Which coffee chain did The Coca-Cola Company acquire in 2019?

The Coca-Cola Company acquired Costa Coffee in 2019.

Coca-Cola agreed to buy Costa Coffee from Whitbread in 2018, and the transaction was completed in January 2019 for about £3.9 billion. Costa was founded in London in 1971 by brothers Bruno and Sergio Costa and had grown into an international coffee business with cafés, vending, and packaged coffee products.

The acquisition expanded Coca-Cola’s presence in coffee, a category that includes cafés, ready-to-drink beverages, beans, and coffee machines. It also gave Coca-Cola a well-known coffee brand with operations extending beyond traditional soft drinks.

Costa Coffee is sometimes confused with other major coffee chains because Coca-Cola has distributed or marketed several beverage products through different partnerships and markets. Costa, however, became part of Coca-Cola through a direct acquisition from Whitbread. The deal did not include Whitbread’s other major hospitality businesses.