Coca Cola needs a new plan

Coca-Cola Iberian Partners is going to have to pay more for its ERE obligations after laying off workers in Spain. The bottling facility will end up paying severance to people who have worked more than 45 days in the year (various other options were considered), and 1,190 workers are going to be affected.

Now, the bottling facility's CEO, Sol Daurella, will have to pay for a restructuring that will cost between 100 and 150 million euros, which is around 85,000 to 126,000 euros per person. All of this results from a pile of errors and an irrational position that the plant took when it came up with it had the option to pursue a legal and straightforward restructure.

Daurella and Sagardoy wanted nothing to do with the team of lawyers that are now managing the ordeal. The law office that Íñigo Sagardoy runs didn't bother presenting a business plan that would have definitely been approved. Instead, it moved forward with the layoffs and closing of four plants.

The lawyer tried to cover up a plan to fire a massive number of people at a plant that employed a lot of Spaniards and provided Coca-Cola products throughout the country. Looking at the way the conflict was managed, the bad communication among workers and the media (elEconomista was threatened in order to keep information quiet), we can see that Coca-Cola could have done things differently.

At this point, Coca-Cola will have to present a real business plan and pay a high price so that its workers get severance. This is the price to pay for grave errors and Daurella's attempt to use his political contacts to pull off a shady operation.