INTRODUCTION

The Coca-Cola Company was first established in 1886 by Dr John Styth Pemberton. Today, the company is the world's leading manufacturer in the beverage industry, operating globally in more than 200 countries with its head office located in Atlanta, USA. It produces more than 300 beverage brands and over 1.06 billion drinks are consumed per day.

In India, Coca-Cola was the leading soft-drink till 1977

when govt. policies necessitated its departure.

Coca-Cola returned to India in 1993 and over the past ten years has captured the imagination of the nation, building strong associations with cricket, the thriving cinema industry, music etc. Coca-Cola has been very strongly associated with cricket, sponsoring the World Cup in 1996 and various other tournaments, including the Coca-Cola Cup in Sharjah in the late nineties.

A Healthy Growth To The Indian Economy

Ever Since, Coca-Cola India has made significant investments to build and continually consolidate its business in the country, including new production facilities, waste water treatment plants, distribution systems and marketing channels. Coca-Cola India is among the countries top international investors, having invested more than US$ 1 billion in India within a decade of its presence and further pledged another US$ 100 million in 2003 for its operations.

A Pure Commitment to The Indian Economy

The Company has not only shaked up the Indian carbonated drinks market, and given consumers the pleasure of world-class drinks to fill up their hydration, refreshment & nutrition needs but has also been instrumental in giving an exponential growth to job opportunities.

Creating Enormous Job Opportunities

With virtually all the goods and services required to produce and market Coca-Cola being made in India, the business system of the Company directly employs approximately 6,000 people, and indirectly creates employment for more than 125,000 people in related

industries through our vast procurement, supply and distribution system.

The vast Indian operations comprises 25 wholly-owned- company-owned bottling operations and another 24 franchisee-owned bottling operations. That apart, a network of 21 contract-packers also manufactures a range of products for the Company On the distribution front, 10-tonne trucks, open-bay three-wheelers that can navigate the narrow alleyways of Indian cities constantly keep our brands available in every nook and corner of countries.

Industry reviewPlayers

The biggest competitor of coke is PepsiCo. other from

Pepsi there are many players in this industry like juices,

natural drinks but coke and pepsi dominate 95% of the

market.

Growth RateSoft drink industry has shown a growth at a break neck

speed. During the last 4 to 5 years, the turn over has touched a

mark of 7000 crore and is heading for 8000 crore mark.

Globally, carbonated soft drinks are third most consumed

beverages. Per capita annual consumption of carbonated soft

drinks is nearly four times the per capita

consumption of fruit beverages. Soft drink

consumption is growing by around 7% to

8% a year, according to the publication

Global Soft drinks 2002, total volume

reached 412,000 million litres in 2001, giving a global per

capita consumption of around 67.5 litres per year. Carbonated

Soft drinks contributes 45% to the GLOBAL BEVERAGE

SECTOR as compared to Bottled water 31%, dilutables 6%,

Juices/nectars 8%, Still drinks 10%. Almost 19% of the

population consume soft drinks. In India, the leading players

are Coca cola and Pepsi, who holds a strong market share.

Coca cola contributes to 58% market share whereas Pepsi

holds 42% market share. Soft drink market size for FY02 was

around 270 m.n cases (6480million bottles). During summer,

the sales of these two multinationals rise significantly to

around 50% per annum.

SWOT of Pepsi

1. Pepsi has stayed in this market for almost one century. So they are so experienced and stationed in people's mind deeply. Now no one doesn't know the brand Pepsi-Cola Whenever the name Pepsi is heard, people will conjure up the image of fresh and cool drink.

2. Pepsi-Cola is not only in high quality, cool and fresh but also have a competitive price in indian market. Sometimes Pepsi-Cola even has a lower price than Coca-Cola In india.

3. Pepsi is such an experienced powerful global company, Which has a basic of a great fund. So it has the ability to place a Idle sum of money to the promotion. We can see that the advertisement of Pepsi-Cola is so attractive. It also invited the top famous people to advertise for it. The advertisement is so elaborate and attractive so that Pepsi gained the special prize of the advertisement Granny.

4. Pepsi also compares with the competitors and find their disadvantages to update its own quality, flavor and also package promptly in order to satisfy the consumers' need. This is the biggest advantage of Pepsi company.

5. It is proved in a survey that 41% of the interviewees prefer the flavor of Peps-Cola. It is the most popular one. Pepsi company also produce the Diet-Cola to meet the people who more concern their health. And it just changes the design of the package of Pepsi-Cola.

The disadvantages of Pepsi-Cola

Still there are some disadvantages existing in Pepsi-Cola survey showed that most of the people like the package of Coca-Cola best.48% people like it. It has only 32% people prefer the package of Pepsi-Cola. So the design of Pepsi-Cola's package is not as attractive as Coca--cola. It still needs to be improved. We suggest that the package needs to be designed more colorful to attract people's attention.

Although in the cola market there are many competitors, Pepsi still has the opportunity to enlarge its market share because the cola in the market is quite monotonic. Most of the end user is young people. There are still some people who do not like the taste of the cola. So we can try to provide some other taste of cola such as adding some lemon juice. We can change the flavor in order to meet different taste of different people.

As to the threats, all of us know that Pepsi-Cola and Coca-Cola have competition for about 80 years. Although Pepsi-Cola have won several times during this competition, but the market share of Pepsi-cola is a little bit smaller than Coca-Cola at global level.

Marketing mix

Product

Product line :-

The Coca-Cola Company has n no of brands like thus up, sprite. But if we talk about coca cola as a product it has sub products like Diet Coke, Caffeine Free Coke, Cherry Coke Coca-Cola Zero, Vanilla Coke and special editions with lemon and with lime, and even with coffee. They introduced other cola drinks under the Coke brand name. The most common of these is, which has become a major diet cola is diet coke. But we find only diet coke and vanilla coke in India.

Coca Cola Company deals mainly in soft drink industry and these are some of its major brand. It also deals in soda and mineral water through the brand name kinley.

Multi branding is the is the branding strategy used by Coca Cola company for its different products.

Quality :-

Water

Since water is a key component of the beverages, care is taken that the quality of water is very good. And, since public water quality varies around the world, each plant further treats the water it uses. This means that before water is added to any of the beverages; it's rigorously filtered and cleansed. Then they continuously sample the water to ensure it meets the standard. Apart from that the company ensures quality by making significant investments to build and continually consolidate its business in the country, including new production facilities, waste water treatment plants, distribution systems and marketing channels. Coca cola has been rated three star for quality and packaging.

After the pesticide matter coca cola was given a certificate that it is safe to be

consumed.

Certificate is as shown below.

“ Quality Is Our Highest Business Objective ”

This is the statement given by the company.

Brand Name :-

Proved in a survey

In 'blind' taste tests, people prefer the taste of Pepsi over the taste of Coke. However, if the test is not 'blind' and the tasters know which beverage is which, they prefer the taste of Coke over Pepsi! That is the emotional power of a brand. The Coca-Cola brand has the power to actually change an individual's taste!

Coca-cola is the no.1 brand in the world.

Coca-Cola is recognized by 94% of the world’s population. Guinness World Record ranked coca cola as the most popular soft drink.Coca-Cola had signed on various celebrities including movie stars such as Karishma Kapoor, cricketers such as Srinath, Sourav Ganguly, southern celebrities like Vijay in the past. Today, its brand ambassadors are Aamir Khan and Hrithik Roshan.

Logo :-

The famous Coca-Cola logo was created by John Pemberton's bookkeeper, Frank Mason Robinson, in 1885. It was Robinson who came up with the name, and he also chose the logo’s distinctive cursive script. Coca cola has two registered trade marks as shown below.

Packaging :-

As we have visited Coca Cola Company personally we have seen that for pet bottles it is produced on the spot when production and packaging work is also done and the bottles are not reused. The glass bottles

production unit is not at the place of production but it is brought till there and even the used bottles are used after cleaning it through many processes. The cans are imported from foreign countries as it is not produced here.

The packaging of have been always very attractive and different from others, as we can also see in the bottles below. Even the 600 ml bottle has a different kind of packaging.

The first shape that was registered was of the coca cola bottle. Once the filled beverages have passed final inspection, they are ready to be packaged for delivery. Generally, packing can refer to everything from the unique "BOTTLE" and "CAN" designs, to label designs, to cardboard boxes and containers, to plastic rings. Because the needs and tastes of our consumers are so diverse, packaging varies depending on where the beverages are being sent

Sizes :-

Glass PET Can Fountain

200 ml, 300 ml, 500 ml, 1000 ml

500 ml, 1.5 L, 2 L, 500 ml + 100 ml

330 ml Various Sizes

Positioning :-

Value proposition: `To benefit and refresh everyone who is touched by our business.'

Target customers are the people who are safety and taste conscious.Its benefits is that the drink is refreshing.Target customer, value proposition, benefits.

Innovative product :-

In 2002, the Coca-Cola Company extended the products of Coke and developed the new products Coke with lemon and Vanilla Coke. This extension responded to consumer demands and generated sales and profit. It also launched innovative product like diet coke which was then also copied by their competitors but they dint succeeded.

Guarantees and warranties :-

Coca cola is best before 3 months of manufacturing date.

PriceMost of the bottling companies are under the control of

coke which gives that much of flexibility for its modulations in the pricing strategy which cannot be exercised by the rival cola giant PepsiCo because it does not own its own bottling companies hence it does not enjoy that much of flexibility in modulating the pricing strategy of PepsiCo.

Coca cola is available at prices depending on their sizes.

For e.g. 200ml is available at Rs.8.

500ml is available at Rs.20.

1.5 ltr is available at Rs.43.

2 ltr is available at Rs. 48.

The coke is sold in retail stores , petrol stations etc. The pricing methods are set by the company. Usually the prices are fixed. Meet-the-competition pricing The Coca-Cola products pricing are set around the same level as its competitors.

Psychological pricing Most of the Coca-Cola products use this method of pricing. For example, for a pack of 5 cans of Coca-Cola soft drinks it is priced at Rs.99 instead of Rs.100 this pricing strategy makes consumers perceive the products to be cheaper.

When coca cola entered into Indian market it used penetration method. In India it started with low price, its price in India was just Rs 5 in the year 2003 with an intention to occupy Indian rural market, which is almost 90%of the population.

Coca cola also follows going rate policy as the price of its major competitor Pepsi.

Promotion

Advertisement :-

Advertising The Coca-Cola Company uses advertising as its main source of increasing consumer awareness. It mainly uses television for advertisement. There are many television advertisements on Coca-Cola products. This source allows the company's products to reach a large audience. The latest

television advertisement for Coca-Cola soft drinks was Aamir khans ` hum same same' advertisement. One of the older one are `thanda matlab coca cola' & ‘Manu bhabhi’. The company also uses the radio as another source of advertisement. This is a cheaper source of approach compared to the television. But in television the insertion time per capita is very low compared to radio. The business had substantial advertising and promotions of the company's brands. The Coca-Cola Company when advertising has a primary target market of those who are of age 13-24, and a secondary market of age 10-39. These are some of the TV commercials of coca cola.

Radio advertisement :-

Other from this it also advertises on radio for e.g. “thanda matlab coca cola”, “life ho toh aisi” and many other.For radio advertisement they mainly use the proverbs only.

Print advertisement :-

If we talk about print ads there are hoardings of coke. Some of the hoardings are as shown below:-

These are some of the hoardings of vanilla coke a product of coke.

The special thing about the all the ad of coca cola is that its advertising message is very effective.

Coca cola also some times use Bollywood for their advertisement like Dhoom 2 and Na tum jano naa hum. It also sponsored 1997 world cup. It has also sponsored fifa world cup which gave it lots of publicity.

Brand localization strategy in two India’s

India A: “Life ho to aisi”

“India A,” the designation Coca-Cola gave to the market segment including metropolitan areas and large towns, represented 4% of the country’s population. This segment sought social bonding as a need and responded to inspirational messages, celebrating the benefits of teir increasing social and economic freedoms. “Life ho to aisi,” (life as it should be) was successful and relevant tagline found in Coca-Cola’s advertising to this audience.

India B: “Thanda matlab coca cola”

Coca-Cola India believed that the first brand to offer communication targeted to the smaller towns would own the rural market and went after that objective with a comprehensive strategy. “India B” included small towns and rural areas, comprising the other 96% of the nation’s population. This segment’s primary need was out-of-home thirst-quenching and the soft drink category was undifferentiated in the minds of rural consumers.

Additionally, within average Coke costing Rs. 10 and an average day’s wages around Rs. 100, Coke was perceived as a luxury that few could afford. 34In an effort to make the price point of Coke within reach of this high-potential market, Coca-Cola launched the Accessibility Campaign, introducing a new 200ml bottle, smaller than the traditional 300ml bottle found in urban markets, and concurrently cutting the price in half, to Rs. 5. This pricing strategy closed the gap between Coke and basic refreshments like lemonade and tea, making soft drinks truly accessible for the first time. At the same time, Coke invested in distribution infrastructure to effectively serve a disbursed population and doubled the number of retail outlets in rural areas from 80,000 in 2001 to 160,000 in 2003, increasing market penetration from 13 to 25%.35Coke’s advertising and promotion strategy pulled the marketing plan together using local language and idiomatic expressions. “Thanda,” meaning cool/cold is also generic for cold beverages and gave “Thanda Matlab Coca-Cola” delicious multiple meanings. Literally translated to “Coke means refreshment,” the phrase directly addressed both the primary need of this segment for cold refreshment while at the same time positioning Coke as a “Thanda” or generic cold beverage just like tea, lassi, or lemonade. As a result of the Thanda campaign, Coca-Cola won Advertiser of the Year and Campaign of the Year in 2003.

Coca cola soft drink advertisement is handled by Mc Cann-Erickson (India) Ltd.

Sales promotion

Coca cola at every stage has done sales promotion. If you must have remembered the Aish Cash offer of coca cola which was a big success now also a new offer have come into market, which is there for all products of coca cola. Now they have started a new “sms and win offer” which will soon hit the market.

Aish cash contests ad :-

Coca-Cola

   

A porter is admiring a cleaning lady, when she shouts, "Aeh Ramu, chal hat."

 

Offended he whispers to himself, "Ek din Ramuji bologi."

 

Just then an ad on TV beckons him, "Kismat ke darshan pane hai to aaja."

       

   

The ad continues, "Thande ka liner thandi se bottle par laga ja. Lakho ka cash pa, ya mere saath videsh aaja."

 

Ramu wins and enters the fantasy world singing, "Ab the bhaiya kismat ka main gate khola hua parenge yo."

 

Getting into a limo with Aishwarya he continues, "Lambi si gadi mein chode se jarenge yo."

       

   

Receiving a red carpet welcome with the heroine, he goes on, "Aishwarya Rai ke sang photo khichwarenge yo."

 

A voice asks, "Aur kya chahiye?" and cutting the ribbon he says, "Sauratbhi parenge, izzat bhi parenge yo."

 

Finally his dream comes true as the cleaning lady with much respect calls out, "Aapka phooto Ramuji."

    

MVO: "Inki to kismat badli, aapki bhi badal sakti hai. Thanda Aish cash."

Free samples are distributed when any group of people or students visit its industry.

Public Relation

Coke India partnered with NGOs and governments to provide medical access to poor people through regular health camps. Like its parent, Coke India initiatives were both community and environment-focused.

Priorities included education, where primary education projects had been set up to benefit children in slums and villages, water conservation, where the Company supported community-based rainwater harvesting projects to restore water levels and promote conservation education, and health.

Place

Indirect distribution. Coca-Cola Company uses intermediaries in its distribution. That is, the company does not sell its products directly to its consumers. The Coca-Cola Company uses the intensive distribution strategy. The business's products are sold in almost every outlet including: · retail outlets · small shops · restaurants · petrol stations · newsagents · schools · sports and entertainment venues· from vending machines.

Ware housing & delivery :-

In order to make sure the freshest beverages possible get to you, each warehouse must efficiently manage the thousands of beverages cases produced each day. Beverage organization is key, though it's the bottle and can coding that allow for the necessary precision. From the warehouse, they load beverages on to our distinctive trucks. Night and day, the trucks are delivering our refreshing beverages to stores, soda fountains, and vending machines near you.

Marketing Channels :-

The distribution chain is given below:-

Company’s products are transported from it’s warehouses to their respective dealers. Company uses its own transport medium like trucks and other heavy vehicles.

Coverage :-

Company plans to grow their outlet base by 100,000 outlets next year to 6,00,000 outlets and will not stop growing that base until they are truly "within arm's reach of desire". The company had opened 50,000 new outlets in the first two months of this year, as part of its plans to cover one lakh outlets for the coming summer season. The new outlets also covered 3,500 new villages.

SWOT

Company warehousing wholesellers retailers consumers.

(Strength, Weakness, Opportunities, Threats)

Strength

1. STRONG BRAND NAME The world's most valuable brand. Its brand value at $70.45. It is the most recognizable word across the world after Ok is Coke. Extremely recognizable branding is one of Coca-Cola’s greatest strengths. Coca-Cola’s brand name is known well throughout by 90% of the world today.

2. CORPOARATE IDENTITY it has a very strong corporate identity as it is very recognized company in all the parts of the world and it is in existence since 1880’s.

3. GLOBAL DISTRIBUTION coca cola is available in each and every part of the world as it is operating globally in more than 200 countries with its head office located in Atlanta, USA and daily more than 1.06 billion dollar are consumed around the world.

4. ADVERTISEMENT of coke is very attractive and they use big stars like Aamir Khan, Aishwarya Rai & Hrithik Roshan in it.

5. INNOVATION it always launches innovative products like diet coke, vanilla coke and many other.

6. LOCAL APPROACH it conducts business on a global scale while at the same time maintain a local approach which is purely visible from its advertisement.

7. STRONG R&D coke has a very strong R&D.

8. BACKWARD INTEGRATION is one of its biggest strength as it has wholly company owned bottling operations and that’s why it also has a chance to work on is price. Also according to Bettman Coca-Cola’s bottling system is one of their greatest strengths.

9. “THANDA MATLAB COCA COLA” campaign worked really well in India.

10. BRAND LOYALTY Coca cola enjoys the brand loyalty from the customers

11. FINANCIAL STABILTY is their in company as it is a very old and prestigious brand.

Weakness

1. NOT NO 1 IN INDIA in every part of the world coke is at the first position in terms of sales leaving its competitors far behind. But in India it is at the third position behind

its biggest competitor Pepsi at first place and coke owned company Thumsup at the second place.

2. MARKET SHARE its market share in India as a product is very less as compared to others.

3. UNDER UTILIZATION OF CAPACITY is one of its weakness

4. SALES IN INDIA its sale in India is 6 bottles per capita per year which is very low compared to other western countries like Mexico which has a total sale of 533 bottles per person per annum.

5. PESTICIDE SCANDAL in India decreased its sale and created a doubt in minds of people about pesticide.

Opportunities

1. POSSIBLE GROWING DEMAND in a country like India the per capita consumption of coca cola per year is the lowest in the world that is only 6 per person.

2. DEVLOPING A GLOBAL BRAND

3. COCA COLA’S BOTTLING SYSTEM also allows the company to take advantage. It can work on its price. Most

of the bottling companies are under the control of coke which gives that much of flexibility for its modulations in the pricing strategy which cannot be exercised by the rival cola giant pepsico because it does not own its own bottling companies hence it does not enjoy that much of flexibility in modulating the pricing strategy of PepsiCo.

4. SUFFICIENT CAPITAL gives it significant growth opportunities.

5. HAS A POTENTIAL to innovate and differentiate the company's products to sustain a competitive advantage

6. EXPANSION INTO NEW MARKET other than soft drink market. As coke is enjoying so good brand name, then if they enter in any other industry with same brand name it can also succeed in that industry.

7. MERGE with other global business is another option in front of them to expand their business.

Threats

1. COMPETITION PEPSI its competition from Pepsi is a big threat to the company as the market share of Pepsi is more than coke in India

2. .3. Coca-Cola can be SUBSTITUTED by other soft drink

products made by its competitors.

4. The soft drink industry is very strong, but consumers are NOT NECESSARILY MARRIED to it. Possible substitutes that continuously put pressure on both Pepsi and Coke include tea, coffee, juices, milk, and hot chocolate.

5. PESTICIDE MATTER after the pesticide matter the sales of coke felled tremendously and it happened twice and company has to get a permanent solution to it.

6. Other threat which the companies possess is of CHANGE OF TASTE of their consumers.

Future plans

Increasing the per capita consumption of its beverages

Coca-Cola continues its efforts at increasing the per capita consumption of its beverages in the country. India PCC currently is at 6 Servings a Year. This requires a comprehensive activation of the Indian market by addressing acceptability, affordability and availability of its products.

Expanding its distribution networks

The company had also decided to expand its retail network by 18 per cent taking the total number of retailers to 1.3 million across the country.

Creating an ultra low cost model: lowering cost of goods sold and fixed cost

In light of the company’s Affordability Strategy, Coca-Cola went about bringing a cost-focus culture in the company. This included procurement efficiencies – through focus on key input materials, trade discipline and control and proactive tax management through tax incentives, excise duty reduction and creatingmarketing companies and owning bottling units of their own. These measures have reduced the costs of operations and increased profit margins.

Leading the beverage revolution in India

The company continues to build on its foundations in India. While it continues to maximizes its carbonated soft drink potential through various pack, pricing, occasion-based strategies across town-classes in India, it is exploring other categories like juice, water and tea and coffee. It is poised to lead the beverage revolution in India.