Secret Formula

A history of Coca-Cola traces the company from the debut of the popular soft drink in an Atlanta soda fountain to its present status as a multibillion-dollar international corporation, drawing on the personal papers of founder Asa Candler and long-time CEO Robert Woodruff.

The Coca-Cola Company's secretive top executive, Robert Woodruff, threw his support behind presidential candidate Lyndon Johnson, then spurned the loser, Richard Nixon, when he applied for a job at Coca-Cola. Nixon later became senior partner in Pepsi-Cola's outside law firm, while President LBJ, a close ally of Coca-Cola, arranged political favors for the company. These are among the charges presented in this highly entertaining history of a firm that traces its origins to Confederate war hero John Pemberton and his Yankee business partner Frank Robinson, who developed the soft drink in the late 1880s. The book provides a juicy look at wheeling-dealing, litigation, global hustling, cola wars and the marketing savvy that carved a niche for Coke in the American social psyche. CNN commentator Allen charts Coke's fortunes through two world wars, European anti-American backlash and the civil rights era, and tells how Woodruff, though a plantation-owning Georgian, supported desegregation in Atlanta with an eye toward selling Coke to people of color around the world. Photos not seen by PW.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

An informative and agreeably anecdotal history of the Atlanta- based multinational that, despite the best efforts of archrival PepsiCo, continues to bestride the global soft-drink trade like a colossus. Drawing on a wealth of archival sources and personal interviews, CNN commentator Allen offers a generation-spanning account of how Coca-Cola Co. (which turned 100 in 1986) managed to achieve cultural significance as well as commercial success. While he covers much the same ground as Mark Pendergrast in For God, Country, and Coca-Cola (1993), Allen focuses to good effect on the individuals who have played leading roles in corporate affairs: founding father Asa Candler, a dour hustler who acquired the rights to Pemberton's Tonic, an obscure patent medicine that became the basis of a beverage empire; Robert Woodruff, a banker's son who did more than anyone to build the company's extraordinary consumer franchise; and Cuban-born Roberto Goizueta, the incumbent CEO who, notwithstanding a notable blunder with the flagship brand, has kept Coke on a fast upward track. As its subtitle suggests, Allen attributes Coca-Cola's accomplishments to dedication and merchandizing savvy, not to the exotic ingredients in a soft-drink recipe that's been altered a dozen or more times over the years. In this account, moreover, the company's stewards proved themselves alertly opportunistic during WW II, classically pragmatic when they became early backers of America's civil rights movement, astute students of political risk in any era or venue, and aggressive strategists in the ongoing cola wars. Allen effectively ends his coverage with Woodruff's death at 95 in 1985, touching only lightly on events of the past decade. An engaging audit of a corporate phenomenon that wisely eschews what-it-all-means analysis in favor of a vivid narrative that can speak for itself. (80 photos, not seen) ($30,000 ad promo; author tour) -- Copyright ©1994, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Atlantan and CNN commentator Allen shows that there is still plenty more to tell about Coca-Cola, despite last year's For God, Country, and Coca-Cola, by Mark Pendergrast, and Elizabeth Candler Graham's nostalgic The Real Ones: Four Generations of the First Family of Coca-Cola. Allen seems to have had unprecedented access to company insiders, corporate archives, and private papers, and he uncovers a trove of information about corporate political clout at home and abroad, CEO Woodruff's quiet arm-twisting in early support of the civil rights movement (though with an eye to expanding the market for Coca-Cola among African Americans), and marketing campaigns both failed and successful. Also included is the obligatory analysis of Coca-Cola's so-called secret formula, with part of the secret being that more than a dozen formulas have existed throughout Coke's history. Allen successfully contributes to the fascinating lore surrounding this symbol of American culture and enterprise. David Rouse

In this company history, Allen, a political columnist and commentator for CNN, emphasizes corporate internal politics and Coca-Cola's role in the inner councils of Atlanta. Allen traces the history of the drink from its origins as a drugstore formula to its present multinational success and chronicles Coke's unceasing efforts to preserve its trademark and "secret formula." In researching his work, the author consulted numerous primary sources, including the papers of Asa Candler and Robert Woodruff, both heads of Coca-Cola. Access to one of Woodruff's longtime aides surely provided many of the intimate details studding the text. At times the book reads like a Russian novel combined with a thriller. It will appeal to the general reader as well as to students of history and complements other recent titles on Coca-Cola, including Roger Enrico's The Other Guy Blinked (LJ 3/15/87) and Mark Pendergrast's For God, Country, and Coca-Cola (LJ 3/15/93).
Mary Chatfield, Angelo State Univ., San Angelo, Tex.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.