How Coca-Cola Broke the Law
Coke's sales force would order shop owners to remove Big Cola or else lose all promotional gifts and offers and eventually lose their coolers and be cut off from renewing supplies of Coke. An insider at Coca-Cola, referred to as "Coke Throat" by journalist Mark Thomas, described how the whole scheme worked and how it was The Coca-Cola Co. that coordinated the effort with Mexican bottlers.
Coke Throat stated, "[We're] the brain power and the mastermind behind everything... We [The Coca-Cola Co.] wanted to get out of this saying to people, 'we do not sell Coca-Cola and we didn't do anything, we just sell concentrate, but the reality - and that's why the Competition Commission brought us down - was that we have the brainpower and the money behind everything and we are the ones that make everything work in a synchronized way." Thomas points out that "The [Federal Competition Commission] investigation visited various shops to examine the claims against Coca-Cola and found that Big Cola was either not available or was placed at the back of the shop, away from the Coca-Cola fridges at the front, in 500 instances that they examined.