Coca-Cola Zero Japan makes 10,000 cans feel alive in Harajuku

Coca-Cola Zero had high recognition in Japan but needed a memorable tasting experience for young consumers who saw sampling as disposable.

Build a convenience-store-style pop-up where every Coke Zero can has a generated character, talks to visitors, and prints its profile at checkout.

Dentsu opened Living Mart in Harajuku from February 6 to 18, 2024. Visitors picked from 10,000 cans, scanned a QR code, received a unique profile, and shared the encounter as video.

ADFEST reports 195+ media articles, more than 130 million yen in ad value, 13,000+ visitors and an average stay of 20 minutes.

Coca-Cola Zero in Japan was known, but the brand still had to overcome a common sampling problem: people take the product, forget the moment, and move on. The brief was to make trial feel personal enough for Gen Z to record and retell.

Dentsu's answer was Living Mart, a Harajuku pop-up styled like a lively convenience store. Products and fixtures moved or spoke, and more than 10,000 Coke Zero cans carried generated backstories, hobbies and occupations.

A visitor chose one can, brought it to the register, scanned its code and received a printed profile. The can was no longer a generic sample; it became a one-off character, echoing Japan's animistic idea that things can have spirits.

The two-week store drew queues from opening to closing. ADFEST lists more than 13,000 visitors, 195+ media articles, over 130 million yen in equivalent ad value and a 20-minute average stay.

It turned a low-attention promotion mechanic, sampling, into a social object with a built-in story.

The execution matched the location: Harajuku made the store feel like culture rather than a retail booth.

The AI layer mattered because it gave every can a different reason to be photographed and compared.

Sampling gets stickier when the product gives people a story to carry away, not just a free taste.

Living Mart became an ADFEST 2025 Brand Experience finalist and a compact example of how generative AI could be used in retail theater without asking consumers to learn a new interface. The brand experience lived mainly through visitors' own videos.