John Pemberton-Entrepreneur Essay

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In May of 1886, Coca Cola was invented by Doctor John Pemberton a pharmacist from Atlanta, Georgia. He concocted the Coca Cola formula in a three legged brass kettle in his backyard. The name was just a suggestion given by John’s bookkeeper, Frank Robinson. Being a bookkeeper, Frank had excellent penmanship. It was he who first scripted "Coca Cola" into the flowing letters which has become the famous logo of Coca Cola today. The prototype Coca Cola recipe was formulated at the Eagle Drug and Chemical Company, a drugstore in Columbus, Georgia, by John. It was originally a coca wine called Pemberton's French Wine Coca. But soon Atlanta and Fulton County passed a prohibition legislation, so he responded by developing Coca Cola, essentially a non-alcoholic version of French Wine Coca. John claimed Coca Cola cured many diseases, including morphine addiction, indigestion, neurasthenia (noo r-uh s-thee-nee-uh), headache, and impotence.908 When launched, Coca-Cola's two key ingredients were caffeine and cocaine. The drink once contained an estimated nine milligrams of cocaine per glass. In 1903 it was removed. The cocaine was derived from the coca leaf and the caffeine from kola nut, leading to the name Coca-Cola. The "K" in Kola was replaced with a "C" for marketing purposes. John never realized the potential of the drink he had created. He slowly sold portions of his business to various partners. Just prior to his death in 1888, sold his remaining interest in Coca-Cola to Asa G. Candler. An Atlanta man with great business acumen, Mr. Candler proceeded to buy additional rights and acquire complete control. About nine servings of the soft drink were sold each day. Sales for that first year added up to a total of about $50. According to Coca Cola there are 1.7 billion servings of Coca Cola sold every day. I couldn’t find how much Coca Cola makes a year now but I’m

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