Satisfaction guaranteed!
John Brock, the former CEO of InBev, who was ousted in 2005 so that the Brazilian Carlos Britos could take his seat, will get a chance to revisit Belgium again – as the new CEO of the world’s largest Coca-Cola bottler.
Coca-Cola Enterprises (CCE) announced that John Brock, 59, will become its Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, following the company’s annual meeting of shareholders on 22 April 2008. Mr. Brock will succeed Lowry F. Kline, Chairman, who will retire from the Board of Directors at that time.
Only a few months after his ignoble departure from InBev, Mr Brock became CEO of CCE, which is the world’s largest marketer, distributor, and producer of bottled and canned non-alcoholic refreshment. CCE sells approximately 80 percent of The Coca-Cola Company’s volume in North America and is the sole licensed bottler for products of The Coca-Cola Company in Belgium, continental France, Great Britain, Luxembourg, Monaco, and the Netherlands.
In December 2007, Mr Brock reportedly secured a EUR 20 million payout from InBev after two years of wrangling over the size of his severance package.
At CCE Mr Brock has returned to his core expertise: non-alcoholic beverages. Prior to InBev, Mr Brock was Chief Operating Officer of Cadbury Schweppes and chairman of the Dr Pepper/Seven-Up Bottling Group from March 2000 to January 2003. He joined Cadbury Schweppes in 1983. When he was hired to head Interbrew/InBev, the Belgium brewer was still the “world’s local brewer” and even bragged about it. However, it was not really focusing on global strategies, resource allocation, the co-ordination of marketing programmes, and global ways of making decisions.
It was left to Mr Brock to change that. He came with a wealth of experience as a global organiser — though not as a marketer.
Obviously, his experience is needed at CCE, whose profits leave something to be desired. CCE has reported better than expected earnings for the fourth quarter of 2007. The company says European results were helped by Coca-Cola Zero.
In North America, the strong results were thanks to Coke’s range of non-carbonated drinks such as flavoured water drinks and tea. The continent has seen the launch of the Glaceau range of vitamin-enhanced waters.
The company reports that Coca-Cola Zero, a calorie-free carbonated cola aimed at males, is performing well.
Fourth quarter revenue rose 11 percent to USD 5.3 billion from USD 4.79 billion the previous year and for the full year, revenue rose 6 percent to USD 20.94 billion from USD 19.8 billion.
Full year net income was USD 711 million, compared with a loss of USD 1.1 billion in 2006. The 2006 figures were affected by one-time charges of USD 1.8 billion, some of which was related to massive “franchise-impairment” costs.
Atlanta-based CCE projects growth for 2008 of between 4 percent and 5 percent.
