The pseudo-legal descriptions were typically metes and bounds descriptions of distributor contractual territories with amendments. These contracts started in the late 1800s and continue to the present. However, the vast majority were executed between the 1890s and 1930s and have been amended over the years. The biggest issue with these contracts is that many were written in a different era with a different primary transportation system, railroads. Many of the railroads and towns they reference have been gone for decades.

The objective was to create legal definitions that would be current today and for the next 100 years. The basic guidelines are:

• Territories based on U.S. Census Bureau 2010 county boundaries
• Territories should utilize county boundaries wherever possible;
• County subdivisions should utilize perceivable ground landmarks (e.g., road intersections, bridges, etc.) wherever possible; and,
• County subdivisions should utilize temporally stable landmarks.

Initially, DDS went through all the independent bottler contracts and transformed them from their historical descriptions and amendments into current legal descriptions. The priority was with independent bottlers because those contracts are legally binding and not easily altered.

CCR territories were generated from distributor outlet data to represent current operational boundaries, not historical ones. DDS understands that only outlets that have been active in the last two years are being utilized. The only time that a Contractual Agreement is requested is when CCR outlets encroach into an existing Independent Bottlers territory. DDS has found cases where amendments to territories have not been reciprocal between agreements and identified handshake agreements between bottlers.

The final developed geospatial datasets were provided to Coca-Cola to be utilized internally. DDS also worked with Coca-Cola to develop internal SQL scripts to identify outlets not within their assigned territory. DDS also provided Coca-Cola with a subscription to ZIP+4 locations that are updated quarterly and appended with the territory they fall into. DDS continues to provide on-call services to maintain the distributor territories as transfers occur between bottlers.