but not if Coca Cola's continuing growth depends on their ensuring that many many people are drinking it to excess

Not sure the math even comes out obviously in favour of someone who overindulges but dies an early death, vs someone who lives long and enjoys a coke every so often throughout that long life.

Of course it does. Let's just calculate the revenue of two scenairos:

Person A consumes 2L of Coke every day. Dies an early death at 45 year old. 2L coke is ~$2. From the age of 18 to 45 that person spent $19710.

Person B is good at consuming things with moderation. Drinks one 7.5 oz Coke per week, and lives to the ripe old age of 90. A ten pack of 7.5oz coke is ~$6. That person spent from the age of 18 to 90 about $2252.

You can of course tweak the assumptions, but the thing is sugar doesn't kill anyone that fast. People by and large don't drop dead in years from overconsumption of it.

Munger wasn't responsible for Coca Cola's continued growth (and it's worth noting that Berkshire has never owned 25% of Coca Cola as another comment here claimed, they own 9.25% at present).

And there's no reason Coca Cola couldn't diversify away from sugary drinks in the pursuit of growth, exactly as they have been doing for decades. Sugary soda drinks have been a dead-end in terms of growth for a while now. The growth has gone to eg Monster and RedBull et al.

Imagine being an exec at coca cola.

All your product development is done. You already got it right.

Now your only goal is coca cola displacing a greater and greater quantity of the substances humans put in their bodies.

Every quarter you want that percentage to go up. Maybe public water infrastructure should be looked upon as a competitor.

You think about the future and see vague stormclouds- vitamin supplementation can keep our consumers active a bit longer after the product displaces all sources of nutrition, but there is an absolute limit to how much matter a human can ingest over a given 24h period.

Perhaps a campaign to de-stigmatize public urination. Or maybe theres a way to grow the population…

Define "occasional."

I drink about one soft drink per year, and it's a Coke. (Which reminds me, I don't think I've had my drink for 2023!)

If all world citizens limited themselves to my rate of indulgence, Berkshire Hathaway's KO stake would be worth quite a bit less.

He didn't make money on you buying the "occasional" Coke. He made money by addicting you (the royal you) to Coke to want it over, and over, and over again.

I used to be that way. I'm glad I gave it up.