common ingredients on it. Mix those items in the right proportions under the proper conditions, and you re-create the world's most popular soft drink: Coca-Cola. Billions of people across the globe know the name, but rumor has it that only 3 or 4 company executives, including the company's chief chemist, know the exact formula from that piece of paper in that mysterious vault. Special undisclosed measures are taken to ensure the safety of these individuals, as if they were royalty. They rarely travel together, and when one dies, the others must approve his successor.
This is one example of the lengths to which multi-billion dollar food companies will go to protect the formulas that make their products unique and successful. And, since most of us have heard phrases like "secret blend of eleven herbs and spices" or "secret sauce" it's obvious these companies have also found they benefit from perpetuating the mystique surrounding their closely held confidential recipes.
I thought I'd check out what truth there was to these rumored security measures for the secret formulas of products with which we've all become familiar. When I called Coca-Cola, I asked company spokesman Robert Baskin if he could be more specific about the location of that bank vault where the formula resides or perhaps give us a little insight into the security measures taken to ensure the secret stays a secret. Unfortunately, no dice.
"It's like asking a security company how they keep a building secure. They're just not going to tell you or it wouldn't be secure anymore," said Baskin. I guess Robert didn't feel like leaking any corporate secrets that day.
I did, however, manage to keep him on the phone long enough to get him to confirm that "less than five" Coca-Cola employees know what the secret formula is, and that he definitely isn't one of them. Thanks Robert.
In his super-cool book Big Secrets, William Poundstone's sources say the number of people who know the Coca-Cola formula is just two. He also discovered that the bank vault holding the secret formula is owned by the Trust Company of Georgia. Poundstone goes even further to print a recipe based on an analysis of Coke that produces "a gallon of syrup very similar to Coca-Cola's." Among the 17 ingredients in his recipe are nutmeg oil, lemon oil, cassia oil, alcohol and coca leaves from which the cocaine has been extracted. Considering that last ingredient, I would say that duplicating this formula at home might entail a few legal snags.
As mysterious as the secret formula for Coca-Cola are the eleven herbs and spices in KFC's famous fried chicken coating. The former Kentucky Fried Chicken has shortened its name to KFC, but the company claims the recipe has stayed the same for 40 years. According to KFC Spokesperson Jean Litterst "less than a handful of people" know their multi-million dollar recipe.
Like Coca-Cola, KFC secures its recipe in a bank vault. This one is somewhere in Louisville, Kentucky. To ensure that spice vendors don't know the formula, the secret blend of eleven herbs and spices is mixed at two different locations and then combined elsewhere with the aid of an IBM processing system. All this technology, secrecy and security for a formula that used to be mixed by KFC's founder, Colonel Harland Sanders, on the concrete floor of his own backyard porch.
Poundstone lists his version version of this well-kept secret recipe. He claims to have obtained a sample of the coating from a KFC employee, and then to have had it analyzed by a laboratory. What he found was shocking--only four ingredients: Salt, ground black pepper, flour and MSG (monosodium glutamate, a flavor enhancer).
But it wasn't just the ingredients that made the Colonel's Southern Fried Chicken so special. To speed up the cooking process, Harlan Sanders thought to use a "new-fangled device" he first saw demonstrated in the 1930's. He found that frying the chicken with a pressure cooker took half as long, while locking in moisture that keeps the chicken juicy.
Using Poundstone's list of four ingredients and a pressure cooker, Todd developed a recipe published in Top Secret Recipes that I thought tasted just like the "Finger-lickin' good" original. When I asked Ms. Litterst what she thought of the recipe, she insisted it is different from the original and that "the actual recipe does include eleven herbs and spices."
According to Litterst, "Sealed up in the cornerstone of the Colonel Sanders Technological Center in Louisville, Kentucky is a sample of the eleven herbs and spices used in the recipe." Hmm, anybody got a chisel?
Orange Julius is another one. The 70-year old formula for this frothy orange juice drink is owned by International Dairy Queen and is also under lock and key. An IDQ spokesperson says just 3 or 4 people know exactly what goes into the special powder added to orange juice, ice and sugar water that, when blended, magically turns the drink into a sweet, foamy Orange Julius.
The story behind this concoction starts with a man named Julius Freed who was doing a modest business in the 20's selling plain orange juice at a roadside stand. One day he met an ex-chemist named Bill Hamlin. The two became good friends and Hamlin used his chemistry background to devise a natural compound that turned Freed's plain orange juice into the frothier drink we know today. Immediately sales at Freed's little orange juice stand increased five-fold. And the rest is convenience-food history.
So what's in the powdery compound? It seems to be mostly powdered egg whites. When egg whites are whipped in a blender, with other ingredients, the result is a beverage with a light, foamy texture. The sweetness in the original Orange Julius comes from the large quantity of sugar water that is added to the orange juice from a special soda fountain nozzle. It's likely just as simple as that.
All of these food companies and many others out there have found that the hype and mystique surrounding their secret recipe makes for a good marketing tactic. Promoting the secrecy of that formula and the security surrounding it sends the message that we are getting something original and very special for our dollar; indeed something that we can get nowhere else. But how truly valuable are these corporate secret formulas that have become the heart and soul of these corporations?
Assume for a moment that you were able to get your hands on the real deal, let's say, the actual herb blend for the Original Recipe from KFC. How much would it really be worth? And what damage could that security leak do to KFC? If you think about it, probably not that much.
A competitor isn't likely to be interested in the recipe. Another chicken company such as Church's or Popeye's Fried Chicken wouldn't need the recipe. Their success depends on having a unique flavor all their own. They want special formulas that appeal to folks who crave a flavor and texture other than what is offered at KFC.
Alright, so maybe you'll open your own chicken franchise. You can't call it KFC, so you have to come up with a new name that nobody's heard of. You'll have to develop an image, a distribution and manufacturing network, and a logo that everyone will recognize and trust. These are elements that KFC worked for decades to establish. Since your chicken tastes exactly the same, you'll have to sell it for less to compete in the marketplace. That's going to be tough to do considering the economies of scale. KFC has saturated the market with more than 5,000 domestic units (not to mention the overseas units). And that growth has come from a secret spice blend that's been wooing customers for more than 60 years. KFC was first on the block with that particular product, and it will stomp you.
Consider the Gatorade brand owned by Quaker Oats. This was the first potassium-rich sports drink to hit the market, and today the company rakes in over a billion dollars from the brand each year. I asked company spokesperson Rob Botrell if there is a valuable secret formula for the drink locked away in a vault somewhere. He told me flatly, "no."
According to Botrell, "The formula is something that can easily be determined. There are very few ingredients."
So how is it that Gatorade continues to dominate the market? Botrell's explanation: "There's a great advantage to being first."
Indeed, for some time Gatorade was the only sports drink on the market, but has more recently been faced with more than 100 imitators. Most of those never made it beyond the regional test markets and are now long gone. However, even with all of this competition, some of it coming from giants like Coca-Cola and Pepsi who have designed their own sports drinks, Gatorade continues to hold onto 80 percent of the sports drink market.
So, all you giant food conglomerates, keep your little secret formulas all locked up tight in those big 'ol armored vaults. Those worthless scraps of yellowing paper aren't the real secret to your continuing success after all, are they? By now, with the numerous competitors falling behind you, we've come to see that those secret formulas you're protecting are not even close to as valuable as your reputation and your marketing saavy.
No bank vault contains a secret formula for that. |
|
|
|
