A lesson learned in the cola wars

 

My First Job: A Lesson Learned In The Cola Wars

October 29, 2013

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When does your “career” begin? I held several jobs during high school and college that included being a lifeguard, teaching martial arts and playing gigs in a rock band, but my first “real job” (according to my parents) began when I joined the Pepsi Bottling Group in 1986 upon graduating from Marshall University. Since my parents have been right in most situations throughout my life, I’ll tip my hat to them once again and claim that as the starting point for my career.
Pepsi had a career track for college graduates designed to teach the fundamentals of management. The program included intensive “on the job” assignments and classroom training of key concepts like P.R.O.F.I.T.S. selling, overcoming objections, and developing winning channel strategies. Upon completing a fast paced 90 days foundational program, I was relocated to my first official assignment in Kalamazoo, Michigan as a District Sales Manager.
The role of a District Sales Manager involved the direct supervision of six route salesmen, an assigned sales territory with quota, and the responsibility of securing in-store and advertising campaigns with the key accounts located in my territory. I learned much in those early days, with the over-arching lesson being the power of leadership frameworks that could easily be understood and applied in pursuit of creating shared vision and organizational alignment. After all, “retail is detail” and execution is key!
One of my greatest lessons came from one of these leadership concepts that we referred to as “a one better mentality”. In the mid-80’s, the Cola Wars were reaching epic proportions with advertising and endorsements that included Michael J. Fox, Michael Jackson and Madonna championing the brand promise for the Next Generation. On the ground, my marching orders for my territory were clearly communicated – I was to find the person who had my job at Coke and apply a “one better mentality”. If my Coke counterpart had one display in a convenience store, I needed to have two. If they had 13 feet of shelf space in a supermarket aisle, then my goal was to have 14 feet. The concept was simple and galvanizing for an army of district sales managers, the competitive intensity was thrilling, and the ability to measure one’s success on a daily basis was clear.
But along the way, a very important lesson emerged that I have never forgotten. In 1991, I was inspecting our execution in a key account and nodding my head in approval as we had secured 16 feet in a major supermarket aisle as compared to Coke’s 12 feet. Then I looked to the left and saw 24 feet of bottled water. Bottled water? Who invited them to this fight?
Lesson learned: Sun Tzu was wise in saying, “know thyself, know thy enemy, and you need not fear the results of a thousand battles”. However, being fixated on a single competitor can blind you to other disruptive entrants and substitute alternatives. A powerful way to avoid this trap is by staying laser-focused on the customer versus the competition, and by defining your market and competitive alternatives more broadly (which we eventually did, moving to “share of stomach” versus “share of carbonated soft drinks”).
My early days in the Cola Wars taught many leadership lessons that I have carried with me since, and those Michael Jackson concerts were a blast as well!
Photo: Screenshot from the classic Michael Jackson Pepsi commercial.

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Brad Smith

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