Pest-ered Coke carts in Minute Maid

NEW DELHI: Buffeted by pesticide-in-cola charges and declining sales of its carbonated drinks, Coca-Cola is hitting the health trail.

The company will soon introduce its Minute Maid brand of orange juice in India, pitching it against arch rival PepsiCo’s moderately successful Tropicana range and home-grown major Dabur’s Real & Active brands, which have 58% market share.

The fruit juice market is India is worth about Rs 250 crore and has hit an explosive 35% growth trajectory as Indians turn more health-conscious.

Coke is already present in the Rs 1,250 crore fruit drinks segment (drinks having less than 10% pulp content) through Maaza, the brand it bought in 1993 from Parle Agro Products.

The fruit drinks segment is growing at a furious 50% annually in India.

Parle’s Frooti and Maaza are the leaders in the segment with a 38% and 35% market share, respectively.

Minute Maid will be the first non-carbonated soft drink product to come out of the Coke stable after its not-so-successful attempt to introduce Georgia tea and coffee three years back. Coke has stopped making fresh investments in Georgia.

The company has been witnessing declining cola sales in the last three years. According to the quarterly report that The Coca-Cola Company filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission in July 2006, unit case volume in India continued to decline in the second quarter of 2006.

Sources said Coke may be thinking about introducing the whole range of Minute Maid products down the line.

The orange juice will initially be sold in PET or plastic bottles imported from Coke’s overseas facilities.

Globally, the Minute Maid brand comprises orange juice and blends, other light beverages, lemonades, punches and many more non-soda beverages.

A Coke spokesperson said the company is thinking of launching several new products in India, but declined to give further details.

Industry watchers find the timing of the new launch rather interesting, coming as it does just when the company is trying hard to position itself on the health platform.

The launch of Minute Maid will come right after a major organisational shake-up in Coke’s Indian operations. Several new faces have been added to the management team. These include three new vice-presidents who will be responsible for region wise sales, besides a new vice-president for corporate strategy and a fresh marketing chief.

All these positions have been filled by people who have either worked in Coca-Cola India in different capacities earlier or have held senior positions in Coke’s other operations across the globe.

Milind Sathe is being brought from Coke Russia to head the crucial South and West regional operations, while Sumanto Dutta is coming from Atul Singh’s former office in Coke China and will look after sales in the entire northern region.

Venkatesh Kinni, who has earlier worked in Coke India and FMCG companies such as Cadbury’s, is being appointed as vice-president marketing, whereas another former Coke India employee - Sandeep Gupta - is the new head of corporate strategy.

Vikas Chawla is replacing Jaspal Singh as vice president looking after franchisee bottlers; he comes from Coke’s Sri Lankan operations. Vineet Kapila will continue to look after the South West Asia region, which includes operations in Sri Lanka, Nepal, Maldives and Bangladesh as the fourth operational vice president..

This latest round of new appointments comes more than a year after Coca-Cola India was split right down the middle, when the Atlanta headquarters created two separate functions.

The entire bottling function was put under John Ustas whereas the India division head was asked to look after only franchisee bottlers and the marketing function. But will the new faces help bring a fresh lease of life to Coke’s India stint and stem the tide of sliding sales? Only time can tell.