Cola Wars Continue: Coke and Pepsi in 2010

Essentially, the soft-drink industry is largest beverage industry. It gross millions a year, and has different distribution channels. For example, these soft-drinks are sold in supermarket, Vending Machines, Gas stations, etc. The cost is incomparable to the amount of consumer we currently have in America. If Americans consumer on average 50 gallons in a year. The cost of 2.00 is not missed by the average person. With that said, there is a least likely chance that a person would attempt to duplicate the process at home. The soda making process is too time consuming, and inconvenient when a person can simply can go to the store to purchase. Consumers can either be very loyal to the brand or fickle. Influx in prices can make consumers switch very quickly. However, there are typically incentives associated with loyalty. There are giveaways and contest that entices the customers to keep purchasing. For example, Snapple does this with a real fact on every lid. I personally know people that will buy the product just to read the facts.

     PepsiCo. Incorporated and The Coca-Cola Company are the two largest and oldest archrivals in the carbonated soft drink (CSD) industry. Coca-Cola was invented and first marketed in 1886, followed by Pepsi Cola in 1898. Coca-Cola was named after the coca leaves and kola nuts John Pemberton used to make it, and Pepsi Cola after the beneficial effects its creator, Caleb Bradham, claimed it had on dyspepsia. The rivalry between the soda giants, also known as the "Cola Wars", began in the 1960’s when Coca-Cola's dominance was being increasingly challenged by Pepsi Cola. The competitive environment between the rivals was intense and well-publicized, forcing both companies to continuously establish and

Essentially, all risk in price fluctuations in the raw materials market is transferred and paid for by the bottling business. Supplier power of the concentrate business is also exerted over the bottling business by the threat of acquisition and vertical integration – the concentrate business supports its bottling business through providing suggestions for operational improvement. While this support can be viewed positively, both Coca-Cola and Pepsi have acquired its bottling franchises due to their dissatisfaction over the operational effectiveness of its bottling business. Through the last few decades, Coca-Cola and Pepsi have oscillated between acquiring and re-franchising its partner bottling businesses.

The competition between Coke and Pepsi reached its peak to become a real war battle by the year 1980. This war had affected the industry profit for both concentrate producers and bottlers, while the effect of bottlers was much higher. After the successful “Pepsi Challenge” (blind taste tests: sales shot up) in 1974, Coke countered with rebates, retail price cuts and significant concentrate price increases. Pepsi followed of a 15% price increase of its own. During the early 1990’s bottlers of Coke and Pepsi employed low price strategies in the supermarket channel in order to compete with store brands. The concentrate producers were always able to increase their profits by increasing the concentrate price, while the bottlers, especially the

Porter’s (2008) competitive forces play a significant role in the success of the concentrate producers (CPs) in this industry. The forces are "threat of new entrants, rivalry among existing competitors, bargaining power of buyers, threat of substitute products or services, and bargaining power of suppliers" (p. 27). Concentrate producers usually produce carbonated soft drink (CSD). Coca-Cola and Pepsi-Cora are known as two big CPs in the world.

The soft drink industry in the United States is a highly profitably, but competitive market. In 2000, carbonated soft drink retail sales were estimated $60.3 billion, however, soft drink consumption growth has slowed in recent years. There are three major companies that hold the majority of sales in the carbonated soft drink industry in the U.S. They are the Coca Cola Company with 44.1% market share, The Pepsi-Cola Company with 31.4% market share, and Dr. Pepper/ Seven Up, Inc. with 14.7% market share. These three companies market the top ten brands account for 73% of soft drink sales in the U.S. Dr. Pepper/ Seven Up, Inc. owns two of the top ten brands: Dr.

For more than a century, Coca Cola and PepsiCo have been the major competitors within the soft drink market. By employing various advertising tactics, strategies such as blind taste tests, and reward initiatives for the consumer, they have grown to become oligopolistic rivals. In the soft-drink business, “The Coca-Cola Company” and “PepsiCo, Incorporated” hold most of the market shares in virtually every region of the world. They have brands that the consumers want, whether it be soft-drink brands or in PepsioCo’s case, snacks. With only one soft-drink market, the two competitors have no choice but to increase sales by stealing the other competitor’s clients. This led to the term, the “cola wars” which was first used

The industry is predominantly led by three companies; Coca Cola, Pepsi, and Dr. Pepper Snapple Group (also commonly referred to as RC or 7 UP by consumers). Each of these companies has strong players in multiple beverage categories. Furthermore, there is numerous other store, local, and regional owned brands depending on where you are. This creates a high number of substitute products throughout the beverage industry in all its categories. For example, in a typical carbonated soft drink aisle at Walmart you might find up to nine different brands of each beverage flavor. Interestingly, at Walmart each brand will tend to have a different price point. However, if you go to Target you may only find three brands per flavor and typically they are priced in line with one another. The high number of available substitutes often leads to a pricing war. When companies compete on price, often the consumer wins. The result of interpreting that competition is a learned behavior by consumers to be sensitive to temporary promotional pricing. Ultimately, the high number of available substitutes makes the beverage industry elastic in short bursts throughout the

give them some control over soft drink profitability. Furthermore, consumers expected to pay less through this

The Concentrate Producer industry can be classified as a Duopoly with Pepsi and Coke as the firms competing. The market share of the rest of the competition is too small to cause any upheaval of pricing or industry structure. Pepsi and Coke mainly over the years competed on differentiation and advertising rather than on pricing except for a period in the 1990’s. This prevented a huge dent in profits. Pricing wars are however a feature in their international expansion strategies.

Coca-Cola is a leading beverage industry in the United States and many other countries in the world. PepsiCo is also a leading worldwide beverage company, but they are also the parent company of the Frito-Lay and Quaker Oats Companies. This makes PepsiCo a leader in the beverage, snack and cereal industries. As consumers, we have indulged in their products for many years. My personal preference has always been Pepsi over Coke, which is why I was very interested in conducting this analysis. Regardless of the results, I will always seek out a Diet Pepsi over a Diet Coke and so will many of my physician friends at Children’s Hospital who start their mornings with a Diet Pepsi. These personal preferences are what contributes to a company’s profits through net sales. However, the key performance measurement tools used are not based on sales alone. Calculating liquidity, solvency, and profitability ratios on a regular basis give us a better insight on the performance and overall health of a company.

The company known as Coca-Cola today was started in September of 1919, but the first Coke brand was served as early as 1886. Since that time it has grown to be one of the most globally recognized brand names with a stock value of $167 billion. Coke’s plan has always been developed with the future in mind. Right away the company realized that it was more profitable to manufacture the concentrate used to make carbonated drinks than to bottle it. From that point on they saw the entire world, not simply the originating country, as their desired market. It seems only practical that the company should pursue this agenda until conquered then focus the effort on expanding into different product lines. This logical

The industry of Carbonated Soft Drinks (CSD) is highly concentrated. The three major companies, Coca Cola, PepsiCo, and Cadbury Schweppes accounted in 1998 for more than 90% of market share by case volume –Exhibit 1-.

The last two topics within Porter’s Five Force Analysis are the threats of substitutes and new entries. The threat of substitutes for PepsiCo and Pepsi products could be considered quite high. In recent years, Americans have been cutting back soda consumption, approximately 1.2% in 2015, and 0.9% in 2014 (Taylor, 2016). Customers have been replacing soft drinks, in particular, with water, coffees, and all natural juices. This also leads the way for the threat of new entries. As people are tending to lean away from traditional soft drinks, the threat of new entrants could be considered moderate. This is because the cost of entry is relatively low as it is not a technology driven industry. Most of the cost of entry would be related to branding and marketing of the new product (Thompson, 1996). In recent years many competitors have entered the market with desirable ingredients and non-soft-drink beverages.

In order to better analyze the industry and to understand the macro-environment in which Coca Cola is evolving, we have used