SustainAbility has worked with The Coca-Cola Company for a number of years to enhance the company’s strategic foresight, support stakeholder engagement and better align core business decision-making with sustainability trends. In 2009, we worked with Coca-Cola to develop a value chain strategy to better interlink the company’s most material sustainability issues with the relevant business functions (i.e. those most capable of addressing the risk or opportunity the issue(s) presented). The strategy provided a basis for assessing both business and sustainability value, specifically linking production issues (e.g. supply security) to consumption issues (e.g. nutrition). As one component of the value chain work, we provided detailed analysis for the formation of a Sustainable Agriculture Strategy. This involved a comprehensive survey of the landscape, core issues, stakeholders and related standards, and presentation of recommendations for Coca-Cola’s chief ingredients and future business opportunities.

We have also worked with Coca-Cola and its bottlers to develop greater understanding of sustainability trends and how they will intersect the business by facilitating a workshop on globalization trends in order to identify future risks and opportunities for alignment across the Coca-Cola system. Likewise, we have provided counsel to Coca-Cola on potential partners that could assist the company in achieving its sustainability aims, including WWF, whom the company now partners in pursuit of its water and agriculture goals.