The HabForum

All right. Every time I've been to space camp, they go to great lengths to tell us that Coke is the official soft drink of NASA, nay, Coke is the official EVERYTHING of NASA, and all other brand name products, especially other soft drinks, are the work of satan and have no place in the space program. Well not in so many words, but yeah. Although I always thought it was stupid that they couldnt eat M&Ms in space if they wanted (candy coated chocolate covered peanuts!!), I was like "Yeah, whatever, cool," since Coke is my favorite soft drink anyway. In fact, I'm drinking it right now as I write this. However, small quibbles aside, I was always of the opinion that NASA favored coke. However, last Summer, I went to Kennedy Space Center, and lo and behold, all they serve is Pepsi. It was quite baffling. And this post is quite long winded. Sorry about that. I've been BSing essays all day and I'm still in BSathon mode. But anyway, could anyone explain this soft drink connundrum of DOOM?

I rember that in one of your lectures they told us that both Coke and Pepsi have been tried in space. Plus it also depends on who has the license in the musem or space center. Plus I could me wrong but I think coke was invented in Alabama or at least in the South.

ApolloXI wrote:I rember that in one of your lectures they told us that both Coke and Pepsi have been tried in space. Plus it also depends on who has the license in the musem or space center. Plus I could me wrong but I think coke was invented in Alabama or at least in the South.

Funny you should mention this. One of the last lectures of Adult Space Academy was this. Both Coke and Pepsi flew on the shuttle in seperate "experiments" but according to them, NASA doesn't allow carbonated drinks due to the gas buildup in its astronauts.

As for Pepsi being at KSC. NASA doesn't run KSC. KSC is run by a private company. That private company can license whatever soft-drink it wants to serve on property.

Richasi

Close... but no cigar...

Coke is not the official drink of NASA.

Coke is the official drink of the U.S. Space & Rocket Center... Just like Delta is the official airline of Space Camp.

These companies offer the center really good deals for using their products exclusively or with preference.

As for KSC. KSC is owned by NASA. However, NASA has contracted the park services to a company called Delaware North. They also run several large National Parks. The parks are still considered National Parks just like KSC is considered an official NASA Visitor Center. For the most part the KSC visitor center is supported by ticket income and not by federal income.

You may ask yourself why would NASA contract out their visitor center? Because if they didn't they would have to hire all employees as Federal Employees which can be expensive. (In most cases) It costs a lot less to let a contractor do the job and their own hiring and firing.

The NASA Langley Visitor center is run similarly. We have a board of directors who are in charge of making decisions for the center. But they answer to the city of Hampton not to NASA. We are still the official NASA Langley Visitor center but we only have 2 people who are technicly NASA Employees they run the educator Resource center.

It just doesn't pay for NASA to run it. By giving operational control to a private company (or at least out of NASA), the program has much less liability (financially and PR-related) and there's a lot of buerocratic junk that NASA would probably have to put up with that private companies don't. If NASA had control, the visitor centers may have to run on some of their funding, too. This way, it supports itself.

I think it's much better for NASA for the visitor centers to be run privatly. It works for both the company and NASA.

The only two NASA owned centers that I am aware of are Kennedy and JPL. All the others are owned by foundations (Houston), State Government (Marshall/U.S. Space & Rocket Center) or City Government (Langley)

Okay thanks for the info. Sorry I haven't been online in forever (not like anyone noticed but hey). I just remember learning about how coke could be the only sponsor of NASA and astronauts couldnt use any other kind of brand name. But maybe I misheard. I went to Johnson Space Center last month and sure enough they had all pepsi products too. That's too bad. I like coke