Learning From the Gospel of Coke

[James Nored]

In the book, Outspoken: Conversations on Church Communication by WIll Mancini and Leonard Sweet and others, Brad Abare writes this infroduction entitled, "Learning from the Gospel of Coke."

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“There’s nowhere in Africa we don’t go. We go to every town, every village, every community, every township.” –Coca-Cola CEO  

In a recent issue of Bloomberg Businessweek, Duane Stanford tells the story of Coca-Cola and the intense focus they have to penetrate Africa with the gospel of Coke: “Like Alexander the Great, at the prospect of having no worlds left to conquer...

Coca-Cola will rely on some of the poorest nations to generate the 7 to 9 percent earnings growth it has promised investors. Piles of trash are burning outside the Mamakamau Shop in Uthiru, a suburb of Nairobi, Kenya. Sewage trickles by in an open trench. Across the street, a worker at a bar gets ready for the lunch rush by scraping the hair off a couple of roasted goat heads. It’s about 70 degrees, the sun is beating down, it smells like decay and it’s time for Coke to move some product

Annual per capita consumption of Coca-Cola in Kenya is 39 servings. In more developed countries like Mexico, which consumes more Coca-Cola than any other country, it runs 665 servings per year. One does not need an MBA to see the possibilities. Coke could have focused on China (too complicated) and/or India (Pepsi already has a strong presence), where there is also plentyof potential, but they decided to increase its focus on Africa, where Coke has been since 1929.

“Coke plans to spend $12 billion in the continent during the next 10 years, more than twice as much as in the previous decade.” Muhtar Kent, CEO of Coca-Cola, says “There’s nowhere in Africa that we don’t go. Being in a country is very easy, you can go and set up a depot in every capital city. That’s not what we’re about. We go to every town, every village, every community, every township.” Coke’s mission is clear,

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This introduction really made me think. Why is it that Coke is so incredibly focused on spreading the gospel of a brown syrupy drink, but we are so complacent in sharing the life-giving gospel of Jesus Christ? Do we have a strategy for sharing Christ in every community and neighborhood in our city? (Let alone the world?)

Where is our passion? Our bold plans to claim our cities and neighborhoods for Christ? Why is that American companies seem to be more motivated, more passionate, better funded, with more workers than the church has in sharing the gospel?