Mountain Dew - Supernova Review

As part of their summer marketing campaign called DEWmocracy, which we've explored extensively here on BevReview.com, PepsiCo has released the first of 3 "finalists" to be the next Mountain Dew flavor: Mountain Dew Supernova, Mountain Dew Voltage, and Mountain Dew Revolution. Let's take a look at Mountain Dew Supernova!

This flavor is described on the packaging as "Dew with a blast of Strawberry Melon Flavor and Ginseng". Alrighty, then! The beverage color itself is of the pinkish/purplish variety, but not as dark as something like 2004's Mountain Dew Pitch Black.

It's specifically noted that this flavor is "Dew Drinker Designed", which is a reference to the DEWmocracy campaign.To summarize for those who are to lazy to click a link, in Fall 2007 PepsiCo rolled out a "design your own Dew" initiative, but did it through online gaming and a social media-oriented storyline. The result was out of all these combinations, 3 flavors rose to the top, to be featured during the summer of 2008 and voted on by fans. The winning vote getter would be the new Dew.

Encouraging promotion of your favorite flavor is done through campaign tools... graphical banners that can be placed on MySpace, Facebook, e-mail templates, or blogs, each with a distinct tracking code. That way, everyone who is registered as part of the DEWmocracy site can have metrics assigned to their participation. I'm not exactly sure how the "vote" will take place, but I would imagine that it has to do with these tools. But let's move beyond the marketing behind this product... which is ironic, because I think the whole reason it exists is marketing. It's a manufactured device designed to create buzz and brand loyalty, because it sure wasn't designed to taste very good. Mountain Dew Supernova tastes like a syrupy, fake-flavor strawberry soda, similar in execution to Fanta Strawberry, Tropicana Twister Strawberry, and Strawberry Crush. Despite the claim that it has a "strawberry melon" flavor, I really didn't detect a melon influence at all.