Pepsico, reporting a 26-per cent jump in sales in China to $1 billion in 2004, now aims to sustain double-digit China sales growth in 2005, its country head said on Tuesday as Pepsi wages war against market leader Coca-Cola.PepsiCo, which vies with Coca-Cola Co in the world’s fastest-growing soft-drinks arena, counts China as its fastest-expanding market and its biggest after the United States and Mexico, China Chief Wah-Hui Chu said.‘‘We expect our sales will continue to see double-digit growth this year,’’ Chu said.Pepsi and Coca-Cola are turning to emerging countries to combat a prolonged downturn in the US, Germany and other Western markets.But both have found the going tough in China, hindered by a tea-crazy population, an aversion to paying extra for premium brands, and competition from upcoming local players.Pepsi already takes some 4 per cent of its $27 billion in annual global revenues from China, according to its Web site. That figure is growing.But it lags arch-rival Coca-Cola, which state media report commands 57 percent of the country’s carbonated drinks market, which has grown 20 per cent yearly over the past decade.‘‘China’s per-capita consumption still lags by far that of European and American regions,’’ Chu said. ‘‘But the growth potential is so huge that our company’s overall sales of carbonated soft drinks have multiplied despite market share diving by half over the past two decades,’’ he said.The average Chinese takes in just eight soft drink servings a year, versus 150 in Hong Kong, industry executives say. Packaged teas comprise 35 per cent of the soft drinks arena now. To overcome that, Pepsi and Coca-Cola have launched a marketing blitz — just one way of getting around a distaste among Chinese for paying a premium for brands, especially outside rich urban centres like Shanghai and Guangzhou.In Pepsi’s latest strike, the US giant plans to sit girls in mini-skirts inside transparent drinks vending machines in downtown Shanghai, according to the Shanghai Daily. But China has proved a tough nut to crack because of a die-hard tea-drinking culture spanning thousands of years and a traditional aversion to cold drinks.
