Prague University of Economics and Business International Business
Consumer Loyalty and Brand image as keys to enduring the Covid 19 crisis – The case of
Coca Cola.
Author: Karel Kučerovský
Thesis instructor: Andrea Escobar Rios Scholar year: 2020/2021
Declaration:
I hereby declare that I am the sole author of the thesis entitled “Consumer Loyalty and Brand image as keys to enduring the Covid 19 crisis – The case of Coca Cola “. I duly marked out all quotations. The used literature and sources are stated in the attached list of references.
In Prague on 30th April 2021 Signature
Karel Kučerovský
Acknowledgement
I hereby wish to express my appreciation and gratitude to the supervisor of my thesis, Doctora en Ciencias Andrea Escobar Rios for her time and her support throughout the whole process. I would also like to thank my family and Katie for supporting me every step of the way.
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Content
List of figures... 2
Introduction ... 3
Problem statemet... 4
Objectives... 5
Limitations of the thesis ... 6
1. Change of brand communication during the Covid 19 pandemic ... 6
1.1. Impact of Covid 19 pandemic on Corporate social responsibility ... 7
1.2. Stronger together ... 10
1.3. Keys to appeal to czech customers local community and culture to maintain customer loyalty ... 12
2. . Digital Media during the COVID 19 pandemic ... 13
2.1. Digital media marketing during the Covid 19 pandemic ... 14
2.2. Influence of digital media on Brand Image ... 17
2.3. Influence of digital media on customer loyalty ... 19
3. Methodology, data analysis and findings of Quantitative research ... 22
3.1. Demographic information of soft drink consumers ... 23
3.2. Consumption habits of survey respondents ... 27
3.3. Demographic information of active consumers of cola sodas ... 30
3.4 Brand image of cola sodas producing companies in the Czech Republic during the Covid 19 pandemic ... 35
3.4.1. Comparison between the brand image change of Coca Cola and Kofola during the. 36 Covid 19 pandemic 3.5. activity of Coca Cola on social media during the Covid 19 crisis... 45
3.6. Key takeaways from primary research ... 47
Conclusion ... 49
Bibliography ... 52
Apendix 1 ... 57
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List of figures:
Figure 1. Current country of residence of survey respondents ... 23
Figure 2. Age of survey respondents. ... 24
Figure 3. Highest education level achieved by survey respondents ... 25
Figure 4. Marital status of respondents. ... 26
Figure 5. Employment status of respondents. ... 26
Figure 6. soft drinks consumption habits of survey respondents. ... 27
Figure 7. Age group of soft drinks consumption habits of survey respondents. ... 28
Figure 8. change of soft drink consumption habits of survey respondents during the Covid 19 pandemic, based on their opinion. ... 29
Figure 9. Most convenient price of 330 ml soft drink can. ... 30
Figure 10. consumers of cola soda. ... 31
Figure 11. Employment status of survey respondents that consume cola sodas. ... 31
Figure 12. Age of survey respondents that consume cola sodas. ... 32
Figure 13. Highest achieved education level of survey respondents that consume cola sodas. ... 33
Figure 14. Marital status of cola sodas consumers. ... 34
Figure 15. favorite cola brands of survey participants. ... 35
Figure 16. Brand Image of Kofola. ... 37
Figure 17. Active consumers of Kofola and their change of consumption habits during the Covid 19 pandemic ... 38
Figure 18. Brand Image of Coca Cola ... 40
Figure 19. Active consumers of Coca Cola and their change of consumption habits during the Covid 19 pandemic.. ... 42
Figure 20. soft drinks consumption habits of active Coca Cola consumers...44
Figure 21. Activity of Coca Cola on social media during the Covid 19 crisis, according to active consumers of Coca Cola. ... 45
Figure 22. Change of time spent on social media during the covid 19 crisis. ... 46
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Introduction
During the modern global era companies had to solve and work on many problems during various times of crisis. For example, during the housing and banking crisis in 2008 many Banks, investment firms and even real estate companies had to figure out how to delicately rebrand itself in order to severe ties between them and the crisis. These various companies did lose many of their customers during these times and more importantly their brand image suffered tremendously. Banks were always viewed as the most stable institution of capitalism and its staple. But during 2008 people started viewing banks and financial institutions as something very unstable and unsafe, because of the epic failure and disaster that happened at Lehman Brothers, which then affected many of the various banks.
How companies behave during times of crisis can have severe impact on the loyalty of its customers, as the perception of a company can be a deal breaker or a deal maker for a customer. The customers perception and awareness of a company – brand awareness – is also becoming more and more important in today´s global world, as even customers in small villages have usually a very wide array of products to choose from, as they can order and buy products not only in stores that are near them but also buy products from all over the world via the internet.
This does not only apply to physical products, but it now also applies to services, for example investing can now be done online via various brokers then meeting your local broker. It is also very possible to let someone fill your taxes via Fiverr or some other internet portal. Thus, maintaining brand loyalty and brand awareness are absolutely crucial for many companies the only things that decide if the company turns a profit or files for bankruptcy. In my opinion the most important example of a company with very loyal customer base is the one and only Coca Cola.
Coca Colas gross profit has been around 20 billion US dollars per year since 2015 and it has the world’s highest global advertising costs which are estimated at 4 billion US dollars per year. Its investment in advertising is clearly paying off as Coca Cola has been around since 1886 and successfully building its brand and expanding to new countries almost
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every year. Accumulating cash reserves and then spending said cash reserves during various times of crisis – like the 2008 crisis, during which Coca Cola decided to spend some of its cash reserves in order to expand to the growing African market. It seems like getting stronger has been Coca Colas calling card and it seems like every crisis makes this big and successful brand even bigger and more successful.
Now as was mentioned before the main weapon of the Coca Cola company is its elite marketing and advertising. How is it possible, that one company has managed to seemingly be the best marketing company year in and year out. Many people in the world even in economically less developed countries have an idea of how Coca Cola looks like and how should it taste.
Problem statement
The Covid 19 pandemic has disrupted how most customers buy and consume products.
During the pandemic, most business had to adapt in many different ways, for most
businesses meant moving most of the business activities online where they flourished and continued to make money. For already established online businesses like Netflix, Amazon, Facebook, Rohlík the sudden transfer of most not only business-related activities to the online world greatly enhanced their operations and their stocks soared to record heights in 2020. However, for some business the sudden shutdown of the “normal” way of life left them struggling and in a really bad positions, most of the businesses that were negatively affected by the coronavirus pandemic are operating in the gastronomy sector. Restaurants make great profits from selling alcohol beverages as the alcohol makes the customers less worried about how they spend their money. Many countries across the world decided to introduce a curfew and a specified time until which restaurants can make their deliveries, which made it even harder for restaurants to make profit as their operating hours shortened.
Yet Coca Cola is recovering nicely along with its stock price which is on a continuous rise since the end of march. So, is it possible that even after this crisis, which in many ways discourages activities that are almost synonymous with exactly what Coca Cola stands for, like going to movies and ordering Coca Cola and cheese popcorn, or being out during the
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summer and sharing a coke with your friend, that Coca Cola will again emerge stronger and victorious?
With my thesis I would like to answer how did Coca Cola manage to seamlessly transit its marketing and advertising presence online and keep its customers happy and aware of what their favorite brand is doing. I would also like to find out if the marketing of Coca Cola is somehow replicable for companies in the Czech Republic and how it could help other companies in the Czech Republic.
Thesis objectives
The general objective of my thesis to define key elements of consumer loyalty and brand image in the Covid 19 era in Czech Republic, to maintain brand awareness and consumer participation. In order to determine how much influence do these factors truly have and how could companies enhance and maintain their brand image and consumer participation during these difficult times, in order to help businesses overcome similar pandemic
situations and crisis that could force people to stay more at home. To achieve the main objective of this thesis, the following theoretical framework specific objectives were setup in order to closely examine the changes that occurred during the Covid 19 pandemic and find a possible marketing solution for the companies in the Czech Republic.
1. To study how brand image can be influenced by the utilization of digital media.
2. To determine how customer loyalty can be influenced by the utilization of digital media.
3. To identify/study keys to appeal to Czech customers local community and culture to maintain customer loyalty.
4. To study how did brands change their communication and messages during the Covid 19 crisis
In addition to the theoretical framework specific objectives, the specific objectives for the quantitative research have been established as well, since the focus of this thesis is how to better communicate and maintain relationship between the company and the consumer.
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These quantitative specific objectives will be researched via an online survey in the Czech language to reach as broad audience as possible. The specific quantitative objectives are:
5. To investigate how did the consumption of soft drinks change during the Covid 19 crisis
6. To study the brand image and brand awareness of Coca Cola during the Covid 19 crisis.
Limitations of the thesis
This thesis will have some limitations as the final results will likely be useful mainly for big companies that have the budget and maneuverability to shift their marketing strategy based on the current events. This thesis is useful to small businesses to some extent, however it will be useful to a much lesser degree. The population of Czech Republic is 10.65 million, however only 222 people have filled out the survey for this thesis, also given the current pandemic there was only possibility of gathering survey participants online, which may lead to some biases in the survey. But given 222 respondents should be a large enough sample size, the results of this survey should still provide relevant and conclusive information.
1. Change of brand communication during the Covid 19 pandemic
COVID 19 has forced many companies to rethink and reassess their marketing strategy, as the whole world fell into a chaos and uncertain future as the coronavirus pandemic slowly disrupted the world economy. Many people were suddenly left without jobs and unable to pay for services and even rent, the unemployment rate in the Czech Republic rose from 2%
in 2019 to 3,8% on 30.9.2020 according to (Demeterová 2020), which is the highest figure since 2017. In the US, the situation was even worse as the unemployment rate skyrocketed from 4% at the beginning of February 2020 to 14,4% in May of 2020, a figure which was last seen in the US during 1941 when the US army drafted soldiers to fight in the World War 2 (Amadeo 2020).
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Restrictions were put in place in many countries limiting the ability of people to work as they were used before the pandemic and socialization was greatly restricted as well. The rising unemployment rate and reduced socialization meant that many people started falling into depression and their mental health worsened as humans are social creatures and not every person likes to socialize online or considers it adequate to in person contact
(Doležalová 2020). The worsening of mental health combined with various restrictions put in place forced companies to tear down their marketing strategies that they developed earlier for 2020 and start from scratch.
It is visible that most companies were and are aware of the desperation that set in with the COVID 19 pandemic and the sudden world disruption. Suddenly most companies shifted their marketing from trying to look as strong, cool, and fresh as possible to showing empathy and understanding seriousness of the current world situation.
As many companies had to transfer their business activities online and traditionally offline companies and stores had to evolve in order to accommodate the new type of consumers that suddenly emerged, because the pandemic has forced many of consumers to start shopping and using various services online rather than offline.
Out of nowhere offline shopping became almost obsolete as it was heavily restricted to certain volume of shoppers or in some sectors and during periods when Covid 19 was infecting the population too rapidly, even completely closed. Therese measures were not taken only in the Czech Republic but in many countries around the Globe and even in countries that had very lenient measures against Coronavirus like Sweden.
This disruption of offline shopping also made it very ineffective to do some offline marketing activities and led to complete shutdown of some offline marketing activities, like organizing a public event or handing out leaflets in public places like the subway.
1.1 Impact of Covid 19 pandemic on Corporate social responsibility
Without a question COVID 19 brought a lot of bad into our world, be it mental health of the general population or physical health of the population and disruption of the world
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system that we had. But if there is one thing that the pandemic has made better it is Corporate social responsibility.
Corporate social responsibility is defined as a self-regulating business model, which makes the company socially accountable to its employees, to its shareholders and to the whole society. During the pandemic, the customers focused on the social responsibility of their favorite brands much more as the COVID 19 brought more attention to how will various companies handle the crisis within the company with employees but also how will companies handle it in terms of getting the products to customers safely.
A company that shows Corporate social responsibility is a great tool to improve relations between the brand and employees, customers and shareholders as it shows accountability.
CSR is also a great marketing tool as it enables the company to engage with customers and even earn the company more money. According to a 2015 survey performed by Nielsen (Nielsen 2015), more than 50% of consumers are willing to pay higher prices for products and services if the business is environmentally friendly and socially conscious. A good Company SCR is also viewed as a positive by investors as 61% of investors (2016 Aflac) recognize good CSR as reduction of investment risk.
A great example of focus on Corporate social responsibility is Coca Cola and its response in multiple countries. In the USA on May 26th George Floyd was killed after a Minneapolis police officer knelt on his neck for over 9 and a half minutes. This unrightful death started a wave of riots and protests under the organization BLM – Black Lives Matter all over the US, in order to bring attention to the systematic racism and police brutality against people of color that was and still is happening across the United States of America.
Coca Cola reacted immediately and started its own campaign “Together we must end racism and together we will” for which Coca Cola partnered with National Center for Civil and Human Rights, The king Center, Civic Dinners and Equitable Dinners. With these partners Coca Cola started a series of virtual events “Together we Must: The
Conversation”, which is a series of virtual dinners and conversations around various social justice topics. The goal of these events is to encourage all people to listen and take action
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together against social and racial issues. In addition, Coca Cola also made donations to 100 Black Man of America and the National CARES Mentoring Movement in order to help end systematic racism and bring equality.
On the other hand we have Czech Republic and many struggling small business as Czech Republic failed to provide meaningful help to small entrepreneurs and restaurants. So Coca Cola decided to use its known name and big platform to promote many of these small businesses and bring attention to them. Coca Cola also delivered free packages of Coca Cola beverages to these small business to help them in these struggling time.
Coca Cola also teamed with BeApp to have 100 musical artists perform over 60 days on a livestream so that people would not get bored at home and also to support musicians which are experiencing very difficult times during the Covid 19 crisis as many of their shows get either cancelled or postponed. This is one of the many actions by which Coca Cola wants to showcase that their message is not just a word but that they will support it by actions and hopefully also increase the brand awareness and consumer loyalty when consumers see the Coca Cola is not just another big global company.
And many other companies that were considered as these big heartless companies before the COVID 19 pandemic, tried really hard to change the perception of their brand during these hard times. Suddenly big companies like Hersheys, Microsoft, Verizon got together and boycotted Facebook for allowing racist posts and not overseeing the content on its pages. This campaign is called #StopHateForProfit and it is still ongoing, a grand total of over 1 200 advertisers have joined the campaign so far and demand a change in Facebooks behavior, mainly increased accountability of Facebook (Meade 2020). The campaign launched after big companies have seen their ads popup on White supremacist Facebook posts and pages even after directly demanding from Facebook to remove these posts. Other social media platforms like YouTube or Reddit decided to take measures against posts filled with hatred and racism, proving that CSR is truly on the rise and is making a significant impact.
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For example, Coca Cola teamed with BeApp to have 100 musical artists perform over 60 days on a livestream so that people would not get bored at home and also to support musicians which are experiencing very difficult times during the Covid 19 crisis as many of their shows get either cancelled or postponed. This is one of the many actions by which Coca Cola wants to showcase that their message is not just a word but that they will
support it by actions and hopefully also increase the brand awareness and consumer loyalty when consumers see the Coca Cola is not just another big global company.
The role of CSR is expected to grow even more in importance (Heyward 2020) as
customers, employees and even shareholders care more and more about making a positive impact and eliminating hatred, discrimination and injustice from the world around us. In conclusion Corporate social responsibility is here to stay and grow in importance as
companies and businesses can no longer function with just an aim of making a profit at the expense of society, environment and consumers.
1.2 Stronger together
As many people felt desperate companies needed to quickly adapt and change their marketing strategies to be in line with the new world. In the end, who would want to see ads that promote people sharing a coke together on a beach and having fun listening to music together or a bunch of friend ordering McDonalds on the beach when such gatherings became restricted overnight?
Instead, McDonalds, Coca Cola and many other companies were forced to evolve their marketing and completely overhaul their marketing strategies seemingly overnight.
Suddenly from trying to look as cool and fresh and possible, the messages of all these companies changed. Many companies not just Coca Cola started running new marketing campaigns, which promotes the idea that people are stronger together and promotes cooperation between not just people but companies as well. As was mentioned in previous chapter, Coca Cola in the Czech Republic partnered with many small businesses to show, that it cares about small business and is okay with losing a little bit of profit in order to help these small businesses to survive.
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Coca Cola was always big on making sure that they appeal to the customer and customers personality, they wanted to present Coca Cola as almost like a friend that you always have a good time with. However now during the pandemic the biggest shift in Coca Colas image has been in how they want their brand to be perceived. On the Coca Cola official website it is clearly visible, that they want to encourage support and help the society during these hard times. On the website, one can see highlighted messages that promote working together and being stronger together. Coca Cola wants to assure its customers and partners that they will not use this pandemic to abuse their power and that they will help as much as they can.
And Coca Cola has been very vocal about cooperation between companies and their slogan throughout the Coronavirus pandemic is “Stronger Together”. This campaign is ran by Coca Cola internationally, for example in the Czech republic it is named “jsme spolu” – translated as we are together and in Germany it is called “Gemeinsam gegen Corona”, which means together against Corona. Both of these campaigns focus on fighting the coronavirus together and the brand showcases all the different ways that they try to help against the Coronavirus and express Coca Colas willingness to spend their own resources on helping the society. In every country that Coca Cola operates, it has tried to fight the coronavirus with every possible way that it could. Coca Cola donated thousands of Coca Cola beverages to the heroes.
But the trend of helping the society to fight against the coronavirus is not limited to just Coca Cola company. For example, the French sports goods manufacturer and retailer Decathlon has partnered with the Italy based Institute of Studies for the Integration of Systems and together they have converted a Decathlons snorkeling mask to an emergency ventilator mask which could then be used in Italy’s hospitals to counter the big shortage of ventilator masks that occurred in Italy during the first Coronavirus wave in the spring of 2020 (O’Carroll 2020).
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1.3 Keys to appeal to czech customers local community and culture to maintain customer loyalty
Around 63% of the working age population (Seznam zprávy 2020) were afraid of
Coronavirus infection rate on 31st January 2020. Now on 17th January 2021, 80% of the total population (Daneolová 2020) is still affraid of the epidimic, however less people now maintain all of the restrictions that were imposed to reduce the spread of the Covid 19 virus. At the start of the epidemic in 2020, 80% of the czech population upheld the restrictions compared to 60% in January of 2021. People in the czech republic were
however even less careful in summer of 2020 when only 40% of the population upheld the restriction as it looked like the Covid 19 was successfully.
Even during these troubling time the Czech people managed to keep their sense of humor and they expect the same from the advertisements that they see online or in tv (Očenášková 2020). However the Czech society is now deeply affected by the coronavirus restrictions and its impact on the daily lives of Czech people. It is now estimated that on average czech people have gained 6,5 kilograms over the duration of the Covid 19 pandemic. This factor is caused by the movement restriction that was imposed during the pandemic but also results from stress eating and depression that stems from the current situation. 44% of Czech smokers admit, that they started smoking more during the pandemic which also points to the increase of stress level in the sociaty. According to psychologist Brančík it is not surprising, considering many people are now faced with tough situations that they cannot solve by themselves, which results in incereases of mood swings and negative feelings. (ČTK 2020)
According to Hlavica (1961), it has become increasingly important that companies focus on showing sympthy, understandment and good stories during these troublesome times as the Czech society doesn´t want to feel left behind and alone. But it is still important to not forget the Czech sense of humors even during these times and in the future as that is something that is and should be perceived positively by the Czech consumers in the future.
Coca Cola managed to recognize the need for sympathy and understandment as was Mentioned in the previous Chapter Stronger together. But the stronger together wasn´t the
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only campaign that Coca Cola supported the fight against the Covid 19. During the 2020 christmas Coca Cola created a campaign named ´´Darujme se !´´ which focuses on cheering people up with its creative christmas ad and is for a good cause as well, since Coca Cola printed 3 million etickets on its products that have a QR code through which consumers can send financial aid to the red Cross. On top of that the company has donated 6,3 million czech Krones to the red cross in Czech republic and over 200 thousand euro to the Red Cross Slovakia (Landlová 2014).
Influencers are becomming increasingly popular in czech republic and if companies in the czech republic want to appeal and connect with the young consumers, it is important to promote products through various famous influencers and on social media platforms which are very popular among the czech young people.
2. Digital Media during the COVID 19 pandemic
The consumption of Digital Media has greatly risen during the Coronavirus crisis. A survey performed by Statista in March of 2020 has determined that worldwide 67% of people have started watching more news coverage online or on TV and 45% of
respondents stated that they started watching more TV overall. Over 50% of the survey respondents have also stated, that they started watching more films, series and shows online on streaming services like Netflix, Hulu or Disney +. (Watson 2020) 45% of the population has also admitted to spending more time on messaging services like Messenger, WhatsApp and Viber. There was also a significant increase in video games usage, as the monthly spending on video games grew by 39% (Simon-Kucher & Partners 2020) and is projected to stay higher even after the Coronavirus restrictions will be lifted. It is also estimated that the number of gamers who play more than five hours a week has increased by 30% during the ongoing pandemic.
Gaming a once frowned upon industry dedicated more to hardcore fans and gamers has become much more casual during the Coronavirus pandemic, as gaming became the main way for people to socialize and build community online. Along with the rise of gaming, streaming services have experienced a significant growth as well, as people had to abandon
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the activity of going to the cinema. Some Movie Making, like for example Warner Bros studio, even abandoned the idea of first releasing movies to the cinemas and instead
released all their movies that were supposed to head to the cinemas on their own streaming service called HBO Max. Disney followed Warner Bros and released Mulan straight to Disney + streaming service for 30 US dollars purchase fee (Roberts 2020).
Social media platforms like Twitter, Facebook, Instagram or the new platform TikTok have also grown in popularity during the pandemic and have seen increase in usage. It is quite interesting that the main growth in social media usage was through internet pages as Facebook.com noted a 27% increase in traffic but its app noted only a 1.1% growth. The same is true about YouTube, as its website saw an increase in traffic of 15.3% but its app saw a decrease in usage by -4.5% (Koethe and Popper 2020).
As many companies were forced to move their business and workplaces online, the
demand for online software like Zoom or Microsoft Teams, that can be used for work- and work-related activities. Before the Coronavirus Zoom averaged around 2 million sessions per day in the US and Microsoft Teams average around half a million sessions per day.
Their average number of sessions quickly went up as the COVID 19 restrictions were put in place and Zoom currently averages around 7 million sessions per day and Microsoft Teams averages slightly above 2 million sessions per day (Koeze and Popper 2020).
It is also important to mention, that after the surge in internet activity during the pandemic half of the world is now using social media. The social media is here to stay even after Coronavirus restrictions will be partially or entirely lifted, as even when the Coronavirus restrictions were lighter during the summer, the habits of internet usage stayed almost unchanged, proving that the world is now ready to spend more and more time online even after we return to the “new normal” (Kemp 2020).
2.1. Digital media marketing during the Covid 19 pandemic
With the increase of digital media consumption naturally came an increase in digital media marketing, as companies started looking to capture attention of the increasing internet
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traffic as 34% of digital agencies suggested to their clients taht they should increase their investment in digital marketing during COVID 19 period and 24% of agencies suggested a complete change to digital marketing altogether (Gupta 2020). The Interactive Advertising Bureau projects that a modest growth of 6% of digital ad spending in the US is expected for the year 2020. (Vorhaus 2020). The IAB also projects that traditional TV advertising will fall by 24% in 2020. According to eMarketer 2020 (Influencer marketing 2020) search ad spending should increase by 14.4% in 2020 and the trend of rising search ad spending should continue to at least 2024.
It is no wonder that marketing spending on search ads has increased and is expected to continue rising as in 2020 there was on average around 2 trillion google searches per day.
(Reid 2020). Overall 49% of 5000 surveyed shoppers over the world state, that they now shop more online than before the Coronavirus pandemic. According to Deloitte (Deloitte Digital and Salesforce 2020) these shoppers use a mix of digital touchpoint. The first part of the online shoppers journey is the discovery and evalution part, during this process the customer searches for the best and most suitable product via various searching engines, social media feed or even influencers. During this part the online shopper can come into contact with online advertising. Then in the second part the online shopper evaluates the various products and makes his decision, In last part of the process the internet shopper progresses to the payment window and chooses his way of payment.
In order to maximaze the efficience and ROI of digital marketing, companies must be flexible and willing to adapt to the everchanging nature and environment of the online world. Companies that remain flexible and are willing to invest into digital marketing and come up with new ideas how to improve their digital marketing strategy and efficiency can then become recognized as industry leaders, which brings in more business and customers.
Nowadays as companies spend more and more on digital marketing it is important to perform digital marketing correctly. As customers become more conscious about their choices of products, companies should make sure that they engage with their customers with sympathy. Customer support can be a great tool to show customers that the company really cares about them and make sure that the money spent on digital marketing and acquistion of customers is not wasted. Communication with customers, be it via digital
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marketing or customer support (Deloitte 2020) has to be highly personalized in todays wolrd, it is very important to deliver the right message to the right person and at the right time.
During the pandemic, video content on social media became even more popular on social media platforms. According to Ahmad 2020, Tweets that have a video content are 20 times more likely to be shared than other types of post. Users on Pinterest are 2.6 times more likely to make a purchase, if they recently viewed a content posted by a brand with a video attached to the post. Video content is also the draws more attention and user engagement than any other type of post on Instagram.
As of 2020 video consumption through mobile devices is expected to rise by 100% every year until 2022 and 82% of all consumer internet traffic is expected to come from posted online videos by 2022. According to Ahmad 2020 78% of people watch videos online every week and 55% of these people watch videos online every day and 54% of online video consumers wish that there was more video content online. According to estimates, 88% of users spend more time on websites and pages that have video content.
Video content is also very important for showcasing your product to the consumer quickly and effectively and 72% of consumers prefer to learn about a service or product through an online video and it is estimated that viewers retain 95% of a message if the message comes explained in a video format, making online video a very effective marketing tool. In 2020 81% of businesses have the use of online videos integrated in their digital media marketing strategy, which is an 18% increase from the figure of 63% in 2019. It is also estimated, that by 2022 around 1 million online videos should cross the internet per second. The trend of using online videos as part of marketing strategy should still be popular when move forward after the pandemic and Barnard 2020 forecasts that online videos will be the fastest-growing digital channel by advertising expenditure as 95% of businesses are planning to increase or maintain their spend on online video advertising and 99% of current video marketers plan to continue using video marketing in 2020.
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The importance of digital media is expected to prevail even after the COVID 19 pandemic, which means that digital marketing should also remain a very important factor in the post COVID 19 world.
2.2. Influence of digital media on Brand Image
In order to determine the influence of digital media on brand image in todays world, it is important to firstly explain the term Brand Image. Brand Image is how customers view the brand of a company, a company usually has a certain plan of how customers should view and perceive the company brand. However what the customer perceives is not always what the company wants.
For example H&M would like to be perceived as quality discount brand and they
emphasize that the H&M brand has follows these values: ´´We believe in people, We are one team, Constant improvement, Straightforward and open-minded, Entrepreneurial spirit, and in all we do, sustainability is a natural part´´. However in 2018 the brand H&M experienced a significant scandal as it was discovered that the company is using sweatshop and forces people to perform under poor working conditions and with low wages. It was also discovered that there were many sexual assault cases in those factories in Bangladesh, Cambodia, India, Indonesia and Sri Linka. The noted abuse included charges of rape, slapping and taking advantage of work hierarchy to achieve sexual relationships. Part of the case against H&M were also workplace malpractices like forcing workers to work overtime or preventing women from taking bathroom breaks (Hitchings-Hales 2018).
As more and more reports emerged of H&M poor working place practices, a campaign named #TurnAroundHM started on social media and damaged the image and reputation of H&M.
Coca Cola is perceived positively on the socia media as positive posts outweigh negative posts by 15%. Coca Colas reach on social media is impressive 8,8 billions(Miashkova 2020). This figure reflects the number of times social media users have been exposed to mentions of Coke over the past 7 weeks compared to Pepsis 4 Billions reaches. This figure is even more impressive if we consider the fact that Coca Cola has smaller Share of voice
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(250 400 mentions for Coca Cola vs 292 000 mentions for Pepsi), which reflects the overall number of mentions of these companies in social media posts.
Both companies have significant followers and post by big social media Sites. For example Pepsi was mentioned by following : The New York Times, NTD Television, The Wall Street Journal, KFC, Pizza Hut, Domino's Pizza, NFL, and many others. The biggest person/ single human influencer name on the list of Pepsi is famous singer and songwriter Davido Adeleke with a reach of 16.4 Million. However Coca Cola has even bigger brands on its side being mentioned by the like of : UNILAD, Reuters, Forbes, Tasty, McDonald's, Red Bull, and Jesus Daily. Coca Colas bigest human influencer is Tito El Bambino, a Puerto Rican singer with a 9,3 Million following on social media (Miashkova 2020).
The reach of Coca Cola on social media contributes heavily to how Coca Cola is perceived via customers, it is important that success of Coca Colas brand image is largely due to the focus of Coca Colas marketing on the brand marketing rather than marketing a single product. Coca Colas ads do not sell and promote the Coca Cola products, instead Coca Cola focuses on promoting its own brand as a whole and selling a lifestyle.
One of the key factors for Coca Colas brand image is consistency. A great example of Coca Colas consistency is its signature red Color that is visible on every Coca Cola post on Social media and the emphasis on enjoying a Coke in every Coca Cola ad. Even as Coca Cola slightly changes its messaging and content of ads every year or even season to fit the current climate, the message to enjoy a coke is always present in the ad. This promotes the idea that Coca Cola brings happiness even in dark times like the current ongoin pandemic.
Coca Cola had to learn about the importance of consistence the hard way, as it tried to discontinue the classic and signature Coke in 1985 as it released a New Coke concept and planned to discontinue the production of the Classic Coke. This move angered Coca Cola loyals customer and forced Coca Cola to keep the Classic Coke and its design and on top of that it force Coke to discontinue the New Coke entirely in 2002. (Insights for
Professionals 2017).
Some flexibility is however as important as consistent brading, it would be extremely hard for Coca Cola to stay relevant if it didn´t adjust to modern online marketing and modern
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ideas, Ads from 2002 could hardly work in the current pandemic enviroment in 2020.
Coca Cola uses its strong social media presence to influence their brand image.
As of 17.1.2020 the official Coca-Cola Facebook page has roughly 106 million followers (Facebook 2020), Czech Coca Cola instagram account has 56,2 thousands of followers and the international Coca Cola instagram account has 2,7 million followers (Instagram 2020).
On twitter the official Coca-Cola account has around 3,3 million followers (Twitter 2020).
The company uses their social media presence to interact and engage with customers. For example Coca Cola encourages their customers to post pictures where there are enjoying their coke.
But social media is not the only way how Coca Cola influences and maintains its brand image digitally. Coca Cola also has over 50 mobile applications which can be downloaded by consumers or potential consumers. Examples of Coca Cola apps are : Coca Cola
Ambassador, Virtual Cola Drinking, Coca Cola Surveys or Coca Cola Happy Shopmate which gives the user of the app various discounts for Coca Cola partner outlets. These apps encourage Coca Cola vision of enjoying life with Coca Cola and are a great tool for maintaining and influencing Coca Colas brand image internationally.
2.3. Influence of digital media on customer loyalty
The age of digital media offers companies many tools how to interact with their customers in ways that really were not possible before the digital age. For example, the creation of online communities helps brands to easily achieve loyal customers that now support the brand because of social interactions and not only for the product. Although one could argue that good online brand communities are nowadays a part of the offered product.
Brand community is defined as unique form of non-geographically bound community that exists online, which is bonded by the fact that its members all support and shop a particular brand, these customers eventually become part of the brand itself.
One of the best examples of a great online brand community are Xbox Ambassadors. The Xbox ambassadors must meet many of criteria set by Xbox, and they are dedicated Xbox fans. Every Xbox Ambassador must have an active Xbox Live Gold membership, they
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must have a Gamescore of at least 1500 points, they also need to be 17 years or older and have no previous enforcements on their accounts (Shanahan 2019). The influence of Ambassadors has been tremendous as their main jobs comes in forms of missions from Microsoft, through which they earn experience points and can level up, some missions are as simply as writing “GG – Good Game” to the players that participated in the game with the Xbox ambassador, in order to create a more welcoming and positive environment for the Xbox gaming community, thanks to which consumers of Xbox content feel a sense of belonging and a positive environment around them.
Coca Cola has also managed to build an online community in 2005 when it launched the
“Coca Cola Movement” in Spain. The campaign was targeted on younger audience, because Coca Cola found out that young people have higher tendency to use online websites and forums and on the other hand young people are a lot harder to reach by the traditional advertising platforms like Radio broadcasts, Television advertising or printed leaflets. Young people are also more open to sharing and receiving information online.
Coca Cola Movement started by inviting various users to join the site as members and to do that the users needed to state their name and email address. The registration process also served Coca Cola as a way to closely examine the online consumers and their habits as there was a short survey included in the registration in which the Spanish online consumers filled out how much they drank coca cola when they buy it etc.. This way Coca Cola gained invaluable data for free, the data was used in future marketing projects to make better suited ads.
After the registration process was completed, the users could start earning loyalty points purchasing Coca Cola products, those points would then count towards the Coca Cola loyalty program. The loyalty points in Coca Cola loyalty program could then be exchanged for free Coca Cola drinks.
But the loyalty program wasn´t the only positive aspect of this site for the users. The users could also contact other members of the Coca Cola Movement community by various criteria like sex or age via the “find people” button. The social value of this page was immense as it also allowed users to create posts and share information with other member
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or even the Coca Cola company as the website could also be used to suggest improvements and provide feedback. There were also ways other ways to entertain the customer, like various mini games or debating topics, which made it more attractive for the consumer to spend time on the website. It is important to keep in mind, that Coca Cola basically launched a page similar to Facebook and other hand social media world and again showed how Coca Cola was ahead of its time in terms of marketing and exploration of the digital media marketing tools.
After Coca Cola launched the Coca Cola movement project it generated 3 billion euros in operating profit in 2005. The website averaged 50 000 daily hits and the company received the award Marketing Excellence for being the best digital media program all over the world in 2005.
The success of the Coca Cola movement campaign prevails even today as 18,4% of Coca Colas mentions and posts online by social media users on Facebook, Instagram, Reddit, Twitter and YouTube are in the Spanish language (Miashkova 2020). To put this into perspective, the percentage of posts about Pepsi in the Spanish language are just around 4%. This fact can be contributed to the prevailing customer loyalty that Coca Cola gained not only but as well from the Coca Cola Movement project.
As time went on Coca Cola Movement became obsolete, however this did not pose any threat to the Coca Cola online community, as the Coca Cola super fans quickly decided to build Coca Colas fan website on Facebook. However, when Facebook posed regulations that brands must manage their sites themselves, Coca Cola had a decision to make – either go and create their completely new Facebook page or keep the one that was created organically by their two big fans. Coca Cola decided to keep the page that the fans created and even decided to support the two founders by employing them in the Coca Cola
Marketing department and giving them power to manage the official Coca Cola Facebook.
The official Facebook page now has over 106 million Followers, which Coca Cola keeps informed and engaged by posting on the page regularly in form of videos, posts or even GIFs.
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Thanks to this strong online community, the restriction that were put in place to curb the infection rate of the pandemic, did not damage the relationship between customers and Coca Cola as the company stayed very active on social media and their website where its CEO James Quincey stated that “We are prioritizing safety – whether for our system associates or for our customers and consumers”.
In order to maintain customer loyalty Coca Cola switched their marketing focus from trying to expand brand awareness and emphasizing going out together to supporting local communities through various actions and donations, in order to show customers that Coca Cola cares about them and their environment and is more than just a for profit company.
And even though the company profits have dropped by 25% in Q1 of 2020 (Arthur 2020), Coca Cola kept donating to charities and investing in various community programs throughout 2020.
Coca Cola also allows their customers to design their own drinks (Ritchie 2011), which further enhances the Coca Cola experience and gives the consumer an option to be part of the Coca Cola and see their own product on the shelf! Coca Colas attention to Customer’s input plays a big part in their seemingly unwinding customer loyalty.
3. Methodology, data analysis and findings of Quantitative research
After the literature review of Change of brand communication during the Covid 19 pandemic and the Influence of digital media during the Covid 19 pandemic, which was provided in the chapter one and two. The primary quantitative survey was conducted by the author and the results of the quantitative survey will be presented in this chapter. In addition to the results, the detailed information and answers to the research question and the sub-questions will be answered in this part as well.
Quantitative research was conducted as a questionnaire which was placed on Facebook and Czech reddit forum in order to find out the consumer habits and perception of brands in the Czech markets. The quantitative research was chosen as a proper research method because:
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The survey is easily accessible online to many respondents and protects their safety (taking into account the Covid 19 pandemic and inability to ask questions in person) and
anonymity. Surveys are great tools to provide clear, standardized and objective results.
Therefore, the author assumed that quantitative research in form of a survey will provide the needed information for this thesis.
A total of 233 people responded to this survey out of which 12 persons are employed in the field of Public Relations/Marketing, rendering their responses unusable in the thesis, as their opinions could be influenced by the field that they are employed in.
The survey was divided into 5 parts. The 1st part consisted of 6 questions that were focused on the demography of the respondents, the respondents were asked to provide information on their current residence, occupation, age, marital status and level of education. In the 2nd part of the survey, the respondents provided Information on their consumption habits of soft drinks (sweetened carbonated drinks) and the change of their habits during the Covid 19 pandemic. In the 3rd part of the survey, respondents were asked to provide opinions of their favourite cola like soda brands and if they noticed a change in the behaviour and communication of their favourite cola like brand during the Covid 19 pandemic. Finally in 4th part of the survey, the respondents were asked about their social media habits.
3.1. Demographic Information of soft drink consumers
In the first part of the survey, the demographic section, participants had to answer 6 questions to get specific demographic information. The demographic information that the respondents filled out were: Current country of residence, age, highest level of education achieved, marital and employment status.
Figure 1. Current country of residence of survey respondents
95%
5%
Czech Republic Other
24
Source: Author’s quantitative Research
The primary goal of the Thesis is to examine the consumer loyalty and brand image as keys to maintaining brand awareness and consumer participation during the Covid 19 crisis in Czech Republic. Therefore, it was very important to firstly very the country of current residence of the survey respondents. This was examined in the first question of the survey and 95% of survey respondents (210 respondents) answered that they are living in the Czech Republic.
The 5% of survey respondents (11 respondents) are currently located in other countries, namely: Austria (3 respondents), Slovakia (2 respondents), Finland (1 respondent), Germany (1 respondent), Spain (1 respondent), Bulgaria (1 respondent), Greece (1 respondent), Poland (1 respondent). The respondents from countries other than Czech Republic were excluded from the study, since the sample size is too small to make any conclusion on the habits of consumers in the particular countries.
Figure 2. Age of survey respondents
Source: Author’s quantitative Research
The median age range of survey respondents are 18-24 years old (122 survey respondents) and fall into the category of young adults/Gen Z. The 2nd most populated age group by survey respondents are the Millennials (35 survey respondents). Then we have 20 survey respondents that belong to the age group of 35-44 years old, 15 survey respondents that belong to the 45-55 years old age range, 14 survey respondents that are 12-17 years old and only 4 survey respondents belong to the 55 years old or more age group.
12-17 years old 18-24 years old 25-34 years old 35-44 years old 45-54 years old 54 years old or more
0 20 40 60 80 100 120 140
Number of respondents
25
Figure 3. Highest education level achieved by survey respondents
Source: Author’s quantitative Research
Most survey respondents (82 survey respondents) are high school graduates with a diploma or equivalent. 2nd most survey respondents (35) have some college credit but no degree.
12% - 25 survey respondents have a Bachelor’s degree.
Then we have 20 survey respondents (which equals to 10%) for three education level categories: 1. Some high school, no Diploma 2. Master´s degree 3. Nursery school to 8th grade.
There were also three survey respondents that had no Schooling completed, two survey respondents that had a Professional degree, one survey respondent with a Doctorate degree, one survey respondent with an Associate degree and one survey respondent with a
trade/technical/vocational training.
39%
17%
12%
10%
10%
10%
1%1% 0% 0% 0%
Highest level of education achieved
High school graduate, diploma or the equivalent Some college credit, no degree
Bachelor’s degree Some high school, no diploma
Master’s degree Nursery school to 8th grade
No schooling completed Professional degree
Doctorate degree Associate degree
Trade/technical/vocational training
26
Figure 4. Marital status of respondents
Source: Author’s quantitative Research
The vast majority of survey respondents (78% - 165 survey respondents) are also single and never were married. 33 (16%) of 210 survey respondents are currently married or in a domestic partnership, while 3% of survey respondents are divorced and 2% of the survey respondents are separated. 1 survey respondent also did not provide an answer to their marital status.
Figure 5. Employment status of respondents
Source: Author’s quantitative Research
According to the survey answers, 56% (117 survey respondents) of survey respondents are students, 26% (54 survey respondents) of survey respondents are employed and 13% (27 survey respondents) of survey respondents are self-employed. 3% (7 survey respondents)
79%
16%
3% 2% 0%
Marital status of respondents
Single, never married Married or domestic partnership
Divorced Seperated
Unanswered
56%
26%
13%
3% 1% 1%
Employment status of survey respondents
Student Employed
Self-employed Unemployed and looking for work
Unemployed but not currently looking for work Retired
27
of survey respondents are unemployed and looking for work, while 1% (3 survey respondents) are unemployed and not looking for work. There are also 2 survey respondents (1%) that are retired.
3.2 Consumption habits of survey respondents
Now that we clarified the demographic information of survey respondents, such as age, marital status, employment status, country of residence, it’s time to dive deeply into the consumer habit of the survey respondents.
Figure 6. soft drinks consumption habits of survey respondents
Source: Author’s quantitative Research
Based on the answers of survey respondents, we can see that most survey respondents consume soft drinks more often than once per month. As 26% (55 survey respondents) of survey respondents consume soft drinks once per week, 15% (32 survey respondents) of survey respondents consume soft drinks once per two weeks, 9% (18 survey respondents) of survey respondents consume soft drinks once per day and 4% (8 survey respondents) of survey respondents stated.
On the other hand, 46% of survey respondents (97 survey respondents) consume soft drinks only once per month.
46%
26%
15%
9%4%
once per month once per week once per two weeks once per day more than once per day
28
Figure 7. Age group of soft drinks consumption habits of survey respondents
Source: Author’s quantitative Research
It is interesting to note, that 67 out of the 157 (43%) survey respondents that belong to the age group of young adults and millennials, consume soft drinks once per month. While 90 out of 157 survey respondents (57%) that belong to the age group of young adults and millennials, consume soft drinks more than once per month.
In detail, 8 out of 14 survey respondents that belong to the age group of 12-17 (57%) years old consume soft drinks more than once per month. 70 out of 122 (57%) survey
respondents, that belong to the young adult age group consume soft drinks more than once per month. And 20 out of 35 (57%) survey respondents, that belong to the millennial age group consume soft drinks more than once per month.
It seems that survey respondents that are older than 34 years old, consume fewer soft drinks than the younger part of population, as only 8 out of 20 (40%) survey respondents that are between 35-44 years old reported that they consume soft drinks more than once per month. And also, only 5 out of 15 (33%) survey respondents that are aged between 45-55 years old answered that they consume soft drinks more than once per month. Even in the group of 55 years old and older, 2 out of 4 (50%) reported that they drink soft drinks more than once per month.
14
122
35 20 15
8 4
70
20 8 5 2
0 50 100 150
12-17 years old
18-24 years old
25-34 years old
35-44 years old
45-54 years old
54 years old and more Total participants
Number of participants that consume soft drinks more than once per month
29
Figure 8. change of soft drink consumption habits of survey respondents during the Covid 19 pandemic, based on their opinion
Source: Author’s quantitative Research
Let us take a look how the habits of most survey participants change during the COVID 19 pandemic.
53% of survey respondents (112 survey respondents) answered that their soft drinks consumption habits did not change during the Covid 19 crisis according to their opinion.
On contrary, 47% of survey respondents (98 survey respondents) clarified that their soft drink consumption habits changed during the pandemic. The change of soft drink
consumption habits stated by most respondents, was a decrease of soft drinks consumption.
As 68 out of 98 (70%) survey respondents that reported a change in their habits of soft drink consumption, responded that they decreased their consumption of soft drinks. In detail, 40 survey respondents answered that they consume less soft drinks during the Covid 19 pandemic and 28 survey respondents stated that according to their opinion they now consume much less soft drinks.
Out of the 30 survey respondents that reported an increase in their soft drinks consumption habit during the Covid 19 pandemic, only 7 reported that they now consume much more soft drinks and 23 survey respondents stated that they now drink more soft drinks.
Interestingly, 20 out of the 30 survey (67%) respondents that reported an increase in their soft drinks consumption habit during the Covid 19 pandemic are students. And 19 out of the 20students that saw an increase in their soft drinks consumption habits are also single and were never married.
54%
19%
13%
11%
3%
My soft drinks consumption habits did not change during the Covid 19 crisis I consume soft drinks less often now
I consume soft drinks much less often now I consume soft drinks more often now I consume soft drinks much more often now
30
Figure 9. Most convenient price of 330 ml soft drink can
Source: Author’s quantitative Research
The most convenient price per one 330 ml can of a soda drink is between 11-20 CZK, according to the survey respondents, as 118 out of 210 (56%) survey respondents marked this price range as the most convenient.
This price range is also most convenient for the age group of young adults, as 69 out of 122 (57%) young adults responded that they think the price range of 11-20 CZK per one can of 330ml soft drink is the most convenient price range. This price range was also most convenient for the age group of millennials, as 16 out of 35 (46%) millennials have chosen this price range.
64 out of 210 (30%) survey respondents answered, that the most convenient price per one 330 ml can of a soda drink is between 21-30 CZK.
Interesting fact is, that only 19 out of 210 survey respondents (9%) marked the price range of under 10 CZK as optimal.
On the other hand, even less survey respondents answered that they consider anything more than 30 CZK as the most convenient price per one 330 ml can of a soda drink. As only 5 out of 210 survey respondents (2%) answered, that the 31-40 CZK is the most convenient one, and only 4 out of 210 survey respondents (2%) answered that they think the most convenient price per one 330 ml can of a soda drink is 41 CZK or more.
3.3. Demographic information of active consumers of cola sodas
In previous chapter we clarified the consumption habits of survey respondents, in this chapter we will take a look at the favorited cola brands of the survey respondents and
Under 10 CZK 11-20 CZK 21-30 CZK 31-40 CZK 41 CZK and more
0 20 40 60 80 100 120 140
Number of survey respondents
31
determine if the favorite cola brand of the survey respondents has any influence over the consumption habits of the survey respondents.
Figure 10. consumers of cola soda
Source: Author’s quantitative Research
125 out of 210 (60%) survey respondents that consume soft drinks responded, that they are active consumers of cola sodas, meaning they bought a cola soda in the past 365 days.
85 out of 210 (40%) survey respondents answered, that they are not active consumers of cola sodas.
Figure 11. Employment status of survey respondents that consume cola sodas
Source: Author’s quantitative Research
Students seem to be the group with relatively most active consumers of cola sodas, as 73 out of 117 (65%) of survey respondents that are students, would describe themselves as
60%
40%
Are you an active consumer of cola sodas?
Yes No
117
54
27
7 3 2
73
33
12 4 3 0
0 20 40 60 80 100 120 140
Students Employed Self employed Unemployed looking for
work
Unemployed and not looking
for work
Retired
Total participants Cola sodas consumers
32
active consumers of cola sodas. In comparison, 33 out of 54 (61%) employed survey respondents would describe themselves as active cola consumers and only 12 out of 27 (44%) self-employed survey respondents would consider themselves as active cola consumers.
7 out of 10 (70%) unemployed survey respondents would also describe themselves as active cola sodas consumers. In detail 4 out of 7 (57%) unemployed looking for work respondents are active cola sodas consumers and 3 out of 3 unemployed and not looking for work are active cola sodas consumers (100%). In addition, no retired survey
respondents (out of 2 retired survey respondents) would describe themselves as active cola sodas consumers.
Figure 12. Age of survey respondents that consume cola sodas
Source: Author’s quantitative Research
As visible on figure 12, most consumers of cola sodas are still between 18-24 years old as 74 out of 122 (60%) survey respondents answered, that they are active consumer of cola sodas. Then we have 23 out of 35 (65%) survey respondents that are aged between 25-34 years old, that would consider themselves as active consumers of cola sodas. Then comes a slight change, as the age group of 12-17 years old will the 3rd largest moving forward, as 10 out of 14 (71%) survey respondents that are in this age group reported, that they would consider themselves active consumers of cola sodas.
The soft drinks consumers from the 35-44 years old age group consume noticeably less cola sodas, as only 9 out of 20 (45%) survey respondents that are in this age range
reported, that they are active consumers of cola sodas. From the age group of 45-55 years
14
122
35 20 15 4
10
74
23 9 8 1
0 50 100 150
12-17 years old
18-24 years old
25-34 years old
35-44 years old
45-54 years old
55 years old or more Total participants Number of cola sodas consumers
33
old, 8 out of 15 (53%) survey respondents answered, that they would consider themselves as active consumers of cola sodas. Lastly only 1 out of 4 (25%) survey respondents that are 55 years old or older would consider themselves as active consumers of cola sodas.
Figure 13. Highest achieved education level of survey respondents that consume cola sodas
Source: Author’s quantitative Research
As we can see on the Figure 13., the proportion of highest achieved education level achieved of survey respondents that consume cola sodas, looks very similarly to the proportion of highest achieved education level of survey respondents that consume soft drinks.
In detail, the category of High school graduate, diploma or the equivalent now account for 38% of the survey respondents instead of 39% that they do in the soft drink only category.
Survey respondents with some college credit, no degree now account for 14.4% instead of 17% that they do account for in the soft drink only category.
Interestingly, the share of Bachelor’s degree respondents is unchanged as they still represent 12% of survey respondents. Other categories that remain unchanged are: 1.
Master’s degree, 2. Some high school, no diploma, 3. Nursery school to 8th grade as each
82
35
25 20 20 20
3 2 1 1 1
48
18 15 13 12 13
3 0 1 1 1
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90
Total participants Number of cola sodas consumers
