The Coca-Cola Company :: 2005 Annual Review

Home
Introduction
Letter to Shareowners
Letter Letter 2 Letter 3 Letter 4
Financial Highlights
The Company Today
Performance Review
Board of Directors
Management
Policy and Statements
Shareowner Information

2005 Annual Report on
Form 10-K

Take a Survey | Order Reports | Downloads


  < Page 7
8 of 32
Page 9  />

Unit Case Volume (in billions) Net Operating Revenues (in millions)

2003 = 19.4, 2004 = 19.8, 2005 = 20.6 2003 = $20,857, 2004 = $21,742, 2005 = $23,104

Platform for Sustainable Growth: In my letter to you a year ago, I identified six areas of focus required to accelerate sustainable growth. We made meaningful progress in each of these areas in 2005.

Build on our fundamental strengths: To help improve execution around the world, the Company revised its organizational structure in March 2005, creating the East, South Asia and Pacific Rim Group; the European Union Group; and the North Asia, Eurasia and Middle East Group. On February 1, 2006, we appointed Muhtar Kent as president, Coca-Cola International, to manage our business outside of North America. The leaders of our international operations reporting to Muhtar are Alex Cummings, Africa; Glenn Jordan, East, South Asia and Pacific Rim; Dominique Reiniche, European Union; and José Octavio Reyes, Latin America. Don Knauss continues to report to me and to lead our North America Group. Muhtar also leads the North Asia, Eurasia and Middle East Group.

This strong leadership team--together with a new organizational structure--increases our ability to monitor and fine-tune execution in individual markets. These operating group leaders are members of our Executive Committee, which is composed of 15 leaders with 264 years of combined Coca-Cola system experience--a very real expression of our commitment to talent development within our system.

Under the leadership of Sandy Douglas, our chief customer officer, we are working with our worldwide bottling system to significantly improve our ability to create value with and for our customers. Our new collaborative customer relationship process has been refined in three lead markets--Japan, Mexico and Switzerland--and is now being implemented with key customers in other markets around the world. In an increasingly complex retail environment, we are working together with our customers to improve shopper marketing and supply chain collaboration and to accelerate innovation in order to provide superior beverage selections to every consumer on every shopping trip.

Generate new avenues for growth through core brands, with a focus on diet and light products: Last year, we continued to see strong results for carbonated soft drinks, led by our core brands--Coca-Cola, Diet Coke, Sprite and Fanta. Coca-Cola, the world's best-loved soft drink, grew 2 percent in unit case volume in 2005, the highest rate of growth in five years. We also introduced several new Trademark Coca-Cola diet and light products, including Diet Coke Sweetened with Splenda and Coca-Cola Zero in North America. By the end of 2005, Coca-Cola Zero approached a 1 percent share in supermarkets--a significant accomplishment for a new beverage--and I believe the product will be among the North America Group's top-10 carbonated soft-drink brands in 2006.

In North America, we relaunched Fresca--with new flavors, graphics and packaging--driving unit case volume growth of 16 percent in the last quarter of 2005. Diet Sprite Zero/ Sprite Zero also posted impressive unit case volume gains, increasing 16 percent globally. As we began 2006, we launched Black Cherry Vanilla Coca-Cola and Diet Black Cherry Vanilla Coca-Cola in North America, putting Vanilla Coke and Diet Vanilla Coke on hiatus as we cycle in new products and effectively manage shelf space. In 2006, we continue our focus on diet and light products to capitalize on the strong 4 percent unit case volume growth we had in 2005.

Continue to expand into other profitable segments of the nonalcoholic beverage industry: Globally, our Company significantly outperformed the market in juice and juice drinks and sports drinks, capturing more than one-third of the worldwide growth in juice and juice drinks and more than half of the growth in sports drinks.

We are the largest juice and juice drink company in the world: Minute Maid is available in 80 countries and unit case volume grew 11 percent in 2005, with share improvement in a number of key markets driven by products such as Minute Maid Premium Heart Wise and Minute Maid Premium Kids+. And in Nigeria, our Five Alive juice brand unit case volume grew 47 percent in 2005.


  < Page 7
8 of 32
Page 9  />

Site Use/Legal  |  www.coca-cola.com ©2006 The Coca-Cola Company, all rights reserved