QUENCHING THE THIRST FOR SUCCESS

As the largest bottler of soft drink products in the country, General Manager of Coca-Cola

HBC Hungary, László Békefi highlights the company’s impact on the beverage market, and its sustainable business model

Writer: Rachel Carr | Project Manager: Kyle Livingstone

Coca-Cola is one of the most recognisable brands in the food and drink industry and in popular culture, but a little-known fact is that the soft drink is bottled by different companies around the world.

Coca-Cola HBC Hungary (CCHH) is part of the 29-member-count CocaCola HBC AG, an important strategic partner of Atlanta based The CocaCola Company and the largest bottler of Coca-Cola products in Europe. The company aims to expand to a total beverage company in Hungary and strives to become a production hub of its Group in Central Europe.

Primarily serving retail, hotel, restaurant, and catering customers from small family-owned businesses to the largest multinational retail agents, CCHH is headquartered in Dunaharaszti. The company owns two production sites, eight logistics sites, and the country’s largest food and drink warehouse.

“I personally believe that this company has shown amazing growth potential over the past few years and has finally become what it was always meant to be – a centre of excellence, a driver of innovation, and a home of talent,” introduces László Békefi, General Manager of CCHH.

CCHH currently employs 1,000 people directly, and another 13,000 indirectly through its supply chain.

With 528 million litres bottled for domestic sales in 2021 and exported to 17 different countries, it closed the fiscal year with €308.1 million in net revenue. As a result, CCHH represents the largest beverage manufacturer on the domestic market.

“We see that the stability of CCHH as an employer represents a serious and growing value in the labour market, which gives us a significant advantage. We are an employer of choice in the FMCG category. We have been honoured by PwC with the Most Attractive Workplace Award in the FMCG category for the fourth time consecutively in 2022 and were appointed the most attractive workplace in the FMCG sector

THE COMPANY’S #YOUTHEMPOWERED PROGRAMME...

CCHH’s #YouthEmpowered programme is primarily aimed at helping people aged 18-23 find their way into the labour market. The initiative supports participants in finding a job, choosing a career, changing careers, or starting a business by providing free selflearning and skills development materials and small group face-toface workshops. Extensive online learning materials are available on https://enjovom.hu./ according to Randstad’s employer brand survey.”

The programme’s demographic has grown. Through its partners it now helps disadvantaged young people, as well as secondary school students, university students, mothers, jobseekers with disabilities and young people thinking of starting their own business, with learning materials ranging from selfawareness to basic legal skills.

The latest educational material focuses on food waste and was created in cooperation with The Hungarian Food Bank Association.

The company is proud of its talented workforce and puts significant effort in talent development with programmes targeting different seniority levels and working skills. Moreover, CCHH places important focus on Diversity and Inclusion (D&I) topics putting women leadership at the centre of its activities in order to facilitate the appointment of more women colleagues in management roles.

“We offer a clear and predictable career path for our employees, and as a multinational company, we can also provide our colleagues with the opportunity to try themselves in an international environment in other markets of Coca-Cola HBC or in the central team of our Group.

“Looking back to the past 12 months, I can proudly say that we managed to close a remarkably successful year. We continued to grow strong on the domestic market in order to maintain our leading role in the F&B industry. Our portfolio has expanded rapidly; we have introduced several novelties in almost all market categories and even tried our capabilities in new market segments. We have reached growth in market shares for our key products, and we proudly own several marketleading brands. Our investments have greatly contributed to developing our business to provide faster, more accurate and overall better service to our customers, suppliers and through them to the end consumer.”

Industry Insights

The company mainly operates in the non-alcoholic ready-to-drink (NARTD) market, whose categories include carbonated soft drinks, juice, flavoured and natural mineral water, iced tea, energy, and

Rancilio Group

Sharing a common passion for excellence, responsibility and premium quality, Rancilio Group is a trusted, long-run partner of CocaCola HBC Hungary in the coffee business.

The beautiful simplicity of mopping up a great espresso is at the heart of the Hungarian consumer. Today the decisive drink of Italian coffee culture is the most popular coffee type in the country. Every second Hungarian drinks it regularly. It requires only the best quality coffee, and the best-in-class coffee machine to be able to extract the soul of this extremely complex drink into the consumer’s cup. CCHH knows it and proudly chose Rancilio Group to be the leading coffee machine supplier of its HoReCa business. Today, more than 1,100 professional devices have been placed out to CCHH’s customer network. Rancilio coffee machines provide an exceptional coffee experience, are comfortable to use and come with an overall service support.

Being a leading professional company in the coffee machine industry, Rancilio Group manufactures and sells food service equipment in over 115 countries, owns four brands, and maintains an extensive global sales and service network. Founded in Milan, Italy in 1926, the innovative company has been keeping up with changing industry and consumption trends over the almost 100 years of its history while evolving its business expertise and knowledge of Italian espresso. For Rancilio Group, sustainability is a responsibility and a key to long-term success that involves each part of the business worldwide.

www.ranciliogroup.com sports drinks with further presence in the premium spirit, coffee, and snack categories.

How consumers purchase drinks products changed dramatically with the advent of the COVID-19 pandemic. This unique period’s impact on the beverage market significantly changed consumer shopping habits.

“In 2020, the number one place for consumption has become the home, both for soft drinks and coffee. Therefore, during the pandemic, more people chose to purchase larger packs of products, instead of single serve packs. The purchase of multipacks has increased, so the consumption has not become significantly less, but its structure has changed,” Békefi informs us.

E-commerce has reinforced the trend and pushed the sales of single serve packs as online retail became an accelerated sales channel during the pandemic.

“Despite the challenges of that time, CCHH managed to close 2021 with an outstanding result and continued to the pre-pandemic levels in 2022,” he says enthusiastically.

The summer of 2022 saw the most successful sale season in the company’s history in Hungary. This was primarily driven by its seasonal programmes, but also due to the lifting of restrictions, favourable weather, and a boost in domestic tourism.

“Going forward, and as food inflation impacts shopper baskets in 2023, it is important that we, together with our customers, segment our product range through offering a portfolio of premium propositions and affordable packs at the same time. While this addresses consumer needs, it also helps to grow the category and create value to our customers.”

24/7 PORTFOLIO

The company already has one of the broadest portfolios in the industry, and the selection is still expanding.

“Our products cater to a growing range of tastes with a wider choice of more conscious options, premium products, and increasingly sustainable packaging,” Békefi tells us proudly.

The beverage company offers the right product for all kinds of occasions, 24 hours a day, seven days a week. As a result of this business strategy, CCHH’s products have reached 65 percent of households in Hungary.

The product portfolio is always improving in line with ever-changing consumer needs, the range is

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constantly broadening with 100 different products currently offered including Coca-Cola, Fanta, Sprite, Kinley, Fuzetea, Smartwater, local water brand Naturaqua, Costa Coffee, and Jack Daniel’s.

“In 2022 alone, our premium spirit portfolio expanded with nine new brands as we became the exclusive distributor of the Bacardi-Martini products.

“In the beginning of last year, we added premium Italian espresso brand Caffè Vergnano to our growing coffee portfolio. Soon after, we entered the snack market as a result of a vertical portfolio investment initiative in which we started to sell oat biscuits called MyWellness at one of our biggest key account customers as part of a market pilot,” he adds.

World Without Waste

Supporting this ever-expanding portfolio of diverse projects is an operating model that is becoming increasingly environmentally-friendly. Sustainable-centric technologies, such as reducing plastic, using more recyclable plastic and aluminium are an integral part of the corporate culture at CCHH. With a sustainable