Warren Buffett bought this company in 1988 when ‘no one’ wanted it — now it pays Berkshire $848 million a year dividends grew every year 'just as certain as birthdays'

• Buffett began buying Coca-Cola in 1988, building a 400M-share stake for ~$1.3 billion. • That stake is now worth ~$37 billion and pays ~$848 million in yearly dividends. • Wall Street doubted the pricey, post-'New Coke' buy; Buffett saw a durable global brand. Warren Buffett spent decades drinking Pepsi before switching to Coca-Cola after trying a cherry-flavored sample from a neighbor. Berkshire Hathaway began buying Coca-Cola shares in 1988, eventually building a 400 million-share stake for about $1.3 billion by 1994. Today that position is worth roughly $37 billion at $93 a share, with annual dividend income near $848 million. The timing looked odd to Wall Street. Coca-Cola was still recovering from the 1985 New Coke fiasco, the 1987 market crash, and a pricing war with PepsiCo, and analysts saw a mid-teens P/E as too rich. Buffett instead saw a globally ubiquitous brand with high returns on capital under CEO Roberto Goizueta, run by people he trusted for the long haul. Berkshire even got SEC approval to delay disclosing its purchases by a year to avoid driving up the price; the stake became public in March 1989 at 6.3%. Berkshire has never sold a share. Dividends grew from $75 million in 1994 to $816 million in 2025, and Coca-Cola's February dividend hike -- its 64th straight annual increase -- pushed Berkshire's expected annual payout to about $848 million, more than 11 times its original purchase price each year. As Buffett put it, all he and Charlie Munger had to do was cash the checks. The lesson for everyday investors: durable brands, steady dividend growth, and patience can turn a doubted stock into a decades-long cash machine.