单项选择题

The History of Coca-Cola Today, the company’’s trademark is world-famous and its products average a staggering 400 million servings per day in more than 155 countries. It’’s a far cry from the humble beginnings of a hundred years ago when sales during the first year averaged a mere 13 drinks per day, and company profits totaled &paltry(微不足道的)$35. The product is Coca-Cola and, according to legend, it began in a three-legged kettle in the back yard of Atlanta pharmacist Dr. John Styth Pemberton who carried a jug of his concoction(调和物)down the street to Jacob’’s pharmacy where it was sold at the soda fountain for 5 cents a glass. Frank Robinson, Pemberton’’s partner and bookkeeper thought two "Cs" would look good in advertising and penned "Coca-Cola" in the flowering script so famous today. It is significant that Pemberton spent almost twice as much money on advertising during the first years of operation as he made in profits, for the growth of Coke’’s popularity is as much due to the advertising and marketing strategy as it is to the quality of its product. The Coca-Cola Co. has been guided by the words of its former president, Robert Woodruff, who said that "advertising must move with the times." By continually monitoring changes in consumer attitudes and behavior, the Coca-Cola Co. has become a widely recognized leader in advertising. Pemberton could not foresee the great future awaiting his soft drink and sold out. After a succession of ownership changes over a three-year period, Asa Briggs Candler bought the business and organized the Coca-Cola Co. into a Georgia corporation. In 1893, he registered Coca-Cola as a trademark. Under Candler’’s leadership, the company began to grow quickly. In order to instigate(鼓动) a demand for the product, he spent heavily on advertising. Signs dotted the landscape from coast to coast and appeared on calendars, serving trays and other merchandizing items, urging people to drink Coke. Candler’’s campaign paid off. By 1898, Americans were buying Coke everywhere in the United States as well as in Hawaii, Canada and Mexico. Candler was a creative fellow at advertising, but showed little imagination in understanding the potential. Coke’’s sold throughout most of the United States for $1, which he never bothered to collect. Candler saw Coke primarily as a soda-fountain drink. But two farsighted businessmen from Chattanooga, Tenn, Benjamin Franklin Thomas and Joseph Brown Whitehead, understood the potential, and, for the unpaid dollar, bought & franchise (特许权，经销权) that became worth millions. Their agreement with Candler began the franchising bottling system that still remains the foundation of the Coca-Cola Co.’’s soft drink operations. Thomas and Whitehead sold the rights to bottle Coke to franchisers in every part of the country in return for the bottler’’s agreement to invest in the necessary resources and effort to make the franchise a success. During the following decade, 179 bottling plants went into operation. In the early 20th century, Coke blazed(开辟道路) the advertising trail, developing innovative concepts that became accepted practices in the field. One of the most effective was the distribution and redemption of complimentary tickets, entitling the holder to a glass of Coke free at the soda fountain of a dispenser. In 1909, the company flew a dirigible(飞船) over Washington, D.C., with a huge Coke sign on the side of it, a foreshadowing of aerial advertising. Coke also originated one of the nation’’s earliest animated signs. Standing 32 feet high and located along the Pennsylvania railroad line between Philadelphia and New York, it showed a young man drawing a glass of Coke from one of the crockery ums(陶罐) then used to dispense the beverage. The bills for Coke’’s advertising campaign mounted. In 1893, the total stood at $12,395. It passed the $100,000 mark in 1900, and by 1912, it had skyrocketed to over $1 million, only to double eight years later. Early in its history, the company recognized the need for a distinctive package in which to sell its product. In 1915, Alexander Samuelson, a Swedish glassblower who had emigrated to Terre haute, Ind., designed the famous six-and-one-half-ounce bottle. The new packaging helped to make Coke internationally known. By 1928, the company was selling more Coke in bottles than at soda fountains. Coke sold in the original bottle or in glasses at fountains until 1955, but since then, it has been available in larger glass or plastic bottles and in cans. In 1919, three years after Asa Candler stepped down as president, Coca-Cola experienced a momentous change. The Candler family decided to sell the Coca-Cola Co. to a group headed by Georgia financier Ernest Woodruff for $25 million. At the time, it was the South’’s largest financial transaction. Woodruff spent a brief spell as president, then chose his 23-year-old son Robert to take over. Under Woodruff’’s guidance, Coke launched a campaign to encourage and assist fountain outlets in serving and aggressively selling Coca-Cola. He also cast an eye overseas and became convinced the entire world had tremendous market potential for the company. In 1926, Woodruff organized and initiated a concerted overseas advertising and marketing campaign. When Robert Woodruff took over, the company had fewer than 12 plants bottling Coke overseas. The numbers grew slowly until World War n when Gen. Dwight. D. Eisenhower gave his famous order "to see that every man in uniform gets a bottle of Coca-Cola for 5 cents, wherever he is and whatever it costs the company." During the war, the company established 64 bottling plants overseas for the military during the war and eventually supplied a total of 3 million drinks to U.S. military personnel. Now, sixty years after Woodruffs foreign campaign, more than 770 Coke bottlers operate overseas, and about 50 percent of all company profits come from foreign operations. An Italian newspaper once called the Coca-Cola Co. "a large and uniformed army that today has an outpost or guard station even in the remotest part of our countryside." Throughout its history, Coca-Cola has been able to devise catchy slogans, highlighted by such phrases as the "Pause that Refreshes" (1929), "Sign of Taste" (1957), and more recently, "Things Go Better with Coke." "It’’s the Real Thing," first used in 1942, was reintroduced in 1969. Coca-Cola has recruited countless artists, movie stars and athletes to advertise its products. Haddon Sundlbom’’s "portraits" for holiday ads, which began in the 1930s, made the company’’s redsuited Santa Claus famous. Those who have starred in ads include John Weismuller, Jean Harlow, Clark Gable, Bill Cosby and "Mean Joe" Green. Perhaps Coke’’s most intensive advertising campaign took place in 1979 when the company employed separate terms of advertising consultants in 15 different countries. The company flew the teams into New York for an exhaustive marathon brainstorming session. Given specific creative guidelines, the teams produced hundreds of promotional ideas and 10 potential ad campaigns. Consumer testing proved the best to be "Have a Coke and a Smile." The company then chose six teams to work around the clock for three weeks to design the new advertising. To push the change, the company spent the most money ever on advertising. Coca-Cola has evolved into more than a one-product company. Today, it sells 20 kinds of soft drinks, has fast-food sector that sells Minute Maid products and Hi-Cfruit drinks, and entertainment sector that includes Columbia Pictures. But the original Coke is still at the heart of the company’’s operations, accounting for 70 percent of all its soft drink unit sales. Only Asa Candler and Frank Robinson knew the formula for what is now "Classic Coke". Over the years, it has been passed on from one company management to the next by word of mouth and is secured today in a bank vault. The formula’’s secrecy has added a legendary, even mysterious quality to Coke. The combination of Pemberton’’s formula and a succession of adroit marketing strategies, which developed a worldwide taste for the beverage, have made the company one of America’’s most successful and enduring business institutions. Robert Woodruff and his business partners made the Coca-Cola Co. become a widely recognized leader in advertising.