thumb|right|A spring-loaded tab dispensed real U.S. money or a [[gift certificate redeemable for trips or merchandise.]]
MagiCans were special, mechanical cans used by The Coca-Cola Company in the United States of America as a part of their $100-million "Magic Summer '90" promotion. The MagiCan promotion began on May 7, 1990, and ended on May 31.
In this promotion, some Coca-Cola cans had cash prizes or gift certificates inside instead of Coca-Cola. The prizes were spring-loaded to pop out of the opening once the can was opened. The prize would either be money, from $1 to $500, or coupons redeemable for trips or merchandise. The total giveaway of cash and prize coupons was $4 million. The original plan was to randomly distribute about 750,000 MagiCans among the 200 million cans of Coca-Cola Classic in circulation at any one time. To make the cans feel and weigh normal, and prevent people from easily finding the prize cans, a sealed area within the cans was filled with a mixture of chlorinated water and a foul-smelling substance to discourage drinking.
Technical issues and early termination
A number of cans had problems: the pop-up mechanism malfunctioned, jamming, or a faulty seal released some of the chlorinated water mixture into the can itself. A widely reported incident involved an 11-year-old boy in Massachusetts drinking the foul-tasting liquid used to replace actual cola. Despite initial fears, the Massachusetts Department of Public Health determined that the water was not harmful, containing a lower concentration of chlorine than the water in a typical swimming pool. Worried about the bad publicity and potential product liability lawsuits, Coke immediately placed television and newspaper advertisements in 50 large United States markets. The full-page ads, run only once, warned consumers that a "very small number" of cans contain a foul-smelling but harmless water that should not be ingested. The ads were headlined "Take A Good Look" and in smaller type, read "You could have a MagiCan." The print ads pointed out that the MagiCans might be defective, which actually proved a key point in any potential plaintiff's lawsuit under the doctrine of strict liability. Moreover, the problem with the chlorinated mixture was not concern of being drunk by accident, but that it spilled over into the prize. Multiple winners complained about receiving soggy money after activating a MagiCan.
The decision to end the campaign came one week after the "Take A Good Look" advertisements were released. Coca-Cola then released ads telling consumers that only a few prize cans were left on the market and that they would be "going, going, gone by mid-June", the time when the company estimated the existing cans would be purchased and off the shelves. At the time of termination, 200,000 of the 750,000 planned promotional cans had been distributed. Coca-Cola would attempt a similar promotion three years later with "Monsters of the Gridiron", a Halloween-themed promotion where people could call a toll-free number and enter a code, to which a recording from an NFL star would tell them whether or not they won a prize.
Coca-Cola's quick damage-control initiative was reminiscent of the fiasco over New Coke several years earlier.
Urban legend
There was an urban legend in the 1990s and 2000s that a child had died drinking the liquid in one of the MagiCans. This has been reported as false according to Snopes.com, and its origins were traced back to media coverage of a boy who was taken to the hospital as a precaution after his mother suspected product tampering.
See also
- Cola wars
- My Coke Rewards, another Coca-Cola promotion with a similar concept, tied to redemption codes.
- OK Soda featured a similar promotion with their Prize Can