Levi Strauss & Co.

Address:
1155 Battery Street
San Francisco, California 94111
U.S.A.

Telephone: (415) 544-6000
Fax: (415) 544-1693


Statistics:
Wholly Owned Subsidiary of Levi Strauss Associates Inc.
Incorporated: 1890
Employees: 37,648
Sales: $6.7 billion (1995)
SICs: 2325 Men's/Boys' Trousers & Slacks; 2321 Men's/Boys' Shirts; 2331 Women's/Misses' Blouses & Shirts; 2339 Women's/Misses Outerwear, Not Elsewhere Classified

Company Perspectives:

The Mission of Levi Strauss & Co. is to sustain responsible commercial success as a global marketing company of branded apparel. We must balance goals of superior profitability and return on investment, leadership market positions, and superior products and service. We will conduct our business ethically and demonstrate leadership in satisfying our responsibilities to our communities and to society. Our work environment will be safe and productive and characterized by fair treatment, teamwork, open communications, personal accountability and opportunities for growth and development.


Company History: Levi Strauss & Co., the world's largest brand-name apparel manufacturer, gave the world blue jeans and grew enormously rich on this piece of U.S. culture. Indeed, around the world the name of the company's founder has grown to be synonymous with the pants he invented: Levi's. Levi Strauss markets apparel in more than 60 countries, and it has 53 production facilities and 32 customer service centers in 49 countries. The company operates wholly owned businesses in most European countries, in South Africa, Australia, Japan, Hong Kong, India, The Philippines, Malaysia, New Zealand, South Korea, Taiwan, Brazil and Argentina, and operates through joint ventures and licensing agreements in a host of other countries. Besides its well-known Levi's brand products, the company markets clothing and accessories under the brand names Dockers, Britannia, and Slates.
Early History
Levi Strauss, born in Bavaria in 1829, emigrated to the United States with his family in 1847, at the age of 18. In New York, he was met by his two half-brothers, who had already established a dry-goods business. A year later, he was dispatched to Kentucky to live with relatives and walk the countryside peddling his brothers' goods.
While Levi Strauss was still traveling about the hills of the South, his older sister's husband, David Stern, established a dry-goods store in San Francisco, California, in the wake of the 1849 California gold rush, and the company that would come to bear Levi Strauss's name dates its beginning to this 1850 founding. Three years later, Strauss made the arduous sea journey around Cape Horn to join his brother-in-law. San Francisco at the time was a booming frontier town, and the opportunity was ripe for a well-run business to flourish. Strauss and Stern set up their small store near the waterfront, where they could easily receive shipments of goods from the Strauss brothers back east.
Jeans, which would become the staple of the family business, were invented when Levi Strauss, noting the need for rugged pants for miners, had a tailor sew pants from some sturdy brown canvas he had brought with him on his journey. Once the supply of canvas was exhausted, Strauss turned to a thick fabric made in the French town of Nimes, known as serge de Nimes, which would be shortened to denim. The denim pants, dyed with indigo to make them blue, sold quickly, and the business of Levi Strauss & Co. expanded rapidly, moving three times to new and expanded quarters in the next 13 years. In 1866 the company moved to a luxurious new location on Battery Street, only to have the building cracked from roof to foundation in an earthquake two years later.
In 1872 the proprietors of Levi Strauss & Co. received a letter from Jacob Davis, a tailor in Nevada, offering them a half interest in the patent on a technique he had invented for strengthening the seams of pants by fastening them with rivets. In return, they would pay the cost of obtaining the patent. The cost was negligible, and Strauss and his brother-in-law quickly took the tailor up on his offer. The following year, the company was granted a patent on the use of rivets to secure pocket seams, and also on the double-arc stitching found on the back pockets of its pants.
At first, the company had the pants sewn by tailors working individually at home, in the same way that the Strauss brothers in New York manufactured goods. Soon, however, the demand for the new pants became too great, despite the economic depression that had struck California in 1873, and the company collected its stitchers under one roof, in a small factory on Fremont Street, which was managed by Davis, the tailor from Nevada. Such remarkable success brought envious competitors, and Levi Strauss & Co. filed its first lawsuit for patent infringement against two other makers of riveted clothing in January 1874. On the second day of that month, the founder of the San Francisco concern, David Stern, died. About two years later, Strauss's two oldest nephews, Jacob and Louis Stern, entered the firm with their uncle.
In 1877, in a climate of dire economic conditions, mobs attacked San Francisco's Chinatown, sacking and burning shops and homes in a three-day riot. White men, unable to find work, took out their frustrations on the Chinese, who had been willing to work for lower wages. In the wake of this event, Levi Strauss & Co. solidified its policy of courting its customers' goodwill by relying exclusively on white women as seamstresses. Because this entailed paying higher wages, the company had to charge higher prices for its products, and thus find ways to deliver higher-quality goods.
In 1877 the Levi Strauss & Co. factory expanded, and the notable features of Levi's pants--the dark blue denim, the rivets, the stitching, the guarantee of quality--became further standardized. By 1879 the pants were selling for $1.46, and they had become widely worn in the rough-and-tumble mines and ranches of the West. The firm also continued to sell other dry goods, chalking up sales of $2.4 million in 1880, and it prospered throughout the 1880s.
In 1886 the "Two Horse Brand" leather tag, showing a team of horses trying to pull apart a pair of pants, began to be sewn into the back of the company's "waist-high overalls," the term Levi Strauss preferred to "jeans." In 1890 the firm assigned its first lot numbers to its products, and the famous number "501" was assigned to the riveted pants. In that year as well, Levi Strauss & Co. was formally incorporated and issued 18,000 shares of stock in the company to family members and employees.
In September 1902, the patriarch of the company died. In his later years, Levi Strauss had entrusted the business more to his four Stern nephews, who inherited the firm, in order to devote his energy to charitable and civic causes. Four years after Strauss's death the company endured another shock, when the Great San Francisco Earthquake and Fire of 1906 struck. Both the company's headquarters building on Battery Street and the factory on Fremont Street were destroyed. Along with the rest of the city, Levi Strauss & Co. rebuilt, but the ensuing years were difficult. In 1907 a financial panic, which started in New York and crept westward, caused a slowdown in business, and the company began to streamline the merchandise it sold, relying more and more on its own products. Overall, however, sales were flat, and the four Stern brothers had drifted into a pattern of hands-off management.
In 1912 the company introduced its first innovative product in decades, Koveralls, playsuits for children designed by Simon Davis, the son of tailor Jacob Davis, who had followed his father into the business. Advertised widely, Koveralls became the first Levi Strauss & Co. product to be sold nationwide, helping the company to eventually break out of its regional market. The coming of World War I, and the boom in production for the war, had little or no impact on Levi Strauss & Co., since the company held no government contracts. Its riveted denim goods were sold only to the western laborers for whom they had originally been manufactured, and resale of eastern goods accounted for twice the sales of goods made at the San Francisco factory. Slowly, under the hands of the aging Stern brothers, who were resistant to change, Levi Strauss & Co.'s enterprise was losing ground.
New Leadership
In 1919 Sigmund Stern, who would take over the presidency of the company from his brother, Jacob, in 1921, brought aboard his son-in-law, Walter Haas, to give new blood to the leadership of Levi Strauss & Co. The Haas family, part of the Stern and Strauss clans by marriage, would continue to lead the company into the early 1990s. Walter Haas had little background in the family business, but one of the first changes he made was to update the company's inefficient system of keeping financial records. Despite Haas's attempts at efficiency, the company was battered in the early 1920s by a steep drop in the cost of cotton, the primary raw material for its products, that allowed competitors from other parts of the nation to undercut its prices. Company profits fell by one-third in 1920. In addition, Haas discovered that Levi Strauss & Co. was losing $1 on every dozen Koveralls sold. After a brief internal struggle, the price of Koveralls was adjusted, and steps to increase overall productivity, including the implementation, at this late date, of the assembly-line system, were taken.
The company began attaching belt loops to its basic denim pants in 1922, in addition to the traditional suspender buttons. Throughout the 1920s, Levi Strauss & Co. did business at a profit under the direction of Haas and his brother-in-law Daniel Koshland, a banker, whom he had brought into the firm to assist him. The firm found itself relying increasingly on the pants it manufactured, rather than the other dry goods it wholesaled, for the bulk of its profits. By 1929, 70 percent of the firm's profit derived from its sale of jeans.
The Great Depression and Thereafter
With the stock market crash in 1929, and the subsequent Great Depression, Levi Strauss & Co. fell on hard times. The widespread unemployment that swept the country throughout the 1930s hit the manual laborers who bought the company's pants particularly hard. By 1930 the company's profits had vanished, and it posted a loss on sales that had fallen one-sixth. Unwilling to cut back production by firing workers, the company amassed a large backlog of unsold products, and then put its employees on a three-day work week. By 1932 company sales had dropped to half their 1929 level. With the coming of the next year, however, the Depression had started to lessen, and sales of Levi's pants slowly began to pick up.
In the economic turmoil of the 1930s, the growing U.S. union movement gained a new stronghold in San Francisco. Although workers in the Levi Strauss & Co. factory had not joined a union, organized labor's insistence that union workers wear union-made clothes sharply limited the company's sales in the heavily unionized San Francisco area. In 1935 Levi Strauss & Co. employees joined the United Garment Workers with management's acquiescence, thereby averting a strike and ending the virtual union boycott of Levi Strauss & Co.'s products.
The Depression and subsequent farm failures of the 1930s eventually worked in the company's favor, enabling it to break out of the relatively small market it had served since its inception. Western ranchers, unable to support themselves through agriculture, turned in the mid-1930s to tourism, inviting easterners to visit "dude ranches," where they were introduced to the cowboy's habitual garb, Levi's jeans. In addition, the advent and growth in popularity of Hollywood western movies further spread the word about Levi's jeans. In its advertising the company had always emphasized durability, but now it also stressed a certain western mystique. To capitalize on its growing brand identification, the company added the trademarked red "Levi's" tab to the back pocket of its pants in 1936, the first label to be placed on the outside of a piece of clothing. As demand increased, the vast stockpile of denim pants accumulated during the early years of the 1930s became depleted, and the factory returned to normal operation.
By 1939 the Levi Strauss & Co. blue denim "waist overall" had just begun to be popular outside the world of blue-collar workers. College students in California and Oregon adopted them as a fad, and slowly this humble item of clothing began to take on a status all its own. After the United States entered World War II, the government declared the jeans an essential commodity for the war effort, available only to defense workers. This restricted distribution made them an even more coveted item, and contributed, in the long run, to the brand's success. In the short run, however, wartime price restrictions cut into the company's profits.
With the war's end, the company was well-situated to prosper. Demographic shifts had brought a large number of potential new customers to the West Coast, and Levi Strauss & Co. now operated five jeans factories, in a futile effort to keep up with demand. The immediate postwar years brought a significant production shortage, and the company instituted a strict program of allocation, favoring retailers that were long-time customers. By 1948 company profits for the first time topped $1 million on sales of four million pairs of pants.
In the booming postwar economy of the 1950s, Levi Strauss & Co. underwent the most significant transition in the company's history. Taking advantage of demographic trends, the company began to focus its marketing efforts on young people, members of the "baby boom," who would wear its pants, now known colloquially as "Levi's," for play, not work. Targeting this new market involved widening the company's sales force to a truly nationwide scope, and shifting its emphasis from rural to more urban areas. As a sign of the company's future, Levi Strauss & Co. closed down its business wholesaling others' merchandise in the early 1950s.
Once again, in the 1950s Hollywood gave the company a large boost in its efforts to sell jeans to young people, when actors such as Marlon Brando and James Dean appeared in The Wild Ones and Rebel without a Cause, personifying youthful rebellion, and wearing jeans. The pants were losing their status as a symbol of the rugged frontier, and becoming instead a symbol of defiance toward the adult world. Levi's were on their way to becoming the uniform of an entire generation.
In 1954 the company branched out from denim to the sportswear business, launching Lighter Blues, a line of casual slacks for men. The following year the company added jeans with zipper flies, as opposed to the traditional five-button fly, in an attempt to woo customers in the East, where the pants, relegated to department store bargain basements, lagged in popularity. By the end of the decade, Levi Strauss & Co. was selling 20 million pieces of clothing a year, half of them jeans. The company was growing fast, and profits were robust.
Product Development in the 1950s and 1960s
In the late 1950s and early 1960s, Levi Strauss & Co. experimented with different products and lines of clothing in an effort to build on its reputation and diversify its offerings. In 1959 the company introduced "Orange, Lemon and Lime," pants in six bold colors, which were a short-lived hit. The following year, white Levi's were introduced, a duplicate of traditional jeans, but made in beige twill. Also in 1960, the company introduced pre-shrunk denim jeans, in an effort to overcome the objections of eastern customers, who were uncomfortable with shrinking pants. In 1963 stretch denim and corduroy Levi's joined the fold.
In 1964, after an arduous and expensive process of development, Levi Strauss & Co. introduced Sta-Prest permanent-press pants. Although the product was an initial sales success, problems with the chemical process that created a crease resulted in a large number of defective pants, and it was only later that the pants were perfected. The following year, the company expanded its international division to cover Europe, relying on Europeans to manage company operations in their home countries.
Throughout the 1960s, the company profited from movements in U.S. society, such as campus rebellions and the counter-culture, in which jeans became a uniform. The company's growth was mind-boggling. New manufacturing facilities were added steadily, but demand for jeans still outstripped supply. In the mid-1960s, sales doubled in just three years to $152 million in 1966. That year, the company negotiated a $20 million loan to finance further expansion. Two years later, the company reorganized, establishing a division to produce and market women's clothing. By 1968 the company had grown to become one of the six largest clothing manufacturers in the United States, with sales nearing $200 million.
Global Expansion in the 1970s
In 1971 Levi Strauss & Co.'s long-standing status as a wholly family- and employee-owned enterprise came to an end, when the company sold stock to the public for the first time. Denim jeans, Levi's in particular, had transcended the status of a mere product to become a worldwide social and cultural phenomenon, and the company could no longer raise enough capital privately to pay for needed expansion. The craze for jeans continued to grow, with seemingly no end in sight. The company coped with a constant shortage of denim. Levi Strauss & Co.'s existing, heavily centralized structure became inadequate, and operations were broken into four divisions: jeans, Levi's for women, boys' wear, and men's sportswear.
The company's phenomenal growth caught up with it in 1973, when its European division found itself with huge supplies of jeans in an outmoded style--straight-legged, as opposed to flared, or bell-bottomed--with more of the same on order. The problem was the culmination of years of under-management, and cost the company $12 million as it tried to unload the overstock. For the first time since the Depression, Levi Strauss & Co. announced a losing quarter, and the company's stock price fell dramatically. The following year, European operations were reorganized, and the company moved its headquarters from the site it had occupied on Battery Street for 108 years to new quarters. Seven years later, the company would move again to Levi's Plaza, a newly built complex.
Despite the sobering demonstration in Europe of the company's fallibility, by 1974 sales of Levi Strauss & Co. products had reached $1 billion. The following year the company was once again reminded of the hazards of operating in the murky waters of international business when it was revealed that Levi Strauss & Co. employees in international locations had bribed foreign officials on four separate occasions. When the incidents were discovered by the home office in San Francisco, the practice was immediately terminated. In addition, the company ran into trouble domestically in 1976 when the Federal Trade Commission accused it of price-fixing and restraint of trade because it prohibited retailers from discounting its products. The company reached an agreement with the government in 1977 in which it did not admit wrongdoing, but gave up suggested pricing, retaining the freedom not to sell to certain retailers. In the next several years, the company settled several suits, brought in nine states that charged illegal price-setting practices. The 1970s also saw the formation of the company's community-affairs department, which is Levi Strauss & Co.'s philanthropic arm, and of community-involvement teams, which are company-funded employee groups that participate in projects in communities in which Levi Strauss & Co. does business.
By 1977 Levi Strauss & Co. had become the largest clothing maker in the world. In addition to its original products, the company had grown through acquisitions, and also licensed its name to be used on other products, such as shoes and socks. Sales doubled in just four years, to hit $2 billion in 1979. Purchases such as Koracorp Industries Inc., a large maker of men's and women's sportswear, in 1979, and Santone Industries Inc., a menswear manufacturer, in 1981, prepared the ground for further growth.
The company, now an industry behemoth, ran into difficulties in the early 1980s, however, as the demand for denim stabilized, and its profits flattened. Attempting to increase its distribution, the company reached agreements with several mass merchandisers, including J.C. Penney and Sears, to market its products. Nonetheless, earnings dropped by nearly 25 percent in 1981, and the company undertook another reorganization, which included the elimination of one level of corporate management. Profits continued to plummet in 1982, and the company shut down nine plants, eliminating 2,000 jobs.
Levi Strauss & Co.'s fortunes made a short recovery in 1983, and the company planned a $40 million promotional tie-in with the 1984 Olympics to promote its relatively new active-wear division. Nevertheless, during the year of the Olympics, in which the firm dressed more than 60,000 participants in the games, profits were down again, and the company undertook a major retrenching, closing many factories and eliminating thousands of jobs. Faced with a demographic trend that showed the baby boomers outgrowing jeans, the company began heavy advertising campaigns, allied itself with designer Perry Ellis in an attempt to move into the high-fashion market, and continued its plans to retrench, as profits dropped by 50 percent.
A Private Company
In 1985, as Levi Strauss & Co. continued to restructure and cut back, the company was taken private in a leveraged buy out for $1.45 billion by the Haas family, descendants of its founders and long-time company leaders. Several other officers and directors also were members of the buy out group, Levi Strauss Associates Inc. The following year the company introduced a successful upscale men's pants line, Dockers, and, with increasing demand around the world for U.S. jeans, and with the addition of innovative finishes, such as bleaching or stone-washing, 1990 sales reached $4 billion.
Dockers was one of the most successful brand launches in the history of the American apparel industry. The cotton pants appealed to older customers, whose expanding waistlines didn't fit into traditional jeans any more. Sales of Dockers alone came to $1 billion by 1994, and Dockers represented almost 30 percent of Levi's domestic sales. However, this was only one part of the success of the newly private company. CEO Haas, along with Thomas Tusher, head of Levi's foreign operations, transformed the company's overseas markets. In the 1980s, Levi's had diversified its product in Europe into dozens of unrelated lines. Foreign operations accounted for only 23 percent of sales in 1984. Tusher and Haas moved to concentrate foreign sales on the classic 501 jeans, and positioned the pants as a high-priced, prestige product. The company began selling its jeans at posh boutiques in Europe and Japan, at prices more than double the U.S. price. By 1992, foreign sales represented close to 40 percent of the company's revenues, and over 50 percent of profits.
Levi Strauss also tried to upgrade the image of its pants in the U.S., with great success. Levi Strauss spent $230 million on advertising in 1992, in a campaign to add glamour to its old stand-by. Levi's jeans, which were being sold at lower-end department stores like J.C. Penney and Sears, Roebuck began to appear in Macy's, with a considerably higher price tag. The company also began to open its own stand-alone jeans boutiques. The flagship store in Manhattan opened across the street from Bloomingdale's in 1993. Standard 501 jeans there cost $47. Macy's charged $42, and J.C. Penney $29.99. Of course in Europe, the price could be over $80. The same pair of pants retailed at these drastically different prices depending on where it was bought. Not surprisingly under these circumstances, the company's profits soared. Earnings were $155 million on the average in the 1980s. By 1990, earnings stood at $251, and the next year increased to $361. The next two years each added a hundred million also, until by 1995 the company earned over $700 million.
By 1996, Levi Strauss was virtually free of debt, and the company announced it would undertake a second leveraged buy out later in the year, to concentrate its stock in fewer hands. The company made plans to spend $90 million to open stand-alone Levi's stores, Dockers stores, and discount stores for both brands in the United States. Levi Strauss continued to expand its foreign markets, moving into Eastern Europe and expanding sales in India, for example. The company believed that the American market would continue to grow as well. The trend toward casual dress by office workers seemed to be increasing&mdashcording to one study, 90 percent of U.S. office workers were allowed to wear casual clothes to work on Friday by the mid-1990s. As jeans became more accepted in the white-collar world, the market for Levi's was expected to widen.

A short history of the BBC The British Broadcasting Company started life in 1922, when the government licensed the UK's six major radio manufacturers to form the new outfit. It had a staff of four, and was financed by a Post Office licence fee of 10 shillings, payable by anyone owning a receiver, and supplemented by royalties on radio sales. The first broadcast came from London on 14 November, and "listening-in" quickly became a popular pastime. John Reith, the BBC's first director-general John Reith became general manager a month later, and after the baptism of fire of covering the 1926 General Strike - the company was dissolved and the British Broadcasting Corporation formed with a royal charter. Radio listening spread widely during the 1930s, with people gathering together to listen to national and sporting events, while the BBC also became a major patron of the arts, commissioning music and drama. It also took up home at Broadcasting House in London in 1932, the same year as the Empire Service - precursor of the World Service, began broadcasting. TV comes The BBC Television Service arrived on 2 November 1936 - but was suspended at the outbreak of war in 1939. Wartime brought huge challenges for the corporation - having to deal with the government's Ministry of Information while finding itself a target for German bombs. Newsreader Bruce Belfrage was on air when 500lbs of explosives hit Broadcasting House in October 1940. He paused as he heard the bomb go off during his nine o'clock bulletin - but continued as normal, as he was not allowed to react on air because of security reasons. Seven people were killed. Broadcasting House after the 1940 bomb Entertainment and drama on the Home Service kept up morale - particularly It's That Man Again, featuring comedian Tommy Handley. Meanwhile, the Empire Service - settling into new headquarters at Bush House - broadcast to occupied Europe. Peacetime saw the resumption of the television service and a reorganisation of radio - which now boasted the Home Service, the Light Programme and from 1946, the Third Programme featured music, drama and the arts. The Empire Service continued as the External Service, now receiving "grant-in-aid" from the government, a situation which continues today with the World Service. Coronation boost Television made steady progress from its base at Alexandra Palace, north London - broadcasting for 30 hours each week by 1950, and 50 by 1955. Families rushed to buy sets to watch the Queen's coronation in 1953. But 1955 saw competition in the form of ITV - BBC Radio responding on launch night by killing off Grace Archer in the five-year-old radio drama The Archers. Competition proved difficult - as many BBC staff left to join the new ITV companies - but confidence grew with the beginning of many programmes still familiar today: Grandstand, The Sky At Night and This Is Your Life. BBC Two hopped along in 1964 The opening of Television Centre in Shepherd's Bush, west London came in 1960, playing host to groundbreaking satire That Was The Week That Was two years later. After careful planning, BBC Two was launched in 1964 - but a power cut disrupted transmissions on the first night. Popular TV dramas like Cathy Come Home and Up The Junction captured the nation's attention, while playwrights Harold Pinter and Tom Stoppard were getting their breaks on radio. The success of pirate pop stations prompted the launch of Radio 1 in 1967, and the re-organisation of the Light, Third and Home networks into Radios 2, 3 and 4. The same year saw colour television come to BBC Two. More competition The 1970s saw Open University programmes come to the BBC, and the end of the Post Office's control of broadcasting hours. Teletext arrived in 1974 with early Ceefax transmissions - subtitling for the deaf - coming five years later. The decade was also a strong one for BBC programmes, with Fawlty Towers, The Generation Game, Antiques Roadshow, Question Time, Top Gear and Not The Nine O'Clock News. More competition came in the shape of commercial radio in 1973, followed by Channel 4 television in 1982. 1982: Brian Hanrahan at the Falklands The Falklands War saw reporter Brian Hanrahan tell audiences: "I counted them all out and I counted them all back in," as he watched Harrier jump jets return to their aircraft carrier after a raid. But Margaret Thatcher's government complained the BBC's reports were biased towards the Argentine point of view. The 1984 miners' strike saw similar complaints of bias - this time from the left. Further clashes with politicians took place throughout the 1980s. Michael Buerk's reports from Ethopia inspired the Band Aid and Live Aid fundraising efforts, while EastEnders was the BBC's answer to Coronation Street. The 1990s saw further change, as new director-general John Birt reorganised much of the BBC's internal workings, amid tremendous controversy. Expansion The BBC expanded with new channels - World Service radio being complemented by a BBC World television service, and satellite channel UK Gold helped it exploit its valuable archives. EastEnders hit screens in 1985 A new Radio 5 was launched in 1990, becoming news and sport network Radio 5 Live in 1994. The late 1990s saw the BBC invest in new internet services - such as BBC News Online - and prepare for the launch of digital television by introducing new channels. Now, under Greg Dyke, it has launched new childrens' TV services CBeebies and CBBC, a cultural network, BBC Four, as well as a collection of digital radio services. Indeed, Mr Dyke's appointment was confirmed by BBC chairman Sir Christopher Bland in a BBC Online chat forum - demonstrating just how wide the BBC now considers its remit to be.

A Brief Pepsi History

Born in the Carolinas in 1898, Pepsi-Cola has a long and rich history. The drink is the invention of Caleb Bradham (left), a pharmacist and drugstore owner in New Bern, North Carolina.

The information published here is provided by PepsiCo, Inc. and may be accessed at their site: www.pepsi.com.

The summer of 1898, as usual, was hot and humid in New Bern, North Carolina. So a young pharmacist named Caleb Bradham began experimenting with combinations of spices, juices, and syrups trying to create a refreshing new drink to serve his customers. He succeeded beyond all expectations because he invented the beverage known around the world as Pepsi-Cola.

Caleb Bradham knew that to keep people returning to his pharmacy, he would have to turn it into a gathering place. He did so by concocting his own special beverage, a soft drink. His creation, a unique mixture of kola nut extract, vanilla and rareoils, became so popular his customers named it "Brad's Drink." Caleb decided to rename it "Pepsi-Cola," and advertised his new soft drink. People responded, and sales of Pepsi-Cola started to grow, convincing him that he should form a company to market the new beverage.

In 1902, he launched the Pepsi-Cola Company in the back room of his pharmacy, and applied to the U.S. Patent Office for a trademark. At first, he mixed the syrup himself and sold it exclusively through soda fountains. But soon Caleb recognized that a greater opportunity existed to bottle Pepsi so that people could drink it anywhere.

The business began to grow, and on June 16, 1903, "Pepsi-Cola" was officially registered with the U.S. Patent Office. That year, Caleb sold 7,968 gallons of syrup, using the theme line "Exhilarating, Invigorating, Aids Digestion." He also began awarding franchises to bottle Pepsi to independent investors, whose number grew from just two in 1905, in the cities of Charlotte and Durham, North Carolina, to 15 the following year, and 40 by 1907. By the end of 1910, there were Pepsi-Cola franchises in 24 states.

Pepsi-Cola's first bottling line resulted from some less-than-sophisticated engineering in the back room of Caleb's pharmacy. Building a strong franchise system was one of Caleb's greatest achievements. Local Pepsi-Cola bottlers, entrepreneurial in spirit and dedicated to the product's success, provided a sturdy foundation. They were the cornerstone of the Pepsi-Cola enterprise. By 1907, the new company was selling more than 100,000 gallons of syrup per year.

Growth was phenomenal, and in 1909 Caleb erected a headquarters so spectacular that the town of New Bern pictured it on a postcard. Famous racing car driver Barney Oldfield endorsed Pepsi in newspaper ads as "A bully drink...refreshing, invigorating, a fine bracer before a race."

The previous year, Pepsi had been one of the first companies in the United States to switch from horse-drawn transport to motor vehicles, and Caleb's business expertise captured widespread attention. He was even mentioned as a possible candidate for Governor. A 1913 editorial in the Greensboro Patriot praised him for his "keen and energetic business sense."

Pepsi-Cola enjoyed 17 unbroken years of success. Caleb now promoted Pepsi sales with the slogan, "Drink Pepsi-Cola. It will satisfy you." Then cameWorld War I, and the cost of doing business increased drastically. Sugar prices see sawed between record highs and disastrous lows, and so did the price of producing Pepsi-Cola. Caleb was forced into a series of business gambles just to survive, until finally, after three exhausting years, his luck ran out and he was bankrupted. By 1921, only two plants remained open. It wasn't until a successful candy manufacturer, Charles G. Guth, appeared on the scene that the future of Pepsi-Cola was assured. Guth was president of Loft Incorporated, a large chain of candy stores and soda fountains along the eastern seaboard. He saw Pepsi-Cola as an opportunity to discontinue an unsatisfactory business relationship with the Coca-Cola Company, and at the same time to add an attractive drawing card to Loft's soda fountains. He was right. After five owners and 15 unprofitable years, Pepsi-Cola was once again a thriving national brand.

One oddity of the time, for a number of years, all of Pepsi-Cola's sales were actually administered from a Baltimore building apparently owned by Coca-Cola, and named for its president. Within two years, Pepsi would earn $1 million for its new owner. With the resurgence came new confidence, a rarity in those days because the nation was in the early stages of a severe economic decline that came to be known as the Great Depression.             

 1898 Caleb Bradham, a New Bern, North Carolina, pharmacist, renames "Brad's Drink," a carbonated soft drink he created to serve his drugstore's fountain customers. The new name, Pepsi-Cola, is derived from two of the principal ingredients, pepsin and kola nuts. It is first used on August 28.

1902 Bradham applies to the U.S. Patent Office for a trademark for the Pepsi-Cola name.

1903 In keeping with its origin as a pharmacist's concoction, Bradham's advertising praises his drink as "Exhilarating, invigorating, aids digestion."

1905 A new logo appears, the first change from the original created in 1898.

1906 The logo is redesigned and a new slogan added: "The original pure food drink." The trademark is registered in Canada.

1907 The Pepsi trademark is registered in Mexico.

1909 Automobile racing pioneer Barney Oldfield becomes Pepsi's first celebrity endorser when he appears in newspaper ads describing Pepsi-Cola as "A bully drink...refreshing, invigorating, a fine bracer before a race." The theme "Delicious and Healthful" appears, and will be used intermittently over the next two decades.

1920 Pepsi appeals to consumers with, "Drink Pepsi-Cola. It will satisfy you."

1932 The trademark is registered in Argentina.

1934 Pepsi begins selling a 12-ounce bottle for five cents, the same price charged by its competitors for six ounces.

1938 The trademark is registered in the Soviet Union.

1939 A newspaper cartoon strip, "Pepsi & Pete," introduces the theme "Twice as Much for a Nickel" to increase consumer awareness of Pepsi's value advantage.

1940 Pepsi makes advertising history with the first advertising jingle ever broadcast nationwide. "Nickel, Nickel" will eventually become a hit record and will be translated into 55 languages. A new, more modern logo is adopted.

1941 In support of America's war effort, Pepsi changes the color of its bottle crowns to red, white and blue. A Pepsi canteen in Times Square, New York, operates throughout the war, enabling more than a million families to record messages for armed services personnel overseas.

1943 The "Twice as Much" advertising strategy expands to include the theme, "Bigger Drink, Better Taste."

1949 "Why take less when Pepsi's best?" is added to "Twice as Much" advertising.

1950 "More Bounce to the Ounce" becomes Pepsi's new theme as changing soft drink economics force Pepsi to raise prices to competitive levels. The logo is again updated.

1953 Americans become more weight conscious, and a new strategy based on Pepsi's lower caloric content is implemented with "The Light Refreshment" campaign.

1954 "The Light Refreshment" evolves to incorporate "Refreshing Without Filling."

1958 Pepsi struggles to enhance its brand image. Sometimes referred to as "the kitchen cola," as a consequence of its long-time positioning as a bargain brand, Pepsi now identifies itself with young, fashionable consumers with the "Be Sociable, Have a Pepsi" theme. A distinctive "swirl" bottle replaces Pepsi's earlier straight-sided bottle.

1959 Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev and U.S. Vice-President Richard Nixon meet in the soon-to-be-famous "kitchen debate" at an international trade fair. The meeting, over Pepsi, is photo-captioned in the U.S. as "Khrushchev Gets Sociable."

1961 Pepsi further refines its target audience, recognizing the increasing importance of the younger, post-war generation. "Now it's Pepsi, for Those who think Young" defines youth as a state of mind as much as a chronological age, maintaining the brand's appeal to all market segments.

1963 In one of the most significant demographic events in commercial history, the post-war baby boom emerges as a social and marketplace phenomenon. Pepsi recognizes the change, and positions Pepsi as the brand belonging to the new generation-The Pepsi Generation. "Come alive! You're in the Pepsi Generation" makes advertising history. It is the first time a product is identified, not so much by its attributes, as by its consumers' lifestyles and attitudes.

1964 A new product, Diet Pepsi, is introduced into Pepsi-Cola advertising.

1966 Diet Pepsi's first independent campaign, "Girlwatchers," focuses on the cosmetic benefits of the low-calorie cola. The "Girlwatchers" musical theme becomes a Top 40 hit. Advertising for another new product, Mountain Dew, a regional brand acquired in 1964, airs for the first time, built around the instantly recognizable tag line, "Ya-Hoo, Mountain Dew!"

1967 When research indicates that consumers place a premium on Pepsi's superior taste when chilled, "Taste that beats the others cold. Pepsi pours it on" emphasizes Pepsi's product superiority. The campaign, while product-oriented, adheres closely to the energetic, youthful, lifestyle imagery established in the initial Pepsi Generation campaign.

1969 "You've got a lot to live. Pepsi's got a lot to give" marks a shift in Pepsi Generation advertising strategy. Youth and lifestyle are still the campaign's driving forces, but with "Live/Give," a new awareness and a reflection of contemporary events and mood become integral parts of the advertising's texture.

1973 Pepsi Generation advertising continues to evolve. "Join the Pepsi People, Feelin' Free" captures the mood of a nation involved in massive social and political change. It pictures us the way we are-one people, but many personalities.

1975 The Pepsi Challenge, a landmark marketing strategy, convinces millions of consumers that Pepsi's taste is superior.

1976 "Have a Pepsi Day" is the Pepsi Generation's upbeat reflection of an improving national mood. "Puppies," a 30-second snapshot of an encounter between a very small boy and some even smaller dogs, becomes an instant commercial classic.

1979 With the end of the '70s comes the end of a national malaise. Patriotism has been restored by an exuberant celebration of the U.S. bicentennial, and Americans are looking to the future with renewed optimism. "Catch that Pepsi Spirit!" catches the mood and the Pepsi Generation carries it forward into the '80s.

1982 With all the evidence showing that Pepsi's taste is superior, the only question remaining is how to add that message to Pepsi Generation advertising. The answer? "Pepsi's got your Taste for Life!," a triumphant celebration of great times and great taste.

1983 The soft drink market grows more competitive, but for Pepsi drinkers, the battle is won. The time is right and so is their soft drink. It's got to be "Pepsi Now!"

1984 A new generation has emerged-in the United States, around the world and in Pepsi advertising, too. "Pepsi. The Choice of a New Generation" announces the change, and the most popular entertainer of the time, Michael Jackson, stars in the first two commercials of the new campaign. The two spots quickly become "the most eagerly awaited advertising of all time."

1985 Lionel Richie leads a star-studded parade into "New Generation" advertising followed by pop music icons Tina Turner and Gloria Estefan. Sports heroes Joe Montana and Dan Marino are part of it, as are film and television stars Teri Garr and Billy Crystal. Geraldine Ferraro, the first woman nominated to be vice president of the U.S., stars in a Diet Pepsi spot. And the irrepressible Michael J. Fox brings a special talent, style and spirit to a series of Pepsi and Diet Pepsi commercials, including a classic, "Apartment 10G."

1987 After an absence of 27 years, Pepsi returns to Times Square, New York, with a spectacular 850-square foot electronic display billboard declaring Pepsi to be "America's Choice."

1988 Michael Jackson returns to "New Generation" advertising to star in a four-part "episodic" commercial named "Chase." "Chase" airs during the Grammy Awards program and is immediately hailed by the media as "the most-watched commercial in advertising history."

1989 "The Choice of a New Generation" theme expands to categorize Pepsi users as "A Generation Ahead!"

1990 Teen stars Fred Savage and Kirk Cameron join the "New Generation" campaign, and football legend Joe Montana returns in a spot challenging other celebrities to taste test their colas against Pepsi. Music legend Ray Charles stars in a new Diet Pepsi campaign, "You got the right one baby."

1991 "You got the Right one Baby" is modified to "You got the Right one Baby, Uh-Huh!" The "Uh-Huh Girls" join Ray Charles as back-up singers and a campaign soon to become the most popular advertising in America is on its way. Supermodel Cindy Crawford stars in an award-winning commercial made to introduce Pepsi's updated logo and package graphics.

1992 Celebrities join consumers, declaring that they "Gotta Have It." The interim campaign supplants "Choice of a New Generation" as work proceeds on new Pepsi advertising for the '90s. Mountain Dew growth continues, supported by the antics of an outrageous new Dew Crew whose claim to fame is that, except for the unique great taste of Dew, they've "Been there, Done that, Tried that."

1993 "Be Young, Have fun, Drink Pepsi" advertising starring basketball superstar Shaquille O'Neal is rated as best in U.S.

1994 New advertising introducing Diet Pepsi's freshness dating initiative features Pepsi CEO Craig Weatherup explaining the relationship between freshness and superior taste to consumers.

1995 In a new campaign, the company declares "Nothing else is a Pepsi" and takes top honors in the year's national advertising championship.

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The History of Coca Cola

John Pemberton was the inventor of Coca Cola

By Mary Bellis, About.com Guide

Contemporary Coca Cola Can

Courtesy Coca Cola Company

In May, 1886, Coca Cola was invented by Doctor John Pemberton a pharmacist from Atlanta, Georgia. John Pemberton concocted the Coca Cola formula in a three legged brass kettle in his backyard. The name was a suggestion given by John Pemberton's bookkeeper Frank Robinson.

Birth of Coca Cola

Being a bookkeeper, Frank Robinson also had excellent penmanship. It was he who first scripted "Coca Cola" into the flowing letters which has become the famous logo of today. The soft drink was first sold to the public at the soda fountain in Jacob's Pharmacy in Atlanta on May 8, 1886.
About nine servings of the soft drink were sold each day. Sales for that first year added up to a total of about $50. The funny thing was that it cost John Pemberton over $70 in expanses, so the first year of sales were a loss.
Until 1905, the soft drink, marketed as a tonic, contained extracts of cocaine as well as the caffeine-rich kola nut.

Asa Candler

In 1887, another Atlanta pharmacist and businessman, Asa Candler bought the formula for Coca Cola from inventor John Pemberton for $2,300. By the late 1890s, Coca Cola was one of America's most popular fountain drinks, largely due to Candler's aggressive marketing of the product. With Asa Candler, now at the helm, the Coca Cola Company increased syrup sales by over 4000% between 1890 and 1900. Advertising was an important factor in John Pemberton and Asa Candler's success and by the turn of the century, the drink was sold across the United States and Canada. Around the same time, the company began selling syrup to independent bottling companies licensed to sell the drink. Even today, the US soft drink industry is organized on this principle.

Death of the Soda Fountain - Rise of the Bottling Industry

Until the 1960s, both small town and big city dwellers enjoyed carbonated beverages at the local soda fountain or ice cream saloon. Often housed in the drug store, the soda fountain counter served as a meeting place for people of all ages. Often combined with lunch counters, the soda fountain declined in popularity as commercial ice cream, bottled soft drinks, and fast food restaurants became popular.

New Coke

On April 23, 1985, the trade secret "New Coke" formula was released. Today, products of the Coca Cola Company are consumed at the rate of more than one billion drinks per day.

And this is how Parle Bisleri began

According to the Bureau of India [ Images ]n Standards there are 1,200 bottled water factories all over India (of which 600 are in one state -- Tamil Nadu). Over 100 brands are vying for the Rs 1,000-crore (Rs 10 billion) bottled water market and are hard selling their products in every way possible -- better margins to dealers, aggressive advertising, catchy taglines.... In such a scenario, The Strategist takes a look at how it all started -- with Bisleri -- and how Ramesh Chauhan, chairman, Parle Bisleri created a market out of pure water. Excerpts from a conversation with Prerna Raturi:

Can I be honest? When we bought Bisleri mineral water from the Italian company, Felice Bisleri, in 1969 -- the company had been unable to market bottled water and wanted to exit the market -- we too did not see any potential for the product at that time.
As a soft drinks company, we had Thums Up, Gold Spot and Limca (cola, orange drink and lemonade) but no soft drink company was complete without a soda. So we merely used the name and launched Bisleri soda with two variants -- carbonated and non-carbonated mineral water.
But three decades ago, what could we say about a category that had no market? We didn't know our target group. Then, since bottled water is colourless, tasteless and odourless, it was not an easy product to advertise.
Thus, the earlier brand building efforts focused on Bisleri being healthy with adequate minerals. The Italian name added a dash of class to it. The first print ad campaign captured the international essence and showed a butler with a bow tie, holding two bottles of Bisleri.
The punchline was, "Bisleri is veri veri extraordinari" (the spelling of the punchline was designed to capture the consumer's attention). The campaign was successful and we were being noticed as someone who catered to the need for safe, healthy drinking water.
However, the real boost to mineral water came in the early-to-mid-1980s when we switched to PVC packaging and later to PET bottles. The PET packaging did not just ensure better transparency -- we could now show sparkling clear water to the consumers. It also meant better life for the water.
Meanwhile, Bisleri soda was doing well but we had to discontinue production as we sold our soft drink brands to Coca-Cola in 1993. But my interest was in building brands and not in bottling soft drinks. That's when I started to concentrate on developing the Bisleri water brand.
There was a clear opportunity of building a market for bottled water. The quality of water available in the country was bad. It was similar to what Europe faced before World War II. The quality of water in Europe was extremely poor, which created the bottled water industry there. In India, too, not only was water scarce, whatever was available was of bad quality.
Initially, though bottled water was something only foreigners and non-resident Indians consumed, we still had to increase the distribution, which meant the dealer margins reduced. And because of limited sales, the dealer margin had to be kept high to compensate low sales. Now we had to push sales.
But to reach out to the masses, we had to make the category more affordable. The introduction of a comfortable-to-carry 500-ml bottle for just Rs 5 in 1995 not only answered that need, but also meant doing away with carrying the excess water or throwing it away if you were to buy a one-litre bottle.
The idea was a success and gave the company a growth of 400 per cent. We also introduced the 1.2 litre bottle in 2000, which was aimed at those who share their water. This also gave us the advantage of higher margins that a crate (12 bottles) generated.
With other brands joining the fray, things were hotting up -- the bottled-water market was estimated at Rs 300 crore (Rs 3 billion) and was growing at 50 per cent a year. Bisleri had captured 40 per cent of the market.
We realised it was time to move to the next level -- the bulk segment. Several commercial establishments had no access to piped water. We tapped into this segment by introducing the 12-litre container, followed by the 20-litre can. The bulk segment also helped bring down the price per litre from Rs 10-12 a litre to about Rs 3 a litre.
At present, the bulk segment constitutes 60 to 70 per cent of our sales and we intend to increase it to 80 per cent in the next two years. With water scarcity in several cities, even households are demanding bottled water now.
The home pack was made more user-friendly by introducing pouring spouts and jars with dispensers. At the same time, we were constantly looking for new ways to tap the market. We noticed that during wedding receptions, the older guests (above 50 years of age) generally stayed away from ice cream, soft drinks and so on.
Hence, we introduced free sampling of Bisleri at the tables where the elderly guests would sit. Soon customers were ordering bottled water on special occasions. Currently, the consumption of bottled water is far in excess of soft drinks on such occasions.
The other major challenge was distribution. I still have the mindset of a soft drink seller. Soft drink sales are in glass bottles and the distribution model is built around picking up empty bottles and getting them back to the factory. That's not the case with the retail bottled water packs (below 2 litre). But a product that's not available where it's needed, is useless.
The number of outlets where Bisleri is available has increased from 50,000 in 1995 to 2,00,000 at present. But that is not enough -- we need to keep looking for different avenues. Take stationery shops and chemists, for instance. They don't keep soft drinks but sell Bisleri. That is the kind of exclusivity we look for to get ahead of the distribution network that soft drink companies talk of.
The journey till now
1969: Buys Bisleri bottled water from an Italian company, Felice Bisleri. It was bottled in glass bottles then.
Early-1980s: Shifts to PVC bottles. Sales surge
Mid-1980s: Switches to PET bottles, which meant more transparency and life for water.
1993: Sells carbonated drink brands like Thums Up, Gold Spot and Limca to Coca-Cola for Rs 400 crore.
1995: Bisleri launches a 500 ml bottle and sales shoot up by 400 per cent.
2000: Introduces the 20-litre container to bring prices down from Rs 10 a litre to Rs 2 a litre.
1998: Introduces a tamper-proof and tamper-evident seal.
2000: BIS cancels Bisleri's licence of a water bottling in Delhi [ Images ] since some of the bottles did not carry ISI label; the licence is restored one-and-a-half months later.
2002: Kinley overtakes Bisleri. The national retail stores audit by ORG-MARG show Kinley's marketshare at 35.1 per cent compared to Bisleri's 34.4 per cent.

History Of Parle G

HISTORY OF PARLE-G

A long time ago, when the British ruled in India, a small factory was set up in the suburbs of Mumbai City, to manufacture sweets and toffees. The year was 1929 and the market was dominated by famous international brands that were imported freely. Despite the odds and unequal competition, this company called PARLE PRODUCT, survived and succeeded by adhering to his quality and improvising from time to time.

A decade later, in 1939, Parle Product began manufacturing biscuits, in addition to sweets and toffees having already established a reputation for quality, the Parle Brand name grew in strength with this diversification. PARLE GLUCOSE and PARLE MONACO were the first brand of biscuit to be introduced which later went on to become leading name for great test and quality. That time only one building was having in Vile-Parle where they were making production and any other process. Then gradually that company expanded in many buildings and today that company located in 14 Akers area. That time they were transporting their products ownely by cycle.

HOW PARLE MADE BISCUITS AFFORDABLE TO ALL?

Biscuits were very much a luxury food in India, when Parle began in production in 1939. Apart from Glucose and Monaco biscuits Parle did offer a wide variety of brands.

However, during the Second World War, all domestic biscuits production was diverted to assist the Indian Soldiers in India and the Far East. Apart from this, the shortage of Wheat in those days,   made Parle decided to concentrate on the more popular brands, so that that people could enjoy the price benefits. Thankfully today, there’s dearth of ingredients and demand for more premium brands is on the rise. That’s why Parle now have wide range of biscuits and mouthwatering confectionaries to offer.

STRENGTH OF PARLE BRANDS

Over the year, Parle has grown to become a multi million dollar company. Many of the parle Products – biscuits or confectionaries, are market leaders in their...

What a surprising history of Britannia!!!

The story of one of India's favourite brands reads almost like a fairy tale. Once upon a time, in 1892 to be precise, a biscuit company was started in a nondescript house in Calcutta (now Kolkata) with an initial investment of Rs. 295. The company we all know as Britannia today.

The beginnings might have been humble-the dreams were anything but. By 1910, with the advent of electricity, Britannia mechanised its operations, and in 1921, it became the first company east of the Suez Canal to use imported gas ovens. Britannia's business was flourishing. But, more importantly, Britannia was acquiring a reputation for quality and value. As a result, during the tragic World War II, the Government reposed its trust in Britannia by contracting it to supply large quantities of "service biscuits" to the armed forces.

As time moved on, the biscuit market continued to grow… and Britannia grew along with it. In 1975, the Britannia Biscuit Company took over the distribution of biscuits from Parry's who till now distributed Britannia biscuits in India. In the subsequent public issue of 1978, Indian shareholding crossed 60%, firmly establishing the Indianness of the firm. The following year, Britannia Biscuit Company was re-christened Britannia Industries Limited (BIL). Four years later in 1983, it crossed the Rs. 100 crores revenue mark.

On the operations front, the company was making equally dynamic strides. In 1992, it celebrated its Platinum Jubilee. In 1997, the company unveiled its new corporate identity - "Eat Healthy, Think Better" - and made its first foray into the dairy products market. In 1999, the "Britannia Khao, World Cup Jao" promotion further fortified the affinity consumers had with 'Brand Britannia'.

Britannia strode into the 21st Century as one of India's biggest brands and the pre-eminent food brand of the country. It was equally recognised for its innovative approach to products and marketing: the Lagaan Match was voted India's most successful promotional activity of the year 2001 while the delicious Britannia 50-50 Maska-Chaska became India's most successful product launch. In 2002, Britannia's New Business Division formed a joint venture with Fonterra, the world's second largest Dairy Company, and Britannia New Zealand Foods Pvt. Ltd. was born. In recognition of its vision and accelerating graph, Forbes Global rated Britannia 'One amongst the Top 200 Small Companies of the World', and The Economic Times pegged Britannia India's 2nd Most Trusted Brand.

Today, more than a century after those tentative first steps, Britannia's fairy tale is not only going strong but blazing new standards, and that miniscule initial investment has grown by leaps and bounds to crores of rupees in wealth for Britannia's shareholders. The company's offerings are spread across the spectrum with products ranging from the healthy and economical Tiger biscuits to the more lifestyle-oriented Milkman Cheese. Having succeeded in garnering the trust of almost one-third of India's one billion population and a strong management at the helm means Britannia will continue to dream big on its path of innovation and quality. And millions of consumers will savour the results, happily ever after.