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THE
Philippine operations of the Anglo-Dutch transnational
consumer-goods manufacturer Unilever is now headed by
Argentine Fernando Fernandez, who promised his best to
top the double-digit sales growth of 11 percent set by
Sanjiv Mehta, whom he is replacing, in only 14 months.
Fernandez, former senior vice president global for the
company’s hair category, said he sees more growth in the
sales of facial care, culinary food and deodorant
products. “The personal-care business and market in the
Philippines has a great potential.”
In a
press conference Wednesday, he said their P1-billion
manufacturing plant expected to open this year would
help achieve their sales targets. “I visited it
yesterday and it’s a very big factory.” About 80 percent
of its production will be exported to the
United States,
some European countries and Asia.
But the
one fly in the Unilever ointment is its ice-cream
business. Fernandez said he doesn’t see it performing as
well as their personal-care units. “We expect never to
do good on ice cream.”
RFM Ice
Cream Inc., which produces the Selecta brand, is its
ice-cream subsidiary. Its two other subsidiaries are
Unilever Foods Phils. Inc. (50-percent owned) and
Uniservices Inc. (100-percent owned).
Unilever
data given to reporters show its export receipts last
year was close to P1 billion.
Unilever
sales for the year was over P27 billion from 17 brands,
from Axe to Vaseline.
Its
recent report to the Securities and Exchange Commission
shows it posted gross profits of P9.5 billion in 2006
from P9.6 billion in 2005 from net sales of nearly P18
billion in both years.
Fernandez said these figures show the viability of the
consumer retail trade since each Filipino spends between
$6 and $7 for their kind of products. “The peso’s
strength, which may lead to higher prices, has also
helped cushion inflation since it also led to greater
consumer power.”
Fernandez can’t say yet if the company would have an
upward review of its pricing strategy as inflationary
pressures increase. “I just got in here. . .Maybe in
three months’ time I could give you guys some figures.”
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