Coke India chases distant dream of cracking into top-three league

Low consumption, slowing sales pose challenges

Coca-Cola’s India unit has been eyeing the league of top five of the beverages maker’s global markets for quite some time now. James Quincey, Coca-Cola’s global chief executive, during his maiden visit to India earlier this month, set an ambitious target for India to become the third-largest market for Coke.

The target looks distant. Coca-Cola’s business in India still remains far behind China, currently the fifth-largest market for Coca-Cola globally. Consumption of Coca-Cola products in China is more than 150 per cent higher than in India.

The third- and fourth-largest markets, Japan and Brazil, respectively, consume much more than China’s