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Roberto Crispulo Goizueta: 1931-1997: Businessman, Chemical Engineer - A Successful Career Came To An Abrupt End

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Despite occasional bumps in the road, Goizueta's overall strategic plan for revamping the Coca Cola company was a success. When Goizueta assumed leadership of the company, the share value of Coke was $4.3 billion. By the end of his reign, that number had increased to more than $152 billion. As a share-owner in Coke, Goizueta's personal wealth increased as his company profited. By 1997 Goizueta owned 15.9 million Coke shares worth over a billion dollars. He never sold his original 100 shares of Coke stock that he bought when he started working for the company. His $8,000 investment was worth over $3 million.

Goizueta was a lifelong smoker who was diagnosed with lung cancer in September of 1997. He died just one month later. Goizueta's legacy lives on through the Goizueta Foundation, which donates money to numerous social and educational causes. Goizueta also donated a significant amount of Coke stock to Emory University in Atlanta, which named its business school after him in 1994. According to Maria Mallory of U.S. News and World Report in November of 1997, Goizueta saw his life as an example of what could be accomplished with the American dream. "My story boils down to a single, inspiring reality … that a young immigrant could come to this country, be given a chance to work hard and apply his skills, and ultimately earn the opportunity to lead … an institution that actually symbolizes the very essence of America and American ideals."


Sources

Books


Business Leader Profiles for Students, Gale Research, 1999.

Encyclopedia of World Biography Supplement, Vol. 18, Gale Research, 1998.

Greising, David, I'd Like to Buy the World a Coke, John Wiley and Sons, Inc., 1997.

Newsmakers, Issue 1, Gale Group, 1996.

Newsmakers 1998, Issue 1, Gale Group, 1998.


Periodicals


Atlanta Business Chronicle, October 24, 1997.

Beverage Digest, October 24, 1997.

Detroit Free Press, October 19, 1997.

Economist, October 25, 1997, p. 97.

Emory Report, October 27, 1997; February 2, 1998.

Financial World, April 3, 1985, p. 24; April 4, 1984, pp. 28-35; April 5, 1988, p. 89; April 4, 1989, pp. 74-79.

Forbes, March 21, 1988, pp. 34-35.

Fortune, December 11, 1995, pp. 96-100; December 11, 1995, pp. 80-87; October 28, 1996, pp. 70-78; October 13, 1997, pp. 88-91; December 29, 1997, pp. 230-233; August 4, 1997, p. 34.

Nation's Business, March 1984, pp. 47-49.

Newsweek, March 17, 1997, p. 40; October 27, 1997, pp. 44-45.

Time, October 27, 1997, pp. 102-103.

U.S. News and World Report, June 9, 1997, pp. 50-51; November 3, 1997, p. 15.


On-line


"Coke CEO Roberto C. Goizueta dies at 65," CNN.com, www.cnn.com/US/9710/18/goizueta.obit. 9am (March 26, 2003).

"Goizueta helped the world swig in perfect harmony," CNN.com, www.cnn.com/US/9710/18/coke.icon (March 26,203).

"Roberto C. Goizueta," Corporate Heroes, www.bussinessheroes.com/Pages/articles/1998/98070204.htm (March 26,203).

"Roberto Crispulo Goizueta," http://hem.passagen.se/cokeisit/goizueta.html (March 26,203).

"Why Would Anyone Go to Engineering School?" www.eng.yale.edu/sheff/Goizueta/rg-remarks.html (March 26,203).

—Janet P. Stamatel

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