Read the case study below and answer the questions that follow. Coca Cola Coca-Cola is the most popular soft drink in th

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Read the case study below and answer the questions thatfollow.
Coca Cola
Coca-Cola is the most popular soft drink in the world. It’s soldalmost everywhere, and its brand name is known in most languages.The Coca-Cola Company (TCCC) manufactures and sells not onlyCoca-Cola itself, but also a wide range of other beverages, likeFanta, Sprite, water, juices, and energy drinks. The brand owes itssuccess primarily to the product itself as well as its iconicmarketing campaigns that position Coke as a drink with a fun andactive lifestyle. But there’s one factor a person might miss whenexplaining the wildly successful product: the Coca-Cola supplychain is one of the most wide-reaching, seamless operations in theworld. The History of Coca-Cola’s Success and ManufacturingMilestones Before we start talking about the Coca-Cola supplychain, let’s take a look at the key milestones in the history ofthis legendary drink. • In 1886, Dr John Pemberton, a pharmacist inAtlanta, invented a flavoured syrup mixed with carbonated water. Atthose times, there was a belief that carbonated water had a goodimpact on health, so Coca-Cola was actually sold as a medicine atsoda fountains.
• In 1888, Dr Pemberton sold his business to Atlantabusinessman, Asa G. Candler., who expanded the beverage sales tosoda fountains beyond Atlanta.
• In 1894, Joseph Biedenharn was the first to start sellingCoca-Cola in bottles.
• In 1899, three enterprising businessmen in Tennessee gotexclusive rights to bottle and sell Coca-Cola, thus starting thecompany’s worldwide bottling system.
• In 1929, the first Coca-Cola slogan, “The Pause ThatRefreshes,” appeared in the Saturday Evening Post
• In 1977, the contoured Coca-Cola bottle was trademarked, andthe first marketing efforts were made, which then turned Coca-Colainto the world’s most well-known beverage brand. Coca-Cola SupplyChain: What Makes It So Remarkable? Coca Cola’s VP of CustomerLogistics Wendy Manning once said the company is able to deliver adrink from a factory to a local store within 48 hours. The secretbehind this impressive figure is local sourcing, meaning that mostof the drinks are manufactured directly in the country where theyare sold. Coca-Cola has more than 900 bottling and manufacturingfacilities across the world, and its factories have some of theworld’s fastest production lines. It’s not just about the sheernumber of facilities, though.
These are other things that contribute to Coca-Cola’s supplychain:
1. Innovation Coca-Cola Enterprises seamlessly integrates moderntechnologies into its supply chain. For example, it uses 3Dprinting to manufacture bottles and cans for its drinks.
2. People Coca-Cola’s logistics team consists of more than 100people who ensure the safe journey of each bottle from factory tofridge.
3. Long-term relationships with retail partners Over the pastfew decades, Coca-Cola has proven to be one of the most valuableand reliable suppliers for its retail partners. One example is thatthe company has been growing together with McDonald’s since1955.
4. Supplier relationship management program Helen Davis, VP ofCoca-Cola Supply Chain in the US, conducts supplier innovationdays. During these events, the company’s procurement and marketingteams present the company’s market needs while the suppliers alsopresent their own latest innovations. The program also involvesquarterly meetings with key suppliers, where a mutual performancereview takes place.
5. Strict quality control Coca-Cola has strict qualityrequirements on its manufacturing practices. For example, Coca-ColaHBC, a bottling franchise partner of Coca-Cola Enterprises,requires quality, environment, and health safety certificationsfrom its suppliers.
6. Global Supply Chain Council The beverage giant establishedthe Global Supply Chain Council, which consists of subcommitteesthat focus on adhering to established Coca-Cola supply chainstrategy. The Council has its own centralized portal where theemployees and supply chain participants share their experiences andbest practices.
7. Close collaboration with bottlers The Coca-Cola Companyprovides a standard set of guidelines for all of its bottlingpartners and suppliers. As a result, most of the strategicdecisions are centralised. The headquarters controls most of thebottling partner’s operations, so each bottling partner servicesthe respective geographical area through a head office. Thebottler’s office works in tight collaboration with a regionaloffice under the direct supervision of The Coca-Cola ExportCorporation (TCCEC). The bottler’s head office connects theproduction plant with different distribution and sales centresacross the world, forming a coherent supply chain. All of theseaspects make Coca-Cola supply chain management one of a kind.
Coca-Cola Supply Chain: How It Works In a nutshell, Coca-Colabeverages go through the following destinations in theirjourney:
Manufacturer
• Distributor
• Retailer
• Consumer
Now let’s take a closer look at this journey. The typicalworkflow within Coca-Cola supply chain:
• The Coca-Cola Company headquarters in Atlanta manufacture theconcentrated syrup and sell it to Coca-Cola Enterprises (CCE) oranother bottling partner, which is responsible for selling theproduct in North America and Canada.
• The bottling partner sends it to a manufacturing facility,which mixes the syrup with other ingredients, such as filteredwater and sweeteners. After that, the bottler packages the finalproduct and distributes it to retail partners (stores, restaurants,vending machines)
• The Coca-Cola Export Corporation (TCCEC) partners with localbottlers across the world and distributes the drink to thecorresponding local markets. Coca-Cola Logistics Logistics is anintegral part of any supply chain, and Coca-Cola’s logisticsexpertise definitely contributes to its supply chain success. Hereare some of the logistics-related best practices implemented byCoca-Cola:
• Manufacturing products on a more frequent basis, e.g. once aweek
• Implementing weekly meetings between the teams worldwide
• Moving the production plants closer to customers
• Introducing daily interaction between the main sites
• Introducing seamless processes that are shared between allsupply chain participants. Does Coke’s Supply Chain ManagementInspire You? Coca-Cola’s manufacturing and supply chain managementhave inspired a lot of other businesses to be better. Butbusinesses today can scale growth at a much faster rate than onecould back in the early 1990s thanks to new software and automationtechniques. The takeaway here should be that the principlesCoca-Cola grew from still apply, even if the technology thatfacilitated that growth is outmoded
QUESTION TWO [25]
If Coca-Cola needs an easy-to-manage system that allows it toexert a great deal of control over workloads and user access, acentralised network makes the most sense. Decentralisedarchitecture may be more difficult to implement and maintain.Explain the concept of centralised and decentralised purchasing andwhether it would be suited for an organisation like Coca-Cola