Coca-Cola's journey in India mirrors the country's growth, rising consumption and a vibrant middle class.
Cola wars are pass, it's things like mobile phone services that are the real competition for Coke products, said Neville Isdell, chairman and chief operating officer of Coca-Cola, the world's largest beverage company. In India, strategy is no longer about competing with global rival PepsiCo or other local soft drink brands. Instead, it's about influencing consumer choice away from such purchases as rock-bottom pre-paid mobile cards to buying a Coke product.
During the quarter, Coke rolled out its fruit juice brand Minute Maid in select locations such as Mumbai. It also introduced variants of Schweppes tonic in the city. The brands will be rolled out in other metros shortly.
Realising the strategic importance and growth potential, the US cola giant Coca-Cola has decided to focus on Indian operations as part of which the company's global president (bottling operations) Irial Finan visited India a few days ago.
Coca Cola is planning more investments in India on top of its Rs 1000 crore budget for this market. The incremental investment will be made in the next three years. This is with the view of making India amongst Coke's top five markets. Coke regards India as a 'profitable' venture that is adding to the balance sheet of the global giant. India is currently at number 17 in the list of countries where Coke is present and had emerged among the best markets for Coke during 2007.
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Despite the onslaught of international brands -- Coke and Pepsi -- the fizz has not gone out of India's very own cola brand, Surajeet Das Gupta.
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