Unilever Q3 sales top expectations

In emerging markets, Unilever had an underlying 8.4 per cent sales growth in the last quarter, boosted by strong sales in Latin America and good weather lifting ice cream sales.

“We continue to see soft global markets with no immediate sign of getting help from an improving global economy”, Unilever Chief Executive Paul Polman said in a statement.

The Anglo-Dutch maker boosted its turnover by 9.4 per cent in the third quarter to €13.4 billion (£9.9 billion) after a strong summer of ice-cream sales from its brands Ben and Jerry’s and Wall’s brand.

The company now expects underlying sales growth for the year towards the upper end of the 2-4 percent range. Underlying sales growth in the emerging markets recovered further, whilst its North American business returned to growth, ‘ he said. It also expects a steady improvement in core operating margin and strong cash flow. The company also logged stronger growth in Russian Federation and better volumes in India as well as in Latin America where volume growth accelerated “despite challenging macroeconomic conditions and consumer incomes being squeezed by currency devaluation”. The second quarter figure was just 2.9%.

That’s still respectable, though, and higher than the 4% analysts expected, sending shares up 4% in London to 2,902p by lunchtime today.

Savoury demonstrated good volume-driven growth led by cooking products in emerging markets and innovations around naturalness and health. Profit figures weren’t disclosed. Personal-care revenue climbed 6.2% on an underlying basis, while revenue from foods rose 1.6% on this basis.

Ice-cream is behind soaring sales at Unilever, better known as the world’s largest producer of spreads, or for its toiletries, like Dove and TRESemmé shampoo. New flavours, including Magnum’s Pink champagne and Black espresso duo, helped increase sales of refreshments to 8.5%.

02 October 2015 — Unilever has acquired the premium Italian gelato business, GROM.