INTRODUCTION India with a population of more the 100 cores is potentially one of the largest consumer markets in the

world. With urbanization and development of economy, tastes and interests of the people changes according to the advance nation. Marketing is about winning this new environment. It is about understanding what consumers want and supplying it more conveniently. Marketing deals with identifying and meeting human needs and social needs. One of the shortest definitions of marketing is meeting needs profitably. The consumer market may be identified as the market for product and services that are purchased by individuals as household for their personal consumption. soft drinks is a typical consumer product purchased by individual primarily quench their thirst and also for refreshment. Different types of soft drinks are available in the market and more or less content of all soft drinks is same. The market of soft drinks is facing a cutthroat competition and many companies are floating in the market with their product with different brands names. Thus in a country like India where more than 50% of total population exists below poverty line, the consumer cannot afford such high price for soft drinks. As a result the trading activities of the soft drinks industry are concentrated in and around big cities and town where the purchasing power of population is considered comparatively high. Soft drinks industry in India has an annual sale of about 4000crores, with per capita consumption of soft drinks at a low of seven bottle per annum (even Pakistan has a per capita consumption of 14; in china and U.S.A is more than 800 bottles) is due to price factor. The marketing manager is responsible for both determining and suitability of goods and services in the market to give maximum satisfaction to the consumer. In order to provide maximum

satisfaction, the manager need to know, what is the satisfaction level of the consumer i.e. what is their expectation from the products etc. In order to meet above requirements marketing manager conduct marketing research. Marketing research identify market opportunities, After the completion of marketing research, the company measures and forecast the size, growth and profit potential of each market opportunity.

HISTORY OF COKE The Coca-Cola Company is the world's largest beverage company, largest manufacturer, distributor and marketer of non-alcoholic beverage concentrates and syrups in the world, and one of the largest corporations in the United States. The company is best known for its flagship product Coca-Cola, invented by pharmacist John Smith Pemberton in 1886. The Coca-Cola formula and brand was bought in 1889 by As a Candler who incorporated The Coca-Cola Company in 1892. Besides its namesake Coca-Cola beverage, Coca-Cola currently offers nearly 400 brands in over 200 countries or territories and serves 1.5 billion servings each day. The company operates a franchised distribution system dating back to 1889 where The CocaCola Company only produces syrup concentrate which is then sold to various bottlers throughout the world who hold an exclusive territory. The Coca-Cola Company is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia. Its stock is listed on the NYSE and is part of DJIA and S&P 500. Its current president and CEO is Muhtar Kent The Coca-Cola Company was originally established as the J. S. Pemberton Medicine Company, a co-partnership between Dr. John Smith Pemberton and Ed Holland. The company was formed to sell three main products: Pemberton's French Wine of Cola (later known as Coca-Cola), Pemberton's Indian Queen Hair Dye, and Pemberton's Globe Flower Cough Syrup. In 1884, the company became a stock company and the name was changed to Pemberton Chemical Company. The new president was D. D. Doe while Ed Holland became the new VicePresident Pemberton stayed on as the superintendent. company's factory was located at No. 107, Marietta St. Three years later, the company was again changed to Pemberton Medicine

Company, another co-partnership, this time between Pemberton, A. O. Murphy, E. H. Blood worth, and J. C. Mayfield. Finally in October 1888, the company received a charter with an authorized capital of $50,000. The charter became official on January 15, 1889. By this time, the company had expanded their offerings to include Pemberton's Orange and Lemon Elixir.

MANUFACTURING PROCESS The bottling factory is having a manufacturing process comprising of water treatment, plant producing 1oo*bacterial free soft water as for specification prescribed by COKE & PEPSI. The soda sugar making unit is there to prepare sugar syrup, standard mixed percentage. There is a intermixing unit where through a semi automatic process sugar syrup. The both flavour water and CO2 is punched together resulting into the soft drinks of a particular flavour. There is a huge bottle washing machine where the market returned bottled are washed continuously in the super heated water ,chlorine and then soft chilled water. Through the exhausted washing system the bottles are carried out of the washer with the help conveyer and automatically hundreds of bottles washed and cleaned. Bottle are led by conveyer to the filling machine unit, where the ready soft drink mixture is put in 800 bottled per minute. Simultaneously through an automatic system all the bottle is crowned with the help of crowning machine. The ready to go the market bottles are then passed through aggressive inspection and collected into carats (1 carats contains 24 bottles) with the help of automatic case packer machine. After that pet containing soft drinks are sent to the warehouses and immediately the payment of the excise duty to the Govt. For packed bottle kept in the warehouses are insured and, ultimate stage of the production line is to dispatch it. The product reaches into the market through a network of distribution system.

Raw Material Inputs: A coke & Pepsi bottling plant requires the following raw materials:

1 Sugar 5 crown core 2Flavour 6 Glass bottles 3 water 7 Plastic carats 4 CO2

Packaging & Logo Design

U.S. containers in 2008. Various sizes from 8-67.6 US fl oz (237 mL-2 L) shown in can, glass and plastic bottles In the United States, soft drinks are sold in 2 Ls, 1.5 L, 1 L, 500 ml, 8, 12, 20 and 24 U.S. fluid ounce plastic bottles, 12 U.S. fluid ounce cans, and short eight-ounce cans. Some Coca-Cola products can be purchased in 8 and 12 U.S. fluid ounce glass bottles. Jones Soda and Orange Crush are sold in 16 U.S. fluid ounce (1 U.S. pint) glass bottles. Cans are packaged in a variety of quantities such as six packs, 12 packs and cases of 24, 36, and 360. With the advent of energy drinks sold in eight-ounce cans in the US, some soft drinks are now sold in similarly sized cans. It is also common for carbonated soft drinks to be served as fountain drinks in which carbonation is added to a concentrate immediately prior to serving. In Europe soft drinks are typically sold in 2 L, 1.5 L, 1 L, 0.33 L plastic or 0.5 L glass bottles, aluminium cans are traditionally sized in 0.33 L, although 250 ml "slim" cans have become popular since the introduction of canned energy drinks and 355 ml variants of the slim cans have been introduced by Red Bull more recently. Cans and bottles often come in packs of six or four. Several countries have standard recycled packaging with a forfeit typically ranging from 0.15 to 0.25: bottles are smelted, or cleaned and refilled; cans are crushed and sold as scrap aluminium. In Australia, soft drinks are usually sold in 375 ml cans or glass or plastic bottles. Bottles are usually 390 ml, 600 ml, 1.25 L or 2 L. However, 1.5 L bottles have more recently been used by the Coca-Cola Company. In Canada, soft drinks are sold in cans of 236 ml (8.3 imp fl oz), 355 ml (12.5 imp fl oz), 473 ml (16.6 imp fl oz), and bottles of 591 ml (20.8 imp fl oz), 710 ml (25.0 imp fl oz), 1 L (35.2 imp fl oz), 1.89 L (67 imp fl oz), and 2 L (70.4 imp fl oz). The odd sizes are due to being the metric near-equivalents to 8, 12, 16, 20, 24, and 64 U.S. fluid ounces. This allows bottlers to use the same-sized containers as in the U.S. market. This is an example of a wider phenomenon in North America. Brands of more international soft drinks such as Fanta and Red Bull are more likely to come in round-figure capacities.

In India, soft drinks are available in 200 ml and 300 ml glass bottles, 330 ml cans and 600 ml, 1.25-liter, 1.5-liter and 2-liter plastic bottles

Logo design

U.S. containers in 2008. Various sizes from 8-67.6 U.S. fl oz (237 mL-2 L) shown in can, glass and plastic bottles The famous Coca-Cola logo was created by John Pemberton's bookkeeper, Frank Mason Robinson, in 1885.[36] It was Robinson who came up with the name, and he also chose the logos distinctive cursive script. The typeface used, known as Spenserian script, was developed in the mid 19th century and was the dominant form of formal handwriting in the United States during that period. Robinson also played a significant role in early Coca-Cola advertising. His promotional suggestions to Pemberton included giving away thousands of free drink coupons and plastering the city of Atlanta with publicity banners and streetcar signs

SOFT DRINKS INDUSTRIES IN INDIA Soft drink is a non alcoholic beverage. It is artificially flavoured and contains no fruit juice or pulp. India with population of more than 100 crore is one of the largest consumer markets in the world after china. Soft drink is a typical consumer product purchased by individuals to quench thirst and secondly for refreshment. Searching for the point of origin of Indian soft drinks I first document on Gold Spot, this was the first brand soft drinks in India. It was introduced by PARLE during later part of 40s. Cola giant, Coca-Cola was the first foreign soft drink to be introduced in India in 1965, Coca Cola made a very good beginning and dominated the whole scheme right from the world go. It (coca-Cola) faced no competition at that time . This extraordinary success of soft drinks can be attributed to the following factor:

Absence of contemporary brand.

Europic image build up in the western countries proceeded the entry into India

market,

Indians are very found by nature of foreign goods, services etc. Due to prolonged

foreign rules.

Parle export Pvt. Ltd later in 1970 introduced Limca, lemony soft drinks. Before Limca introduced they had tentatively introduced cola, pepino, which they had to with draw in the face of battering confrontation with coca-cola soon. India always has love and hate relationship with MNCs which gave a significant opportunities to soft drinks industries in India when coca-cola decided to windup its operation in 1977 rather than bowing to the Indian government insisting on:-

Dilution of equity, as the government felt that lots of foreign currency was being wasted.

Manufacturing of the top secret concentrate in India.

Disclose of the chemical composition of the essence.

This left a large vacuum in the popular soft drink market, and a visa was opened to any company with the requisite, technical, marketing and organizational skills.

The existence of Coca-Cola from India in 1977 accelerated the growth of several Indian soft drinks. New soft drink in the form of Tetra pack enters the market among Frooti, Jump-In, and

Tree-top Ire the prominent once. Till 1977 their equipped bottling plants and the distribution network a longing to be of no use. It took them one year to develop new formula to survive and gradually came up with Campa, Lemon, Orange and Coal in same order. However Parle, the pioneer in the soft drinks, blazed its way to national prominence with their product Thumps-up , bearing the slogan Happy Days Are Here Again . This particular

slogan helped to win over the loyalists of addicts to Coca-Cola. Soon the Indian soft drinks industries started at a phenomenal rate and all parle products GoldSpot, Limca and Thums Up became the brand leader in their own segment. In spite of all these the drinks market still has large gap, as claim by soft drink manufacturers. To fill these gaps there are many soft drinks concentrate and squashes flooded the market. The Indian soft market basically offered three flavour i.e. Orange, Lemon ,and Cola. In 1988, multinational company PEPSI entering the Indian market.11 years after the existence of coca-cola . It had name, fame and edge of being one of the best in the game and it also offered stiff competition too parle and coke. Now Pepsi is going all out to prove that they are the best.

CONCLUSION

The whole research shows that there are only two companies dominating in the soft drinks market-coca-cola and Pepsi. There is neck to- neck competition in between these companies.Coke has been adopting aggressive marketing strategies to attract customer. Once of the cokes major competitor is yet another global leader Pepsi. To wars off the threats posed by this stringent competition of coke & Pepsi has adopted some excellent marketing strategies like

Acquiring bottling plant as many as possible

Bottling holds the key to the distribution

Sponsoring major and local events.

Making successful product launches.

Establishing prominent brands of long term stability

Good relation with customers.

Constant touch with the market.

By conducting marketing research in city, Coke & Pepsi can further increase its market share. In general any company to be the market leaders, it has to analyze the market size, growth, project potential, buyer behaviour, life style, purchasing behaviour & the taste of the consumers. The aggressive companies will utilize the full market opportunities.