CORPORATE HISTORY: Remember the Real Thing

By the time a product has been around for a century or more, it has produced mountains of nostalgia-inducing memorabilia. At Coca-Cola (age: 104), that history had been gathering dust in the company’s Atlanta archives until several years ago, when Coke realized its marketing value. Last week the company opened a $15 million corporate museum called the World of Coca-Cola (admission: $2.50). The three-story building houses more than 1,000 artifacts, memorabilia and documents, ranging from 75-year-old green-glass bottles to advertising posters with tag lines like “The Ideal Brain Tonic” and “Coke Is It.”

Corporate museums are gaining in popularity, in part because many companies have closed down their plant tours to protect secrets and to avoid liability for visitors who might be injured. Among the corporate shrines currently open are the Frederick’s of Hollywood Lingerie Museum and the Tupperware Visitors’ Center and Museum in Orlando.