Unilever overhauling European homecare supply chain, executive says
By Richa Naidu
LONDON, Oct 7 (Reuters) -Unilever ULVR.L is spending over 150 million euros ($165 million) to revamp its European homecare business' supply chain, a senior executive told Reuters, aiming to make up for years of underperformance and tap into young, post-pandemic shoppers.
Unilever's European homecare business, whose brands include Persil and Omo detergent, and Comfort fabric conditioner, plans to make improvements including building factories and adding warehouses and new production lines to existing facilities. The push began in early 2023 and will continue into 2026.
The news comes months after the consumer goods giant was reported to be cutting a third of all office roles in Europe by the end of 2025 as a part of a push by CEO Hein Schumacher to revive growth.
A top company executive also told Reuters the European homecare business is increasing its promotion, research and development spending by 40%. Unilever did not disclose how much that amounted to in euros.
"We are completely redesigning our supply chain in Europe," Eduardo Campanella, the head of Unilever's global homecare business, told Reuters. He said the changes are helping Unilever reinvest in better products, store promotions and a new marketing strategy. The company is also deprioritizing some brands and upgrades to existing products.
"We have not invested properly in Europe because we were not growing. So it's a chicken and egg problem."
"Europe was quite stagnant and then the (company-wide turnaround) came as a shock of culture into this organization," Campanella said, adding that the new strategy helped his business "rewire a little bit".
Unilever's global homecare business reported 3.3% underlying sales growth in the first half of this year. Campanella said Unilever's Europe homecare business meanwhile saw nearly 13% growth in that period, about two-thirds of which was made up by sales volume growth. The company does not typically break out regional figures.
Unilever is growing ahead of the wider market, with Euromonitor International estimating the western European homecare market will grow 3.7% to $36.6 billion this year. The laundry detergent market in that region is estimated to grow about 3% in 2024.
Campanella said demand for some of Unilever's European homecare products grew so unexpectedly the company has had to delay some innovations to next year because it couldn't keep up.
He attributed the business' growth to investments in new products that cater to changing consumer habits; for instance, a laundry detergent aimed at shorter washing times, or Cif cleaner advertised to Gen-Z shoppers for cleaning white sneakers.
"More than half of the total loads in Europe are short-cycle load, but not a single product was designed to address short cycle," Campanella said.
He added that Unilever had pitched its new products to European retailers about two years in advance, hoping to woo them in the middle of a cost-of-living crisis that had grocers and consumer goods makers at odds over sky-high pricing.
Campanella said Carrefour CARR.PA asked to launch Unilever's Wonderwash short-cycle product earlier than other French retailers. Unilever gained eight points of market share in its liquid detergents segment at Carrefour after the launch of the product, he added, going from being the second biggest player at that retailer to the first. Unilever's biggest global detergent competitor is Procter & Gamble PG.N.
The product was also added to about 800 Tesco Express TSCO.L stores in Britain on its first day in the market, with Campanella saying the retailer was hoping to attract younger shoppers from smaller, urban households.
Carrefour and Tesco did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
($1 = 0.9066 euros)
Reporting by Richa Naidu. Additional reporting by Helen Reid; editing by David Evans
Asset collegati
Ultime news
Disclaimer: le entità di XM Group forniscono servizi di sola esecuzione e accesso al nostro servizio di trading online, che permette all'individuo di visualizzare e/o utilizzare i contenuti disponibili sul sito o attraverso di esso; non ha il proposito di modificare o espandere le proprie funzioni, né le modifica o espande. L'accesso e l'utilizzo sono sempre soggetti a: (i) Termini e condizioni; (ii) Avvertenza sui rischi e (iii) Disclaimer completo. Tali contenuti sono perciò forniti a scopo puramente informativo. Nello specifico, ti preghiamo di considerare che i contenuti del nostro servizio di trading online non rappresentano un sollecito né un'offerta ad operare sui mercati finanziari. Il trading su qualsiasi mercato finanziario comporta un notevole livello di rischio per il tuo capitale.
Tutto il materiale pubblicato sul nostro servizio di trading online è unicamente a scopo educativo e informativo, e non contiene (e non dovrebbe essere considerato come contenente) consigli e raccomandazioni di carattere finanziario, di trading o fiscale, né informazioni riguardanti i nostri prezzi di trading, offerte o solleciti riguardanti transazioni che possano coinvolgere strumenti finanziari, oppure promozioni finanziarie da te non richieste.
Tutti i contenuti di terze parti, oltre ai contenuti offerti da XM, siano essi opinioni, news, ricerca, analisi, prezzi, altre informazioni o link a siti di terzi presenti su questo sito, sono forniti "così com'è", e vanno considerati come commenti generali sui mercati; per questo motivo, non possono essere visti come consigli di investimento. Dato che tutti i contenuti sono intesi come ricerche di investimento, devi considerare e accettare che non sono stati preparati né creati seguendo i requisiti normativi pensati per promuovere l'indipendenza delle ricerche di investimento; per questo motivo, questi contenuti devono essere considerati come comunicazioni di marketing in base alle leggi e normative vigenti. Assicurati di avere letto e compreso pienamente la nostra Notifica sulla ricerca di investimento non indipendente e la nostra Informativa sul rischio riguardante le informazioni sopra citate; tali documenti sono consultabili qui.
