In the days of Tangier, International Zone, Coca Cola's new customers in this city on the Strait were encouraged to "Tome Coca Cola," as in this 1950 ad in the Tangier Gazette. Sign of the times: Spanish was the primary language among the foreign community of Tangier. The company has been in Tangier since the postwar days, when a shipboard war surplus bottling operation was brought on shore in 1947. Now, Coca Cola is to open Africa's largest production plant in Tangier, where it first came ashore more than sixty years ago.
Yesterday, the American Chamber of Commerce in Morocco, AMCHAM, recognized Tangier's new economic reality and potential by convening its country-wide meeting in Tangier. We were happy at TALIM to welcome the group for a closing reception at the Legation.
Beyond Coca Cola's historic and expanding presence, Tangier has attracted a certain number of US companies, many of which are in the automotive industry: Delphi, Polydesign, Lear. Bathroom fixture giant Kohler has a large plant in Tangier. And Tangier is proud to have not only one, but two of the McDonalds with the absolutely best views in the world, overlooking the Strait of Gibraltar over to Spain.
With the new Tangier Med transshipment port and the major remake of the city port of Tangier – not to mention the construction of the TGV high speed rail line linking Tangier with Rabat and Casablanca – the city is Boomtown Morocco.
We're glad that AMCHAM recognizes this, and that it chose to announce the formation of a new northern Morocco grouping under the wing of Polydesign's director Julianne Furman, a longtime Morocco hand. And we welcome them whenever AMCHAM wants to host events in America's first and oldest property abroad.
Gerald Loftus
You have hit my “memory button” once again. The very small American community used to gather at the Portuguese Fort on Saturday afternoons and a case of those small (probably 6-8 oz) bottles of Coca-Cola was always present. In those days the bottle caps had a cork insert which, if carefully removed intact, enabled us to attach the metal cap to our tee shirts creating what we thought was a suit of armor.