Coke management [sic] team wins the Duh! award

The latest reports on Coke financials shows world-wide growth, above expectations performance - except for North America. It reports that Coke will be spending 300 - 400 Million extra dollars on marketing in 2005 in an effort to get North American sales back in line with their growth expectations:

In North America, a key business unit for Coke, unit case volume declined 1 percent in the fourth quarter, while full-year unit case volume in North America was flat.

But at the same time that the Coke management [sic] team is planning this massive expenditure of corporate funds, Coke remains more committed to a political agenda than increasing shareholder value. Forcing political correctness upon their customer base remains their priority.

Here in the State of Georgia a Mason Dixon poll showed that 79% of Georgians want a Georgia Flag FAIR Vote, and Coke is one of the members of the Atlanta Chamber that has worked to PREVENT a Georgia Flag FAIR Vote.

This year the Georgia Flag FAIR Vote Act - HB 15 sits locked in committee and remember it was the Atlanta Chamber that publicly bragged about their success is stealing the Georgia Flag, discrediting Southern Heritage and PREVENTING a Georgia Flag FAIR Vote!

Not only is this an unholy influence on government and anti-Southern political correctness it is stupid business management! How many Coke stockholders buy Coke stock to promote political correctness?

Some stockholders may begin to wonder if the Coke management [sic] team failed Customer Relations 101?

Insulting your most loyal customer base has never been the key to increased sales! Duh!

Some stockholders may begin to wonder if the Coke management [sic] team also failed Marketing 101?

Placing a political agenda of political correctness at a higher priority than promoting products has never increased sales! Duh!

So while Coke management [sic] establishes an increase of 300 - 400 Million dollars to try to bring Coke sales in North America up to expectations, they continue to make the expenditure a failure by continuing their politically correct agenda. For this we award Coke Management the Duh! Award.

Why are North American sales under expectations?

Duh! We live in North America and thousands of former Coke loyal customers are fed up with Coke's anti-Southern agenda, Coke's insults and their effort to buy unholy influence in our government. We used to buy a lot of Coke products, but do not anymore!

Since Coke is willing to spend 300 - 400 Million dollars to continue ignoring our effort, maybe we should start a newspaper ad campaign! I bet a $200 nice display ad in selected newspapers can generate more boycott participants than a Million dollars of slick Coke advertising can replace!

This is just another example of how Coke management seemed to have failed Marketing 102 also:

Your existing - satisfied customers are the best prospects for new products. Former customers that are boycotting your products do not buy much. Duh!

Folks, start giving some consideration to this idea. If everybody that is participating would contribute $5.00 - 10.00 per year, we could buy three or four newspaper ads a week.

Next Monday we will be sending the next letter to Coke. If they continue to ignore us, we will look into such a newspaper ad campaign and get your opinion.

In the meantime if you are fed up with Coke's politically correct agenda and their anti-Southern attitude continue to spread the word and get signatures on the online petition.

The Coca-Cola Company Should Get Out of Politics Petition

Email This page

Preview of Next Letter To Coke, to be mailed February 21, 2005

By the way, as Coke continues to support the anti-Southern agenda of the politically correct, they are going to promote a culture that they prefer:

Islamic holy month of Ramadan

So if you buy Coke products not only are you supporting an anti-Southern agenda, you are also promoting Islam!

Coke Earnings Jump but Firm Dissatisfied with Results

Beverage Giant to Look at Marketing

POSTED: 5:06 am EST February 17, 2005

ATLANTA -- The Coca-Cola Co., the world's largest beverage maker, said Wednesday it will renew its focus on marketing Diet Coke as it reported it isn't satisfied with a 30 percent increase in fourth-quarter earnings because of only modest growth in revenue and volume.

The results beat Wall Street expectations and drove investors to send Coke shares upward. Still, executives said Coke's performance in recent months doesn't meet the standards that the company and the public have come to expect.

"We believe that Coca-Cola still has much work to do, as there are several markets that require attention," UBS analyst Caroline Levy said in a research note.

She added that rival PepsiCo Inc. of Purchase, N.Y., may be building reserves to respond to any potential strategic initiatives by Coke, which could hamper Coke's efforts to retool its business.

"While Coca-Cola appears to be moving in the right direction, we will likely require further visibility on the success of (its) new initiatives before revisiting our view," she said.

For the three months ending Dec. 31, Atlanta-based Coke said it earned $1.20 billion, or 50 cents a share, compared to a profit of $927 million, or 38 cents a share, a year ago.

Excluding one-time items, Coke said it earned $1.12 billion, or 46 cents a share. That beat the 40 cents a share that analysts surveyed by Thomson First Call were expecting.

Revenue in the quarter was $5.26 billion, a 2 percent increase from the $5.18 billion recorded a year ago.

Coke shares rose 65 cents, or 1.5 percent, to close at $43.30 Wednesday on the New York Stock Exchange.

Despite the results, chief executive Neville Isdell said he wasn't happy. He noted the slim revenue growth and worldwide unit case volume growth of only 2 percent for all of 2004. In North America, a key business unit for Coke, unit case volume declined 1 percent in the fourth quarter, while full-year unit case volume in North America was flat.

Donald Knauss, head of Coke's North America unit, said the company plans accelerated marketing in 2005. In particular, he said the company plans a "major reemphasis" of Diet Coke to deal with an increasingly diet-conscious public.

"We believe there is tremendous opportunity to meet the consumer trends on health and wellness," Knauss said.

Earlier this month, Coca-Cola said it will begin selling Diet Coke sweetened with sugar substitute Splenda in the spring. Rival PepsiCo plans to reformulate its single-calorie drink Pepsi One with the sweetener as well.

Diet Coke with Splenda will have a distinct label with the name of the sweetener on it as well as a yellow streak. Coca-Cola will continue to sell traditional Diet Coke, which is flavored with aspartame, separately.

Chief financial officer Gary Fayard said the increased marketing and weak performance in certain markets will weigh down the company's results in 2005, though he did not provide details on earnings per share guidance, in keeping with company policy.

In the company's unit that includes Europe, parts of Asia and the Middle East, unit case volume increased 3 percent in the fourth quarter, though volume in the region was flat for the year in part because of Coke's performance in Germany, where unit case volume declined 15 percent in the quarter and 11 percent for the year.

Unit case volume grew 4 percent in the quarter in the company's Africa and Latin America units.

In November, Isdell told investors the company needs to execute better.

Among the plans to boost growth: much more advertising. The company plans to spend an additional $350 million to $400 million on marketing this year, shifting its ads from local, promotional types to big-media buys that could span an entire country or continent.

The company has asked five marketing agencies to each create an ad varying in length up to 90 seconds that involves themes that cross different cultures and geographies. Three themes it is trying to focus on are iconic, football (soccer) and holidays like Christmas and the Islamic holy month of Ramadan.

Once completed in the spring, each country that Coke does business in will be given the option to use any one or more of the spots.

"The goal is to be more consistent and bring back some bigness to brand Coca-Cola," spokesman Kelly Brooks said. He described it as Coke's "attempt to restore its global iconic status."

The company's last truly global marketing campaign was its "Always" slogan that was used from 1993-1999, Brooks said. The slogan was meant to capture Coke's enduring qualities past, present and future, Brooks said

Last month, Coke announced several management changes and the resignation of its North American marketing boss.

For all of 2004, Coke said it earned $4.85 billion, or $2 a share, compared to earnings of $4.35 billion, or $1.77 a share, for the previous year. Twelve-month revenue was $21.96 billion, compared to $21.04 billion in 2003.