Huh? Procter And Gamble Says Shoppers Were Unphased by Huge Price Jumps

Procter and Gamble (P&G) reported strong earnings in the second fiscal quarter of 2022 as customers appeared unphased by the company’s recent price hikes.

P&G reported $21 billion in revenue for the period ending on the last day of December 2021, a 6% increase compared to the same quarter of the previous year. Gains reportedly resulted from the company’s largest price increase since 2019.

Prices increased an average of 3% in the period, The Wall Street Journal reported. The price hikes accounted for half of the company’s revenue growth during the quarter.

The price hikes helped the company offset surging costs of raw material, labor and transportation of goods amid supply chain backlogs, the WSJ reported.

The company announced in October that customers should expect price increases for beauty, oral care and grooming products, the Daily Caller News Foundation previously reported.

P&G said it plans to spend $2.8 billion more on commodity, freight and foreign-exchange costs in the upcoming fiscal year, roughly $500 million more than last quarter’s forecast, the WSJ reported.

“The consumer is very resilient and very focused on these categories of clean home and health and hygiene,” P&G chief financial officer Andre Schulten said in an interview, according to the WSJ.

The Omicron coronavirus variant did not trigger hoarding behavior seen at the beginning of the pandemic that led to shortages in toilet paper, cleaning supplies and more, Schulten added.

Meanwhile, inflation grew at its fastest pace in almost 40 years at the end of 2021, with the Consumer Price Index surging to 7% as of December on a year-over-year basis.