Carlsberg says Danes boycotting Coca-Cola

ISTANBUL

The Danish people are boycotting Coca-Cola, the company that bottles the US brand in Denmark said Tuesday.

“Our Coca-Cola volumes are slightly down in Denmark,” CEO Jacob Aarup-Andersen told investors after financial results were released.

“There is a level of consumer boycott around the US brands, ... and it’s the only market where we’re seeing that to a large extent," he said.

Aarup-Andersen noted that the boycott was not having a “dramatic" effect on sales, but smaller local brands were gaining market share against US goods.

He said the company was neither in favor nor against a boycott. "We fully respect people's decisions," he said, but clarified that Pepsi and Coca-Cola were "both being produced by Danish brewery workers in Danish breweries so, these are very much, from our perspective, also Danish brands."

The boycott follows US President Donald Trump's repeated remarks about his interest in the Danish territory of Greenland.

"We need Greenland ... for international security. We have to have Greenland," Trump said March 28.

US Vice-President JD Vance criticized Denmark on March 29 for not being a “good ally.”

Coca-Cola's sales have plummeted in recent years due to boycotts, especially in Muslim-majority countries, because of the company's alleged affiliation with Israel's genocidal war in the Gaza Strip.

The company’s revenues fell 2% in the first quarter of 2025 to $11.1 billion, according to financial results on Tuesday.