The overall group turnover for the third quarter amounted to €15.2bn. The Beauty & Wellbeing division saw a turnover of €3.2bn, up by 6.7%, and the Personal Care division saw a turnover of €3.4bn, up by 4.4%.
Volume growth in the Hair care & Skin care categories
The company owns a wide portfolio of mainstream brands such as Dove and Vaseline, as well as prestige brands like Paula’s Choice, K18 and Dermalogica.
In its Beauty & Wellbeing division, the Hair Care category saw low-single-digit growth with low-single-digit volume growth. Hero brand Dove enjoyed volume-led growth and TRESemmé grew in mid-single-digits.
Another of Unilever’s ‘power brands’ Sunsilk, grew in low-single-digits, while Clear achieved high-single-digit growth (outside China).
Its Core Skin Care category grew in mid-single-digits led by double-digit volume growth in the US.
Dove saw strong double-digit growth, which included the launch of High Potency Body Serums and 3-in-1 face care treatments in Brazil.
Pond's grew in double-digits supported by its Bright Miracle and Age Miracle face care ranges.
Health & Wellbeing sales strong; Prestige drops
The company combines its Health & Wellbeing and Prestige Beauty divisions for the purpose of sales figures, and this delivered double-digit growth for the 15th consecutive quarter.
However, a closer look showed that the success was due to Health & Wellbeing, which offset lower growth in Prestige Beauty, thus reflecting the continued slowdown in the US and China beauty markets.
Beauty from within supplements like Liquid I.V. Nutrafol and Olly all saw strong growth. Notably, Olly’s female health supplements performed well in China’s difficult market.
Hourglass led Prestige growth with strong double-digit growth, driven by hero products such as Vanish Airbrush Concealer and Veil Hydrating Skin Tint, yet Paula’s Choice was affected by the market slowdown.
Personal Care saw Deodorants up in high-single-digits, which was volume-led. Latin America led growth with double-digit volume, while Europe and North America saw mid-single digit increases.
Dove in this category continued to grow in double-digits with strength across all ranges.
Skin Cleansing grew in low-single-digits, driven by volume sales. In Europe, it saw high-single-digit growth driven by volume increases. In the US, it saw mid-single-digit growth.
The company said that growth was halted for this category by deflation in India, category declines in China, and operational challenges in Indonesia.
Unilever has also recently announced that Mary Carmen Gasco-Buisson will become the new CEO for the Prestige beauty division, replacing the original founder Vasiliki Petrou, who left the company earlier this year.
“Price growth continued to moderate”
Commenting on the results, CEO Hein Schumacher noted that the company has delivered a fourth consecutive quarter of positive, improved volume growth, but observed that while underlying sales grew 4.5%, “price growth continued to moderate in line with our expectations.”
One year ago, Schumacher unveiled a new strategic plan which focused on 30 "Power Brands" that when combined represent 70% of the company’s revenue.
This summer, the FMCG company announced that it would launch a cost-cutting plan to boost its margins, which would mean 7,500 job cuts, which equated to around 6% of its total workforce.
In October 2024, the company announced that it was selling its Russia assets to the country’s largest cosmetics manufacturer the Arnest Group.
