Marico’s Saffola, Parachute beat lockdown blues; FMCG firm remains optimistic of revival despite volatility

While the sector was already battling a prolonged slowdown which also made headlines in 2019, coronavirus has only aggravated the issues for fast-moving consumer goods companies.

Two of Marico’s brands Saffola and Parachute have shown high volume growth even amid the coronavirus lockdown. Marico has attributed high sales of Saffola to increase in in-home consumption as consumers remained confined to their homes. “Saffola Edible Oils posted  healthy volume growth, partly attributable to increased in-home cooking and consumption… Parachute Coconut Oil delivered sales at higher than the annual average monthly run rate of FY20, despite a very slow start in April,” the company said. The government had allowed resumption of essential services and goods in early April. On the other hand, hair oils and personal care businesses commenced in late April and early-May.

The Parachute oil-maker Marico Ltd expects growth revival during the rest of the year even while acknowledging that there is a volatility in both consumer sentiment and business environment. “With the Q1 top line translating into a single digit growth over the annual run rate of FY20, the company expects to bounce back to posting volume and value growth during the rest of the year,” Marico said in a quarterly update on Friday. The homegrown FMCG major also said that it remains cautiously optimistic about the future, which depends on the extent of the spread of coronavirus in India and overseas and the response to it. 

“While the business environment and consumer sentiment remain volatile, we believe the company is well positioned to withstand these challenging times through innovation, agile execution, aggressive cost management and its portfolio of trusted brands,” it said. 2020 so far has been a tough year for almost all industries and the FMCG sector is no different. While the sector was already battling a prolonged slowdown which also made headlines in 2019, coronavirus has only aggravated the issues for fast-moving consumer goods companies. Marico has also said that it has witnessed significant disruptions during the first fortnight of April but since then, has been able to steadily scale up operations to near-normal levels in June, when the government had eased lockdown restrictions.