A book that discusses a famous, world-renowned empire: Coca-Cola. This book details Coca-Cola's history for over 130 years, from 1884 to 2004. Through this book, we might learn how Coca-Cola, which is simply sugar water, could become a soft drink empire that gained worldwide popularity. Can Coca-Cola's success be replicated? The legendary investor, Warren Buffett, often says that the world has overlooked Coca-Cola's true value for too long. What is Coca-Cola's true value? The author of this book is an outsider with no connection to Coca-Cola. He is a journalist who spent a lot of time researching the history and stories of Coca-Cola in depth. This book has been highly praised as the best-written book in business history. The original English title of the book is "For God, Country, and Coca-Cola." It sounds like a national anthem. Can Coca-Cola be written alongside nation and religion? That seems a bit excessive. In 1985, during Coca-Cola's 100th anniversary, a significant decision was made: to change the taste of Coca-Cola.
This was done for two reasons. First, Coca-Cola's main competitor, Pepsi, the second-largest soft drink company, was fiercely competing with Coca-Cola. Second, market research showed that customers preferred a sweeter taste. When you hear about this new taste, it doesn't seem like a big change. It's just a little sweeter than before. But something unexpected happened. Many media outlets and the public were outraged, saying that Coca-Cola was betraying them. They said that changing the taste of Coca-Cola was like changing the color of the sky from green to purple. Some people even said that in their soul, there were only two things: God and Coca-Cola. Now, you've taken one of them away. In response to this problem, Coca-Cola decided to buy back all the products it had manufactured. And it never dared to change the taste of Coca-Cola again. Because they knew that the taste of Coca-Cola had entered the bloodstream and DNA of people all over the world.
When Coca-Cola was first created, it wasn't as famous as it is today. 100 years ago, it was just a regional beverage created in Atlanta, in the eastern United States. During World War II, Coca-Cola became a famous beverage throughout the United States. And it followed American soldiers to travel around the world. Until now, Coca-Cola has become the most popular beverage in the world. Every second, 20,000 bottles of Coca-Cola are sold worldwide. In one day, over 1.8 billion bottles are sold. This means that for every four people in the world, one person drinks a bottle of Coca-Cola every day. Next, let's talk about some of the secrets that made Coca-Cola the biggest beverage empire in the world. First, let's talk about Coca-Cola's marketing strategy. Second, how did the decision to grant bottling rights to regional distributors make Coca-Cola unique? And third, how did Coca-Cola leverage World War II to travel with American soldiers around the world? Now, let's start with the first important point: Coca-Cola's excellent marketing strategy. If you talk about Coca-Cola, everyone knows it. If you talk about its popularity, the word "Coca-Cola" is the most recognized word in the world after the English word "okay." Why is Coca-Cola so famous?
There are many stories behind it. If we talk about the creation of Coca-Cola, it was also a coincidence. A pharmacist in a remote area of Atlanta, Mr. John Clifford Pemberton, conducted an experiment by boiling sugar water with a special ingredient. He accidentally spilled it into soda water, which had gas in it. This accident created a beverage with a special and delicious taste. That's when the first bottle of Coca-Cola was born. But the fact that Coca-Cola was created as a complete beverage was not an accident. It was connected to the social situation of the United States at that time. In 1886, Americans were addicted to gold prospecting. Everyone dreamed of becoming rich. At that time, a group of people had the idea to create a medicine with a secret ingredient. No one knew what the ingredients in that medicine were. What they knew was that it contained alcohol, sedatives, and other addictive substances. Those things cost very little to produce. At that time, it was called a tonic, and it was widely sold everywhere, making huge profits. The original creator of Coca-Cola, Dr. John, also wanted to create such a medicine for sale. At that time, they were famous for a type of French wine that had a delicious taste and contained cocaine. John also created a similar wine to that French wine. And later, he named it "Coca French Wine," which contained three main ingredients: coca leaves, kola nuts, and grape wine. This type of wine could help people gain strength and increase their sexual performance. At that time, in Atlanta, this wine sold incredibly well. This made John a millionaire overnight.
He was about to expand the market for Coca French Wine to the entire United States when the Atlanta government announced that it would issue a new law prohibiting the sale of alcoholic beverages. This law prevented Coca French Wine from being sold in the free market anymore. Therefore, John began to research a new formula. He had to quickly create a new beverage formula that contained no alcohol and sell it on the market before the prohibition law officially took effect. Until now, this formula has been kept secret forever. They just know that this new formula still contains coca leaves and kola nuts, but no alcohol. Coca leaves contain cocaine. And kola nuts contain caffeine. These two ingredients are known to be the most important ingredients of Coca-Cola, after water and sugar. 16 years after Coca-Cola was circulated on the market, the American government issued a decree prohibiting the use of cocaine. So Coca-Cola removed this ingredient from its beverage. Of course, Coca-Cola never admitted this point.
Listening up to this point, you probably understand that Coca-Cola had a history as a powerful tonic that no one knew its exact ingredients. Coca-Cola's marketing strategy was simply to spend money. Spend money on advertising, so that wherever customers go, they see Coca-Cola. John's original saying was, "If I have $25,000, I will spend $24,000 on advertising. The remaining $1,000 is for production costs." You can imagine how much Coca-Cola values advertising. Coca-Cola is clear in itself that if one day Coca-Cola reduces its advertising efforts even a little, it probably won't be in the hearts of customers anymore. The special characteristic of Coca-Cola is not its secret formula. In this world, there are many delicious beverages that are more delicious than Coca-Cola. But what has made this beverage stand for over 100 years is its advertising and its pervasive marketing strategy. Below, I will present some of the strategies that Coca-Cola has used in the past. First, advertising other brands on newspapers and magazines, etc. At that time, people liked to use many words, with lots of difficult letters, written too long. Readers had to spend a long time to finish reading each advertisement. But Coca-Cola, at the end of the 19th century, did not do that. They only used their logo and a few slogans. Such as "Coca-Cola, delicious and refreshing."
And until now, Coca-Cola still uses this method. Second, what Coca-Cola does, besides advertising, is still advertising. Coca-Cola tried all possible methods in advertising its brand at that time. Such as using coupons, notebooks, advertisements on streetcars, murals, etc. And each advertisement was done with extreme care and everywhere. They drew the logo everywhere they could draw it, on school walls, house walls, etc. By 1914, the Coca-Cola murals that had been painted on walls covered over 500,000 square meters. Even Coca-Cola employees themselves said that wherever they looked, they saw Coca-Cola. They went crazy every day because they saw too much Coca-Cola advertising everywhere. Not only that, they also made many souvenirs such as calendars, books, cups, umbrellas, clothes, etc., and gave them away for free to customers and distributors. In just one year, 1913, Coca-Cola produced over 100 million products to be used for marketing. You need to know that 100 years ago, the population of the United States was only about 80 million people. This means that each American had at least one product distributed by Coca-Cola. This marketing strategy is still being used today. For example, in 1980, a Coca-Cola CEO said, "We want everyone in the world to see Coca-Cola advertising at least once a day." Of course, using such advertising methods only makes people see themselves. But if you want customers to be loyal to Coca-Cola, this type of advertising is not enough. Coca-Cola also tried to use famous people as ambassadors, which we often call "brand ambassadors." Most product brands invite goodwill ambassadors such as movie stars, singers, famous athletes, etc., to represent their products. But for Coca-Cola, no one would have imagined that they would invite the President of the United States to be a goodwill ambassador. In history, many US presidents, such as Truman, John F. Kennedy, Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton, etc., all said that they were fans of Coca-Cola. Those presidents drank and talked about Coca-Cola many times in public. If you think that this is something that the media accidentally captured, you are greatly mistaken.
Everything is planned and is just Coca-Cola's marketing strategy. For example, in 1963, when John F. Kennedy was President of the United States, he sent a letter to the CEO of Coca-Cola at that time. In it, it was written: "From a loyal customer." And the 39th President of the United States, Mr. Jimmy Carter, went even further. When he took office as president and immediately entered the White House, he banned Pepsi from being there. Only Coca-Cola was allowed. And he declared that "loving the United States means drinking Coca-Cola. Supporting the Democratic Party means supporting Coca-Cola." When there is a president standing behind them like this, Coca-Cola becomes even more confident. They make advertisements telling everyone that "loving the country means drinking Coca-Cola. Coca-Cola is truly the beverage that represents the American people." The words of the president are powerful. But American presidents are elected every four years. At most, two terms, which is eight years. But Coca-Cola still has another person who has not changed for hundreds of years, and that is Santa Claus. You probably imagine the image of Santa Claus: plump, wearing a red coat, a hat, and a long white beard, carrying a sack of gifts. This image came from Coca-Cola's advertising in 1931. Before that, Santa Claus was not like this.
He was thin and tall, and his clothes had all colors, not just red. Later, he became plump like this, probably because he drank too much Coca-Cola, it seems. Because at that time, due to strict laws, children were not allowed to be present in advertising spots. But Coca-Cola did not want to lose such a large child market segment. So they used the image of Santa Claus as a substitute. They let Santa Claus drink Coca-Cola and advertise for them. In that advertisement video, Santa Claus was riding his sleigh, delivering gifts to children. But he was too tired, so he stopped to drink a bottle of Coke. I think some of you have probably seen this advertisement. Nowadays, it's not surprising to do marketing by leveraging important events. But if we talk about over 70 years ago, this kind of thinking was truly highly innovative. Coca-Cola's marketing strategy should be written down in educational programs. Besides marketing, what we should praise about Coca-Cola is that no matter how the world changes, Coca-Cola always maintains its huge profits. How does Coca-Cola do it? This topic talks about the second important point that we want to show you all. That is, granting bottling rights to regional and country-specific distributors.
This licensing allows regional or national Coca-Cola partners to bottle Coke and market it themselves. The parent company of Coca-Cola only sells Coca-Cola syrup. Their partners only need to bottle the syrup and they can sell it. Where did this story come from? Let's go back to the late 19th century. You need to know that before, Coca-Cola was not bottled and canned like today. Originally, it was only served in glasses. Just like other beverages, Coca-Cola was sold in glasses at soda fountains on the streets. When a customer came to buy, the seller would put a lump of sugar with the taste of Coca-Cola into the glass, then pour soda water, add a little ice, and it was ready to sell. Atlanta is a hot region. People living in this region really like to drink cold beverages. On the streets, wherever there was a place to sell goods, you would definitely see ice boxes with only glasses of Coca-Cola inside. But if it relied on this marketing method, Coca-Cola could not expand itself much. Because in cold regions, people don't use ice boxes much. And in remote regions, there were no ice boxes either. So how could they sell to those regions? So, they had to bottle it. The author writes that the decision to bottle Coca-Cola was one of the smartest decisions Coca-Cola ever made. And it was a complete coincidence. Why do I say that? To say it was a coincidence is because originally, the owner of Coca-Cola at that time did not think about bottling it. Because selling in glasses was already profitable. In 1899, when Coca-Cola in glasses was selling very well, two young men came to see the owner of Coca-Cola at that time, Mr. Candler, to ask him to grant them the right to bottle Coca-Cola. At first, Candler refused. But later, he thought that there was nothing to lose, so he decided to sign a contract granting bottling rights to those two young men. By selling Coca-Cola syrup to them at a price of $1 per gallon. And letting them bottle and sell it themselves.
Later, that contract left some serious consequences. First, the contract did not specify an expiration date. Legally, it was valid forever. This meant that Coca-Cola could not revoke the bottling rights from those two people. Second, the contract did not state whether, if the price of sugar went up in the future, the price of Coca-Cola syrup could also go up with the sugar. Later, sugar prices did go up. Coca-Cola asked to raise the price of its syrup, but the bottlers did not agree. Both sides sued each other for many years. Third, Coca-Cola did not sell the bottling rights for Coca-Cola syrup. Later, as more and more bottling companies emerged, the problems became more and more numerous. Such as whether Coca-Cola syrup should be more expensive or not. Who pays for marketing expenses? And does this bottling right include new Coca-Cola products or not? All these issues had to be debated. Because of these issues, both sides went to court many times. If we talk about this model, the original Coca-Cola company lost a lot because of a single piece of paper. From year to year, they could only watch the Coca-Cola bottling companies make money. But if you think more deeply, it was a very smart decision by Coca-Cola. How smart? Coca-Cola leveraged the regional bottling companies to expand its market. And it pushed a large part of the risks to the bottling companies as well. It just sat back and collected money from selling Coca-Cola syrup. Later, the owner of Coca-Cola said one word: "Everyone involved with Coca-Cola all have money." Both the wholesalers, retailers, advertisers, even the truck drivers who transport goods. And the most important people are the bottlers themselves. Only by doing this could Coca-Cola grow rapidly in a short period of time.
This was not difficult for Coca-Cola. Because the capital needed to produce Coca-Cola syrup was not much. The main ingredients were caffeine, water, and sugar. Combined, they did not even equal 10% of the final selling price of Coca-Cola. Therefore, the company could leave a large percentage of the profits to those who participated in marketing and selling Coca-Cola. This is why those who had the right to bottle Coca-Cola received the largest percentage of profits. And they were also the ones who spent the most on marketing and advertising. Therefore, when expanding its market to a certain region, Coca-Cola always chose people who had potential and power in that region or country. For example, in Japan, they cooperated with the biggest company in Japan, Mitsui Group. And in India, they cooperated with Indian religious leaders, etc. They leveraged their power and influence to conquer the regional market. Moreover, the government also did not bother Coca-Cola much. If there was a problem, those bottling companies would solve it immediately. Coca-Cola did not need to worry about it. At the same time, Coca-Cola played the role of a model company. Providing local job opportunities and boosting the national economy as well. One arrow killed three birds. Furthermore, not only that, Coca-Cola also pushed a large part of the risks to the bottling companies.
Because later, Coca-Cola stopped selling Coca-Cola syrup and started selling Coca-Cola concentrate, which no longer had sugar in it. They left it to the bottlers to add water and sugar in appropriate amounts according to the formula, then they could sell it. By doing this, Coca-Cola no longer needed to bear the risk of rising sugar prices. Therefore, even if the world changed many times, such as World War II, the global economic crisis, the Cold War, etc., even if everyone was suffering, Coca-Cola could still stand strong. For almost 100 years, Coca-Cola has been very happy. It has never lost money once. Until 1986, on the occasion of Coca-Cola's 100th anniversary, the company decided to start bottling itself. It was named CCE. But later, due to huge losses, it decided to close down in 2006, losing over $1.1 billion. Let's move on to the last point. How did Coca-Cola follow American soldiers to travel around the world? After the United States declared war, the owner of Coca-Cola announced that "no matter where American soldiers go, whenever, wherever, we must ensure that American soldiers can buy a bottle of Coca-Cola for only $0.05." What he said, he did. As long as you wear an American soldier's uniform, you can buy a bottle of Coke for only 50 cents. So, during World War II, wherever there were American soldiers, there was Coca-Cola. If you asked an American soldier why they were fighting, they would probably say that they continued to fight because they wanted to have the right to buy Coca-Cola for 50 cents. Thus, Coca-Cola trucks could drive alongside military convoys carrying weapons for the United States.
No other beverage in the world has ever received such a special right. To be able to serve the needs of American soldiers and also have their full support, Coca-Cola built 64 bottling plants all over the region. During World War II, Coca-Cola sold 10 billion bottles to American soldiers. Later, the American government removed Coca-Cola from the beverage category and put it in the food category. This position was even higher. This meant that Coca-Cola was no longer just a refreshing drink. It was something you had to drink after a meal. Okay, that's all the important content in this book. Let's summarize briefly. First, we talked about Coca-Cola's pervasive marketing strategy. Coca-Cola has a secret formula. So it pays a lot of attention to promotion. I believe you have all seen Coca-Cola advertising. And their advertising is simple. Just put their red and white logo and a few slogans. Not only that, they also hired celebrities and even presidents to be goodwill ambassadors, especially Santa Claus. Second, granting bottling rights to others was a correct decision by Coca-Cola. Even though it happened by coincidence, at that time, one arrow killed three birds. Third, associating itself with the American military. During World War II, it traveled around the world. It became a beverage that represented the American people, famous all over the world. After Coca-Cola was founded until now, it has received many criticisms. Such as the ingredients of Coca-Cola containing caffeine. Drinking too much makes people addicted. And the gas makes teeth decay. And sugar makes people fat, etc. There were even accusations that Coca-Cola damaged the environment due to bottle waste and land excavation, etc. But Coca-Cola can still stand strong without crumbling. Coca-Cola can still do it, even though different regions, different languages, different customs, and different cultures exist. But Coca-Cola always receives support. Because Coca-Cola brings happiness and refreshing feelings to people all over the world.