As James Quincey steps down after nine years in the top role, Coca-Cola veteran and current COO Henrique Braun is ready to hit the ground running.
After 30 years with Coca-Cola, he understands the company from many angles: having worked in various roles, divisions and countries.
The Coca-Cola company has built up a portfolio of 32 billion dollar brands (and many more besides), while the company has unmatched reach and recognition.
“While we are proud of what we have accomplished, future success is never guaranteed,” he said. “We must remain discontented. Every day, our system needs to focus on being a little bit better and sharper everywhere to drive transformational impact.”
1) Bringing in younger consumers
Braun wants to keep new generations coming to Coca-Cola and its products: aiming for a ‘step change’ in recruitment of consumers.
Brand Coca-Cola is a great starting point: but the company now offers many other products that go beyond its traditional sodas and are likely to appeal to Gen Z. That includes Bodyarmor, the up-and-coming sports drink that’s levelling up to Gatorade and Bodyarmor; milk brand Fairlife, RTD tea Fuze, and RTD canned cocktails such as Jack Daniels and Coke (a partnership with Brown Forman).
“We will aim to step-change recruitment, especially with the young adult consumers, by better integrating our marketing campaigns with commercial execution at the point of sale,” Braun said.
“We already have a good starting point. In the US, for example, we have 10 of the top 20 beverage brands for young adult drinkers, including Coca-Cola, which is the #1 beverage brand.”
2) Improve speed to market
CPG giants like Coca-Cola have always been weighed down by the size of their operations. And Braun wants to hone down on how innovation can get better, faster.
“We need to get closer to the consumer and improve our speed to market,” he said. “While we have made some progress with our overall success rates over the past several years, our innovation today is not where it needs to be.
“We are striving to better anticipate the next growth opportunity in beverages and shape what comes next, driven by our deep consumer insight.”
Coca-Cola has always championed its ‘consumer-centric innovation’, but Braun is keen to look to local markets for inspiration. He gestures to the success of Santa Clara: the 102-year-old Mexican dairy brand that’s just achieved billion dollar brand status.
“When I say that we want to be closer to the consumer, that is to understand them from a local point of view and not miss that opportunity to start in a local market, something that can turn into a $1 billion brand later and then scale,” he said.
“We have put a lot of efforts in discipline on how to grown the brand, learn how to grow them, and leverage scale.”
On the flip side, Coca-Cola famously cut back 400 brands to 170 during and leading up to the pandemic, pruning back the ones that weren’t delivering to accelerate the pace on those that were.
3) Digital first strategy
Coca-Cola’s digital strategy encompasses everything from integrating AI to spearheading the use of next-generation tech.
With a system and supply chain spanning bottling partners, ingredient suppliers, retailers, consumers and much more, digital helps pin all these operations together.
And then there’s pushing the boundaries of what new tech can do: such as with a five year strategic partnership with Microsoft which is designed to accelerate cloud and generative AI initiatives.
Coca-Cola has already created the role of Chief Digital Officer: which will bring together digital, data and operational capabilities, with a ‘clear mandate to enhance speed, effectiveness and efficiency at every level’.
“We must be intentional about putting digital at the core of every connection with consumers, customers and across the system,” said Braun.
