Status: 04/03/2023 2:33 p.m
The East German traditional brand Vita Cola sold more than 95 million liters in 2022. This is the best result ever. And in one state, Vita Cola is even more popular than Coca-Cola.
Company record for Vita Cola: the traditional East German brand sold a total of 95.5 million liters of non-alcoholic soft drinks last year. This is an increase of nine percent compared to the previous year and thus the best result in the brand’s more than sixty-year history, as the company announced today. Vita Cola is a brand of Thüringer Waldquell Mineralbrunnen GmbH in Schmalkalden.
The company reported that it was particularly gratifying that this result was achieved despite difficult framework conditions such as high energy and raw material prices, rising inflation and the resulting reluctance of consumers to spend.
Cola top dog in Thuringia
According to the company, Vita Cola is second in terms of its market share for colas in eastern Germany and even number one in Thuringia. In the lemonade segment, sales grew by 5.6 percent. Here the company is also in second place in East Germany and is the market leader in Thuringia. The company has achieved significant growth in the sale of beverages in glass bottles. Sales were able to “grow in double digits,” it said.
“Coca-Cola of the East”
Vita Cola was originally made to stand up to West German Coca-Cola. At the end of the 1950s, the government in the GDR wanted to improve the supply of non-alcoholic beverages to the population as part of its second five-year plan. The East German cola was then developed by Chemische Fabrik Miltitz.
After the fall of communism in 1990, however, production was sometimes even stopped, the company itself writes: “To make room for American colas.” Four years later, Vita Cola was put back on the shelves under new ownership. At the turn of the millennium, the cola with a light citrus flavor from the East even climbed to the top of the cola market in Thuringia – ahead of Coca-Cola.
“A fixture in East Germany”
The current challenges are not easy for Vita Cola either, the company said today. In view of the increased prices – especially for sugar, but also for energy and transport – the company had to raise prices at the beginning of the year. Nevertheless, we look to the future with optimism. “As a regional brand, Vita Cola is a fixture in East Germany,” the company said. Awareness is high and the range is wide. In addition to sugary drinks, it also includes sugar-free drinks.
Thüringer Waldquell Mineralbrunnen GmbH employs more than 160 people in Schmalkalden in Thuringia. The company belongs to the Hessian Hassia Group, which also fills Vita Cola in Lichtenau in Saxony, Hecklingen in Saxony-Anhalt and in Bad Doberan in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania.