The Stockout

Pricing strategies advance as companies model changes in consumer behavior.

Smucker’s Twinkie defense points to recent growth in indulgent snacking.

The Stockout content breadth expands to include both CPG and retail logistics coverage.

Packaged coffee is an exception to sticky prices where consumers are benefiting from lower commodity costs.

Big-box sellers report healthier-than-expected consumers and stress high in-stock rates.

Numerous acquisitions the past several years bolstered logistics firm’s end-to-end capabilities.

Conagra says consumers are buying less while J.B. Hunt highlights lack of seasonal uptick.

British Columbia port workers’ strike ongoing and UPS Teamsters threatening to strike at month’s end.

New regulations could force CPGs to revise product formulas to eliminate common ingredients.

A proposed revision to FTC regulations would make canceling subscriptions as easy as signing up.

Upcoming revisions are likely to impact CPG ingredients, packaging and labeling.

Amid lower commodity costs, retail CPG prices should stick, leading to margin recovery.

Some supply chain issues remain, but moderating inflation helps margins recover.

Startups aim to help CPGs achieve clean labels while governments revise health regulations.

Production of palm oil, a common CPG ingredient, is associated with deforestation and human rights abuses.

Most food emissions come from ingredients, but the impact of packaging redesign is more immediate.

Automation benefits go beyond productivity and extend into food and worker safety.

Walmart and Target look to save shoppers from the indignity of checkout counters

Mixed commentary suggests that further ticket revisions will be ‘more surgical.’

TreeHouse Foods gains share despite lingering supply chain issues.

In addition to sugar, other regulatory updates pertain to sodium, whole grains and flavored milk.

Commodity prices have come down, but manufacturers say their costs are still rising.

The Food and Drug Administration has issued a 60-day notice of its plans to conduct research on front-of-package nutrition labels.

CPGs’ worst nightmare For certain CPG categories, I would argue that the worst thing that could happen isn’t a recession but consumers getting religion on healthy eating and avoiding the […]

Sugar reduction startups The consumer-packaged-goods-related article that I found most interesting this week was in FoodBusinessNews and it described three startups focused on developing very innovative sugar reduction alternatives. Here […]

Growing evidence of ‘shopper rebellion’ Elasticities, or the negative change in sales volume in response to rising prices, has been one of the main topics in the CPG industry in […]

Deceleration in Constellation Brands’ shipment growth and disappointing margin outlook Constellation Brands, the owner of the Corona and Modelo beer brands and various wine and spirits brands, such as Svedka […]

Sick of earnings season yet? It’s this time of the quarter when I miss my old position as a sell-side stock analyst the least. For those looking to get caught […]

High butter prices expected to persist Butter is currently second only to eggs for the title of most inflationary food item, up 25% year over year, compared to 13%-14% for […]

Industrial carbon dioxide shortage The industrial CO2 shortage is a supply chain issue that stands to impact the consumer packaged goods industry heavily with food and beverage manufacturing representing approximately […]

Consumer packaged goods companies (CPGs) and retailers are among the largest intermodal shippers. Today’s edition of The Stockout highlights data relevant for shippers that utilize rail intermodal or are looking […]

Has CPG ingredient inflation peaked?  I can only speculate whether the recent pullback in commodity prices will continue, but with crude oil off its high, crop prices well off their […]

General Mills’ supply chain disruptions to persist At a Wall Street conference earlier this month, Jonathan Nudi, General Mills’ president of North American retail, said, “We’re seeing 10 times the […]

Kellogg splitsville As I am sure you’ve seen, the big CPG news Tuesday was that Kellogg will become three separate companies. Management will focus on the snacks/international business (I’ll call […]

Ranked 39th on the Transport Topics list of top brokerage firms, Axle Logistics takes a consultative and streamlined approach to your shipping needs. Email [email protected] to connect with the team […]

Ranked 39th on the Transport Topics list of top brokerage firms, Axle Logistics takes a consultative and streamlined approach to your shipping needs. Email [email protected] to connect with the team […]

Numerous companies, including CPG companies, at FreightWaves’ The Future of Supply Chain conference last week highlighted the difficulty of accurately forecasting. We heard that sentiment expressed from numerous companies, including […]

CPG companies expect continued inflation on transportation costs this year. While there are plenty of signs on the horizon that suggest that a freight recession may be forthcoming, 2022 freight […]

Procter & Gamble highlights the combination of commodity, freight and foreign exchange as having a combined 22% headwind on core EPS in its fiscal 2022 (ending June 30). The company’s […]

The truck market is correcting. If you haven’t read the article that FreightWaves CEO Craig Fuller wrote last week titled, “Just 3 years after 2019 trucking bloodbath, another is on […]

Supply chain improvement, leading to better on-shelf availability, drove positive variance relative to management’s prior guidance. Shares of General Mills rose 2.5% on Wednesday in a down market. The increase […]

Grocery prices rose 8.6% year-over-year in February. As miserable as the overall 7.9% inflation rate was for most consumers in February, grocery inflation outpaced it, with its highest rate of […]

In a letter to associates, PepsiCo CEO Ramon Laguarta said, “As a food and beverage company, now more than ever we must stay true to the humanitarian aspect of our […]

Will we see a depression in Russia, a recession in western Europe and slower positive economic growth in North America, or some other scenario? It’s not yet clear whether the […]

Before getting into CPG news, I encourage readers of The Stockout to join us at The Future of Supply Chain event, which takes place May 9-10 at the Rogers Convention […]

Numerous multinational CPG companies are suspending or limiting production in Ukraine in an effort to keep employees safe. The major CPG companies that have announced they are limiting or suspending […]

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) Food Price Index averaged 135.7 points in January, 1.1 percent higher than December and the highest level in 11 years. […]

Nestle’s corporate strategy the past several years has prepared it for the highly inflationary environment we now find ourselves in. The main thing that stood out to me in Nestle’s […]

This is the best article I saw in recent days relevant to CPG companies — Just Food described how consumer behavior will likely change in response to sharp inflation in […]

Following disappointing earnings on Thursday afternoon, Clorox (NYSE: CLX) shares fell 14.3% on Friday, making it the day’s worst-performing stock on the S&P 500. One of the lowlights was the […]

Mondelez sees logistics costs rising worldwide, but not at the same pace as in the U.S. The Chicago-based snack maker cited a severe imbalance between supply and demand for truck […]

What will Unilever look like in the coming years? Unilever stood out Monday because the shares rose 8.6% on news of activist involvement and were up throughout the day while […]

This week’s CPG news items reflect a continuation of recent food/beverage trends.  More crossover between soft drink and alcoholic drinks: Monster Beverage is the latest soft drink company to get […]

Instead of discussing the current CPG news and freight data per my usual, for today’s newsletter I highlight the CPG industry trends I expect to see in 2022.  Trend No. […]

Before getting into CPG news, here are two near-term events for your calendar:  On Friday, The Stockout show is focused on the railroad industry and features a true industry expert […]

J.M. Smucker Co.’s results highlight margin pressure even as CPG companies raise prices and continue to post strong sales. Overall, Smucker reported strong results as its earnings easily beat analysts’ […]

Before getting into what’s happening in CPG supply chains, here’s something for your calendar: I host the next quarterly The Stockout webinar on Dec. 6 at 2 p.m. ET. Here’s […]

Before getting into what’s happening in CPG supply chains, here’s something for your calendar: I host the next quarterly The Stockout webinar on Dec. 6 at 2 p.m. ET. Here’s […]

Oatly (Swedish oat milk company) shares continue to struggle. Oatly’s American depository receipts declined 21% Monday and closed at $9.36, down 45% from the $17 IPO price. Investors’ primary concern […]

Beyond Meat sell-off further ignites debate about demand for plant-based protein. From my perspective, Beyond Meat’s earnings and the fallout have been the most interesting CPG-related news this week. The […]

TreeHouse Foods, a major manufacturer of private-label food products, announced that its board is exploring strategic alternatives. Potential strategic actions include a possible sale of the company or the divestment […]

Kellogg Co. manages to reaffirm earnings guidance despite both industrywide and company-specific challenges. I find it impressive that the company was able to retain its guidance for both operating profit […]

Vertical farming promises to be one of the most impactful trends to food in the coming years. In fact, it was listed as the No. 1 trend in Whole Foods’ […]

It’s times like these that it’s more fun to write about transportation issues than to actually have to move freight (not that I’ve ever actually moved freight). On Wednesday, topics […]

With most CPG companies already having reported first-quarter earnings, the CPG-related news this week centered around descriptions of consumer strength from their retail partners. In addition, the largest CPG companies, […]

As the equity indexes declined on Tuesday, two freight indexes contained in SONAR were up sharply after incorporating data from the past week: the national dry van and reefer spot […]

As the economy surges, inflation pressures are becoming more widespread. Everywhere you look, there are headline-grabbing reports of rising prices. Some areas where inflation is acute are in industrial commodities […]

Wall Street didn’t like Clorox’s earnings report late last week. There were analyst downgrades and shares are down from where they were a week ago and down 10% from their […]

In past editions of The Stockout, I’ve discussed cost inflation trends, which I believe is the industry’s largest issue currently aside from pandemic-related structural changes in demand. In recent days, […]

Tuesday morning there was big news out of the rail industry: Canadian National Railway (CN) made a stronger offer to acquire the Kansas City Southern (KCS) Railway than what Canadian […]

In today’s The Stockout, I discuss first-quarter earnings reports from Pepsi and L’Oreal. L’Oreal, in particular, has a lot of momentum of late with shares reaching all-time highs as investors […]

Most public CPG companies are in their quiet periods ahead of earnings. But there were still significant developments with the CPG companies that are not (yet) public. There is a […]

When we look back at the COVID era, we will remember stockouts of toilet paper, cleared-out grocery store shelves and the impossibility of getting the latest video game console because […]

In today’s edition of The Stockout CPG-focused newsletter, I discuss a company that has been dealing with exactly that — stockouts. McCormick & Co., the world’s largest spice company, reported […]

Most CPG companies will report earnings next month, but with an off-cycle fiscal year ending May 31, General Mills reported its fiscal third quarter Wednesday morning for the December-February quarter. […]

Earlier this week in The Stockout CPG-focused newsletter, I discussed the impact that China’s efforts to replenish its hog population was having on corn and soybean exports as well as […]

Cargill’s announcement last week that it is making a nearly half-billion dollar investment in soybeans caught my attention because it suggests that one of the world’s largest food producers believes […]

Earlier this week, in the last edition of The Stockout CPG-focused newsletter, I focused on reefer since the many CPG companies that require temperature controls are facing an even tighter […]

Just as Pat Riley trademarked the term “three-peat,” I’m considering trademarking “coin flip compliance.” That’s the state of the reefer market today with reefer carriers rejecting 50.3% of tendered loads, […]

This article was originally published in The Stockout newsletter on February 3, 2021. To sign up for The Stockout newsletter, click here. We recommend that CPG companies, and others that […]

One financial metric in the CPG world that stands out to me is AB InBev’s net debt-to-EBITDA ratio: 4.8x. The company has been highly leveraged since its acquisition of SABMiller […]

Plant-based meat alternatives are to the food industry what electric vehicles are to the transportation industry — a niche with a lot of startups today but maybe not so niche […]

Bid season is here, which means contract rates are catching up to spot rates and in turn loosening capacity.

Sustainability efforts are becoming a major focus for CPG companies as consumers demand investments in a cleaner future.

Capital Logistics COO Michael Feig says it’s too early to tell if the summer will bring tight capacity to the reefer market.

Reefer truckload capacity begins to tighten further in the Midwest and Southeast

Reefer trailer orders were over 100% above replacement levels in November which shows capacity is trying to return to the reefer markets.

Droughts and geopolitical tensions are driving up cotton, corn, and soybean prices and in turn impacting supply chain costs.

Reefer spot volume volatility has exploded across the nation over the past week.

Lumber Prices are soaring which is threatening CPG companies with higher supply chain costs.

Reefer tenders have strengthened significantly out of the nation’s largest markets.

New Class 8 truck orders are increasing and this trend is likely to continue through 2021.

Coca-Cola slashes jobs in an effort to restructure.

Frito-Lay is responding to customers’ demands and have introduced an option for consumers to customize their variety packs.

As states prepare to administer COVID-19 vaccines, it is still unclear who will be deemed “essential”.

Reefer capacity is extremely tight across the country and especially out of port markets.

A coronavirus outbreak in Frito-Lay’s Vancouver manufacturing and distribution facility causes a temporary shutdown of the facility.

The Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act is set to disrupt many CPG supply chains.

DIY (Do It Yourself) projects are draining the supply of mason jars.

A shortage of smaller turkeys grips the nation as families gather in smaller groups for Thanksgiving celebrations due to the pandemic.