As it turned out, whoever wanted to buy the world a Coke way back when didn't have to - thanks to zeitgeist-zapped creative, the fizzy elixir has evolved into one of the world's most iconic brands. Now, bicoastal Brand New School continues the tradition with a new visual identity via a series of new spots from Wieden + Kennedy, Portland.

The first cluster of :15 spots and bumps have hit the airwaves, each following a pattern: a message in white font, the sound of Coke being poured, white bubbles that rise and bathe the screen, and the Coke contour bottle rendered in bold red. New :30 spots feature a tag created by BNS.

"When they gave us the first brief, it didn't really say 'keep it simple' - it was more about trying to understand the writing, and giving it a visual expression," says BNS CD Jens Gehlhaar. Hand-drawn treatments that "alluded to the general idea of the Coca-Cola wave" were nixed, as was the "bubbly, '70s-styled typeface" of past classic Coke tags. "Wieden was looking back at how the classic tag lines looked," recalls Gehlhaar. "But then said 'Let's go for something more neutral.' I think it was a good decision."

Although there was "a great deal of revisions and passion to find the way to make it work", there was also room for a little cheekiness. For "Formula", a BNS designer Googled "presumed Coke formulas" and created a chalkboard chemical path, interspersed with etchings of test tubes and happy faces. But as for that formula being the Real Thing, don't bet on it.

Brand New School> http://www.brandnewschool.com
Wieden+Kennedy> http://www.wk.com
Coca-Cola> http://www.coca-cola.com