Pepsi sees ‘infinite possibilities’ in ecommerce

As its second quarter performance beats forecasts, Pepsi says it will prioritise premium products and establishing a greater ecommerce presence.

PepsiCo

PepsiCo plans to focus on pushing healthier products, ecommerce and using marketing to drive its top line as it looks to build on steady growth despite headwinds in the soft drinks industry.

The company reported net revenue growth of 2% to $15.7bn during its second quarter ending 17 June; this was slightly ahead of the $15.57bn it had originally forecast. And sales in its core North America beverage unit also rose 2% to $5.24bn.

The company said it witnessed “good results” across Europe over the second quarter and had benefited from the sale of its minority stake in Britvic. “We continue to deliver strong, reliable results – even as our industry is witnessing some strong shifts,” insisted Indra Nooyi, chief executive at PepsiCo, speaking on an investor call earlier today (11 July).

Nooyi said PepsiCo will continue to deliver strong results by transforming its portfolio to ensure it has more reduced sugar options and focuses more on promoting premium products. She said it has already reduced the sugar and saturated fat in its products to deal with growing customer demand for healthier food and drink options.

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“Going forward, we have paths in place to improve the trajectory of the business. We are trying to move the portfolio to more premium products and to focus on price realisation, letting marketing drive the topline,” she commented.

Nooyi admitted PepsiCo has more work to do on its healthier carbonated drinks portfolio, but said there will be a stronger brand execution behind this during its sponsorship of the NFL in the autumn.

The firm will also go “more aggressively” after productivity to reduce costs and Nooyi said there is an opportunity for Pepsi to look more at innovation for ecommerce, including looking at launching select online grocery stores.

“We want to make sure our snacks are more deliverable, not just through click-and-collect. We want to look at the cold delivery of beverages to support the exploding growth of ecommerce,” she explained. “There are infinite possibilities to create impulse buying through technologies online.”

Furthermore, PepsiCo said it will also focus on analysing consumer habits and the lifestyles influenced by mobile technology through a concentration on big data and communication with customers on a “much more personalised level”.

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