Report on Consumer Behavior of Soft Drinks Essay

Need for the study With the economic liberalization in India a number of global companies have been coming forward to invest in India and tapping perhaps and world’s biggest growing market. As the floodgates have been opened up for Multinational Companies, the global giant Coca-cola also decided to make an entry into the Indian market. In India, the per capita consumption of soft drinks is at rock bottom level even less than our neighboring countries Pakistan and Bangladesh, where it is four times as much. The last summer was particularly sweltering one, with temperatures hitting the high 40’s in some places yet; bottles were disappearing from shelves faster than they could be replaced. In the peak season, they found themselves short of capacity and having to turn around their trucks faster and faster to slake the greater Indian thirst. With growth rates zooming into the double digits, bottlers have been propelled into expanding capacities. With their big-time plans, the multinationals have changed the face of this business, long dominated by small-time businessmen. If demand continues to increase annually at an average of 20 percent, then volumes could reach one billion cases within ten years. 4 These arc ambitious targets and to reach them the cola makers will have to build capacity, infrastructure, make their bottlers more available and more affordable. There are 5. 00,000 retailers stocking soft drinks in India. Also, soft drinks which retail at any where between Rs. 9. 00 and Rs. 12. 00 are expensive when measured against purchasing power. As they concoct their strategies, keeping an eye on each other all the time, ultimately there’s only one guy they have to watch out for, who will determine their fortunes: the consumer. The real race to quench his thirst has just begun 5 Objectives of the studyTo study about the consumer preference with regard to soft drink To study about the consumer perception with regard Coca — Cola To understand the Promotional Strategies To find out the medium which is most effective in reaching the consumers? 6 Research methodology Data will be collected from a sample size 1000 and distributed over different areas by using simple Random Sampling. Random Sampling consists of 1. Demographic Segmentation 2. Sociocultural Segmentation 3. Use-Related Segmentation 4. Use-Situation Segmentation Analysis 1. Data Analysis is done both qualitatively and quantitatively. 2. The analysis is presented pictographically using bar graphs The period of the study is past one year 7 Scope of the study The new economic policies of the Govt. of India adopted in the mid eighties were given further impetus by the early nineties. The Indian market has undergone considerable changed as a direct consequence of many of these policies and soft drink industry is no exception to this. Keeping the above – mentioned perspective in the background, the researcher has selected soft drink market, since the marketing task his became more challenging and intensive competition has opened up new vistas. Companies are evolving marketing strategies by studying the demands of the market place increasingly penetrating into appropriate market segments introducing differentiated products to improve their market share. The soft drink market has achieved an accelerated growth in the past decade. Soft drinks include ail types of non – alcohol carbonated flavored or otherwise sweetened beverages. The entry of Pepsi and the reentry of Coca – Cola in the India market arc inevitably facing stiff competition but the ultimate winner is customer/consumer. This has led the researcher to study me perception of consumers towards different brands of soft drinks and to gauge out the 8 promotional strategic being adopted by the marketers to lure promiscuous buyers and win a larger share in the markets.