Diet Dr. Pepper Tastes Nothing Like Regular Dr. Pepper

Having gotten some coupons in the mail yesterday, I decided to treat myself to lunch at Arby's today. My meal came with a drink and, trying to be somewhat health conscious, I chose diet Dr. Pepper. There are some diet drinks that I can easily drink without thinking about the "diet" designation with every swallow, but after taking a sip of my drink, I was reminded of the harsh reality that Diet Dr. Pepper is not one of those drinks.

Diet Dr. Pepper's slogan is "Diet Dr. Pepper...tastes more like regular Dr. Pepper." I know that slogans sometimes sacrifice grammar and accuracy in exchange for brevity, but this slogan makes no sense. The problem is that little "more." If you took it out, it would be a blatant lie, but with it in there, the phrase is begging for a "than." Did they update the formula and now Diet Dr. Pepper tastes more like regular Dr. Pepper than it used to? Does it taste more like regular Dr. Pepper than Sprite does? Does it taste more like regular Dr. Pepper than it tastes like chicken broth? The possibilities are open to interpretation.

The problem with diet drinks is that they are trying to taste like something that they'll never really taste like. Sodas are sweet. When you change that key ingredient, sugar, you'll inevitably get a different taste. In a way, I admire that Coke knows this well enough that they doesn't even bother trying to make Diet Coke taste like regular Coke. When Coke introduced Diet Coke in 1982, rather than making it a diet version of the original formula, they used a different formula entirely. In fact, when Coke make the ill-fated decision to change their original formula back in the 80's, they took the Diet Coke formula, made it with high fructose corn syrup and called it New Coke. It was a disaster. It wasn't till they came out with Coke Zero that you actually get to try the "original" coke recipe with a diet spin. So perhaps it would be more fitting if Dr. Pepper would lend their slogan to Coke. Then you could accurately say "Coke Zero tastes more like regular coke than Diet Coke does!"