Paper

How would you evaluate the crisis?

“Coca-Cola was created in 1886 by John Pemberton, a pharmacist in Atlanta, Georgia, who sold the syrup mixed with fountain water as a potion for mental and physical disorders” (Argenti, 2009, p. 286). Sanjiv Gupta became president and CEO in 2003 of the Coca-Cola India. From 1993-2003, Coca-Cola invested more than US$1 billion in India making it one of the country’s top international investors. Coca-Cola experienced a major crisis that took Coca-Cola for a loop. The Center for Science and Environment (CSE) issued a press release stating: “12 major cold drink brands sold in and around Delhi contain a deadly cocktail of pesticide residue.” (Argenti, 2009, p. 284). According to the Pollution Monitoring Laboratory (PML) of the CSE from April to August, three samples of 12 PepsiCo and Coca-Cola brands from across the city were found to contain pesticide residue surpassing global standards by 30-36 times, including lindane, DDT, malathion, and chlorpyrifos. With this crisis going on Gupta had to do something quick before Coca-Cola company was destroyed. Within the last two weeks of this incident the sales for Coca-Cola dropped 30-40 percent. Eisner (2013) stated in order to succeed one has to know that one has to fail. The most successful companies have failed many times before they became this successful. Success requires more than micromanagement it requires failure. In some people eyes this may be considered a failure for Coca-Cola. It could be but failing is when you get knocked down but you do not stay there.

The pesticides were found in the water in India. The same products were tested in the US and there were no finds of pesticides. They concluded that the pesticides came from the water source in India. There originally were no laws or limit to what was contained in the water. What India would need to do to help allow this to not happen to the Coca-Cola Company is to test their water source frequently for pesticides and...