The Coca-Cola Company third quarter and year to-date operating results announced this week provided some interesting insights into beverage trends.
Among its performance highlights The Coca-Cola Company reported:
- Global volume growth of 1% in the third quarter and 2% year to date and gained volume and value share in non-alcoholic ready-to-drink (NARTD) beverages in the quarter.
- Global sparkling beverage volume was even in the quarter and grew 1% year to date.
- On a global basis the Company gained volume and value share in core sparkling beverages in the quarter due, in part, to successful execution of the Share a Coke marketing campaign in many markets around the world.
- Worldwide brand Coca-Cola volume was even in the quarter while Sprite and Fanta both grew 1%.
- Worldwide still beverage volume grew 2% in the quarter and 5% year to date, with tea contributing 4% volume growth in the quarter and both water and energy drinks volume growing 7%. Volume growth in these beverage categories was partially offset by a decline in juices and juice drinks, and a decline in sports drinks.
- The Company maintained global volume share while gaining global value share in total still beverages in the quarter and gained value share in juices and juice drinks, ready-to-drink tea, energy drinks and packaged water.
Among the financial results reported net revenues were even in the quarter and declined 2% year to date. Excluding the impact of structural changes, comparable currency neutral net revenues grew 1% in the quarter and 2% year to date.
Global unit case volume grew 1% in the quarter and 2% year to date. Coca-Cola International volume grew 1% in the quarter while North America volume declined 1%. Global price/mix increased 1% in both the quarter and year to date.
Muhtar Kent, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of The Coca-Cola Company said, “Earlier this year, we announced five strategic priorities to restore momentum and reinvigorate long-term sustainable growth. While we have begun to see early signs of progress, we recognize that we need to increase the scope and pace of change as we continue to face a challenging macroeconomic environment. We are therefore taking actions to strengthen our long-term financial performance, including further aligning our organization and our incentive plans to drive revenue and profit growth, increasing our productivity target to $3 billion in annualized savings by 2019, streamlining and simplifying our organization, and proceeding with plans for refranchising the majority of Company-owned North American bottling territories by the end of 2017. While these actions will take time to implement, we are confident that they will position The Coca-Cola Company to continue delivering sustainable value to our shareowners as we work toward our 2020 Vision.”