Unilever today reported underlying sales growth of 7% for 2023, thanks to a 6.8% increase in prices.
Underlying price growth decelerated from 10.7% in the first quarter of last year to 2.8% in the fourth quarter, due to a slowdown in raw material inflation during 2023.
The Guardian reported that nutrition and ice cream faced the highest input cost inflation in 2023 which translated into higher pricing, Unilever says.
Only around a third of the company’s brands increased their market share last year, as customers in Europe shifted to supermarket brands, while Americans bought more “super-premium” goods.
Unilever’s CEO, Hein Schumacher, said: “Today’s results show an improving financial performance, with the return to volume growth and margins rebuilding.
However, our competitiveness remains disappointing and overall performance needs to improve. We are working to address this by improving our execution to unlock Unilever’s full potential.”
