What’s the Most Popular Pop in South Dakota? [POLL]
According to Ad Age, the most popular pop in the United States (they incorrectly called it soda) is again Coca-Cola. Pepsi is number two, followed by Diet Coke, Dr. Pepper and Mountain Dew.
Thrillist.com did an infographic depicting the most iconic soft drink in each state, but they guessed on South Dakota when they wrote: "The Dakotas have really got to ramp up their soda game, because South Dakota, too, was impossible to find any soda for. Pretty safe to say they like Coke there, though."
For South Dakota the top five would likely be all the same brands of pop, but the beverages at the top would probably be different. As anyone from this part of the country knows, there are two soft drinks that rule the racks at convenience stores and there is always more of these two than anything else.
Coca-Cola and Mountain Dew.
While I could not find any real specific data to back up my hypothesis, we asked listeners in one short amount of time to text in what their preferred pop was between Coke and Mountain Dew. By a very unscientific margin of 63% to 37%, Mountain Dew was more popular than Coke in a minor landslide.
Is this true of the entire state? Maybe. I think it is likely true of the southeastern part of the state along with the neighboring states. Maybe it's different West River, but I don't think so. When I lived in Spearfish and Rapid City Coke and Mountain Dew ate up more real estate in the coolers than any other single brand.