The first glass of Coca-Cola was poured in 1886, in a small pharmacy in Atlanta, USA. Now, about 140 years later, this brand is found everywhere in the world. One of the reasons for this is their world-class marketing, so the ideal company to learn all about brand marketing!
My 6-month internship as Junior Brand Manager at The Coca-Cola Company really flew by. I’ve had the privilege of working on a lot of cool campaigns and developed a good understanding of what brand management in a local market entails. Are you also considering an internship in brand management for a big international brand like Coca-Cola? Then see some tips and tricks below!
Use every opportunity to speak your mind
Whenever you step into an internship role, you are there to learn and your host organization also understands this! It is not about always being right or doing everything perfectly, but about showing initiative and motivation to learn. Besides that, good chance that all your colleagues are actually very interested in your point of view on the campaigns as you are most likely their target audience; Gen Z!
Schedule as many coffee catch-ups as you can
The aim here is not to develop a severe caffeine addiction, but catch-ups like these are the best way to learn an understanding of the organization. By scheduling these casual one-to-ones with different people in the office you get to ask them what exactly keeps them busy on a day-to-day basis. Job titles have become unnecessarily complicated sometimes, so the best way of understanding what someone is responsible for is simply by asking. Besides that, it is also great to build your network!
Be realistic about your work load
I think that this is a very common phenomenon amongst people at the beginning of their
careers; you want to experience and learn as much as possible, so you say yes to everything! It is great to show that you are motivated and ready to work hard, however, make sure that you keep a realistic planning for yourself. If you make too many promises that you cannot keep, then you will just end up too stressed and you will not enjoy your internship to the fullest. If someone asks you to pick something up, but you actually feel like you are already at capacity? Just open up the conversation! Tell them you are happy to support, but that you then need X, Y, Z from them to be able to manage it next to your already existing workload.
These are the main personal learnings I gained from the internship. Doing an internship at Coca-Cola means that you get a lot of responsibility right from the start. I’ve for example had the privilege of running the Christmas campaign for Benelux in 2023! This has been a great experience, both to develop my practical project management skills, but more importantly a great opportunity for personal development and learning to set boundaries.