Coca-Cola are now selling milk as their markets move away from consuming sugary drinks, how much of this is due to the baby boomer era coming to an end?
Following yesterday’s post on McDonalds and the franchising model, it’s worthwhile considering how other businesses are being affected by today’s changing society.
Certainly the fast food industry is one of the most deeply affected as KFC owner Yum Food starts experimenting with a modernised layouts and menus to counter the drift in consumer tastes.
KFC are not alone in struggling with this as McDonalds experiments with own changes in response to the demographic and market shifts.
McDonalds’, KFC’s and most particularly Coca-Cola’s Twentieth Century success is largely due to the post war baby boom, as the children born during and after World War II reached adolescence – the Jagger generation as described by Irish economist David McWilliams – they indulged themselves in their newfound wealth and personal freedoms that were unthinkable for their parents who struggled through two world wars and a depression.
Coca-Cola was the emblem of that freedom and wealth which made up the twentieth century American dram that the world envied, adopted and copied. Today the world still looks to the United States but its a different America they see.
As the Jagger generation retires and sugary drinks are no longer their first priority their kids and grandkids are looking to different beverages; coffee, energy drinks, bottled water and, possibly, milk which are more in line with their lifestyles.
The task of Coca-Cola, and all the other brands that represented post War American affluence, the task now is to adapt to a very different generation and a society with priorities very different to that of the previous century.