At a pre-match press conference at the ongoing European Championship, the football icon, Cristiano Ronaldo, pushed aside two bottles of Coke placed on the table before holding up a bottle of water.
It took Cristiano Ronaldo less than 10 seconds to trigger an online campaign that eventually shaved off $4 billion from beverage behemoth Coke’s market value. At a pre-match press conference at the ongoing European Championship, the football icon pushed aside two bottles of Coke placed on the table before holding up a bottle of water.
The gesture does not need much reading into as Ronaldo’s disdain for aerated drinks is no secret. The display, however, almost instantaneously pulled down Coke’s share price from $56.10 to $55.22, as per a report in The Guardian.
Advertising guru Prahlad Kakkar, who has worked on Pepsi commercials with Sachin Tendulkar and Amitabh Bachchan, feels the effects will only be short term. “It does make a huge difference when someone like Ronaldo, considered a God by millions across the globe, makes a gesture like that. It will affect the shares and market value of Coke, but only momentarily. And these share prices don’t reflect the actual turnover,” he said. Kakkar, the founder of Genesis Film Productions, feels even if a good percentage of youth give up fizzy drinks, inspired by Ronaldo, it won’t take much time for the beverage giant to attract new customers. “There is no dearth of fools in the world. If one quits, five more will take up.”
