The Danone recovery plan deployed for two years by the group's new general director, Antoine de Saint-Affrique, is bearing fruit.
In 2023, the giant of dairy products, infant nutrition and water saw its turnover increase by 7%, to 27.6 billion euros.
Its operating margin increased from 12.2% to 12.6%, driven by emerging countries.
It is especially in Europe that Danone's return to form is most impressive.
Its turnover increased by 5.9%, to 8.9 billion euros.
This performance is certainly entirely driven by inflation in food products: in volume terms, the group's sales even fell by 3.3% in Europe, and by 0.4% globally.
However, in the fourth quarter, the owner of Actimel, Activia and Evian experienced a real turnaround, returning to growth in its volumes in Europe: +0.3% compared to the same period of 2022 (+0.8 % at the World level).
Given the still inflationary context at this time and the results of recent years, this is a small victory, which the group is determined to celebrate... “
We returned to growth in volumes in Europe in the last quarter 2023, after 10 years of decline
, welcomes Juergen Esser, deputy general director of the group in charge of finance, technology and data.
These are the first fruits of the recovery that we have initiated and it is an important signal for the market.
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The group is reaping the fruits of its “Renew Danone” strategy deployed over the past two years, with the main focuses of rationalizing its portfolio and investing in innovation.
“
We have notably rationalized our portfolio with 20% fewer products, while reinvesting strongly in brands that consumers love such as Activia, Actimel, through promotional and advertising campaigns,”
explains Juergen Esser.
In particular, sales have progressed well in dairy products (EDP) after years of underperformance.
“
Confident for 2024, we are opening a new chapter and we will consolidate our competitiveness, in particular by investing more
,” indicates Juergen Esser.