Word: coca-cola
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...ANGELES: Gain a star center, lose a soft-drink sponsor. That was the trade the Los Angeles Lakers made in signing Shaquille O'Neal. Since O'Neal is a spokesman for Pepsi in his spare time, Coca-Cola has decided to end its five-year sponsorship of the Lakers, since in the Atlanta firm's view, O'Neal represents the fox in the Coke chicken coop. "There was nothing to prevent Shaq from pulling out a Pepsi in the locker room during an on-camera interview," said a Coca-Cola spokesman. In fact, that's almost what O'Neal...
...shenanigans with Pepsi Bottling of Puerto Rico. And last week Pepsi's sad summer seemed to reach its nadir in Venezuela, the company's showcase South American market: overnight and without notice, Pepsi's independent (to say the least) bottler switched 18 plants and 2,500 trucks to archrival Coca-Cola, a midnight move that will cost Pepsi some $400 million in sales and $10 million in profits according to analysts if the defection cannot be reversed by Venezuela's regulators...
...comes news from Europe, and it's even worse. Russia's gone red. Again. Coca-Cola CEO Roberto Goizueta told TIME that Coke has overtaken Pepsi in Russia, a market of huge size (150 million people) and scope, erasing the 10-year head start Pepsi enjoyed as the Official Party Cola. Coke opens its 12th plant there this week, staffed by locals trained in Coke's bottling university in Moscow. It's all part of Coke's relentless push across the continents. "The conclusion is obvious," says Goizueta with his typical detachment. "Our system has terrific momentum...
...partnerships or muscling undesirable bottlers out of the way. Pepsi, for instance, now has a 40% interest in its bottlers. Earlier this summer Coke arranged to buy out its British partner, Cadbury Schweppes; the two were the beverage version of Charles and Di. Coke's new partner is Coca-Cola Enterprises, the world's biggest bottler--44% owned by Coke. In this same manner Coke has reclaimed operations in the Benelux countries and France and set up "anchor bottlers" such as Coca-Cola Amatil in Vienna, which handles Central Europe. Pepsi General Bottlers of Chicago supply Poland as well...
Ishii-san told me how the Coca-Cola marketing crew brought Coca Cola Light to Japan about 10 years ago. At first, it was everywhere...