Statement by Daniel Stockton, University of Georgia (Athens, Georgia)

ANNUAL SHAREHOLDERS’ MEETING OF COCA-COLA, DULUTH, GA—APRIL 22, 2009

My name is Daniel Stockton, and I am a graduating senior at University of Georgia in Athens. I am speaking on behalf of the thousands of students who have taken action over the past year to support public water systems and Think Outside the Bottle.

Students at more than 100 colleges and universities across North America are advancing initiatives to get their campuses to Think Outside the Bottle. These students are part of a growing number of people taking action on this campaign.

Today, more than 40,000 individuals have taken the pledge to Think Outside the Bottle and choose tap water over bottled water. We have more than 6,000 public comments here that we would like to deliver to you after the meeting. There are also dozens of restaurants across the country that are no longer serving bottled water, and a growing number of cities that are canceling bottled water contracts.

But you are well aware of the actions that cities are taking, and have fought it aggressively. Last June in Miami, when more than 1,000 mayors resolved to cut city bottled water budgets to reduce waste and promote tap water, Coke and the American Beverage Association lobbied aggressively against the resolution. Your corporation even tried to advance your interests through mayors in cities with Coke bottling plants, proposing a competing resolution that would have undermined the stronger measure.

One of the biggest complaints I hear from students is about how misleading bottled water marketing is. Coke has created a market for Dasani by promoting the brand as safer and purer than tap water, when in fact bottled water is subject to far less regulatory scrutiny and, in the case of Dasani, comes from the same source.

Mr. Kent, the winds of change are blowing. The demand for bottled water in the U.S. is diminishing as more and more people Think Outside the Bottle and turn back to tap. According to a Reuters report last week, Wal-Mart may be cutting shelf space for Dasani and Aquafina by 50 percent  arguably due in part to falling demand for bottled water.

People are tired of being deceived and are changing their minds about Dasani and other major bottled water brands. But Coke is behind the curve.

Two years ago, Pepsi took steps to address concerns about its marketing of Aquafina and announced that it would reveal the source of the water used for the bottled water brand by printing ‘public water source’ on Aquafina labels. Your corporation is refusing to provide similar information on labels for Dasani consumers, even going so far as to respond to the thousands who voiced such concerns by saying, “We don’t think consumers are confused about the source of our water.” This seems like a customer service model turned on its head, where the customer is always wrong.

Mr. Kent, as young people we are inheriting what this corporation leaves behind, we’re asking Coke to do ‘the real thing’ and respond directly to our concerns and stop deflecting.

My question is, if Aquafina—Dasani’s longstanding competitor in the bottled water market — can reveal this information to its customers, why does Coke refuse to follow Pepsi’s lead and make this information available to its customers?