Unilever admits sales under the weather

Poor weather has hit ice cream sales at consumer goods firm Unilever, which owns the Ben & Jerry's brand

Joanna Hodgson19 October 2017

Marmite-to-Dove consumer goods behemoth Unilever, which fought off a shock takeover bid from Kraft Heinz this year, on Thursday blamed Mother Nature for weaker third-quarter sales.

Finance chief Graeme Pitkethly said “the developed markets were extremely challenging” for the FTSE 100 manufacturer as it grappled with natural disasters during the period.

He added that there were a number of cancelled orders and shipments left on docks after hurricanes hit Florida and Texas.

The Ben & Jerry’s parent also suffered from poor weather in Europe, which hit ice cream revenues.

Group underlying sales rose 2.6% to €13.2 billion (£11.8 billion) against the 3.9% analysts had pencilled in.

The Anglo-Dutch firm was more upbeat about China and India, and stuck to its full-year outlook. But it was still among the biggest fallers on the blue-chip index, with the shares falling 166p, or 3.6%, to 4382.5p.

The firm, led by Paul Polman, rebuffed a $143 billion (£115 billion) approach from Kraft Heinz in February. After that, it launched a review of options to “accelerate delivery of value” for shareholders and improve performance.

Last month, Unilever kicked off a sale of its spreads business, which is valued at around £6 billion.