8. Pepsi's strategy

I wanted to introduce you some interesting IT brand or news, but I could not find it.
Well, I chosed Pepsi this week because I posted about Coca-Cola before.


PepsiCo, which is known as NO.2 coke company, now becomes the most powerful rival to Coca-Cola. Before, they seemed to have kind of complex under the shadow of Coca-Cola, but how have they grown up as much as threatening the NO.1 postion of Coca-Cola? You might think Pepsi is selling just soft drinks. Unlike Coca-ocla, Pepsi is not a company which focuses on only beverage market. They diversified the range of field in food industry from the early year. One part is snack and another is restaurant business. In 2000, Pepsi made 66% of total sales through 'Frito-Lay' which is a snack business line in PepsiCo. The brand 'Frito-Lay' which produces kind of potato chips and corn chips, occupaies 60% of American market and 40% of world market.

Pepsi also had a hard time to get into the distribution channels which Coca-Cola had already dominated. Therefore, they turned their attention to the restaurant business. PeopiCo took over several chain restaurants: Pizza Hut, KFC, Taco-Bell, and so on. It was the opportunity to receive real evaluation about Pepsi cola from customers. Although those restaurant business line was seperated from Pepsi group due to the difficulty in managing the group getting bigger, those three restaurant chains contributed to the present brand image of Pepsi.

In beverage business, they diversified into other three parts: mineral water, sports drink, juice.
The demand in mineral water is growing every country in the world, and with Gatorade, Pepsi became NO.1 in the sports drink market. Moreover, in the juice market, Pepsi became NO.1 by taking over juice company 'Tropicana'.

Although Coca-Cola still might be recognized as the best coke brand, Pepsi has enlarged the range of their business in the growing field, overcame some difficulties and made synergy effect with other business lines. Well, Coca-Cola could keep the position with traditional taste and brand image until now, but they also need to catch up the change of customer needs and taste.
/posted by 20500580