Chesterman logo from the company’s website.
Sioux City’s long time Coca-Cola bottler is expanding its territory in Iowa and Nebraska. The Chesterman Company has signed a letter of intent with the Coca-Cola Company to assume territories in Nebraska and western Iowa, including the Omaha and Lincoln markets.
Company CEO Cy Chesterman says it’s part of a 21st century partnership model Coca-Cola is implementing with its main distributors. “It’s a big deal for us, those are very big markets,” Chesterman says. “It’s really part of a broader scope of what the company is doing across the county.” Chesterman has been a Coca-Cola bottler for five generations, beginning in 1904, and currently has more than 400 associates serving a territory of nearly one million people in parts of Iowa, Nebraska, South Dakota and Illinois.
The company’s corporate headquarters is in Sioux City. Chesterman says there will not be any change to their existing territories. “We love doing business in Sioux City and it has been a great place for us,” Chesterman says. He says a final agreement and transition probably won’t be completed until late 2016. Financial terms of the agreement were not disclosed.
(Reporting by Woody Gottburg, KSCJ, Sioux City)