Clorox Q4 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

Quartr
Provided by Quartr
August 2, 2023

There are 15 speakers on the call.

Operator

Day, ladies

Speaker 1

and gentlemen, and welcome to the Clorox Company 4th Quarter Fiscal Year 2023 Earnings Release Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen only mode. At the conclusion of our prepared remarks, we will conduct a question and answer session. As a reminder, this call is being recorded. I would now like to introduce your host for today's call, Ms.

Speaker 1

Lisa Burhan, Vice President of Investor Relations for The Clarks Company. Ms. Burhan, you may begin your conference.

Speaker 2

Thanks, Ross. Good afternoon and thank you for joining us. On the call with me today are Linda Rendle, our CEO and Kevin Jacobson, our CFO. I hope everyone has had a chance to review our earnings release and prepared remarks, both of which are available on our website. In just a moment, Linda will share a few opening comments and then we'll take your questions.

Speaker 2

During this call, we may make forward looking statements, including about our fiscal 2024 outlook. These statements are based on management's current expectations, but may differ from actual results or outcomes. In addition, we may refer to certain non GAAP financial measures. Please refer to the forward looking statements section, which identifies various factors that could affect such forward looking statements, which has been filed with the SEC. In addition, please refer to the non GAAP financial information section of our earnings release and the supplemental financial schedules in the Investor Relations section of our website for a reconciliation of non GAAP financial measures to the most directly comparable GAAP measures.

Speaker 2

Now I'll turn it over to Linda.

Speaker 3

Hello, everyone, and thank you for joining us. We closed out fiscal year 2023 with strong results, underscoring the significant progress we've made against our strategic priorities. Over the course of the year, we've been relentlessly focused on driving top line growth and rebuilding margins in a challenging operating environment, while continuing to invest in the long term health of our brands, categories and capabilities. Thanks to our team's strong execution across a comprehensive set of actions, we delivered on these commitments. For fiscal year 2023, we generated net sales growth of 4% within our long term target, gross margin expansion of 3 60 basis points and adjusted EPS growth of 24%.

Speaker 3

Our performance reflects our commitment to driving operational excellence and margin improvement, supported by the strength and resilience of our portfolio and the relevance of our Ignite strategy. In addition to delivering results over the short term, we made progress on our Ignite strategy. The investments we're making to deliver consumer inspired innovation, Strengthen the superior value of our brands, advance our digital transformation and streamline our operating model are positioning us to drive long term profitable growth. As we look ahead to fiscal year 2024, we are clear on our priorities. While we expect the environment to remain difficult with macroeconomic uncertainty persisting, We believe these actions will enable us to continue to drive top line growth and rebuild margins back to pre pandemic levels and put us in a position to grow share and helpful penetration over the long term.

Speaker 3

I'm confident we're taking the appropriate actions to build a stronger, more resilient company positioned to win in the marketplace, deliver on our operational and financial goals and create long term value for stakeholders. With that, Kevin and I will take your questions.

Speaker 1

Thank you, Ms. Rendell. And our first question comes from Peter Grom from UBS. Please go ahead, Peter.

Speaker 4

Thanks, operator, and good afternoon, everyone. So I wanted to ask 2 related questions on the top line. Maybe first, I know you called out stronger shipments in cleaning and some early shipments for back to school, But the minus 2% volume performance was certainly stronger than what we can see in the track data. Was that largely due to the shipment timing that you mentioned? Or is there And then just second on the organic sales guidance of 2% to 4%, You mentioned a mild U.

Speaker 4

S. Recession in the back half. You provided some color on phasing starting with mid single digit growth in 1Q. I just would be curious to get your perspective on the balance of pricing versus volume in that outlook, specifically as we move through the year. And do you expect volume growth at some point in the back half?

Speaker 4

Thanks.

Speaker 3

Hi, Peter. I'll start with your first question, then I'll hand it over to Kevin. So on Q4 over delivery versus what we had expected, as we noted, we did see stronger consumption across the board across our categories in aggregate. And that's a result of 2 things mainly. The first being elasticities continue to be better than they have been historically.

Speaker 3

And that's an aggregate comment. We see differences by category, but in aggregate they're favorable. And trade promo has been normalizing at a slower pace than we'd expect. And we'll continue to see that normalize as we go through fiscal year 2024. But for Q4, it wasn't to the degree that we thought it would be.

Speaker 3

So that's the first bucket, stronger consumption. The second is better operational performance by our team and that's just a broad statement across the supply chain. We were able to Make some supply that we didn't think we would have. Our shipments to retailers were stronger than we had expected. A lot of the things operationally came together with great execution and supported that growth.

Speaker 3

And then finally in Kingsford, we spoke about in Q3, we did not Our expectations in Q3, we made significant adjustments to the plan, including working with retailers on category growth plans, Centered in having the right merchandising and those performed significantly better than we had expected, which was great to see. The consumer reacted very favorably and retailers executed with And those are really the big three main buckets between what we saw and what we expected.

Operator

And then Peter, I can talk about the our plans for fiscal year 2024 as it relates to sales. And as you saw, we're projecting 2% to 4% for the year. If you think about the front half and the back half, our expectations are sales will be closer to mid single digits in the front half and then low single digits in the back half. And that phasing from front half to back half, I'd call out a few items. The first is, as you saw in our prepared remarks, We're projecting a mild recession in the back half of our fiscal year, which would be the front half of calendar year twenty twenty four.

Operator

So we think that will put a little bit of pressure on consumers and our categories we've reflected that in our outlook. The other item to be aware of is, we are now going to lap the 4 rounds of pricing we've taken when we get to the middle of the year. So that 4th price increase we took last December, we will lap that when we get halfway through the year. So the second half of the year, we will now have lapped all the pricing we've taken. So as a result of that, what we expect to see is you'll see improving volume trends as we move through the year and you'll see the benefit of price mix Larger in the front half and then really start to tail off in the back half.

Operator

And so as we get that low single digit growth, it will be a combination of some Price mix because we're still doing a little bit of pricing internationally, improving volume trends, but recognizing we still think it's going to be a difficult economic environment for consumers.

Speaker 4

Thank you, both. I'll pass it on.

Speaker 1

And our next question comes from Anna Lizzo from Bank of America. Please go ahead, Anna.

Speaker 5

Good afternoon. Thanks very much for the question. In your fiscal 2024 guidance, you are expecting flat to 2% net Sales growth, this is a little bit below your long term algorithm from your Ignite strategy of that 3% to 5% annual sales growth. I was wondering if you can comment on when you expect to return to the 3% to 5% net sales growth on a more normalized basis. And in addition, what do you see as the drivers of really achieving that sales growth longer term?

Speaker 5

Thank you.

Speaker 3

Yes. 2% to 4% organic sales growth and 0% to 2% from reported is what we're expecting now. And that is slightly below what we want from a long term perspective. But just to put that in perspective, of course, if you look at our 4 year CAGR and our strategy We did deliver in the midpoint of that range at 4% and again 4% this year. This year coming up is kind of a tale of 2 halves is the way I would talk about it.

Speaker 3

And we expect stronger growth in the front half as we continue to lap the 2 price increases that we have. And then in the back half, we expect it to get tougher for consumers. And right now, our expectation is a mild recession. So when you put those things together, I think In aggregate, we feel good about the top line that we've committed to. In addition, that includes about one point of a headwind from our vitamins, minerals and supplements business.

Speaker 3

As we spoke about over the last couple of calls, we have reengineered that plan to focus more on profitability and we've done that at a trade off from a top line perspective. So that does include a one point headwind and over time we would expect that that wouldn't be the case and that that would help us return to getting in within that 3 to 5. The way that I would think about this as we march through the year, we are expecting again lapping to price increases. We are expecting our Elasticities to be more normalized as we go through the course of the year. We're expecting trade promotion to normalize as well.

Speaker 3

And then we're expecting a mild recession in the back half. Those are all of our assumptions informing that growth. And if those come true, we feel this plan is a very balanced plan. We'll be watching really carefully as we move through the year if any one of those assumptions change and we need to adjust our plan that could impact both on the high end and the lower end of us delivering against what we put out there from an outlook perspective.

Speaker 5

Thank you. And just wanted to ask a follow-up on just on marketing Spend versus promotional levels, you've mentioned that advertising as a percent of sales, you intend to spend about 11% in fiscal 2024 Versus about 10% in fiscal 2023. Do you feel this is the right level of investment given a ramp in marketing spend versus some peers in this space? And also just in terms of the balance of advertising spend versus promotional levels in fiscal 2024, it does sound like you're ramping back up on promotional levels and is this an intention Get back to pre COVID levels of promotion as well. Thanks.

Speaker 3

Sure. So on the marketing spend, as you rightly noted, we spent about 10% of sales on advertising and sales promotion, over our history. And there's times we spent more than that. This year, we're targeting 11% We think that's a prudent investment given the pressure the consumer is going to be under from a macroeconomic perspective, the fact that we are coming off of 4 Rounds of pricing, significant price increase, obviously cost justified, but we want to continue to support the consumer as they transition through that. And so we think 11% is the right number.

Speaker 3

And your 2 data points that give us confidence that 11% is the right number. During the pandemic, we took our advertising spending up, Even in a time when we couldn't fully supply, that increase in advertising led to stronger superiority ratings for our brands And that gave us the confidence to take the 4 rounds of pricing that we took. So we think again in a time where consumers are pressured and stressed, I'm investing that additional point of advertising makes a lot of sense. And then the second data point I would give you is that we've been on a journey to get to know 100,000,000 consumers And that allows us to personalize to them. This was part of our Ignite strategy.

Speaker 3

We've nearly met that goal and that has led To return on investment in our advertising being the highest it ever was, we reached a high point this year. So we feel really good about putting that extra point in because we know what we're going to get from a return Effective in addition to supporting the superiority of our brands. And again, we'll continue to evaluate this moving forward. It doesn't mean it will necessarily be 11% The year after, this is really a roll up of what we think our general managers need to best support our brands during this time. And then from a promotion perspective, promotions continue to be lower than they were pre pandemic, but are ramping up.

Speaker 3

Our expectation is throughout the course of the year, we'll return to more normalized promotions, so similar to what we were pre pandemic. And we've assumed to be fair though this year it would ramp up faster and it hasn't. But based on what we're seeing in the data, we think that's a fair assumption. And again, we wouldn't be targeting going beyond what we were pre pandemic, but just returning to those levels that we had. And for our categories, that still means Vast majority of our sales are done off the shelf with no price reduction.

Speaker 3

Most of this is good quality merchandising, targeting the consumer, around key price points, etcetera. So we think those in combination are the right level of spend given the consumer dynamics, given what we see from a return perspective and what we think is needed to grow categories and to grow share over the long term.

Speaker 5

Great. Very helpful. Thank you very much.

Speaker 1

And our next question comes from Dara Mohsenian from Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead, Dara.

Speaker 6

Hey, guys. Good afternoon.

Speaker 7

So I just

Speaker 6

wanted to Touch on the fiscal 'twenty four guidance. You're assuming gross margins come in well below the fiscal Q4 level and the level in the back half of the year. I know you've got $200,000,000 of higher costs you mentioned in prepared remarks. First, can you just give us some more details specifically on that bucket and what's driving Cost increases and then B, just as you think about it conceptually, the lack of sequential progress versus the back half of the year, Obviously, it's up year over year for the full year. Just I'm wondering how that fits in with your goal to eventually move back towards those pre COVID gross margin levels And why not more progress this year, again, specifically relative to that back half?

Speaker 6

Thanks.

Operator

Yes, happy to take those questions, Darden. Maybe let me start with cost inflation and what we're projecting for this year. And maybe if I step back and just think a little Longer term in terms of what we've been dealing with and you folks know fiscal year 2022 a really difficult year given the extreme levels of cost inflation about 800,000,000 Last year, we experienced about $400,000,000 of the cost inflation and this year we're projecting about 200,000,000 So sequentially getting better, it's moderating, but we're still expecting to operate in a higher cost environment. As we look at that $200,000,000 with the supply chain inflation, There's really 2 areas we're predominantly seeing those cost increases coming through. I would say about a third of that we're projecting will hit in commodities.

Operator

There's a number of items we still seeing inflating, particularly chemicals, substrate, corrugated linerboard. We're still looking at rising costs year over year. Resin for us, we're looking at a fairly neutral cost. It came down last year and we're assuming it'd be relatively flat this year. And then we are seeing some cost Declines in some of our ag products and diesel, but overall, we think that bucket will be modestly inflationary.

Operator

And then the other item we're looking at really hits Particularly manufacturing and warehousing primarily driven by labor that we continue to expect to be operating inflationary environment. And so Those are the primary buckets where we expect to see the $200,000,000 Now on the gross margin goals this year and the phasing of those, as you said Dara, we're We're expecting to continue to make progress rebuilding gross margin and you folks know we've talked about this quite a bit. We're committed getting back to those pre pandemic levels of margin. I think we made good progress last year. We improved about 3 60 basis points.

Operator

We expect to build on this year, expecting to get another 150 basis points to 175 basis And so by the end of this year, assuming we deliver this plan, we will have recovered a little over 500 basis points of that $800,000,000 loss. Now in terms of phasing, I'd say, Daragh, typically Clorox has some seasonality in terms of our margins. Typically, our Q4 is our highest margin And that's particularly because we deal in a disproportionate amount of our Kingsford business in the Q4. I think as you folks know, we sold out 50% of Kingsford in the 4th quarter. It's a very So that tends to generate our highest margin.

Operator

And then typically Q2 is our lowest margin point, one because we do very little Kingsford As well as we do some a lot of gift packing on our Burt's business, which is a great activity to drive awareness and trial, but it comes at a lower margin. So you should Normally think about our business, once we've gotten past the normalization and the pricing and all the disruptions, historically Q2 is a low point And then Q4 is our high. So I think it's better to look on a year over year basis versus sequentially quarter by quarter. Now in Q1, I expect we'll make good solid progress. Now not to the same degree in Q4, 5.60 basis points because we've now lapped That 3rd round of pricing starting now and so you should expect it to step down the benefit of pricing, but I expect to have a good solid Q1.

Operator

And then what I expect to do is continue to advance margins on a year over year basis. And as we said, we're targeting to get to about 41% this year.

Speaker 6

Okay. And are you assuming any incremental pricing next fiscal year? I'm assuming you're not. Is that more just a pause after all the pricing you've taken and maybe you can return later on? And then if I'm not overstaying my welcome, Linda, Can you just comment on household penetration and your performance this fiscal year, particularly in light of the comments around ROI on marketing being an all time high and the personalization reaching nearly 100,000,000 consumers?

Speaker 6

Thanks.

Operator

Yes, Dara, I can start with our pricing assumptions. In the outlook, we have not assumed any broad based pricing in the U. S. Similar to the first four rounds we've taken. Now, We will continue to price internationally because of the higher inflation rates we're experiencing there.

Operator

And we'll also continue to focus on net revenue management activities. But in terms of broad based pricing, we don't have anything assumed in the U. S. This year.

Speaker 3

And then your question on household penetration, When we talked about this a bit over the last few quarters, household penetration along with volume were things that we knew were going to take a hit as we took the level of pricing We have over the last 18 months, and we've certainly seen that. And this is a category comment, not just a Clorox brand comment, What we tend to see is people having short term reactions from a behavior perspective, and they adjust as they see the initial shock of pricing and certainly they've seen 4 rounds they've had to adjust to. So typically what we see is we see consumers looking to go to alternates. Maybe they use the inventory they have in their home. They delay a purchase cycle.

Speaker 3

They look they engage in value seeking behavior. They trade up to larger sizes or smaller sizes. And in very extreme cases, they leave the category. And then from a household penetration perspective, a number of those factors play in. We've seen some light users exit the category, which isn't a big surprise.

Speaker 3

It's typically what we've seen During price increases. And I think importantly to note, again, this is a category behavior, not a Clorox Brands behavior. And then what we're focused on of course is over time returning that household penetration. And I think it's important to put in perspective, we're still in 9 out of 10 U. S.

Speaker 3

Households with our portfolio, But we want to be in a place where we're growing household penetration again. So what I would think about is all the investments that we spoke about a little earlier, Increase in advertising and sales promotion as well as our focus on innovation and category growth plans are all in service of returning to volume growth, Returning to household penetration growth and then of course our aim over the long term to grow share, we would expect household penetration to begin to improve as we get through pricing And as we move through the course of the year and through the course of our plan. But what I would say is very in line with our expectation, and we feel good about the plans we have in place

Speaker 1

And our next question comes from Filippo Falerni from Citi. Please go ahead, Filippo.

Speaker 8

Hey, good afternoon guys. Just want to ask a question on gross margin again following up to Dara's question. What drove the outperformance relative to your plan in Q4? It seemed like cost saving came in Well, ahead of expectation, it was a record year for you guys, particularly Q4. And how much was the incremental volume leverage From the better volume trends.

Speaker 8

And then as you think about next year, how should we think about cost savings? Is Like also another year above algorithm? Thank you.

Operator

Yes. Thanks Filippo for the question. As it relates to Q4 and you're right, the over deliver on gross margin versus our expectation, we went into the quarter targeting 40% to 41% gross margin. And as you saw, we delivered just under 43%. I would say for the most part, as you look at the various drivers within gross margin, they're generally In line with our expectation, that was certainly true for cost savings, pricing and commodities.

Operator

The biggest variance was our top line performance and particularly on volume. And so volume only declined 2% for the quarter. We had projected a larger volume decline in the quarter. And as a result of that and had improved operating leverage that really flowed through the Tire P and L, it certainly benefited gross margin, but it also was a primary driver of our very strong earnings performance for the quarter. And then as we go forward and on your question on cost savings, look, our team did some just terrific work this year.

Operator

We target 175 basis points of EBIT margin expansion each year through cost savings. In fiscal year 2023, we delivered well north of 200 basis And that's really a credit to the team and the work they're doing to drive cost out of the system. And I fully expect to have a very strong year this year as well. So I would expect this year We'll have another strong year that's probably north of 200 basis points. And that's incredibly important because as we said, we continue to operate in an inflationary environment And for us to continue to grow margin, it's really based on the good work our team is doing both on driving cost savings and driving the supply chain optimization work we're doing.

Operator

And that's allowing us to absorb that increased inflation and continue on our progress rebuilding margin. So really good work by the team and And exceeded our goals both last year and I expect to do it again this year.

Speaker 8

Great. That's super helpful. And then a high level question Linda, just in your guidance on Top line. You mentioned you expect a sequential improvement in volume throughout the year. Just what gives you guys the confidence of The volume coming back other than obviously the comparisons, but like at a high level, is it incremental advertising investment or any other Specific point that you can point to give us some confidence on the volume improvement?

Speaker 8

Thank you.

Speaker 3

Yes. On volume, maybe just to take a step back, I think would be helpful and talk a little bit more similar to my comments on household penetration of what impacts volume and then what we believe we'll see over time as we return to more volume based growth from more pricing driven growth. So the big picture on this, We knew we were going to make a volume trade off with the level of pricing that we took, and certainly that pricing was cost justified. And I think that's the right trade off given the fact that we were able to deliver the top line and margin progress that we committed to. And it's only one lever that we look at it understanding Brand and category health.

Speaker 3

So if we look at volume, again, what impacts it? Consumers are adjusting to pricing Right now, and we still have 2 price increases that will lap here in Q1 and Q2. And so they're still adjusting to what the pricing is. And they're adjusting to pricing well beyond our categories. I think it's also important to note there's an element of cross elasticity here.

Speaker 3

Everything in their world has changed From a wallet perspective. And they also just came through a pandemic and they want to have experiences. So we're watching that consumer settle out. And what Seeing in our data is volumes are beginning to improve. You saw that if you looked 52 weeks, our volumes were down more than they were in the latest 13 weeks, for example, so we are making improvement.

Speaker 3

We still have to lap those 2 price increases. But from a consumer behavior standpoint, what you'll see is Consumers will return to their old routines because those routines were the most efficient and effective for them. And particularly in essential categories, They don't want to have to work harder to do this stuff. So perhaps they've run through the inventory they have in their house. Maybe they tried an alternative and it doesn't work as well.

Speaker 3

We tend to see those people start to come back. We also those light users that the category loss tend to come back again because we reintroduce our products to them through innovation. We use our advertising spend to talk to them about the benefits of the product. We remind them that and they pick us up again as they send their child back School or if their family experiences a run of cold and flu in the house. So those moments we tend to bring those light users over and volumes tends to grow again.

Speaker 3

And we've seen that every time we've taken pricing and that's consistent in categories. I think what's unique for this time is, The amount of inflation our industry and Clorox experienced specifically is unprecedented. We've certainly not taken this level of pricing. So it really will be about the pace that this happens at, but we're happy with the progress we've made so far. We think we have the right plans in place.

Speaker 3

We're making the right investments. Our brands are still a superior value versus what they were pre pandemic, so they're very strong. And we believe over time, again, we will make progress on volumes and return to more volume based growth

Speaker 8

Great. Thank you, guys.

Speaker 1

And our next question comes from Andrea Teixeira from JPMorgan. Please go ahead, Andrea.

Speaker 9

Thank you. Good afternoon. Hello, everyone. My question is on the shipments and consumption Trade offs, if there is any trade offs. You mentioned volumes came in better than anticipated Linda and was driven by Was it driven by consumption?

Speaker 9

Or do you think retailers were also rebuilding inventory given that consumption was better than feared? As you exit the quarter, do you feel inventory levels are where they should be? And then related to that, I also have a clarification on the assumption for the mild recession for the second half and your comments about like volumes coming in It's slightly better than anticipated. So but on top of that, you said category behavior has been changing. Is that some more price elasticity that you saw towards the back end of the quarter or Are you exit rate on the quarter or you're just assuming prudently that at some point you're going to see the historical price of a fiscal one to 1 kick in?

Operator

Hey, Andrea, let me maybe start with your shipment consumption question and then Linda can address price elasticity. As it relates to the Q4, I think there's a few things we were seeing and I'll talk both versus our expectations and on a year over year basis. Versus our expectations, as you know, we had anticipated about 3% to 6% organic sales growth and we delivered much stronger growth in the quarter. That was primarily driven by consumption coming in stronger than we anticipated. So the consumer is still quite resilient And we haven't seen any drop off in consumption as we look Q4 to Q3 and we expect that we might see some drop off in consumption and that didn't materialize.

Operator

And then the other driver of our performance was Kingsford. And as you know, we talked quite a bit about that last quarter. We were Disappointing with our results in the Q3, we made some changes to our plans. And I would tell you, we're a bit cautious on what exactly we'd be able to accomplish in the Q4. But a credit to our team, we had very strong execution.

Operator

That business grew both volume and double digit in sales, so we had a very strong performance and that was the primary drivers to the over delivery. The other element to think about though as it relates to inventory, we think retailers generally have the right inventory levels. But one of the reasons we had very strong growth on a year over year basis is, if you think about last year, retailers were reducing inventory levels. And at the time, as we were all getting more comfortable with the resiliency of the supply chain, everyone was starting to take down their safety stocks and we saw that last year with retailers reducing inventory. And if you think about what's really happening when they do that, what that means is retailers continue to sell to their customers, but they don't reorder from the manufacturers.

Operator

So they're still selling product and not reordering from us. And so last year, our shipments lag consumption. This year as you fast forward, we saw our shipments much closer to consumption because retailers are not adjusting inventory levels. So on a year over year basis that drove much stronger performance. That was particularly true in our Home Care business where we saw inventory reductions a year ago.

Operator

We saw and particularly in Wipes, we saw very strong Wipes shipments this Q4, which was really now we're shipping in line with consumption, which was not the case a year ago. And that really contributed very strong year over year performance in that 14% growth. And then Linda, I know she can speak to elasticities.

Speaker 3

So on elasticity, what we saw in Q4 specifically was continued in aggregate, We're more favorable than we expected. What we expect to happen in fiscal year 2024 is over time those elasticities return To more normalized levels. And it's not anything related to particularly our categories, but just the broader pressure the consumer is under. So if you look at what's going on, certainly balance sheets for them are returning to pre pandemic levels, particularly savings rates where the consumer had a lot of excess savings Over the last few years, right now, we are anticipating a mild recession in the back half. We think that's the most prudent plan based on what we're seeing for economic predictions in the U.

Speaker 3

S. That will put additional pressure on the consumer as well. And we think those factors in combination will lead to more normalized price elasticities. And that's what we have assumed in the plan.

Speaker 9

That's helpful. And on the just a clarification, the impact of the inventory Not write down, but the inventory rationalization last year, was it like a low single digit headwind That NAND disappeared this year or normalized?

Operator

Yes, Andrea, you're exactly right. Last year, we anticipated there was a couple point headwind as a result of Reductions at retailers and so we didn't have that impact this year. So year over year that's a source of benefit And part of the 14% organic sales growth we delivered this year, part of that was driven by lapping that inventory reduction in the prior period.

Speaker 9

Super helpful. Thank you. I'll pass it on.

Speaker 1

And our next question comes from Chris Carey from Wells Fargo. Please go ahead, Chris.

Speaker 10

Hey, everyone.

Speaker 2

Hi, Chris.

Speaker 10

Just one quick follow-up on The gross margin assumption. Kevin, you said in the prepared remarks that commodities would still be a bit inflationary. What are those commodities? I know there's always a lag, but I would just be curious where you're seeing that just given The favorability that we can see on this side? Then I have a quick follow-up.

Operator

Sure. Chris, as it relates to commodities and within that $200,000,000 we said about a third of that we see is coming from commodity inflation. So that'd be roughly $60,000,000 or so. Yes, I would say there's a few areas. We're seeing substrate, some chemicals and some corrugate linerboard inflating year over year.

Operator

Now that's partially being offset in a number of areas where we are expecting some deflation, particularly in ag products, soybean oil. We also expect diesel down year over year. In resin, we've got about flat on a year over year basis, so it's not initially contributing or helping. But that's really what we're seeing in terms of our commodity basket and it's modestly Certainly an improvement from where we were last year, but still modestly inflationary is what we're projecting.

Speaker 10

Okay. And then just on the organic sales over delivery, non track charcoal comping, Some undershipping in the base, and then stronger consumption, just to make sure I have those. Anything else? It's just coming up a lot this evening. Okay.

Speaker 10

All right. Thanks. Yes, those are the primary drivers. Okay, great. Just like a strategic question, Linda, It's interesting how far this whole spectrum on investment has come that this evening it's almost like Are you spending enough?

Speaker 10

And you're talking about higher advertising spending, really strong S and A. And I guess maybe it'd be helpful because we're getting Through earnings season now, what's your take on why we're seeing this really significant step up in investment It's not just from Clorox, it's from all of your peers, marketing spending, SG and A are just going to levels that have not been seen in a very long time. Is this just a lot of manufacturers saying we need to get volumes going? Or are you feeling a lot more push from the retailers to get volumes going? Yes.

Speaker 10

Just what are your thoughts on maybe why this investment cycle is coming together and some of the key drivers and Yes. I can't see where it's going. So just I know it's a big question, but thanks for any thoughts.

Speaker 3

Sure, Chris. Yes, I won't speak on behalf of the industry. I'll certainly let everyone speak on their own behalf. But I can just give you the insights into how we're thinking about it. And I think it's a pretty clear understanding.

Speaker 3

We Headed into COVID, we had learned a lot about volatility and the impact that it had on our business. And so we began investing more a number of years ago to ensure that we have the right digital foundation, that we have the right organization suited to a more volatile environment, That we have the right capabilities to ensure that we continue to lead from a consumer insights perspective and that the data we have flows as fast as we possibly can get it so that we can make quick decisions. So that was certainly an area for us where we needed to invest within our digital transformation and our operating model to ensure we could react as fast as Consumers could be, we want to be more consumer obsessed, faster and leaner. And then if you look at the bucket on promotional spending, I look at that as more of a return to the norm. And for us, that spending is on good faith.

Speaker 3

We spend mostly on quality merchandising. We do that to introduce consumers to innovation. We do that to remind them and keep health points of the year like back to school, back to college, Remind them the great products that we have, introduce them to new benefits, etcetera. And so seeing that return to more pre pandemic levels, I think Makes good sense given the industry can fully supply now. We can certainly supply now and so we get back into that good cadence of giving the right Information to shoppers.

Speaker 3

And then on ANSP, which we have decided to take up as you know, from 10 to 11 and we addressed earlier, I think this is another case where the number one thing that we can do right now is ensure that we have superior value for our consumers. And we have that from a ratings perspective. Over the last couple of years, we reached the highest brand superiority overall from a portfolio perspective we've ever had. We continue to have more of our portfolio superior than we did pre pandemic. And we think given the stress that consumer is going to be under, It would make absolute sense given the improvement we've made on margin to invest a bit more in advertising and sales promotion to secure that with consumers.

Speaker 3

And that's how we're thinking about it. We have great brands, Great innovation, great products and we want them at this time when they're making those choices in their total basket of spending to remind them in our household essential categories no one delivers a better And that's exactly what we're focused on. So to me, I think it is it's exactly what we do. We focus on the long term. We focus on building brands And the spending is right in line with doing that.

Speaker 10

Thank you, both.

Speaker 3

Thanks, Chris.

Speaker 1

And our next question comes from Javier Escalante from Evercore ISI. Please go ahead, Javier.

Speaker 7

Hi, good afternoon, everyone. I have another permutation of the same, Observe retail sales in tracked channels versus the over deliver in the quarter, but hopefully it's from a different angle. So if you can talk about all channel retail sales growth, if you give us a sense of What were Clorox's Q4 retail sales, including Online and Home Depots and things like that, so we can better understand Your guidance going into fiscal 2024. So if we can start with that and I have a follow-up.

Operator

Javier, let me see if this helps. If you look at our Q4 performance and I think your question is sales across many different channels. As you saw very strong growth. If you look at tracked channels that's true, but what I'd also tell you is some of the areas that are not showing up in tracked channels we had very strong performance. Our PPD business grew both volume and sales in the quarter.

Operator

In international, we held volumes and grew sales 14% organically. And then our non track sales were even stronger than track. So we're seeing broad performance not only in track channels, but we're seeing it in all the areas where we're selling product. And that contributed to the overall performance of the business and that's why you'll probably see even stronger results in what you're seeing if you're just looking at track channel performance.

Speaker 9

Well, the reason I'm

Speaker 7

asking that is because I think Linda mentioned that consumption was stronger, Right. And this is part of the over deliver in the quarter, but we don't see that in tracked channels. We see retail sales growth at 6, both in the March June quarter. And then there is this very big difference in organic sales And particularly on the volume side, so wondering if you could at least Let me tackle differently. What percentage of your sales is in non tracked channels, specifically in this quarter given the seasonality of Kingsport?

Speaker 7

That would be helpful.

Speaker 3

Javier, maybe it would be good just to back up again and go through make sure we go through all the drivers of what drove Track consumption versus organic sales and Kevin just covered part of it. But we do have a fair amount of our sales in non track channels. It's a little complicated because non track does not include international TBD, which is why Kevin broke it out the way he did. So just to break it down, we had Q4 organic sales growth of 14% and we saw track channel consumption of about 7%. So the delta would be what Kevin highlighted international and PPD are a portion of that.

Speaker 3

PPD grew volume, international held volume. Remember that we're lapping wipes inventory that Kevin spoke about and that's a portion of it. And then we saw stronger non tracked performance in a number of retailers on a number of businesses. And that's across e commerce and brick and mortar, etcetera. And then in addition to that, we haven't Spoken a lot about this yet, but we do always ship, some of our Q1 events in Q4 and that contributed to that delta as well.

Speaker 3

But we do have a strong non channel track channel presence. And so yes, that absolutely can move the number. And this is pretty normal for us to have a quarter that is a bit disconnected from track channel sales. In addition that you have the fact that we have very strong merchandising in Q1 as we normally do and we typically ship some of that in Q4. But those are really the if you look at Those four buckets those are the 4 buckets of the difference between the 14 and the 7.

Speaker 7

Well, thank you. And if I could squeeze in something when it comes to pricing For next year, how much is the carryover impact for fiscal in fiscal 2024?

Operator

Javier, at this point, it's pretty minimal. What we have left to lap is the 4th round of pricing we took for half a year. So if you look this year, we had in total about 6 70 basis points of total benefit for the year. You should expect a much Smaller benefit in fiscal 2024 because now we're looking at just half a year on one of our pricing actions and the 4th round was not as large as the 3rd round.

Speaker 7

Okay. Thank you so much. Very helpful.

Speaker 1

And our next question comes from Olivia Tong from Raymond James. Please go ahead, Olivia.

Speaker 5

Great. Thanks.

Speaker 11

I just want to revisit gross margin because the pace of gross margin expansion in fiscal 2024 versus The year just reported obviously a fair bit of deceleration. But I'm trying to understand, I mean fiscal 'twenty three recovery in gross margin was We're so meaningfully ahead of your expectations. Why is the pace of expansion slowing so much in fiscal 2024? Because cost inflation, while Maybe not down, it's certainly less of a pressure versus last year. Pricing is by and large working.

Speaker 11

The top It is growing and gross margin is still quite a bit below pre COVID levels. So would love a little bit more color on that. Thanks.

Operator

Sure, Olivia. As it relates to gross margin, as you said, we continue to expect to make progress this year. So our commitment is to rebuild gross margin Back to pre pandemic levels, this year we're looking at about 150 basis points to 175 basis points of progress. And that's Slowing from what we delivered last year and is primarily driven by pricing. So we took 4 rounds of pricing over the last 18 months and that had a significant benefit last year.

Operator

It contributed over 6 50 bps to gross margin. As we look at fiscal year 2024, as I was just mentioning to Javier, We have fairly limited pricing in the plan. We're going to get a little bit of carryover on that 4th price increase. So it'll have a smaller impact on gross margin. And then we're really able to grow margin based on all the very good work our team is doing on cost savings and supply chain optimization.

Operator

So in spite of still dealing with about $200,000,000 worth of cost inflation. We believe we can more than offset that through the good work we're doing within the supply chain And continue to grow gross margins. And so while we're making good progress, I'd expect that to continue as we move into fiscal year 2025, I expect that progress to continue. The one thing we'll have to look at over time is, we bought these commodities for decades. They are cyclical.

Operator

At some point, they'll turn deflationary. That's not our expectation this year, but certainly when that occurs that will certainly accelerate the pace of recovery. It's just hard in this environment to predict exactly when that's going to occur, But we feel very good about our ability to rebuild margins back to those pre pandemic levels and we know that's going to take some time to get there. But I have to tell you, I feel very good about the progress we're going to continue to make this year in in spite of ongoing inflation we're dealing with.

Speaker 3

Olivia, I'll add just one point to that. Kevin underscored the $200,000,000 which is Significantly better than what we had a $500,000,000 in fiscal year 2023. But I just want to underscore that's still 3 times the level of average we had Before we got into this inflationary cycle on an average year of inflation. So I think the point that Kevin is making is really important to understand. This is Still a very challenging environment with significant cost inflation, although certainly better than we experienced over the last 2 years.

Speaker 11

Got it. And then on the top line, as you look towards rebuilding volume as the year progresses, Can you talk a little bit about innovation and what role that plays? And in your view, what kind of impact does innovation Have on this year versus last?

Speaker 3

Sure. Innovation continues to be the lifeblood of how we grow our brands over time and We set out to deliver bigger, stickier innovation platforms as part of our Ignite strategy and we've talked about the fact that we've been able to have more net contribution from innovation in our strategy Then we did, in the prior strategy period and we're going to continue to focus on accelerating that this year. We have Innovation across our portfolio just as we did this year. So all of our major brands launched innovation in fiscal year 2020 3. We would expect something similar in fiscal year 2024.

Speaker 3

We're really focused on value and value superiority in that innovation. So we're looking at a combination of product improvements and new innovations as well as good claims support. And of course, we'll support that innovation with that 11% of sales from an advertising and sales promotion perspective. But we think as we lap these price increases, As a consumer comes under more pressure, innovation will be as important as it ever has been. And certainly, our retailers are looking for innovation to help them grow their categories to ensure that we're getting shoppers down the aisles, etcetera.

Speaker 3

So what I would say is it's a continuation of what we've done. Of course, we want to have additional progress as we can and We think we have the right investments to ensure that that continues in fiscal year 2024. Great. Thank you.

Speaker 1

And our next question comes from Lauren Lieberman from Barclays. Please go ahead, Lauren.

Speaker 12

Great. Thanks so much. So it's just taking a look playing around my model and looking at kind of the dreaded multiyear stacks. And so and, but looking at the 2 year stacks on volume and on pricemix this quarter in particular, like all your comments make frankly more and more sense on the things you were lapping and the contribution, for example, for charcoal To price mix, the inverse probably I guess for Wipes on Health and Wellness. I was curious as we look forward, Any other periods because the stacks are messy that you think should be called out where there is a dynamic of retailers having reduced inventory in the Prior years said that we should be particularly keen for differences in shipments versus what we're seeing in tracked channels, Knowing there's always on track that we won't see.

Speaker 3

Lauren, it has certainly been, as we said, bumpy. Now this is everyone understands I think the definition of bumpy and that we have lots of lots etcetera. I would say we are at a pretty good period of normalization Now where I don't see anything, that we look ahead and say there was a significant inventory buildup or something that we have to lap That's very notable. We've gone through the COVID waves lapping. Pricing would be the one thing I'd call it.

Speaker 3

We're still lapping pricing. And Kevin, I think, and I have been clear on that. But I think you can predict that based off of what we put out there. And of course, that comment is barring any other changes that we Any other shocks in the environment, I want to knock on a little bit of wood saying that. But I don't see anything material That we would be looking ahead and saying there's a big lap ahead of us that we have to consider, pricing being the one exception.

Speaker 12

Okay, great. And then just in follow-up, I was curious if you could comment on kind of where you stand, I guess, in terms Shelf space or distribution and knowing that and we've talked about several times in the past pre COVID there was some kind of lost Shelf space and now you've had, as you pointed out in the release, really strong innovation agenda. So I guess, where do you stand on kind of shelf space? How are you thinking? Do you think there's To be growing shelf space with innovation in 2024, is that part of the outlook or not so much?

Speaker 3

Yes. We made good progress As we return to full supply and getting our total distributions point up. So we made good progress over the last call 18 months to 24 months across a number of our businesses. And you all remember that in many cases where the current us and our competitors couldn't fully supply to a lot of 3rd tier brands that had entered in, For the most part, that is cleaned up and we've been able to gain distribution points as a result of that in aggregate. What we're focused on for fiscal year 2024 is exactly what you said.

Speaker 3

We want to gain distribution on our innovation. We want to make sure that we have the right SKUs on the shelf as we think about The right pack for the consumer given their value seeking, we think we've done most of that work, but we want to continue to make progress And particularly ensure that we get our innovations on shelf as fast as we possibly can on both the physical and digital shelf and that's what the team will be focused on. And that will contribute to 2024. We expect the category growth plans and the plans we have with retailers and our execution of those plans to contribute, But we feel good about what we're walking into and what we have for both the front half and the back half.

Speaker 2

Okay. Thanks so much. Thanks, Lauren.

Speaker 1

And our next question comes from Stephen Powers from Deutsche Bank. Please go ahead, Stephen. Steven, is your line muted?

Speaker 13

Sorry, can you hear me?

Speaker 7

Yes, can hear you now. Go ahead. Okay,

Speaker 13

great. Sorry about that. So following up on that conversation you were just having with Lauren actually. So it sounds like things are Relatively normalized from a supply and inventory standpoint, so the guidance implies shipping to consumption. I guess I'm curious If it also you've guided to what you expect category growth rates to be, both from a value perspective and a volume perspective Or if you're embedding any bias of share gain or even some share sacrificed as you still continue to Rebuild the margins.

Speaker 13

Just how do I think about your guide relative to category growth expectations?

Speaker 3

So we certainly take into account that's the foundation Any year that we plan, we look at what we expect the categories to contribute and our assumptions As we lap pricing and as we head into what we predict as a mild recession in the back half of our fiscal assume category rates commensurate with that. And then by category, we're looking at our plans comparing it to that and adjusting based off of if we see headwinds or tailwinds. We want to make progress over the long term on share. We've built that into these plans. We've built in the fact that we're spending additional advertising and sales promotion that we have good innovation And that lands us at the total outlook that we've provided, but they're very much grounded in the realities of the categories and what we expect.

Speaker 13

Okay. So just to summarize that on a net basis, it doesn't sound like you're it sounds like The top line call you're making is essentially in line with category growth. If things go well, maybe Top end will market share gain, if not, you're kind of in the zone. Is that fair?

Speaker 3

That's fair.

Speaker 14

Okay.

Speaker 8

Thank you.

Speaker 2

Thanks, Steve.

Speaker 1

And our next question comes from Jason English from Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead, Jason.

Speaker 14

Hey, folks. Good evening. Thank you for stopping me in and congratulations on a strong finish to the year. I'm going to totally date myself by going back in time to Tom, you guys used to give us a log of all your price increases and decreases. The point there was decreases back in, I think, 20092010, you had some decreases on Glad, on litter more recently in 2018, I think you roll back the prices at Glad.

Speaker 14

Obviously, all that was accompanied by pretty substantial downdrafts in commodities. So my question is, if we get to your point, Kevin, your other downdrafts in commodities, Because these commodities to your point are cyclical, would we expect or should we expect you to roll back some of these price increases that you put through 1 of the 4 in the last year or 2? Or I'm not at the investment you're making, like are you trying to manage the business differently? So instead of give back that relief in the form of pricing, Spend it back into the ability of the P and L through lines like A&P and Marketing.

Speaker 3

Hi, Jason. Thank you for your comment. And then on your question on price rollbacks, just to be completely clear, so we're all on the same page, we've rolled back One price increase in a category we no longer own, from a truckload perspective after taking an increase. And the other ones that you're referring to, I think rightfully on Glad, As we've always used trade as a way to evaluate given resin is such a volatile commodity. And so as we've taken pricing, we've used trade in the past in order to make up If we've seen favorability in resin that we needed to deal with or we saw something change in the category, but the pricing that we've taken has stuck In the marketplace, and given what we're facing right now, obviously, we have not fully recovered margins, have made great progress through the pricing action we've taken, But we have additional work to do.

Speaker 3

Given the fact that we continue to see an inflationary environment, with what we talked about 3 times the average year, Certainly better than last year, but still a big headwind. We are planning to and anticipate that price increases will stick, And that will bring back volume and household penetration through innovation and through investment in advertising and sales promotion. But we don't see any structural reason why these price increases wouldn't stick like they have in the past. And again, we're really focused on ensuring we grow categories the right way through those other levers. And if we need to make an adjustment, I think Kingsthor is a good example.

Speaker 3

We did not roll back pricing. So we took pricing. Competition did not follow. We made an adjustment to our plan by putting incremental merch in place. We did not roll back our truckload pricing.

Speaker 3

We continue to hold that. It's a good example of how we're approaching it that if we see a dynamic in a category we need to react to, we will try to do that in a short term manner, and maintain the track web pricing we've taken.

Speaker 14

Okay. So that actually sounds like you do intend to manage pricing differently than you did a decade ago or so. Last time we came through a commodity super cycle where You didn't just adjust by trade. You actually announced those price increases. You published those price increases.

Speaker 14

You gave us a log of the list price decreases on the back end of it. And I'm hearing you say now that that's even if clients do come in, that's not the intent. The intent is to manage differently with trade, flexi trade. If we find ourselves in that scenario, I totally appreciate that you don't see that scenario that's not what you're calling for in 2024 given the commodity and the overall inflation environment. Yes.

Speaker 3

I see it as a continuation of what we've done in the past, Jason. It seems sounds like we have a little bit of different data. But yes, I think we're getting to the same In conclusion, which is we intend for these and price increases to stick. We think we have the right tools in place to do that, and we're focused on all the other levers we can pull to On the strong category performance we've had from a top line perspective, as I noted on spending and innovation, but you're landing in the same conclusion, which is we believe these price

Speaker 1

This now concludes the question and answer session. Ms. Rendell, I would now like to turn the program back to you.

Speaker 3

Great. Thank you, everyone. We look forward to speaking with you again on our next call. And until then, please stay well.

Speaker 1

This concludes today's conference call. Thank you for attending.

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Earnings Conference Call
Clorox Q4 2023
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