Walk into a grocery store in around 200 countries across the world and you'll find Coca-Cola (KO 1.03%) products for sale. Its name is almost synonymous with soda, but The company sells a range of beverage products from tea and coffee to juice and sports drinks to soda of various kinds.
If you are looking for a well run consumer staples company, this industry giant, which has been in existence since 1886, should be on your shortlist. But Coca-Cola will probably be most interesting to dividend investors. Here's why.
Coca-Cola a dividend growth machine
Coca-Cola's many strengths include its iconic brands, massive distribution network, huge marketing budget, and its size (which allows it to swallow up smaller competitors with hot new products). The company is the king of the non-alcoholic beverage sector and it is unlikely that it will be dethroned anytime soon. That has translated into a lot of good news for dividend investors over the years.
Image source: Getty Images.
How many years? Coca-Cola has increased its dividend every single year for 62 years and counting. That's 12 years more than what is needed to be crowned a Dividend King, a highly elite group of companies that have shown incredible consistency when it comes to returning value to shareholders via regular dividend increases. You don't create a record like that by accident.
The last 62 years has included the rampant inflation of the 1970s, the oil crisis, the dot-com bust and the associated recession, the Great Recession in the late naughts, and the coronavirus pandemic, to name some of the big negative highlights. Being a consumer staples maker has helped the company, since it sells relatively low cost items that consumers purchase on a regular basis. But there are plenty of other drink makers that haven't fared nearly as well as Coca-Cola over the years.
Why Coca-Cola's dividend growth matters
But why should dividend investors pay so much attention to Coca-Cola's dividend growth? The streak alone isn't the big story. There are companies with similarly strong dividend streaks that can't hold a candle to Coca-Cola. The difference is in the dividend growth rate. To put some numbers on it, Coca-Cola's dividend has increased at an annualized rate of roughly 5% over the past decade.
That may not sound huge, but it is a couple percentage points higher than the historical growth rate of inflation. So the buying power of Coca-Cola's dividend has grown over the years. That means that Coca-Cola's slow and steady dividend growth has increased your cash flow over time so you can not only continue to afford a loaf of bread, but you've now got some cash left over to buy something else you like, maybe some butter.
KO Dividend Per Share (Quarterly) data by YCharts
Don't underestimate the importance of reliable and substantive dividend growth. The chart above compares Coca-Cola's dividend to that of utility Northwest Natural (NWN 0.79%), which is also a Dividend King. While Northwest Natural is a boring and reliable dividend payer, its dividend growth over the past decade has averaged around 0.6%. You can clearly see the difference that makes when you look at the growth of the two dividends over that span. Coca-Cola is clearly playing in a different league.
Is Coca-Cola a buy today?
So material and reliable dividend growth is one of the biggest reasons why you'll want to consider Coca-Cola as an investment. But is it worth buying right now? Unfortunately, the answer is probably not.
Looking at traditional valuation metrics, the company's price-to-sales and price-to-earnings ratios are both above their five-year averages. That suggests Coca-Cola is expensive today. But, like most stocks (and sodas), Coca-Cola does go on sale on occasion, with multiple drawdowns of at least 25% over the years.
That's why it is so important to make a plan today, while Coca-Cola is expensive. When it does go on sale, perhaps during the next bear market, you'll have to invest while others are selling -- a very hard thing to do.
However, if you put this Dividend King on your wishlist and prepare ahead of time, you won't look back and say, "I should have bought Coca-Cola while I had the chance." Instead, you'll be able to say you did buy Coca-Cola and, perhaps, locked in a growing dividend and a yield that, if history is any guide, could be as high as 3.5% or even 4%.
