PepsiCo has pushed deeper into ecommerce with two new direct-to-consumer websites selling core brands from Doritos to Gatorade. The websites are the product of a dedicated PepsiCo operating team of tech experts in Manhattan that are chasing consumer demand for online convenience. Industry watchers and PepsiCo bottlers are privately asking whether PepsiCo’s retail partners such as Walmart will view the direct-to-consumer initiative as a competitive threat. In addition, it appears PepsiCo won’t owe invasion fees to the company’s independent bottlers for products sold direct to consumers, which could create tension...

Since early March, BD has tracked the COVID-19 crisis through the eyes of beverage executives in the Coca-Cola, PepsiCo and independent bottling systems. By last week, a period of frenzied demand had given way to a more normalized sales pattern, bottlers and distributors said. Some are now bracing for...  Story includes direct comments from beverage bottlers and distributors.

After flying under the radar following its 2012 launch, Bang Energy sent a sonic boom across the US energy drink market during the past two years, surpassing an 8.0 dollar share in 2019. The brand, owned by Vital Pharmaceuticals (VPX), ignited what is now known as the “performance energy” segment, taking on established players such as Monster Energy by touting better ingredients, low or no sugar, and supplements such as creatine and branched-chain amino acids (BCAAs). Under threat, Monster Beverage launched a counter-attack early last year with Reign Total Body Fuel, using the company’s partnership with Coca-Cola’s US bottling system to shower retail stores with incremental floor displays and c-store cooler placements. Fast forward a year and the threat posed by Bang may have subsided...

Here’s what the entrepreneur Tal Shub imagines: A patron walks into a café holding a stylish, re-usable cup that includes a built-in lid and retractable straw. The consumer inserts their cup upside down into a port that resembles a shallow automobile cup holder. In seconds, the port.......this company offers a window into a beverage frontier where entrepreneurs are leveraging consumer concern over plastic waste and looking beyond the bottle to create new commercial opportunities...

Late last year, Coca-Cola Bottling United opened a new $86 million sales and distribution center in the metro Atlanta town of Union City, just south of Coca-Cola headquarters. The 456,000-sq-ft facility serves 10,000 retail customers in metro Atlanta, covering 2.8 million consumers. As many as 750 employees will manage the warehousing, picking and delivery of 36 million beverage cases per year. Manual order picking has been converted to an automated process built by System Logistics. Marketed as “Vertique,” the system is “an organized, more ergonomic and efficient sequential operation, with less stress on associates and not as labor intensive,” according to Coke United (click HERE for a video of the system). The Union City facility is among a series of investments by Coke United to modernize its distribution system since acquiring new territory, including Coke’s flagship metro Atlanta market in 2017. Last month, Coke United broke ground for construction of a $60 million, 300,000-sq-ft warehouse and sales center in the South Georgia town of Tifton, about an hour’s drive from the Georgia-Florida line. The facility will consolidate inventory from eight older and smaller facilities into a single automated order picking location when it opens by the end of 2021. Birmingham, Alabama-based Coke United, with franchise roots dating back to 1902, covers territory in Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Tennessee. The company is Coca-Cola’s fourth largest US franchise bottler (after Coke Consolidated, Reyes Holdings and Arca’s Coke Southwest Beverages). United distributes 11% of Coca-Cola system bottle/can carbonated soft drink volume in US. Last week, Coke United CEO John Sherman and East Region VP Mike Succo joined officials at the new Union City center for a grand opening attended by Coca-Cola North America President Jim Dinkins. BD sat down for an interview with Sherman.

The following has been edited for clarity and space:

Reed’s, which made its name selling high-intensity ginger beers, is looking to capitalize on a much bigger and faster-growing category: ginger ale. The company is readying ...

In October, Simon Lowden was named PepsiCo’s first chief sustainability officer. The job made sense for Lowden, whose 23 years at PepsiCo has included leadership posts in food, beverage and international. Lowden’s most recent prior role was as president of PepsiCo Global Foods. Previous roles have included chief marketing officer for PepsiCo North America Beverages and before that PepsiCo International.

This story is a recap of highlights from his Future Smarts conference appearance Dec. 9 in New York.