Pinnacle Foods has booked a 19.3% increase in net sales for the third quarter of 2016, which the US group said “largely reflects the benefit” of its recent Boulder Brands acquisition.
The company said today (27 October) net sales for the period were US$758.8m compared to net sales of $636.3m in the year-ago period.
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Boulder Brands contributed approximately $121m in the quarter “and continued growth of North America Retail, which is comprised of the Birds Eye Frozen and Duncan Hines Grocery segments”, Pinnacle said.
However, Pinnacle only saw muted growth in volumes from its business beyond the Boulder Brands assets.
“This growth reflected a 19% benefit from the Boulder Brands acquisition, as well as higher net price realisation of 0.2% and increased volume/mix of 0.1%,” Pinnacle said.
Pinnacle gave some detail of how the Boulder Brands business had performed during the third quarter. “Boulder Brands contributed $120.9m in net sales in the third quarter of 2016, including the unfavourable impact during the quarter of Boulder’s SKU rationalisation programme,” Pinnacle said. “Retail consumption, excluding the SKU rationalisation impact, continued to advance versus year-ago for the Glutino, Udi’s, Earth Balance and Evol brands, offset by a decline for Smart Balance.”
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By GlobalDataThe net sales from Pinnacle’s North America Retail division increased 0.8% to $558.5m in the third quarter of 2016, compared to $554.1m in the third quarter of 2015, “reflecting increased volume/mix of 0.5% and higher net price realisation of 0.3%”.
Pinnacle’s group gross profit increased 29.3% versus year-ago to $228.7m, or 30.1% of net sales, compared to gross profit of $176.9m, or 27.8% of net sales, in the prior-year period. “This strong performance primarily reflected the benefit of the Boulder Brands acquisition, as well as strong productivity, improved mix and the favourable impact versus year-ago of items affecting comparability, principally hedging gains in 2016,” Pinnacle said.
EBIT in the third quarter of 2016 increased 20.9% to $118.3m, compared to EBIT of $97.8m in the same period a year ago. Pinnacle said the result “largely reflected the strong growth in gross profit, partially offset by higher selling, general and administrative expenses due to the inclusion of Boulder Brands”.
