The Coca-Cola Company

The Coca-Cola Company is an American historical multinational beverage

corporation and manufacturer, retailer, and marketer of nonalcoholic beverage
concentrates and syrups, which is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia. The company
is best known for its flagship product Coca-Cola, invented in 1886 by
pharmacist John Stith Pemberton in Columbus, Georgia. The Coca-Cola formula
and brand was bought in 1889 by Asa Griggs Candler (December 30, 1851
March 12, 1929), who incorporated The Coca-Cola Company in 1892. The
company operates a franchised distribution system dating from 1889 where The
Coca-Cola Company only produces syrup concentrate which is then sold to
various bottlers throughout the world who hold an exclusive territory. The CocaCola Company owns its anchor bottler in North America, Coca-Cola
Refreshments.
Its stock is listed on the NYSE (NYSE: KO) and is part of DJIA; S&P 500 index;
the Russell 1000 Index; and the Russell 1000 Growth Stock Index. As of 2015, its
chairman and its CEO is Muhtar Kent.

Acquisitions
The company has a long history of acquisitions. Coca-Cola acquired Minute
Maid in 1960 the Indian cola brand Thums Up in 1993, and Barq's in 1995. In
2001, it acquired the Odwalla brand of fruit juices, smoothies, and bars for
$181 million. In 2007, it acquired Fuze Beverage from founder Lance Collins and
Castanea Partners for an estimated $250 million. The company's 2009 bid to buy a
Chinese juice maker ended when China rejected its $2.4 billion bid for
the Huiyuan Juice Group on the grounds that it would be a virtual monopoly.
Nationalism was also thought to be a reason for aborting the deal. In 1982, CocaCola purchased Columbia Pictures for $692 million. It sold the movie studio
to Sony for $3 billion in 1989. In 2013, Coca-Cola finalized it's purchase ZICO, a
coconut water company. In 2015, the company took a minority stake ownership in
the cold pressed juice manufacturer, Suja Life LLC.

Revenue

The Coca-Cola Company's Minute Maid group North America offices inSugar
Land Town Square, Sugar Land, Texas, United States
According to the 2005 Annual Report, the company sells beverage products in
more than 200countries. The report further states that of the more than 50 billion
beverage servings of all types consumed worldwide every day, beverages bearing
the trademarks owned by or licensed to Coca-Cola account for approximately
1.5 billion (the latest figure in 2010 shows that now they serve 1.6 billion drinks
every day). Of these, beverages bearing the trademark "Coca-Cola" or "Coke"
accounted for approximately 78% of the company's total gallon sales.
Also according to the 2007 Annual Report, Coca-Cola had gallon sales distributed
as follows:

43% in the United States

37% in Mexico, India, Brazil, Japan and the People's Republic of China

20% spread throughout the rest of the world

In 2010, it was announced that Coca-Cola had become the first brand to top
1 billion in annual UK grocery sales.
Stock
Since 1920, Coca-Cola has been a publicly traded company. One share of stock
purchased in 1919 for $40, with all dividends reinvested, would be worth $9.8
million in 2012, a 10.7% annual increase, adjusted for inflation. In 1987, CocaCola once again became one of the 30 stocks which makes up the Dow, the Dow

Jones Industrial Average, which is commonly referenced as the performance of the

stock market. It had previously been a Dow stock from 1932 to 1935.[24] Coca-Cola
has paid a dividend, increasing each year for 49 years. Stock is available from
a direct purchase program, through Computershare Trust Company, but unlike
many programs, has investment fees.
Consumer relations
Throughout 2012, Coca-Cola contributed $1,700,500 to a $46 million political
campaign known as "The Coalition Against The Costly Food Labeling Proposition,
sponsored by Farmers and Food Producers". This organization was set up to
oppose a citizen's initiative, known as Proposition 37, demanding mandatory
labeling of foods containing genetically modified ingredients.
Bottlers

Houston Coca-Cola Bottling Company

19962002 Chevrolet Expresswagon from The Coca-Cola Company.

In general, the Coca-Cola Company and its subsidiaries only produce syrup
concentrate, which is then sold to various bottlers throughout the world who hold
the local Coca-Cola franchise. Coca-Cola bottlers, who hold territorially exclusive
contracts with the company, produce the finished product in cans and bottles from
the concentrate in combination with filtered water and sweeteners. The bottlers
then sell, distribute and merchandise the resulting Coca-Cola product to retail

stores, vending machines, restaurants and food service distributors. Outside the
United States, the bottlers also control the fountain business.
Since the early 1980s, the Company has actively encouraged the consolidation of
bottlers with the Company often owning a share of these "anchor bottlers".
The Company's largest bottlers outside North America are:

Coca-Cola Amatil, based in Australia (Australia, New Zealand, Indonesia,

South Pacific nations) (Company owns share)

Coca-Cola European Partners PLC, based in the United Kingdom (western

Europe) (Company owns share)

Coca-Cola Bottlers Philippines, Inc., based in the Philippines, a joint venture

between the Company and Coca-Cola FEMSA

Coca-Cola FEMSA, based in Mexico (parts of Mexico and Latin America)

(Company owns share)

Arca Continental, also based in Mexico (parts of Mexico and Latin America)
(independent)

Embotelladora Andina S.A, based in Chile (southern South America)

(independent)

Coca-Cola Beverages Africa, based in Port Elizabeth, South Africa (southern

and eastern Africa) (company owns share)

Coca-Cola Korea, based in South Korea (independent)

Coca-Cola HBC AG, originally based in Greece but now located

in Switzerland (Greece, Eastern Europe, Russia, and Nigeria) (Company owns
share)

Coca-Cola Icecek, based in Turkey (Turkey, southwest Asia, Arabia)

(Company owns share)

Swire Group, based in Hong Kong (China, Taiwan, Hong Kong)

(independent)

Kirin Company, based in Japan (independent)

In the United States, the company bypasses bottlers and is responsible for the
manufacture and sale of fountain syrups directly to authorized fountain wholesalers
and some fountain retailers.
After purchase of the North American assets of Coca-Cola Enterprises, as of 2014
the company directly owned 100% of Coca-Cola Refreshments, the anchor bottler
of Coca-Cola products in North America, representing about 90% of Canada and
80% of the United States.
Other major bottlers in the United States are:

Coca-Cola Bottling Co. Consolidated, based in Charlotte, North

Carolina (company owns share)

Coca-Cola Bottling Company of Northern New England based in Bedford,

New Hampshire and owned by Kirin Company

Coca-Cola Bottling Company United, based in Birmingham,

Alabama (independent)

Swire Coca-Cola USA, based in Salt Lake City, Utah and owned by Swire
Group

In September 2015, the company announced the sale of several production plants
and territories to Swire, Consolidated, and United and creation of the Coca-Cola
National Product Supply System which controls 95% of the territory in the United
States.
Civil rights
After Martin Luther King, Jr. won the 1964 Nobel Peace Prize, plans for an
interracial celebratory dinner in still-segregated Atlanta were not initially well
supported by the city's business elite until Coca-Cola intervened.
J. Paul Austin, the chairman and CEO of Coca-Cola, and Mayor Ivan Allen
summoned key Atlanta business leaders to the Commerce Club's eighteenth floor
dining room, where Austin told them flatly, 'It is embarrassing for Coca-Cola to be
located in a city that refuses to honor its Nobel Prize winner. We are an
international business. The Coca-Cola Co. does not need Atlanta. You all need to
decide whether Atlanta needs the Coca-Cola Co.' Within two hours of the end of
that meeting, every ticket to the dinner was sold.

Andrew Young

Coca-Cola Company's office building in Madrid (Spain)

The Coca-Cola Company offers more than 350 brands in over 200 countries, aside
from its namesake Coca-Cola beverage.
Brands Tab
Tab was Coca-Cola's first attempt to develop a diet soft drink, using saccharin as
a sugar substitute. Introduced in 1963, the product is still sold today, although its
sales have dwindled since the introduction of Diet Coke. The Tab soft drink is
difficult to locate in recent times, due to its de facto replacement by Diet Coke.
Other soft drinks

The Coca-Cola Company also produces a number of other soft drinks

including Fanta (introduced circa 1941) and Sprite. Fanta's origins date back to
World War II during a trade embargo against Germany on cola syrup, making it
impossible to sell Coca-Cola in Germany. Max Keith, the head of Coca-Cola's
German office during the war, decided to create a new product for the German
market, made from products only available in Germany at the time, which they
named Fanta. The drink proved to be a hit, and when Coke took over again after
the war, it adopted the Fanta brand as well. Fanta was originally an orange flavored
soft drink which can come in plastic bottles or cans. It has become available in
many different flavors now such as grape, peach, grapefruit, apple, pineapple and
strawberry.
In 1961, Coca-Cola introduced Sprite, a lemon-lime soft drink, and another of the
company's bestsellers and its response to 7 Up.

An ad in Berlin, Germany.
Coca-Cola South Africa also released Valpre Bottled "still" and "sparkling" water.
Columbia Pictures
Coca-Cola bought Columbia Pictures in 1981 owing to the low monetary value of
the studio. The film company was the first and only studio ever owned by CocaCola. During its ownership of the studio, the studio released many popular films
including Ghostbusters,Stripes, The Karate Kid, and some others. However, after
the 1987 film Ishtar, Columbia was sold to Sony Pictures Entertainment.
Breakmate

No longer manufactured, the Coca-Cola BreakMate was a three-flavour dispenser

introduced by Coca-Cola and Siemens in 1988. Intended for use in offices with
five to fifty people, its refrigerated compartment held three individual one-litre
plastic containers of soda syrup and a CO2 tank. Like a soda fountain, it mixed
syrup in a 1:5 ratio with carbonated water. In North America, Coca-Cola
discontinued spare BreakMate parts in 2007 and stopped distributing the syrup in
2010.
Healthy beverages
During the 1990s, the company responded to the growing consumer interest in
healthy beverages by introducing several new non-carbonated beverage brands.
These included Minute Maid Juices to Go, Powerade sports beverage, flavored
tea Nestea (in a joint venture with Nestle), Fruitopia fruit drink and Dasani water,
among others. In 2001, Minute Maid division launched the Simply Orange brand
of juices including orange juice.
In 2004, perhaps in response to the burgeoning popularity of low-carbohydrate
diets such as the Atkins diet, Coca-Cola announced its intention to develop and sell
a low-carbohydrate alternative to Coke Classic, dubbed C2 Cola. C2 contains a
mix of high fructose corn syrup, aspartame, sucralose, and Acesulfame potassium.
C2 is designed to more closely emulate the taste of Coca-Cola Classic. Even with
less than half of the food energy and carbohydrates of standard soft drinks, C2 is
not a replacement for zero-calorie soft drinks such as Diet Coke. C2 went on sale
in the U.S. on June 11, 2004, and in Canada in August 2004. C2's future is
uncertain due to disappointing sales.
Starting in 2009, The Coca-Cola Company invested in Innocent Drinks, first with a
minor stake, increasing to 90% in the first quarter of 2013.
Best selling
Coca-Cola is the best-selling soft drink in most countries, and was recognized as
the number one global brand in 2010. While the Middle East is one of the only
regions in the world where Coca-Cola is not the number one soda drink, Coca-Cola
nonetheless holds almost 25% marketshare (to Pepsi's 75%) and had double-digit
growth in 2003. Similarly, in Scotland, where the locally produced Irn-Bru was
once more popular, 2005 figures show that both Coca-Cola and Diet Coke now
outsell Irn-Bru. In Peru, the nativeInca Kola has been more popular than CocaCola, which prompted Coca-Cola to enter in negotiations with the soft drink's
company and buy 50% of its stakes. In Japan, the best selling soft drink is not cola,

as (canned) tea and coffee are more popular. As such, The Coca-Cola Company's
best selling brand there is not Coca-Cola, but Georgia.
Information
On July 6, 2006, a Coca-Cola employee and two other people were arrested and
charged with trying to sell trade secrets information to the soft drink maker's
competitor,PepsiCo for $1.5 million. The recipe for Coca-Cola, perhaps the
company's most closely guarded secret, was never in jeopardy. Instead, the
information was related to a new beverage in development. Coca-Cola executives
verified that the documents were valid and proprietary. At least one glass vial
containing a sample of a new drink was offered for sale, court documents said. The
conspiracy was revealed by PepsiCo, which notified the authorities when they
were approached by the conspirators.
Green tea
The company announced a new "negative calorie" green tea drink, Enviga, in
2006, along with trying coffee retail concepts Far Coast and Chaqwa.
Glaceau
On May 25, 2007, Coca-Cola announced it would purchase Glaceau, a maker of
flavored vitamin-enhanced drinks (vitamin water), flavored waters, and Burn
energy drinks, for $4.1 billion in cash.
Huiyuan Juice
On September 3, 2008, Coca-Cola announced its intention to make cash offers to
purchase China Huiyuan Juice Group Limited (which has a 42% share of the
Chinese pure fruit juice market) for US$2.4bn (HK$12.20 per
share). China's ministry of commerce blocked the deal on March 18, 2009, arguing
that the deal would hurt small local juice companies, could have pushed up juice
market prices and limited consumers' choices.
Coke Mini can
In October 2009, Coca-Cola revealed its new 90-calorie mini can that holds 7.5
fluid ounces. The mini can is often sold in 8 packs. Despite costing nearly 30
percent more per ounce, the mini cans have been met with positive sales figures.

Holiday can
In November 2011, Coca-Cola revealed a seasonal design for their regular Coke
cans as part of a partnership with the World Wildlife Fund. However it was
withdrawn only a month after release due to consumer complaints about the similar
look to the silver cans commonly used for Diet Coke. There were also complaints
about deviating from traditional red as the color of Coca-Cola cans previously.

World of Coca-Cola
Coca-Cola operates a soft drink themed tourist attraction in downtown Atlanta, Ga;
the "World of Coca-Cola" is a multi-storied exhibition of the many flavors sold by
the company as well as a museum to the history of the company.
Stake in Monster Beverage
It was announced on August 14, 2014, that Coca-Cola Co is making a cash
payment of $2.15 billion for a 16.7 percent stake in Monster Beverage Corp to
expand its market for energy drinks. Coke's ownership in Full
Throttle and Burn will be transferred to Monster. In return, Monster will transfer its
ownership in Hansen's Natural Sodas and Peace Iced Tea to Coke. Muhtar Kent,
Coke's Chief Executive Officer, stated that the company has the option to increase
its stake to 25 percent but cannot exceed that percentage in the next four years.
Sponsorship
Coca-Cola's advertising expenses accounted for US$3.256 billion in 2011.
Sports
Coca-Cola sponsored the English Football League from the beginning of the 2004
05 season (beginning August 2004) to the start of 2010/11 season, when
the Football Leaguereplaced it with NPower.

Along with this, Coca-Cola sponsored the Coca-Cola Football Camp, that took
place in Pretoria, South Africa during the 2010 FIFA World Cup, during which
hundreds of teenagers from around the world were able to come together and share
their love of the game, partly due to Best Buy's efforts through their @15 program.
Other major sponsorships include NHRA, NASCAR, the PGA
Tour, NCAA Championships, the Olympic Games, the NRL, the FIFA World
Cups and the UEFA European Championships.
Each Fall, Coca-Cola is the sponsor of the TOUR Championship by Coca-Cola
held at East Lake Golf Club in Atlanta, GA. The TOUR Championship is the
season ending tournament of the PGA TOUR.
In the Philippines, it has a team in the Philippine Basketball Association,
the Powerade Tigers.
Television
The company sponsors the hit Fox singing-competition series American Idol.
Coca-Cola is a sponsor of the nightly talk show on PBS, Charlie Rose in the US.
Theme parks
While not necessarily having naming rights to anything in all locations, the
company does sponsor and provide beverages in many theme parks, usually in an
exclusive capacity. This includes the Walt Disney Parks and Resorts, Merlin
Entertainment, Universal Parks & Resorts, Six Flags, Cedar Fair, SeaWorld
Entertainment, and Parques Reunidos, which are seven of the eight largest theme
park operators worldwide (it is unknown whether OCT Parks China, the fourth
largest theme park operator, uses Coca-Cola).
The company also operates "Coca-Cola" visitor centers in Israel and Turkey.