go-Digital Blog on Digital Marketing

Coke And Pepsi’s Business Model Is ‘Insane’ (SODA)

Source: http://www.businessinsider.com/coke-and-pepsis-insane-business-model-2012-11

SodaStream CEO Daniel Birnbaum has an incentive to disparage his rivals — but nontheless he made a strong argument as to why Coke and Pepsi are “antiquated” and “insane.”

Some unusual candor in an interview with WSJ’s Simon Zekaria:

“Coca-Cola Co. and PepsiCo will have to face the reality that their business model cannot be preserved forever. The world is changing and we’re going to call it out,” says the CEO of SodaStream. 

“If the beverage industry had to create itself now from scratch, it wouldn’t do it the way it is. You don’t need factories, trucks, bottles and cans,” he says. “Transportation for carbonated drinks in the world utilizes 100 million barrels of oil every year. That is 20 times the BP disaster that hit the Gulf of Mexico.”

“I think it is criminal that the industry, led by two big companies, will do anything to protect their antiquated business model. They are generating 35 million bottles and cans every single day in the U.K. alone. World-wide it is one billion bottles and cans, most of which just go to trash, landfill, the oceans or parks. It’s insane,” Mr. Birnbaum added.

Now that he mentions it, that does seem wildly inefficient.

Of course, inefficient companies can last a long time thanks to all of that infrastructure in place. And if the industry is disrupted by a new company, there’s no guarantee that company will be SodaStream (which is one of the most shorted stocks on the market).

Don’t miss: The Complete HIstory Of Sodastream >

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Groupon is bleeding in the water, and the sharks are circling.

On Friday, we learned that Groupon under reported the number of returns it had in Q4, and that the company had to revise its earnings.

Then Groupon’s auditor filed a “statement of material weakness,” basically telling the SEC it would not vouch for the company’s numbers.

Yesterday, the WSJ reported that the SEC is investigating the company.

That’s not all the company has to worry about. 

Institutional investors put big money into Groupon’s IPO.  

Since that day’s highs, the stock is down more that 50%. It tanked 16% yesterday alone.

If those institutions can blame somebody else for those losses and recoup any of their own investor’s money, they will.

That means if those investors catch even slight whiffs of fraud out of Groupon – and trust me, they are sniffing – the lawsuits and subpoenas will come in rapid succession.

Ever seen a shark frenzy?

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See Also:

• Groupon’s Andrew Mason: We Were ‘Toughened Up’ By Quiet Period
• Groupon Eyes Foursquare Territory And Acquires Location Database Startup, Hyperpublic
• San Francisco Puts Hackers To Work Fixing The Horribly Broken Taxi System

According to the Chicago Booth/Kellogg School Financial Trust Index (h/t WSJ’s Sudeep Reddy), only 23% of Americans trust the financial system.  And 62% are either “angry” or very “angry” about the state of the economy.

Trust in the financial system hasn’t been this low and anger in the economic situation hasn’t been this high since March 2009.  And March 2009 was when the S&P 500 hit that horrific low of 666.

“In an election year, this certainly indicates the importance of the economy to the political agenda,” wrote Paolo Sapienza.  Sapienza co-authored the index with Professor Luigi Zingales.

Then again, March 2009 turned out to be an amazing time to buy stocks.

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See Also:

• Nassim Taleb: ‘The Only Candidate I Trust Is Ron Paul’
• This Is The Best Explanation Of Davos By The Numbers We’ve Seen
• President Obama Mentions An Energy Company In His Big Speech And It Goes Bankrupt Instantly

There’s nothing worse than watching a 30-second ad to watch some 30-second clip of something the world inevitably finds funnier than you do. Google/YouTube are acknowledging this phenomenon of the consumer psyche and will introduce an ad-skip button this year.

The idea is as simple as this: If an advertiser’s commercial isn’t captivating enough to watch in its own right, it’ll be skipped by viewers. If viewers don’t watch the ad, Google doesn’t charge the advertiser.

Now I know what you’re thinking: Why would anyone watch an ad voluntarily? See exhibit A, the lead video in which the god of the infomercial, Ron Popeil, does his thing. The only way that 9-minute clip could be more captivating is to put ANOTHER 9-minute Ron Popeil clip in front of it.

This skippable ad model will inevitably lead to better ads—at least in terms of catering the online attention span—and, for those of us* with the libidinal fortitude to turn a blind eye on GoDaddy-esque BOOBIES BOOBIES BOOBIES teasers, a lot more free time. [WSJ via Fast Company]

* OK, maybe I don’t skip every such commercial. But I only** watch them to be educated enough to write about them on Giz.

** This is a flat-out fabrication***.

*** What sort of monster have I become?

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