The Global Business Challenge
The Coca-Cola Company has been experiencing both product sales and consumer consumption declines
globally for its sugar-based soft drinks. These declines have been occurring consistently since the year 2000
in both the US and many critical global markets. Much of the decline is due to changes in consumer lifestyle,
the rise of competitive alternative soft drinks, the entry of other types of non-sugar drinks into the global
marketplace, as well as a continued focus on rising obesity rates and general health concerns.
Coca-Cola is at a crossroads concerning what they need to do to keep their products and brands fresh, as
well as address the apprehensions of the marketplace and the changing lifestyles of global consumers. This
is not a simple problem; it will require a combined and integrated effort across product development,
marketing, and distribution supply-chain networks within the Coca-Cola organization, if they are to be
successful.
This real case study is being addressed currently in the global arena with an actual business challenge and
set of marketing research requirements. You will have an opportunity to address a real business issue and
provide tangible recommended solutions based on desk research, industry assessments, proposed product
development strategies, and/or brand approaches, just as Coca-Cola and its research agency partners are
currently doing.
We have selected a business problem with a distinct research objective that must be addressed by Coca-
Cola for the organization to continue to be successful on a global basis. You will devise a strategy and propose a
research approach (e.g., research design) to fully identify what the problem is, conduct summary desk research,
and compare the problem across five global markets based on your understanding of the cultures and national
conditions within those markets—the five markets are Canada, Colombia, Sweden, Romania, and Malaysia.
You are to assemble an inclusive set of knowledge, data, articles, and reports detailing the issue affecting the
product and the Coca-Cola brand with respect to sales, health issues, brand positioning, product reputation, and
the targeting of a new strategy for Coca-Cola within these markets.
Your key learning is to consult with Coca-Cola to reinvigorate their brand and products on a global scale.
What methods or approaches will you use for your marketing research design and how confident should the
client be in the results. Please keep in mind culture, the targeted regional/global markets, and both a Coca-
Cola global, as well as regional/market strategies.
Summary of the Assignment:
• Problem: Coca-Cola must develop a global product and brand strategy to successfully retain its
product volume and brand image leadership within the global arena. You will look for a research
approach/design across the five target markets: Canada, Colombia, Sweden, Romania, and Malaysia.
• Your Assignment: the main content of your deck is to provide a recommended method and design
to conduct primary marketing research in each of the five identified markets to support the Coca
Cola Company in addressing their business challenge. While you will not be conducting the actual
primary research, you will need to provide a comprehensive research design that will support Coca-
Cola in understanding how you would solve the problem. You will need to understand the markets,
the cultures, decide on what methodology and types of methods (market and culture specific) to
use, anticipated outcomes, as well as a plan to report your insights.
MKT 843-301: International Marketing Research
MSU MSMR—Online Course
Assignment: Research Design/Brief— “The Global Future of Coca Cola in the 21st Century”
MKT 843-301: International Marketing Research Page 2
Research Brief Assignment: The Future of Coca Cola in the Global Landscape
Final
• Method: Secondary data/desk research, but also review blogs, social media, chat rooms, the
manufacturer’s site, etc. The design portion of the project will require you to develop a research
design and specify how you will address the business challenge within and across the 5 specified
markets.
• Results: Support desk research presented in tables, figures, diagrams, and summary insights to
address the main topic problem identified in the table below. Research design addressing
methodology, methods, sample frame, cultural influences across the 5 markets, infrastructure, and
proposed outcomes. Please note that you may or may not apply similar methods and
methodologies across markets based on cultural differences and infrastructure. Please justify your
choices and decisions.
• Discussion: How can you research and address the potential success and threats of reinvigorating
Coca-Cola’s products in these select markets that are truly innovative and culturally different from
the core corporate brand and its manufacturer of origin. This is very common for globalized brands,
as they must remain fresh and competitive in a rapidly changing market and under uncertain global
economic conditions. Based on what you have learned about global marketing research and global
business development, lay the foundation for a successful Coca-Cola strategy for the near future.
Problem Detailed Topic
Global Consumer Lifestyle Change The lifestyle of global consumers is changing
rapidly. There is a growing concern for health
and nutritional aspects of a healthy lifestyle.
Sugar drinks, and sodas in particular, are not
viewed as being healthy choices for global
consumers. Over the past few years, many
have drifted away from these products and
this has affected the Coca-Cola brand and its
offerings.
What should the Coca-Cola Company do to
confront this challenge? What types of
insights do they need to know from
consumers to be able to develop and
implement a successful global strategy? Be
sure to focus on culture and lifestyle “needs”
and “wants” for a cold drinks throughout the
five test markets. The coca cola assignment –
For instance exploratory design you can use it for all 5 markets, but we need to get used to 2 biggest things – we can take the subject as is about sugary drinks, health consciousness, do a little research of each market and tell what is the status of sugar drinks in each of these markets why do I need to research this and 2 other aspects – first, how do I handle culture in these markets, For example – In Canada the infrastructure we can use in an online survey if we do quantitative or in-person focus groups, about half of the population does not speak English as the main language, cover English, cover French. Think about the culture and infrastructure when we plot this out for each market. Ex – for Romania talk about what cultures they have, what kind of activities can I do such as an online board, an in-person focus group. Some markets are different such as Malaysia because the issue is that there are 3 major cultures.
We have a problem, we are looking at it cross multiple countries, so we need to look at the problem and decide if we can do focus group across all, or a survey in one. Cover all 5 markets
We can create a summation of all 5 markets,.
