Please tell me about the Coca-Cola Factory and/or Museum tour? Is it in a bad part of town as-of late [I heard it moved to a better area]? Is it worth a side trip off I-95 to Atlanta and back to I-95? Is it worth the price of admission? Will kids love it?
Oh, and is it hard to find? How’s the parking situation?
Please tell all - good and bad!
Haven’t been there in over a decade. Rather boring tour, ends with you in a place with free Coca-Cola products all over the world. The parking situation should be OK - it’s not like thousands of people are going to the Coke museum daily.
And, for pedantry’s sake, it’s I-85, not I-95.
I was there a couple months ago for a work-related thing. We had a great time. I liked the historical stuff. Kids will love trying the different sodas. Parking is easy. It’s not a bad part of town at all. Big park right next door and the convention center is on the other side.
Be sure to watch the 3/D movie. Kids will love it.
Agreed, rather boring. The Coca-Cola products from all over the world is only interesting because some are so disgusting. Don’t drink any of their products from Italy.
You are right. The Italian one was by far the grossest!
The World of Coca-Cola is well worth the price and is right next to the Georgia Aquarium. There are parking decks and a few surrounding lots. Centennial Olympic Park is right across the street and the CNN Center is at the other end of the park. The new Ferris Wheel is right there as well. Very easy to make a day of it. Close by is the Georgia World Congress Center, Phillips Arena and the Georgia Dome. A short walk away is Underground Atlanta with shopping restaurants and nightlife. This part of town used to be the dumps but is now the center of tourism.
I have never taken the World of Coke tour in it’s new location. But have worked there for weeks while under construction. And all night in there several times. I like the bottling plant. And there is lots of memorabilia and a movie theater. There’s a tasting room where you can taste Coke products from around the world.
*Check out all the quality glass display cases and glass tunnel at the bottling plant. We installed glass panels with an electrostatic film inside so they can project a tour guide along the route through to bottling plant.
They have a new larger facility next to the aquarium. The old museum down by the Underground is still unused.
Gotcha. That’s the one I went to… did not know there was a new museum.
I went around a decade ago.
It’s not a factory tour (which would have been interesting) - it’s a display of all the Coke advertising throughout the ages. It really struck home how Coke is nothing but sugar water, marketed very, very well.
I’ve been there twice, the last time almost 10 years ago, so if there’s a new museum I know nothing about it. But we thought all the Coke history and memorabilia was cool, and the fountain room was a spectacular show (with unlimited drinks). I recommend it.
The new one has a bottling plant inside. It has a glass walk through tunnel where you can see the robot packaging and a slowed down production line. With a virtual tour guide. It’s not very long but you can get freshly bottled Coke. The company I worked for at the time we installed the glass tunnel and all the display cases also make all the glass Coke bottles.
But is it really worth driving in Atlanta for?
No, to clarify: I am wondering if it is worth taking a detour off my route along I-95 to drive way off to Atlanta and back.
No definitely not. It’s worth going to if you are already there and looking for something downtown to do.
Definitely not worth a detour.
But I’m a curmudgeon about the place anyway. I don’t think it’s worth it even if you’re in Atlanta.
It’s not called a museum anymore, and it’s not. It’s The World of Coke. The first 5 minutes you’re in a room where you can see some historic signs and machines. After that it’s a bunch of dumb stuff - a ‘4-d’ movie with all the typical annoying 4-d movie stuff and a message that the secret ingredient in the formula is in our hearts or some crap. A kid-oriented interactive maze to get to see a safe where they claim the formula is kept but I doubt it. A room where they show some old ads (cool) and a short impressionistic film about coke (bad). As others have said, there’s a fountain room at the end with soda flavors from all over the world. Some are nasty.
Then a gift shop.
If you’re going to downtown Atlanta, hit the nearby Georgia Aquarium instead. The place is huge, and really interesting. No smoking inside, and they will attempt to confiscate your lighter going in, but if you stash it in your pants pocket, they don’t pat you down or anything. And there’s a tub of lighters at the exit so you can grab another one.
That’s a big hell no. It’s at least 4 hours from I-95 to Atlanta.
I don’t know if I’d drive out of my way just for the World of Coke. But maybe if you were going to make a day of it. There are plenty of things to do right near by. If you could time it with a Falcons game or a show at the Arena even better. The M.L. King Jr. memorial, The Zoo, Cyclorama, Fernbank Natural History Museum and Atlanta Botanical Gardens are all within a couple of miles of Downtown. Lots of great restaurants. More than enough to make a day for the whole family.
I’d be interested in seeing the CDC if a tour for that could be arranged. Anyone know?
(I’m a medical person so things like that interest me. When in Hawaii we made sure to see the leper colony which was a highlight of our honeymoon!)
The High Museum of Art is quite good.
The CDC won’t be giving any tours during the shutdown, of course.