Beverage Industry is edited for decision makers in the multiple beverage markets: soft drinks, beer, bottled water, juice, wine and spirits.

Each month, it provides an analytical look at marketing distribution, technology, production and other current news issues facing the industry. In depth statistical reports are compiled annually on each beverage market. Other key areas of coverage include packaging/recycling, beverage fleets, merchandising, quality control, computers, fountain/food service, vending and ingredients.

Beverage Industry covers the entire beverage marketplace reaching beverage producers, distributors and retailers. With our magazine you can stay in touch with the top companies and decision-makers and stay on top of the latest issues and trends, read about the newest ingredients and technology.

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Read the Digital Issue: Beverage Industry, June 2009

FEATURES
8 Beverage Beat
10 Industry Issues
18 Category Focus
Tea and RTD Tea
26 New Products
32 Cover Story
Coca-Cola United opens a new bottling facility and introduces new packages to differentiate the company’s products from its competition.
38 Plant Focus
Baton Rouge Coca-Cola Bottling Co.’s new production and distribution facility
46 Up Close With…
The Switch
48 Special Report
The Top 100 beverage companies
54 Channel Strategies
Supermarkets give consumers value and
convenience.
57 Marketing
58 Packaging
Sustainability is a top priority for secondary packagers.
63 Beverage R&D
Sweeteners play a role in healthy beverage formulation and marketing.
69 Distribution
Driver monitoring systems
70 Warehouse
Route optimization solutions help provide cost-efficient and timely truck stops.
72 Supplier’s Marketplace
77 Classifi eds
82 The Last Drop

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Beverage Industry Delivers Unique and Powerful Editorial Products Each Month

• In-depth Corporate Profiles and Plant Features that take readers inside the leading companies in their beverage industry.
• Extensive New Products coverage that keeps readers up-to-date on the latest beverage offerings in all categories.
• Packaging features that profile innovative designs and the newest packaging technologies available in the beverage marketplace.
• Category Focus features that delve into specific beverage categories, examining sales trends and new product introductions.
• Channel Strategies, a department that takes on issues and trends in beverage retailing.
• Beverage R&D articles that cover the latest ingredient trends and expert formulation advice.
• Trucks/Transportation features that help beverage companies keep their fleets running in tip-top shape and their drivers safe on the roads.
• Warehouse/Distribution articles that help beverage bottlers and distributors make the most efficient use of warehouse space as well as sales and delivery technology.
• A look at the latest Operations technology that features solutions for processing, bottling and palletizing.

Our recipients are general management, plant operations, production, packaging, engineering, warehouse and distribution managers as well as fleet personnel, research & development, quality control and sales & marketing professionals.

At-home generation?
A NUMBER OF TIMES THIS MONTH, COMMENTS HAVE popped up about the consumer shift toward eating at home again. In her Channel Strategies report on supermarkets (page 54), Beverage Industry’s Associate Editor Stefanie Scott discovered that a number of retailers are benefi tting from this shift, supercenters in particular.

In the Category Focus on tea (page 18), Inko’s Andy Schamisso indicated his company’s family-size tea bottle was introduced at exactly the right time to take advantage of its value perception, and the packaging experts I spoke with for the secondary packaging story on page 58 said multi-packs are strong items these days as well. For as long as I have covered this industry, I have heard about on-the-go consumption, with a particular focus on single-serve sales, so this represents quite a shift in thinking.

IRI called this part of the “Downturn Generation” in its Times and Trends report “Dissecting the Downturn Generation: Recognizing and Leveraging Performance in Today’s Transformational Economy.” The Chicago-based market research fi rm predicted that today’s consumers will “adopt many of the practices Depression-era shoppers implemented, both to weather the recession as well as to keep a close eye on spending long after the recession ends.”

Sixty-six percent of shoppers in IRI’s report said they are buying more foods and beverages at grocery stores for home consumption vs. buying them away from home. In addition, they reportedly are deciding what to buy before they leave home rather than at the store. IRI Chairman Romesh Wadhwani told attendees at the Reinventing CPG and Retail Summit that the “first moment of truth is in the home, not the store.”

I certainly have observed such behavioral shifts among my own generational cohorts, but I don’t know that I’m ready to say they will be permanent. When times get tough, we tend to see a “hunker-down-and-stay-home” trend that dissipates once the situation turns around. But in the short term, and maybe even the long term, the companies that are prepared to embrace both at-home and on-the-go needs will come out winners. Fortunately for many companies, that’s a shift that had begun before the economy began its slide, and those who had not been thinking that way seem to be following suit.

SARAH THEODORE Editor

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