After pandemic-led slump in June, Mondelez registers growth in September quarter in India

Mumbai: Mondelēz International, the maker of Cadbury Dairy Milk and Oreo cookies, said growth in India returned in the September quarter due to high demand for chocolates and biscuits and availability increased after lockdown restrictions eased out. A quarter ago, it had declined double digit especially in April and May due to lockdowns and store closures, but posted growth in June with a mid-single-digit expansion."India returned to growth with a high single-digit increase for the quarter driven by chocolate and significant biscuit growth, and the excellent execution of the team there. Chocolate returned to growth at more than 5 per cent. This was aided in part by large chocolate businesses such as India and Brazil returning to robust growth," Luca Zaramella -- executive vice-president, chief financial officer at Mondelez said on an investor call.For Mondelēz, India accounts for around $1 billion of revenue, and has been one its fastest growing markets. Most packaged food companies including Mondelēz saw increased sales in biscuits as consumers filled their grocery carts before lockdown. But chocolates, an impulse product, was affected especially as it is partly skewed towards away-from-home consumption and convenience."In emerging markets, we saw good growth in 80 per cent of the business units revenue base including in large businesses like India, China, Russia and Brazil as operation restrictions eased, enabling better mobility and access to traditional trade," added Zaramella.The market share of flagship brand Cadbury Dairy Milk in India is one of the highest for Mondelēz globally. The company said chocolates came back in Q3 and accelerated largely because of strong growth in emerging markets like India. The company said temporary headwinds in emerging markets do not hamper the long-term prospects as they have advantaged network, deep distribution and had good momentum pre-crisis."We are coming out of the crisis in most of the emerging markets. It's very fast. I am thinking about India, Brazil. We have share gains that we see and obviously, we can only focus on what we control which is execution, cost management, selective investment," said chief executive Dirk Van de Put on the investor call.

from Economic Times https://ift.tt/2TKtrsl