Amazon joins eBay as a destination for random, dopey consumerism — especially of food.
There’s an unexpected destination for the offbeat snacker where limited-time promotional snacks and discontinued cult-classic flavors find new life: Amazon, the new laboratory of the food world.
As brands throw products on Amazon to test demand and generate buzz, the platform has become littered with odd, limited-time promotional products, evolving into a paradise for enthusiasts of weird snacks unavailable in stores. Want nacho cheese Doritos in a bag with an audio jack that can also play the Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 soundtrack? Available only on Amazon.
How about the fictional “Pepsi Perfect” product from Back to the Future Part II? PepsiCo made the soda a reality on Amazon in 2015 and — in the carefully crafted words of a spokesperson — it “sold out faster than we can say 1.21 gigawatts.”
And this year, Coca-Cola decided two classic products, Diet Coke Lime and Diet Coke Cherry, would spend their final days in the land of Amazon before they were eventually discontinued.
E-commerce is the next frontier for food companies, as evidenced by Amazon’s acquisition of Whole Foods. But for now, Amazon is tuned more for impulse-buying gimmicky junk food than weekly grocery shopping.
Consider, for instance,…
