PepsiCo missed expectations for second-quarter revenue on Thursday as a series of price hikes and competition from private-label brands slowed sales of its snacks and soda mainly in the United States, its largest market.
Analysts have said that product prices, which are starting to normalize almost after two years of multiple hikes, are still higher than the pre-pandemic levels, giving packaged-food companies such as PepsiCo little room to raise prices as volumes shrink.
PepsiCo raised average prices on its products by 5% for the quarter ended June 15, in line with the first quarter. However, overall organic volumes slipped 3% in the reported quarter.
Company executives said year-to-date performance across many food categories, including snacks, has been subdued and consumers have become more value-conscious with spending and preferences across brands, packages and channels.
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Frito-Lay North America, which sells Lay’s and Doritos chips, contributed about 27% to PepsiCo’s total revenue in fiscal 2023 and is the company’s second-largest business after the North America beverages unit, which accounted for about 30% of overall sales.
Shares of the company fell 2.2% in premarket trading after PepsiCo also said it expected fiscal 2024 organic revenue to be about 4%, compared with prior expectations of at least 4%.
“They are on the lower side of projections here, they’re seeing the weakness here and we’ve been talking about that for several quarters now and that seems to be ongoing, especially in the lower-income consumer, which is no surprise,” said Don Nesbitt, senior portfolio manager at F/m Investments.
Still, easing production and other expenses from pandemic peaks, along with the impact of price hikes, helped PepsiCo post an adjusted profit of $2.28 per share, beating LSEG estimates of $2.16.
The company’s revenue rose 0.8% to $22.50 billion in the quarter, while analysts had estimated $22.57 billion.
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