After facing tough operating conditions in India due to demonetisation and GST in the past few months, beverages major Coca-Cola Company said that its India business has returned to growth in the third quarter.
The company, which announced its global results on Wednesday, said that it witnessed a high single-digit growth in terms of unit case volume in the India and Southwest Asia business unit in the July-September period.
Addressing an investor call post the announcement of its results, James Quincey, President and Chief Executive Officer, Coca-Cola Company, said that in the third quarter, India returned to growth with volumes up 6 per cent which was driven by solid performance across the portfolio. He said that the India business successfully moved past the recent difficulties related to demonetisation and implementation of GST in the first half of the year.
Talking about performance in the Asia-Pacific region, Coca-Cola Company said in a statement, “Unit case volume growth of 3 per cent was driven by low single-digit growth in the Greater China & Korea business unit and high single-digit growth in the India and southwest Asia business unit.” Unit case volume “means the number of unit cases (or unit case equivalents) of beverages directly or indirectly, sold by the company and its bottling partners to customers”.
Under its recently launched “fruit circular economy” initiative in India, the beverage major said that it will focus on adding Indian fruit juices to existing sparkling brands, launching new juice drinks based on Indian fruit flavours and exploring new beverage categories. “The programme supported the launch of Minute Maid Pulpy Mosambi, which helped the Minute Maid Pulpy brand grow triple digits in India during the quarter,” the company said.
The company has been focussed on several new launches to expand its product portfolio. Recently, the company had decided to extend its packaged water brand Kinley to launch a range of aerated beverages called the Kinley flavours to take on local rivals.