Coca-Cola and PepsiCo lose popularity to local Cola brands due to boycott over Gaza in Muslim countries
Coca-Cola and rival PepsiCo spent hundreds of millions of dollars over decades building demand for their soft drinks in Muslim-majority countries including Egypt to Pakistan. Now, both face a challenge from local sodas in those countries due to consumer boycotts that target the globe-straddling brands as symbols of America, and by extension Israel, at a time of war in Gaza.
In Egypt, sales of Coke have cratered this year, while local brand V7 exported three times as many bottles of its own cola in the Middle East and the wider region than last year. In Bangladesh, an outcry forced Coca-Cola to cancel an ad campaign against the boycott. And across the Middle East, Pepsi's rapid growth evaporated after the Gaza war started in October.
Pakistani corporate executive Sunbal Hassan kept Coke and Pepsi off her wedding menu in Karachi in April. She said she didn't want to feel her money had reached the tax coffers of the United States, Israel's staunchest ally.
«With the boycott, one can play a part by not contributing to those funds,» Hassan said. Instead, she served her wedding guests Pakistani brand Cola Next.
She is not alone. While market analysts say it is hard to put a dollar figure on lost sales and PepsiCo and Coca-Cola still have growing businesses in several countries in the Middle East, Western beverage brands suffered a 7% sales decline in the first half of the year across the region, market researcher NielsenIQ says.
In Pakistan, Krave Mart, a leading delivery app, has seen local cola rivals like Cola
