ATLANTA — Two bright spots for The Coca-Cola Co. during its most recent third quarter were the performances of the company’s trademark Coca-Cola brand and its fairlife dairy business.
Both led during the quarter in at-home sales growth, according to the company, but looming over fairlife is limited growth due to near-term capacity constraints.
“Clearly, it’s going to be hard to cycle this year’s numbers until we get the capacity,” said James Robert B. Quincey, chairman and chief executive officer, during an Oct. 23 conference call to discuss third-quarter financial results.
That capacity will come from a $650 million, 745,000-square-foot facility being built in Webster, New York. The company broke ground for the new plant in April and expects it to be operational by the fourth quarter of 2025.
“I think there’s huge opportunity and demand in the marketplace,” Quincey said. “We just need to continue to run, keep it (fairlife) relevant, and bring online the capacity.”
The Coca-Cola Co. opened a 300,000-square-foot production and distribution facility in Goodyear, Ariz., in 2021 to support fairlife.
The fairlife brand and company have evolved from a high-protein dairy shake product originally launched by Dallas-based Select Milk Producers as Athletes HoneyMilk. In 2012, Select Milk Producers reached a national distribution agreement with Coca-Cola, whereby Coca-Cola eventually acquired a 42.5% stake in fairlife.
Athletes HoneyMilk was later re-branded and re-launched as Core Power, fueling the way for more dairy product innovation using an ultra-filtration processing technology developed by Select Milk Producers. In January 2020, Coca-Cola acquired the remaining equity stake in fairlife.
Today, fairlife’s product portfolio includes its dairy beverages marketed as “ultra-filtered milks,” as well as Core Power protein shakes and fairlife Nutrition Plan shakes that feature 30 grams of protein and 2 grams of sugar.
During the third quarter conference call, Quincey said fairlife passed $1 billion in sales “a while ago.”
