BackAfter Thums Up and Sprite, Coca-Cola sets goal for Maaza to reach $1 billion
Opening up of markets following the easing of the pandemic and a general uptick in beverage consumption has prompted the local arm of the US beverage maker to raise its stakes in the Indian consumer goods market
PremiumNEW DELHI : After scaling the milestone of $1 billion in annual sales for its Thums Up and Sprite brands, Coca-Cola India said on Tuesday that it is on track to ensure that its mango drink Maaza reaches $1 billion in annual sales by 2024.
“We would love to have one juice brand getting into that ($1 billion portfolio) very clearly—that’s our ambition. It may take a little bit longer, may not be by next year. Because one of the issues which happened is that this year, the mango crop has fallen, the price of mango is obnoxiously high. We have done good work in building operations for Maaza. If it happens, it’s good but definitely it will happen by 2024; if it happens by 2023 it will be a bonus," Sanket Ray, president for India and South-West Asia, Coca-Cola, said during a media interaction at the company’s headquarters in Gurugram.
Earlier this year, Coca-Cola announced that Thums Up, which it had acquired in the 90s in India, became the first brand from its Indian portfolio to touch $1 billion in annual sales; this was followed by news of its lemon-flavoured beverage Sprite that too reached the milestone last month.
According to the company, lower pack sizes and a greater focus on occasion-based drinking is helping drive consumption of its beverages in India.
Ray said Coca-Cola has invested more money into marketing in the second half of the year to reap benefits of it in the next summer season.
Opening up of markets following the easing of the pandemic and a general uptick in beverage consumption has prompted the local arm of the US beverage maker to raise its stakes in the Indian consumer goods market.
Earlier this year the company said its bottling partners will boost capacity by 30%-40 by the end of this fiscal with its bottlers also committing large investments.
Meanwhile, Ray said that Coca-Cola continues to fight inflation in its beverage business by initiating cost-saving measures and passing on higher costs to consumers where possible.
“So it’s actually double whammy—inflation plus currency depreciation. We have a large portion of PET in everything, which goes up. Commodity cycle overall is challenging. We are following two roadmaps—the revenue management strategy and also the enterprise wide saving initiatives which we had done," he said. The company raised product prices by 3-4% at the start of the year, mainly on large pack sizes while maintaining prices of its ₹10 and ₹20 packs. It also removed consumer promotions on some packs.
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