THE IGA INSTITUTE TO AGAIN ADOPT ORIGINAL NAME

IGA Institute renamed IGA Coca-Cola Institute

CHICAGO, IL - IGA today announced The IGA Institute will again adopt its original namesake, The IGA Coca-Cola Institute, effective immediately.

“Coca-Cola’s vision has been instrumental in the formation and development of IGA’s training initiative,” said Paulo Goelzer, Ph.D., President, IGA Coca-Cola Institute, Chief Learning Officer & Executive Vice-President, IGA International. “We are very thankful for the support Coca-Cola has given us over the years, and are proud to recognize them as title sponsor of the IGA Coca-Cola Institute. This support demonstrates that Coca-Cola values the independent retailer, and is dedicated to helping those retailers achieve a sustainable competitive advantage by providing continued learning at all levels.

IGA and Coca-Cola launched IGA’s accelerated learning training program in 1991 in Sydney, Australia, in cooperation with Davids Limited. At the time of its inception, the training program was named the IGA Coca-Cola Institute. Over the years IGA operations in countries around the world chose their own variations on the name of the Institute, yet Japan and Australia, the first countries to utilize the program, remained loyal to the original name.

“When 20 years ago senior executives of IGA and Coca-Cola met to determine the best way for IGA to prepare to enter overseas countries which were requesting our presence, the late Ira C. Herbert, executive vice president of Coca-Cola, and John Hunter, then managing director of Coca-Cola International, suggested the development of a multifaceted training program,” said Thomas S. Haggai, Chairman and CEO of IGA. “Now that this blended education includes a total web certified language specific program as well as classroom training sessions, it seems appropriate to return globally to our original name in honor of the support from our title sponsor that started in Australia and Japan.”

The IGA Coca-Cola Institute is a dynamic center for education committed to the accelerated learning of IGA employees. In addition to the Executive Master’s in Food Marketing program, the IGA Coca-Cola Insitute offers multi-language Web based training, Online courses employee certification programs, and classroom training sessions.

"The Coca-Cola Company has supported the IGA Institute since its creation, and firmly believes in supporting the development of family-owned retailers around the world and in contributing to their success, as much as it believes in a committed support to worldwide education,” said Gabriel Pascual, global account director for the The Coca-Cola Company.

Joining the title sponsor are these additional global sponsors of the IGA Coca-Cola Institute:

Alto-Shaam, Inc.
Anheuser-Busch, Inc.
Campbell Soup Company
Colgate-Palmolive Company
The Gillette Company
Hussman Training Center
Kraft Foods Inc.
Nestlé USA
Procter & Gamble Co.
The J.M. Smucker Company
Wm. Wrigley Jr. Company

IGA, the only global supermarketer based in the United States, is the world’s largest voluntary supermarket network with aggregate worldwide retail sales of more than $21 billion per year. The Alliance includes more than 4,000 Hometown Proud Supermarkets worldwide, supported by 36 distribution companies and more the 55 major manufacturers, vendors and suppliers encompassing everything from grocery to equipment items. IGA ranks in the top 10 in world food supermarketing. IGA has operations in 48 of the United States and more than 40 countries, commonwealths and territories on all six inhabited continents.