Nivea and Eucerin organic sales up as Beiersdorf continues growth

07-Aug-2014 - Last updated on 08-Aug-2014 at 10:01 GMT

Related tags Organic sales growth United states Beiersdorf

While emerging markets stuttered for Beiersdorf, as they have for all the main players, the Nivea, Eucerin and La Prairie skin care brands saw a lift in sales for the first half of the year, boosting the consumer business segment.

The Germany-based firm recorded organic sales growth of 5%. In nominal terms, sales increased by 0.2%, from €3.163 billion to €3.171 billion.

“Beiersdorf continues on its profitable growth path in the first half of 2014. Once again, we increased sales and earnings, and gained market shares in our relevant markets and key categories,” comments Stefan F. Heidenreich, Beiersdorf CEO.

The consumer business segment, which accounts for the company’s cosmetics business, recorded organic sales growth of 5% in the first half of the year.

Nivea sales rose by 6.1% compared with the previous year, while Eucerin continued its strong sales performance of the previous year, recording a 6.8% increase in sales, and La Prairie recorded sales growth of 7%.

Regional

For the consumer business in Europe, sales saw slower growth than other regions due to market saturation with organic sales growth of 2%. In Western Europe, sales improved by 1.6%. In Eastern Europe, the growth rate was 3.9%.

The Americas region continued its positive sales trend with a sales increase of 4.8%, with Latin America recording sales growth of 5.1% and North America posting a sales increase of 4.2%.

In the Africa, Asia, Australia region, Beiersdorf lifted sales by 11.3%.

Looking ahead, the company stated that it expect slightly higher growth in the United States economy in 2014. Alongside increased consumer spending due to a lower unemployment rate, it anticipates higher public spending.

Slowdown

There has been a slightly slower growth for every company in once promising emerging markets and this has caused Beiersdorf to adopt a slightly more cautious approach for its full year outlook.

Other consumer goods players such as L'Oreal, P&G, and Unilever have all recorded a slight slowdown from markets that they had previously seen growing demand in.

Notably this was from increasingly brand-conscious consumers in Asia, Eastern Europe and Latin America and was seen as a way to compensate for saturated Western European markets.

"Markets are cooling down dramatically," Beiersdorf CEO Stefan Heidenreich said on Thursday, citing in particular China, Thailand and Vietnam.