EU – Baltic States, Foodstuff, Latvia, Markets and Companies

“In the soft drinks segments competition is quite stiff, and it is due to the fact that this product category is attractive in terms of its the future growth perspective. If we compare soft drink consumption per person in Latvia and Europe, we see that there is growth potential in all categories. For Latvian producers, the challenge is the right choice of strategy and understanding consumers’ needs and how they change to be able to offer the right product that would ensure consumption growth,” said Korolova.

She added that in the segment of non-alcoholic beverages, water is one of the fastest growing and most significant product categories, followed by carbonated beverages. The two other categories – energy and sports drinks – have also been showing growth each year, although the sports drinks category is still comparatively small. Although the category of non-alcoholic beverages is still growing in Latvia, the shrinking of Latvia’s population was becoming the producers’ greatest problem, the Coca-Cola representative admitted.

The company’s representatives told LETA that with its new product, the premium-class ice tea Fuzetea, Coca-Cola aims to conquer the Latvian ice tea market. With the launch of Fuzetea, the soft drinks giant also plans to phase out its old ice tea brand Nestea.

According to information available on the company’s website, Coca-Cola Balti Jookide represents Coca-Cola in the Baltics and is in charge of the company’s trademarks and marketing campaigns. Coca-Cola Hellenic Bottling Company is the company’s bottling partner in Latvia, and its subsidiary Coca-Cola HBC Latvija organizes production, logistics and wholesale operations.