Maaza and Limca brands were acquired by The Coca-Cola Company along with Thums Up from Ramesh Chauhan of Parle Bisleri in 1993, when the Atlanta-headquartered company had re-entered the Indian market. Thums Up has now become a billion-dollar brand (Rs 7,500 crore) under Coca-Cola’s stable.
During a post-earnings call last week, The Coca-Cola Company Chairman and CEO James Quincey had said, “Our local Thums Up brand became a $1-billion brands in India, driven by focussed marketing and execution plans.”
Asked about the performance of Maaza and Limca, Coca-Cola President (India and Southwest Asia) Sanket Ray told news agency PTI: “Both the brands are doing well.”
In India, currently, Maaza is ranked at No. 3 brand and Limca is the sixth brand in terms of sales volume in the overall beverage category, said Ray while citing market data from Nielsen. “Definitely, Maaza is bigger than Coke, and Limca is just smaller than Coke. That is the current situation,” he added.
In 1993, Coca-Cola had then bought the entire portfolio of aerated drinks from the Chauhan brothers, which also included Gold Spot, a brand that is not presently used by Coca-Cola. “Limca is doing well and it is especially strong in a few states like Punjab and northern part of India,” he said adding that the “rest of the part, it is still weak”.
The company has a “mega plan” for brand Limca and in the coming years, it will slowly pick up. Over Maaza, Ray said it is doing “extremely well” and had made significant gains with market shares last year, as juice as a category had done well.
“We have just signed Amitabh Bachchan and Pooja Hedge and we are going all out on Maaza in the coming year,” he said. While talking about the orange-based drink brand Gold Spot, Ray said Coca-Cola is not using it right now as the company has another brand ‘Fanta’ operating in a similar space.
“Two brands in the orange category will be a confusion and so, we are not using Gold Spot now,” he said.
