Ladies and gentlemen, good day and welcome to Hindustan Unilever Limited conference call for December quarter 2020. As a reminder, all participant lines will be in listen-only mode, and there will be an opportunity for you to ask questions after the presentation concludes. Should you need assistance during the conference call, please signal an operator by pressing star, then zero on your touch-tone phone. Please note that this conference is being recorded. I now hand the conference over to Mr. Amit Sood, Group Controller and Head of Investor Relations. Thank you, and over to you, sir.
Thanks, Stephen. Good evening and welcome to the conference call of Hindustan Unilever Limited. We will be covering this evening the results for the quarter ended 31st December 2020. On the call from HUL end is Mr. Sanjiv Mehta, Chairman and Managing Director, and Mr. Srinivas Phatak, Chief Financial Officer HUL. We hope that you are staying safe and healthy. As is customary, we will start the presentation with Sanjiv sharing his perspective on market and an overview on how we are navigating the current environment. Then Srinivas will share with you our performance for the quarter with category highlights and our outlook for the future.
Before we get started with the presentation, I would like to draw your attention to the safe harbor statement included in the presentation for good order's sake. I request all of you to pay close attention to Sanjiv and Srini's messages over the next 30 minutes. We will be addressing upfront a lot of questions which are likely to be top of mind for the analyst and investor community. With that, over to you, Sanjiv.
Hi, good evening everyone, and thank you for joining us on the call today. I wish you and your loved ones a safe, healthy, and a very happy 2021. Before I get into the results, I would like to start with a sense of gratitude about being safe and healthy, and would like to thank every member of Team HOL. I'm very proud of the efforts of all our employees and partners, our frontline heroes in factories and sales, for the outstanding commitment and hard work that they've shown in the most difficult circumstances. They've exemplified the meaning of perseverance and resilience.
For me, it is an honor to lead them and to serve our consumers. I will today take a bit more time and have some more flesh to the bone on many of the issues that we have faced. So let me first start by talking about a strategy. 2020 has been a year of pandemic, disruption, disorder, and loss. Yet it has also been the year which has marked the triumph of human resilience, agility, grittiness, fortitude, and very importantly, compassion. In these challenging times, a clear and compelling strategy remains consistent. We remain focused to deliver on our strategic agenda of consistent, competitive, profitable, and responsible growth.
To weather the current storm, like seasoned sailors, we have adjusted our sails, which has helped us to navigate the crisis. A fine growth fundamentals and the COVID priorities have enabled us to maintain consumer connectedness while embracing speed and agility in operations. Onto the macroeconomic front. In this quarter, India saw the impact of COVID-19 receding. We are extremely grateful for the speed with which the government is rolling out the COVID vaccines. The count of the daily new cases in the country has come down substantially.
At one stage, it was about to touch 100,000 cases a day, and now it is in the vicinity of 15,000. Recovery rates are high, and mortality rates continue to remain low. Mobility is on the rise as people are increasingly stepping out of their homes, just like we have done, and we are taking this call from office today. After witnessing a sharp contraction in GDP of 15.7% in the first half, the Indian economy is exhibiting stronger-than-expected pickup in recovery, which is also very clear with the IMF forecast for 2021, which has come out a day or two back.
The timely and decisive measures taken by the government and RBI are indeed helping the country be put back on the path to recovery. Now, from an FMCG market perspective, we did see the growth reviving in the last three months. The overall market growth has inched up to 5%. Within this, rural and smaller towns continue to lead the growth, while the metros and big cities are improving progressively. From a channel lens, general trade and e-commerce continue to ride the tailwinds, while modern trade is slowly mounting a comeback.
The mega trends of COVID-19, health, and hygiene continue to drive demand. With the increase in mobility, we believe the discretionary categories and out-of-home consumption have also started to improve. On the commodities front, we have been witnessing unprecedented inflation, especially in tea prices and the palm oil prices, which have gone up by 40% to 50%, buoyed by COVID-19 vaccine rollouts and the faster-than-expected recovery in the global economy. Crude prices too have gone up sequentially.
W e believe the inflation in select categories is likely to continue in the near term. COVID-19 has brought to the forefront some very clear trends, like demand for health and hygiene, in-home consumption, e-everything, and the surge of the humble grocer. Leveraging these trends, we swiftly pivoted the organization to serve the demand spaces and landed relevant innovations. We also accelerated a journey in e-commerce and strengthened our execution in the traditional trade through our eRTM initiatives.
The COVID-19 pandemic has fundamentally reshaped how we look at and approach hygiene. Practicing hygiene is no more a problem-solution-based approach. It is increasingly now becoming a lifestyle need. We launched the Nature Protect Hygiene range, a powerful multi-category hygiene mix that is designed for new normal. Powered by plant-based actives, the Nature Protect range includes surface disinfectants, germ-removal detergents, fruit and veggie disinfectants, on-the-go hygiene sprays, and wipes.
I would certainly urge you to try them. They are available online. We've also launched Domex Toilet Cleaner with a power of sodium hypochlorite, which is proven to destroy the virus in just 60 seconds. Surf Excel, which is known to fight tough stains, introduced a variant Active Hygiene with hygiene boosters proven to remove 99.9% of viruses. We have introduced new hygiene products in Lifebuoy. Lifebuoy laundry sanitizer is an anti-germ post-wash liquid, which has a very special formula that removes 99.9% invisible germs post-wash, which ordinary detergent wash may not always remove.
Lifebuoy germ-kill spray. While we always remember to sanitize our hands, we often forget about germs on surfaces that are frequently touched. Lifebuoy has introduced instant germ-kill spray that kills illnesses causing bacteria and viruses instantly. During the pandemic, in-home cooking has picked up, and along with it, the daily chores to clean dishes. Taking this head-on, Vim introduced its new Matic dishwasher range, specially designed to remove the tough Indian grease. Given the low penetration of dishwashers in India, this is yet another market development initiative which will help us build and premiumize the utensil cleaning segment in the country.
Adding to the convenience, we have expanded a range of offerings into multiple formats, like the Surf Excel Smart Spray with a stain-lifting technology, surely a smart way to remove stains. Lifebuoy has introduced multi-purpose germ protection wet wipes for the on-the-go germ protection needs, and Domex has brought multi-purpose disinfectant surface spray which contains sodium hypochlorite that kills infection-causing germs. As a fallout of COVID-19, another mega trend that has emerged is the need for nutrition and stronger immunity.
With the relaunch of Plus range from the house of Horlicks, we made strategic intervention into the high sciences space of adult nutrition. Talking about Horlicks Protein Plus, Indian diets sometimes may be insufficient to meet the RDAs of protein. Horlicks Protein Plus encourages Indian adults to fight protein deficiency every day by making protein a routine. It's a scientifically formulated high-protein nutritional beverage for adults that contains a triple protein blend of whey, soy, and casein, which is known to support muscle maintenance and growth.
I would again urge you to please use this range. We've also launched Horlicks Mother's Plus, which has been scientifically designed keeping in mind the nutritional requirements of pregnant and lactating women. It contains 25 vital nutrients that are important to provide optimal nutrition for the mother's health and baby's growth. Another one from Horlicks is the Women's Plus. Research shows that one in two women over the age of 30 have a risk of low bone density and hence require bone-building nutrients.
The Women's Plus, with its advanced calcium formula, has three nutrients: calcium, vitamin D, and K2, proven to support bone health. In the space of in-home consumption, we have launched Kissan Peanut Butter, which contains 100% real peanuts from the farms of Gujarat. It is naturally an excellent source of protein and zinc. One serve of Kissan Peanut Butter has 30 grams, has as much quantity of protein as one glass of cow's milk. We have also introduced a new variant of Bru instant coffee, Bru Veda, a great-tasting instant coffee infused with Ayurvedic ingredients like ginger, black pepper, tulsi, palm jaggery, and coriander seeds, known to ease the symptoms of cold and cough.
New Knorr Chicken Cube is a unique product that's made with best-quality chicken and a special blend of spices to give you the flavor of slow-cooked chicken instantly without any added preservatives. We have strengthened our play in the skincare and hair care categories by landing new innovations. Let me talk about a few. The launch of Vaseline 2-in-1 Antibacterial Hand Cream. We've combined skin moisturizing with germ protection for soft and hygienic hands in one go. Clinic Plus has imbibed egg protein in its shampoos and nurture hair strands to give strong and shiny hair.
Another innovation in hair care comes from TRESemmé, which has launched deep smoothing serums and masks, providing frizz-free, shiny, and vibrant hair. As you can see, in the last nine months, we have stepped up innovation intensity significantly in our business. Winning in channels of future like e-commerce was a strategic imperative for us even before the pandemic. With consumer preference for e-everything, there are clear tailwinds for this business. As consumers get used to assortment and convenience of e-commerce, we believe this will continue to stick.
We have a strong portfolio of products with the right price architecture exclusively designed for e-commerce. Surf Excel Matic Value Pack offers value to the consumers and is economically viable from a last-mile delivery perspective. We are seeding e-com first brands like Nature Protect. We are bringing premium offerings like hair masks and serums, which form part of the hair care regime of consumers who shop on these channels. Our focus on building perfect store online and driving everyday great execution has ensured best-in-class online availability and discoverability of our products.
Consequently, we continue to gain share in e-commerce, and our current shares are higher than the pre-COVID levels. E-commerce channel contribution for us has doubled year-on-year basis. Our growth momentum has picked up significantly, and our growth in this channel are now 2x versus December quarter 2019. Sharpening our execution focus, we continue to expand our direct coverage and are back to pre-COVID levels. We have significantly increased our assortment, which is now higher than the pre-COVID levels. Rural has become the driver of growth, and we have doubled down to capture this opportunity.
Our network of Shakti entrepreneurs today is at 1.36 lakhs and has doubled from the 2016 levels. This rural channel of ours is growing at twice the rate versus 2019. In December quarter, we have deployed more than 8 lakh outdoor assets in rural areas. This has enabled us to augment the physical reach of our products with mental reach, especially in many of the media dark geographies. As digitization has picked up rapid pace, technology adoption has become a clear imperative. GT is now more open to the adoption of technology. At HUL, we have always worked with and for the Kirana stores.
We are driving our Connected Stores program to digitally rewire the traditional trade ecosystem, and we see this as a clear competitive advantage. Shikhar, our eB2B ordering app, is now available in 3.4 lakh stores. Our orders per month have gone up by 6x versus the December quarter 2019 baseline, indicating an active participation from the retail stores. We continue to make strong progress on our fight COVID priorities. We remain committed to ensure full safety and well-being of our people. On the supply front, all our factories and depots are operational, and service levels are back to pre-COVID levels.
As I already spoke earlier, keeping our fingers on the pulse of consumers, we have invested significantly behind rolling out innovation. At the same time, we have repurposed our brands to drive relevance with our consumers. We have committed INR 100 crores in the fight against coronavirus and have been deploying these funds in a manner which best serves the best interests of our nation. We continue to embrace cost agility in operations. Our focus behind driving savings and preserving cash has allowed us to preserve the sanctity of our business model.
Now, if we look at our performance in the current quarter, there are a couple of standouts. First, this has been another quarter where we have delivered competitive growth. Our business fundamentals remain strong, with 86% of our business gaining relative penetration. Basis Kantar Worldpanel on last three-month basis, 86% of our business is gaining volume shares. With reported turnover growth of 20% and profit after tax growth of 19%, we can say that we have sustained strong performance. Health, hygiene, and nutrition, which forms about 80% of our portfolio, continues to grow in double digits for the second quarter running.
We've also seen significant improvement in discretionary and out-of-home categories as well. These are extremely attractive categories, and the improvement in growth is directly linked to increase in mobility. This has enabled the business to gain sequential momentum, and our performance is improving every quarter. Sustainability is fully integrated into our strategy. We believe business has to be purpose-led and future-fit, and that is what drives superior performance. The very business of doing business responsibly brings benefits to society.
Through HUF, our foundation and its partners, we have cumulatively created 1.3 trillion liters of water conservation potential, working in thousands of villages. 76% of our tomatoes and 78% of our tea are being sourced from sustainable sources. At the exit of 2020 calendar year, more than 67% of our plastic footprint is now in recyclable form. In 2020, we also collected and processed 58,000 tons of plastic, which is 60% of the total plastics that we use. Till date, we have touched the lives of 150 million people through our Swachh Aadat Swachh Bharat initiative.
Four Suvidha centers have been operational in Mumbai, and I'm pleased to inform you that on the occasion of our Republic Day yesterday, we inaugurated the fifth Suvidha center in Kasaiwala in Kurla East. Our water conservation initiatives under HUF have also helped generate 30 million person-days employment. Nearly 4.5 million people have been benefiting under Prabhat. 136,000 Shakti entrepreneurs are getting opportunities to enhance their livelihood. As I look forward, the near-term demand outlook is improving, and we expect to see improvement in urban, while rural should continue to be resilient.
Inflationary pressures are building up in select commodities, and we will manage them judiciously. I'm confident that we are well-positioned to capture the growth opportunities and accelerate the momentum. With that, let me hand over to Srini to cover the details of our quarter's performance. Before I hand it over to him, I have a very pleasant task of thanking Srini. He has been a fantastic partner. I'm extremely delighted that Srini is going to Unilever headquarters in the UK and will be occupying a very important position as Executive Vice President, Financial Control, and Risk Management.
Another quality product of HUL goes and occupies a senior position in Unilever. I'm sure all of you would like to congratulate him and wish him well. I'm also very pleased to announce the appointment of Ritesh Tiwari, subject to government approvals as CFO of HUL and Vice President, Finance of Unilever South Asia. He's our homegrown talent, has done a fabulous work in Unilever, and now returns home. I'm sure many of you know him. I'm absolutely certain that, like his great predecessors, he will take the finance function to the next level of excellence.
Even as we imagine being done with this crisis, crisis, ladies and gentlemen, is surely not done with us. So please keep physical distance, wear your mask, and keep washing your hands with soap and water or use sanitizer. As the great brand Lifebuoy purposefully said in its public service message at the beginning of the pandemic, use any soap. With that, over to you, Srini.
Thank you, Sanjiv, and good evening, everyone. So let me start by giving a bit of a flavor of some of the financials and the category dynamics. As Sanjiv said, during the quarter, our growth was competitive and profitable. In the quarter, we saw economic activity picking up and FMCG growth surviving. And more than 86% of our business has been getting relative penetration and volume shares. Our reported turnover growth stood at 20%, including the nutrition business and acquisition of B Wash . On a like-for-like basis, if we remove the mergers and acquisitions, our domestic consumer business grew by about 7% with UVG of about 4%.
More importantly, we have seen a strong sequential pickup, and we expect this to continue. Seven of our categories, namely household care, skin cleansing, hair, oral, tea, nutrition, and packaged foods have grown in double digits, and this augurs very well. Circa 80% of our business, which is in the spaces of health, hygiene, and nutrition, has grown at 10% again for one more quarter. We will talk a little more about growth when we get into the category slides, but let me spend a little bit of time talking through the bottom line. The net profit after tax for us grew by 19% at INR 1,921 crores.
The overall EBITDA margins were closer to the range of about 24.5% and remain quite healthy. You would appreciate that a year-on-year comparison on margins gets distorted on account of many factors, but more importantly, the nutrition merger. So what we are also doing is to give you a bit of a flavor on a sequential movement that's really comparing the September quarter margins with December quarter and giving you a flavor of that. On such a lens, if you see, sequential margins for us have been lower by about 100 basis points. Now, if I look at some of the key drivers, clearly, from a cost of goods sold, notwithstanding that there has been inflation, we've had many positives.
The first one really has been a significant improvement to our mix, whether it's category, division, or premium. For example, many of our premium segments in categories such as soaps, cleansing, tea, and hair are now growing and growing very well. We have also taken up prices, and that has partly negated the higher commodity cost in tea. So on a sequential basis, we have seen a cost improvement of about 90 basis points. Employee expenses are also lower by about 20, and this is a line that we continue to manage well while continuing to leverage the synergies from the nutrition business.
And if you see, the third element is from another operating income. On a sequential basis, we have seen about a 10 basis points improvement. So if I really add these up, about 120 basis points of sequential improvement you would see in these three lines. I think the two places where we are significantly stepping up our investments is really in terms of our BMI, spend behind our brands, and spend behind our other expenses, which is really going to do all elements, including our capabilities. Let me first take our BMI. On a sequential basis, our BMI is higher by about 180 basis points.
Importantly, we have actually increased our absolute spend by about 250 crores. This is important for us as demand is reviving. We are continuing to invest for growth, and we are going to support our innovations. You heard from Sanjiv. He spent a bit of time explaining to you, giving you examples, and we'll also touch a little more in the category section. Our spend are competitive, and our share of voice is higher than the previous quarter. For sure, there is also a bit of the media rates normalizing, where we did enjoy some discounts early on, but that started to normalize.
But all in all, we are investing for growth. We are investing to really capture the opportunity. You'll also see that on other expenses, on a sequential basis, you would have seen an increase of about 40 basis points. Actually, the other expenses, as you are all well aware, is a wide spectrum of costs. There is supply chain costs, which are non-material. There are general overheads. There are sales overheads. In June quarter and September quarter, we were a bit circumspect given the lockdowns and the disruptions, and we held these expenses very, very tight.
But now, as we are seeing demand revive, we are investing ahead of the curve to capture growth opportunities. We are investing into our go-to-market, into our e-route-to-market, into the channels of the future, and our capabilities. These investments will help us bring the long-term and deliver the long-term competitive advantages. Now, if we look at a quick construct of the divisional growth, BPC has come back strongly. It was flat in September quarter. We are now growing at about 9%. Foods and refreshments are continuing to sustain the momentum of 19% at similar levels of September quarter.
More important is really the nutrition business, with supply issues being resolved, is now growing in double digits. Our home care, as Sanjiv also explained, has been an issue of category consumption. Again, when you strip it out, household care does well, but laundry specifically has been impacted because of category consumption. But as mobility is improving and people are coming back to offices, schools are reopening, we have started to see a sequential pickup, so clearly, we are now seeing every month, sequentially, the growth trajectory is looking better, and the growth trajectory is looking up.
Having said that, in aggregate, our growths have continued to be competitive. A bit of a flavor in home care, Sanjiv did talk about our launch of Nature Protect, which goes across categories and Wheel Magic, which is really addressing the new need as well as premiumizing. All in all, it helped sustain a double-digit quarter, one more quarter of double-digit growth in household care. I have spoken to you about the sequential improvement and the category performance of fabric, but more important within this, when you look at some of the premium formats such as liquids, they continue to do well, whether it was in September quarter.
They're continuing to do very well as we look at December quarter, and we are actually getting into the new formats such as the Smart Spray and the Active Hygiene. Purifiers, it's been a stable performance, again, enabled and led by e-commerce, with our portfolio now really being reshaped to play and win in this channel. When it comes to beauty and personal care, it's been a broad-based growth across all categories. Our skin cleansing continues to be stellar with high double-digit growth led by Lifebuoy. What will be very pleasing is that in the premium parts of our portfolio, whether it's Dove or Pears, have now started to revive, and we have seen them grow in double digits.
Lux, which has been more in the beauty space, has picked up growth even in the previous quarter and is likely to continue. We did talk about significant inflationary pressures in skin cleansing. You track the commodities well, and you are well aware of the replacement, the cost increases. If one needs to mitigate the cost, one needs to price it anywhere between 7% to 9%. If you need to price for margins, it's even higher. In December quarter, we have taken up prices on our portfolio by about 2.5%. And as you speak, we have initiated further pricing actions, which will again amount to about 2.5%.
Between the two rounds that we have done, we have taken about 5% price increase. While we will continue to look at all avenues in terms of managing the business model, we will continue to look at pricing with a close eye on inflation and keeping a close eye on maintaining the right price-value equation from the consumer's perspective. In oral care, we have seen a very strong double-digit growth led by Close Up. Pepsodent has also picked up performance in the quarter. Overall, I think the performance in oral care has been quite strong.
Hair, in many respects, has been stellar. We have seen double-digit growth across our brands, and it's been a broad-based performance. The consumer-focused innovations are yielding very, very good results. Again, in this segment, we see that our growth would be significantly ahead of the market and anyone else. Skincare was a category in September quarter. We did talk to you about winter loading being a bit slower given the trade sentiment. Happy to note and happy to state that winter has picked up well with good performance coming through in Vaseline.
And in addition, and we are seeing that some of that effect is also coming through in January. We have also seen facial cleansing and towels do well. The Glow & Lovely transition has happened well, and it's on course as we look at it. The communication, the first part of the communication was really in landing the transition, which has gone off well. And we are now focusing our communication to really drive towards demand. And with the country opening up, I think, again, the communication will be apt. We are confident that it's also actually going to start giving a better growth trajectory in that part of the portfolio.
Color cosmetics, again, has been an important piece of our business, done well for a long period of time, has taken a certain beating, but again, on a sequential basis, we have started to see good pickup come through in this category. If I go to foods and refreshments, I think the growth momentum has been sustained, and we have seen double-digit broad-based growths. In foods, ketchups and soups continue to do well on the back of strong consumer traction. In tea, I think the performance has been stellar for a couple of quarters with high double-digit growth and across all brands. This is well ahead of the market.
Our approach of being calibrated approach to pricing, even at the sacrificing some margins, has helped us manage the tea inflation extremely well. You would recollect that after hitting highs, some of the inflation came off. But I think our approach of being calibrated has enabled us to manage this well, and we are gaining shares across the board and definitely from the unorganized sector. Sanjiv did cover the coffee innovations. The performance has been reasonable, coming on a high base. I think the good news is really about nutrition.
When we have spoken to you last, we said that, "Look, with the supply issues getting resolved, we should start seeing this business come back to growth." And indeed, it has happened. Both Horlicks and Boost have actually grown in double digits. Sanjiv spoke to you extensively about the plus range, which has just gone in. What I also want to tell you is, earlier in the year, we had introduced the pouch packs to make the products more affordable and drive penetration. This has landed extremely well. We have now started to see volume growth in the 500 grams plus segment after many years, and we have actually gained penetration.
Boost was relaunched in North and West, and we saw some good selling and some share gains. So in totality, nutrition has started to pick up the trajectory. Of course, we will have bigger opportunities in 2021 as the innovations come through. And our go-to-market, we will complete the job, which is likely to take about six months from where we sit. That is when we will start to see the next level of benefits coming through on distribution. Ice cream, food solutions, and vending is a smaller part of our business in the quarter.
did take some beating early on, but sequentially, again, that's something, and I'll show you in a separate chart, is continuing to pick up. I think this is a good summary, and perhaps we are also reaching stages where maybe it will be worthwhile to see whether this will be relevant for future. But for now, health, hygiene, and nutrition, as I said, has been growing at 10%. Discretionary, which was negative 25%, has now come back to minus 1%. And out of home is improving all the time. And when you look at health, hygiene, and nutrition, it's important to also highlight that this has got the full home care portfolio.
So notwithstanding the category consumption being lower, I think there's a mega opportunity here. It's also important sometimes, and often a question has been asked of us saying that, "Look, post-demonetization and post-GST, we have come back very strong. And is it any different this time?" I think it's important for all of you to understand that in the segments which have not been impacted by lockdowns, our performance has been significantly better and has been picking up sequentially extremely well.
I think the parts which actually hit us hard have really been the portfolio, part really being in discretionary and part really being in out of home. But I think it's important to give you a bit of a flavor. Lakmé is a business which sits in discretionary, has actually grown for more than five years and mid-teens, and is highly profitable. If you look at skincare, again, it's been a business which has grown for us for many years and high single-digit growth with very strong margins. If you look at laundry, laundry actually grew for close to double digits for many, many years, and it significantly led value creation in all aspects of P&L, and even an ice cream business grew in mid-teens with strong cash generation for many years.
So if you really look at all of these categories, these are fundamentally very attractive categories with massive growth potential. We are confident that with the sequential improvement, we'll keep getting better as the country is opening up and mobility is increasing. We do recognize that the timing of full recovery is difficult to predict, but the pace of the recovery has definitely been quite encouraging. Now, I think to talk a little bit about the profitable volume growth. I think the strategy that profitable volume growth is the center of what we do, absolutely intact.
As demand is picking up, we are clear that we will invest for growth, be it in innovations, be it in market development, be it in e-commerce, go-to-market, and we will make sure that all our spends are competitive across lines. Yes, we do have a robust program for generating fuel for growth. The mix is coming back, and that augurs well. We've got a lot more sophisticated with net revenue management, and we are being judicious with pricing. We will not shy away from pricing while maintaining the right value equation.
As we said, the inflationary pressures that we see in tea and the inflationary pressures that we see in cleansing are not small and are material, and we will continue to manage them more dynamically. But if I have to put out a real focus, our focus for a couple of quarters would really be on driving growth while protecting our business model. But if we have to put a premium, we're actually putting a premium on growth. And why do we say that? If we get the profitable volume growth going for us, we have a demonstrated track record of driving margin expansion.
We've done that for more than eight or nine years, and we are very confident that we will be able to come back to our mantra or our model of growth ahead of market and a modest margin expansion going forward. But for now, I think clearly, for the next quarter or two, the focus would really be in driving profitable volume growth. The other different cuts to really look at that would be a segmental performance. You would see that they changed slightly, but the picture broadly remains the same. And from a margin perspective, while the segmental margins continue to be very heavy in home care and beauty and personal care, we did see an impact of tea playing out on F&R, notwithstanding significant progress in the synergies from nutrition.
It's also that we've been investing for growth across the portfolio. Therefore, if I now come to our December quarter summary of results, from a sales perspective, the reported growth is around 20%. EBITDA is up about 17, and there are aspects of other income coming lower because of cash being paid out because of dividend and Horlicks brand acquisition. And second is that we've also had lower yields given the interest rate regime in the country. PBT is up at 16%, profit before exceptionals after tax up 15%, and net profit is up 19%, given also that we had certain one-offs in the base which give the picture.
Sorry, just one second. Yeah. The exceptional items continue to be restructuring of our supply chain operations and the integration of our nutrition business. You would well know about our nine-month performance. At an aggregate, it is a 14% reported growth with a double-digit net profit increase. And if I come to one of my second-to-last chart, it is really about the outlook looking ahead. As we have clearly articulated a couple of times during the course of this evening, the demand outlook is definitely looking up. Rural is continuing to do well and growing in double-digit. Urban has come back into positive trajectory.
We do expect that barring any unforeseen events such as COVID outbreak coming back. We clearly see demand picking up. Our focus, therefore, is to really invest behind consumer-centric innovations, market development, and capabilities. We do have elevated pressures in select categories. We will look at all levers, the mix, net revenue management, including pricing and savings to manage the business model. Overall, our focus remains to be one of delivering volume growths which are competitive and profitable.
On the last piece, Sanjiv did share the news, and I'm sure you have seen that having served this wonderful business for large parts of my career and, more importantly, in the last a little over three years as a CFO, now I'm actually moving to the mothership, if I can call that, to Unilever. It's never easy if you've been brought in, brought up with this business to parts. But it is an opportunity, and with active encouragement from Sanjiv, I am taking that responsibility. I'll continue to hold the business till 1st May, and then that's when I hand it over to my wonderful friend, Ritesh Tiwari.
It's an upgrade in every sense, whether it's in terms of quality of what he will deliver or even the quality of looks. So we got a rather impressive-looking Ritesh on screen, wide set of experiences in the business, in the function. And interestingly, Ritesh also brings to the table experiences from broader, just not finance, but also from demand planning, supply chain. And in his latest role, he was actually managing the performance management for Unilever across all the markets, and he was also the CFO for our international businesses.
So all in all, I think he is a delightful addition to South Asia, and I have no doubt that he will really take the business and the function to new heights. So that's what we had to share, and we are very happy to take any questions, and I'll hand it over to Amit at this stage. Over to you, Amit.
Thank you, Sanjiv, and thank you, Srinivas. With this, we will now move to the Q&A section. In addition to the audio, as always, our participants will have an option to post questions through web option on your screen. We'll first take those questions which come through the audio line, and then we'll take the web questions. With that, I would like to hand back the call to Stephen to manage the next session for us. Go ahead, Stephen, over to you.
Thank you very much. We will now begin the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one on their touch-tone telephone. If you wish to remove yourself from the question queue, you may press star and two. Participants are requested to use handsets while asking a question. Ladies and gentlemen, we will wait for a moment while the question queue assembles. The first question is from the line of Abneesh Roy from Edelweiss. Please go ahead.
Yeah, congrats, sir, on the all-round good show in the current context. My first question is on the brand strategy. So pure-play e-commerce kind of brand like Nature Protect, which is a very generic-sounding name, unlike your specific brand strategy, brand names which you have, because it's e-commerce, will not have much of mass media. And every other FMCG company is doing similar strategy, either in terms of product or in terms of naming. So how do you scale up these kind of products? Any learnings from Ayush? Because essentially, it is again the natural kind of positioning.
And similarly, on the Lifebuoy laundry sanitizer, so Lifebuoy is more of a skin/body wash. So taking that to fabric, how does it work? So this is my first question.
Hi, Abneesh. A very happy New Year to you. From being an analyst, now you're becoming a marketer. Nature Protect, at the end of the day, it is a brand which is based on credentials of neem, which is a very distinct property and antiseptic property, cleaning properties. And that's the reason we are focused on it first in the south of India and in e-commerce. And depending on the success, which we are very optimistic about, we will not restrict it just to e-commerce. Yeah? But initially, we have put the brand over there. And for us, we have a lot of learning.
We have learnings from Indulekha, which has been absolutely a fabulous success. And we have learnings from brands like Hamam. We have learnings from brands like Lever Ayush. So we put them in whenever we look at new launches. As far as brand extensions are concerned, these are carefully thought through. And only when a brand has the property to move to adjacencies that we take it over. So the steps that we have taken on Lifebuoy, which is an extremely strong brand and has got very clear health credentials, antibacterial credentials, and that's a very thought-through decision that we have taken.
And we are, again, very optimistic with all the extensions that we have done that more than fewer will prove to be good success in the marketplace.
Right. My second question is on oral care. So second consecutive quarter of double-digit sales growth. For the past many years, this has been a tough category for you in terms of market share. And you have called out also many times that it is a WIP. So are you now calling it as structural? And in the category, naturals is growing faster. So how are you playing there? And is Sensodyne in the portfolio helping, or is it something which will pan out in the future?
No, please. The numbers that we have quoted you do not include Sensodyne because Sensodyne, we are just doing a distribution.
So, from a distribution, sir, my question was from a distribution scale-up and that advantage, not from the numbers.
No, not really from that perspective. I think both Close Up stands on its own right. It is absolutely a fabulous brand standing on the freshness platform and appeals immensely to the youth. And we are very pleased the way Close Up has performed. The good bit has been that we are also seeing strong traction on Pepsodent. But on Pepsodent, I would still say there is more work to be done. Yeah, that is still work in progress. But as far as the overall oral care category is concerned, last couple of quarters have been very heartening for us with the performance.
And specifically on naturals, yes, it has indeed been a high-demand space. While we've had some play with Ayush and others, we are also looking at opportunities and a strategy in terms of how to handle it differently. In due course, you will see more action there as well.
Right. My last question, sir, is on the recent pH issue. So the competitor is claiming 400 crore run rate and 10x from there in five years. So my question is, do you need to launch something here differently? All the campaigns which you're already running, those should be more or less enough to overcome this?
Abneesh, I'll only tell you one thing. See, I don't want to comment on what others say. But as far as we are concerned, we know how to protect our turf, and we will protect our turf. This, let me be absolutely clear about it.
Sure. Okay, sir, that's all from me. Thanks a lot, sir. All the best.
Thank you.
The next question is from the line of Warren Ackerman from Barclays London. Please go ahead.
Hi, everybody. It's Warren Ackerman here at Barclays. Hope everybody is safe and well. Can I ask two questions to you, please? The first one is on your nutrition division. You mentioned nutrition opportunities in 2021 on innovation. You mentioned finishing the job on go-to-market and distribution and nutrition synergies. I'd be very interested if you could touch on each of those three buckets. And what do you actually think you can do on top line, on margin, and on distribution of Horlicks as you bed in the acquisition and it moves into the organic growth?
If you can frame that opportunity for us into the medium term, that would be really, really helpful. And then the second one is just around the kind of domestic organic growth. Nice to see the acceleration in the quarter, and it's nice to hear you're being so upbeat about the outlook. But I guess when I look at it, you've got the home care division negative two, but you've got food and refreshment plus 19, and you've got the improvement coming through on discretionary and out of home. But clearly, as we go into 2021, some of those categories are going to sort of move in different directions.
I guess home care is going to increase, and food and refreshment might normalize. Can you kind of maybe look at in your crystal ball how we should think about the moving parts by category and channel as we look forward 12 months? Thank you very much.
Yeah. So thanks, Warren. Two interesting questions, and I'll give my bit first, and Sanjiv can add on. I think let me take you back to the nutrition business case. When we actually looked at the acquisition, clearly coming through from a perspective of very strong brands, a clear consumer need where you can actually transfer through the various stages of life cycle of people, right, from child to an adult. Overall category penetration being around 24%-25%, which also means it's a massive market development opportunity. If you think about distribution, clearly with Hindustan Unilever's reach, we said that we will have advantages of about 2.5-3 times the distribution reach.
And therefore, we also said when we look at a portfolio, you can play the high sciences, you can play the base. If you look at the formats, you can play the large packs, you can play the small packs, so there were multiple levers to get growth, and therefore, if you said into the medium term, our objective was to grow this business in double-digit, and we talked about synergy realizations in the bottom line to close to about 1,000 basis points, so that's really what's the construct of where we were. Important to highlight that this business actually has come into our fold only from April of this year because the whole regulatory process took more than 15-odd months.
Not much we could have done earlier, but if you really see from a first nine-month perspective of a large integration of the kind that we have done, it's been one of the best integrations in the FMCG space and for Unilever by far. If you start to see, yes, we did have some supply challenges given some industrial relation issues in a quarter. We also had some very tough lockdown months in the country. The good news is all of that is behind us. The business is picking up traction. We have seen a double-digit growth where we're comparing with what GSK did in its base.
Clearly, the momentum and the trajectory has now started to pick up. I did talk to you about the two key brands being really Horlicks and Boost. Both the brands have actually grown in double digits. We have taken Boost national, and in Horlicks, we are doing multiple things. We're dialing up communication on one side, introducing new packs such as an affordable pouch pack. At a certain time, we will look at really doing a sachet, a low-price offering, which also enables us drive penetration. And Sanjiv spoke to you extensively about the high sciences range.
So interventions coming through on portfolio. Communication, you've already started to see take a very different cue, I believe, which again works well. So if you start to see, we've started to put the wheels in motion on many aspects relating to portfolio. Yeah? The second aspect is going to be go-to-market. Today, we are taking the easy pickings and the early wins and doing multiple things. In some cases, we are combining distributors between nutrition and HUL. They're handling the combined business. And in some cases, we are actually synthesizing and going deeper into rural areas.
The other place we've also started some work is really the chemist channel and the medical marketing program. So some of those benefits have started to come in in Lifebuoy as Lifebuoy has started getting better post-lockdowns. The big advantage for us is if you really see, it's a big algo-driven distribution model because we have the widest retail coverage in India by far. That actually means that we have to put out a larger assortment in stores, and we need to replenish those stocks at a certain frequency. To really run that, you really, really need the full power of the analytical engine, which is able to not manage just at a distributor level, but at a store level.
So we've always been clear saying that into the second half of the year, once we finish the SAP integration and then the CD systems integration, we'll start to see the big juice coming through from a distribution side. But all in all, I think many levers in motion, both on portfolio as well as on channel. And let's do acknowledge that some of this takes time. This is not a business without massive potential, but this was not a business running in the rhythm of double-digit, and that's exactly where we are trying to take this to, and we're very pleased with the performance to date.
If I look at the bottom line synergies, we're significantly ahead of our plan. Yeah? If I were to contrast and I said 1,000 basis points over a medium-term, if you really look at the first year, perhaps we have done better than first year. We have actually done better than the second-year synergies, and somewhere, we are between two and a half to three years in terms of getting the monies upfront. So all the hypotheses that we said in terms of media, promotions, buying savings have started to come through, and we're also using some of that to actually invest behind product and product quality.
So if I were to bring home the total answer, I think progressing well from a growth perspective, more to be done, significantly better from a margin and cash realization point of view. Yeah? If I take your second question yeah. So if I take your second question, and I'll also ask Sanjiv to come in here, you are indeed right that, look, there will be a bit of a rebalancing of portfolio. Health, hygiene, and nutrition in some parts. And when I say some parts, such as hand sanitizers, hand wash, will start to come down a bit. But having said that, within that, we've got large home care business.
Home care business will pick up. Home care for us over three, four, five years has actually grown in high single digit and has been a huge value-accretive business. So clearly, that rebalancing, even if it were to happen, we start to see that the numbers will continue to be high. I also talked to you about the structural attractiveness of our discretionary categories. I spoke about Lakmé. I spoke about skin. We definitely expect them to start to pick up, and ice creams, which has been an out-of-home business and took a big beating, and our food solution businesses will also start to see traction and come back as out-of-home consumption picks up.
Even if the aggregates change, the important spaces fundamental to the business are extremely well-positioned. Now, the big question is, yes, we are seeing consumer demand pick up. Yes, we are seeing the economic activity pick up. The pace of recovery and the pace of expansion is still a bit of an unknown. But within that construct, I think the portfolio is very well-positioned to actually grow ahead of the market. And with a bit of little luck and COVID staying away, I think in the great space to drive momentum. Sanjiv, any comments on the growth story?
No, and the other bit, Hi Warren. The other bit, of course, is how the vaccines get rolled out. India has a very ambitious plan, and it has started well. And I believe with the vaccine because the mobility will increase tremendously. And today, if you were to de-average the country, rural and GT are doing very well. And urban and modern trade, for reasons of lack of mobility, have not been doing well. So if the vaccine rollout happens the way the government has planned it out, then I think we will clearly see the urban demand also coming back.
And with the urban demand, that would imply that the modern trade would also come back. And which means that some of our discretionary categories, which have got hit, like Srini alluded to, should start bouncing back.
Okay. Thank you, gentlemen. Very helpful.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Avi Mehta from Macquarie. Please go ahead.
Hi, sir. Thanks for the opportunity. I just wanted to revisit your comment on the food margins, food and refreshment margin. Despite there has been a sequential drop in tea prices and GSK performance improving, the moderation could you explain why there has been a moderation in margin performance?
Yeah. So a couple of elements. Definitely, the impact of tea inflation, where we have taken a calibrated approach, has been one reason. Because if you see the height of consumption impact of tea, which was bought earlier, came together in December quarter. And I think we had to be calibrated with the pricing because there is a massive opportunity to unlock from the unorganized sector. And it's a calculated business decision we have taken, I think, which is serving us well.
You get sometimes opportunities to really gain significant volume shares and hold on to the franchise. And that's what we have done. The second element, which I also spoke to you, is that we have also been dialing up significant investments in our FNR category from a BMI lens, whether it's really investing behind nutrition while the gross savings continue to be heavy. We have invested behind our packaged foods. We have invested behind our BMI in the category, and we're also starting to invest behind some of the capabilities for future.
The combination of that has really meant that from a segmental perspective, we have seen a bit of a dip in FNR, but as an important comment that we make is that, look, it's important to make that investment, and I think if you get the right volume trajectory growing, which we are, I think we'll be well-positioned to really pull back margins. Important to understand that these are inflations which have never been experienced in these categories over a decade. This is exceptional, and we have got enough of history to say you don't go and price all of that.
You lose consumers. You lose the franchise. Getting them back takes much longer and seriously expensive. It's worthwhile being calibrated, taking a bit of a knock in margins, managing it in your portfolio, and getting that growth trajectory going on. That's exactly what we're doing.
Sir, I appreciate that. What I was trying to, let me rephrase the question. Is it possible for us to kind of give us an impact of the investments that we would have in this? Because as you alluded, some of these investments will continue, which is where I'm coming from.
Yeah. So my friend, you know we don't start to dissect some of them at a category line level. We haven't done that, and I don't think we need to do that. Rest assured, we know how to protect the business model. We will. And if it means a quarter or two of slightly subdued margins, don't worry about it. We know exactly how we are playing this game.
Very nice. Sir, lastly, just a bookkeeping bit. When you highlight the 5% odd growth that we would have seen in the nutrition business on a nine-month basis, we are looking at the nine-month equivalent for the 4,542 crores sales number that we had shared in the GSK presentation. Is that understanding correct, sir?
Avi, on this one, what you need to do is we are talking only domestic business. The GSK reported numbers also included the exports business. Hence, it will not be a like-to-like comparison. Looking at 15-5% growth on base period reported numbers. Then we are having it for the reported numbers for HUL nutrition business should be.
Our exports goes into our subsidiary, whereas what you see also here is on the standalone. If you can connect with Amit, he'll be very helpful.
Sure. I'll take this offline. No issue. Thank you very much, sir. Thank you.
And then for others there. All right.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Percy Pantaki from IIFL. Please go ahead. Hi, team. Congrats on a good set of numbers, and Srini, congrats on your promotions. Basically, my first question is on the categories impacted by COVID. So if I look at how it started off in Q1, basically, skincare was the worst affected, 40% to 50% down. And now it has become almost flat. Whereas your detergents business is probably a couple of percentage points down. So today, skincare on a YoY basis is growing better than detergents, which to me was a little bit shocking to see this data point. So just wanted to understand what is it that is constraining the detergent growth, which is clearly a category affected by COVID, but also I would guess a category less affected by COVID than what skin care is.
No, I think Percy, you have missed a very important point, which is the winter portfolio in skincare. Yeah? Winter portfolio went up majestically with the cold wave happening in most parts of the country.
Okay. So adjusted. And that's the Q2 to Q3 delay which happened. That is the thing which is sort of causing. I mean, approximately what would be the impact of this change in phasing of sales from Q2 to Q3?
So, Percy, look, we've never split up our winter between month and quarter. So, I'm not going to do that. Look, I'm also seeing a bit of effect coming through in January, which we never used to see earlier. So, I think the whole picture is when we get we then start to see the full season, which I think we'll get a better handle around mid-February. Yeah? Because the sales start somewhere between August, September. And this time, given the intensity of the winter, we are seeing it go a bit further. So, perhaps it's something we can revisit at a later date. Yeah?
The other element important to understand, Percy, is there is also a bit of a pent-up demand. We underestimate the need of consumers wanting to look good and feel good. Yeah? So, call it a bit of a lipstick effect or call it whatever. With lockdowns coming off, we are also seeing a significant improvement in categories such as colors and Lakmé. Yeah? The first instance is even in some of the social gatherings. You've now started to see a big step up, and people are meeting. People are wanting to look good and feel good.
So there's a lot of hair products and consumption picking up. The negative growth in Lakmé and colors have come off at a dramatic pace. To be honest, the last three months has been a big pullback. A lot of laundry. Yeah? Again, I think what happens with our laundry is the size and the magnitude of our business means that we are addressing the needs of all consumers, premium, mid, and mass. While premium has continued to be robust and continues to grow well, at an aggregate, if I need laundry to move, yeah?
Because at the end of the day, it's a sizable part of my business. I need a lot of rural to come back in. I need a lot of consumers to consume Surf Excel wash at INR 10 to come back in. And they come back in when schools, colleges, and offices start to open. So multiple ways to look at it. They are indeed strange times. Give it a quarter, and I think you'll start to see a much better reflection of where the underlying demand is.
Yeah. And we are very pleased with the strength of our laundry portfolio. Yeah? And it is still even now the volume shares are looking very robust. And very confident that as people start moving out, laundry will come back to its growth patterns, which have been fabulous over the last several years.
Understood. Second question is on margins. And maybe you will feel it's a rather unfair comment because this is an exceptional year. But you typically sort of used to have this sort of guideline that we would grow margins modestly on a full-year basis, which obviously in the beginning of the year only you said that this guideline will not apply for this year. But now that you've seen demand, except for a couple of products, to come back so strongly across all product categories, what is it that is now holding us back from taking price increases where necessary?
And a corollary to this question is that since this year we have missed out on the margin expansion, next year, would you sort of look at a slightly higher than normal margin expansion to make up? On a two-year basis, the run rate would be more or less equalized, or that doesn't work that way?
So it doesn't work that way, Percy. Percy, first is, look, yes, demand is looking good. Demand is picking up. But if you look at four months ago, six months ago, the picture was quite difficult. And you all know that very well. Sometimes I think we just miss how fast some of these changes can happen. But how important it is one to be calibrated in the way you manage this. And I think both are important. If you start to see the inflation which has come through in categories such as skin cleansing, and it's an evolving picture, or tea, these are the kinds of inflation which are talking about inflation excess of 50% to 70%.
We haven't had these kinds of inflations for many, many years. You can price. In the short term, everything looks good. You'll get price growth. You'll maintain margins. And you'll structurally lose your consumers because of the affordability issues. And that's something clearly we don't want to do. And therefore, we are being calibrated, but we will price. Yeah? It's not a question of saying we will not price. And actually, better word is judicious rather than even being calibrated. Yeah? So we are continuing to look at opportunities. We are continuing to price, and we will do that.
At the same time, we are also significantly investing for growth. And if you see our model starts to work when the full portfolio starts to play, that means I have home care grow, I have BPC grow, and I have FNR grow. So without getting ahead of ourselves into two years and trying to make it up, the model has always been of a profitable volume growth. Now, you would have seen that when the equation works well for us, in years, we have had margin expansions which have been even upwards of 200 basis points. Yeah? Significantly ahead of what we wanted to do, so much so that all of you started to ask us what did modest even mean for us.
Yeah? But then there have been years and quarters where the equation doesn't hold. So suffice to say, we want to focus for the next couple of quarters in capturing growth, being sensible. And if it means a little bit of margin dilution from where we are on a sequential basis, it's not bad. At 24.5% EBITDA margins, very healthy. But when we start to see that growth trajectory, our ability to dial up margins, I mean, we've got plenty of levers. So leave it with us. Then we will come back to that medium. Whether the medium will cover one year or two years, let's start to talk about the next couple of quarters.
Because for us now, I think it's getting that growth trajectory going with a sensible business shape. I think that the model works very well. But rest assured, profitable volume growth, center of where we are. Once we get this period the way we want to navigate it, we will come back to our plans of competitive growth and modest margin expansion.
Very helpful. Thanks. Thanks and all the best.
Thank you, Percy.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Rajesh Kothari from Alfa Accurate Advisors. Please go ahead.
Good evening, sir. Sir, one question is basically from strategic perspective. If I look at this quarter, apart from home care, most of your businesses have shown now decent numbers. This is unlike FY18, FY19, and also first nine months of FY20, where growth was a little bit subdued from 7%, 8%, 5%, 9% kind of thing. So do you think most of the work in progress areas are now getting kind of fructified? It is working fine. So that's the first question. And second question is that from the organization perspective, from the leadership perspective, I'm talking about division-wise, which are the areas, which are the sub-micro segments where you think the work is yet to be done and it requires probably a lot of efforts to further improve the growth over the next three, five years?
Rajesh, you've covered a very wide spectrum. I think on the first part of your question, I think we spent a fair amount of time talking through growth, whether it is through the lens of divisions, whether it is through the lens of health, hygiene, nutrition, discretion, or out of home, whether it is through the lens of seven of our divisions growing in double digits. We also spent enough time explaining some of the dynamics from a home care point of view. I think if you look at the aggregate, I think that starts to give you a good picture in terms of where we are in.
On the second part of your question, I thought it was a very wide one. You talked leadership. You also talked portfolio. And you also talked the horizon of three to five years. Tough to answer all of them in a results call. I think there are more opportunities. Let me put it this way. There are a couple of spots where we have more work to do. As Sanjiv said, in oral care, where Close-Up has been doing well. Pepsodent is still a bit of work in progress. Naturals, there is a bit of work in progress for us. So that's one cell I think we have more work. If you look at deodorants and mild toiletries, again, a small part of our business, work to be done.
But if you see, I think the bigger opportunity is in the whole space of how do we digitize, how do we reimagine HUL? And there's a comprehensive program. And I think if we do that well, it will augur very well and set us up for future. So to be honest, for us, it's less about some of the troubled cells, but it's really about reimagining the company to capture the growth opportunities. And I think that's where our focus is. I know you have some more strategic questions. I would suggest you connect with our investor relations team, and they will be able to give you better and more detailed perspectives.
Sure, sir. If I can add this last question, is that in terms of the margin, just continuing from the previous analysis left, in terms of the while it is, of course, difficult to increase the price when the raw material inflation is very high, do you think the initial signs of reducing promotion, which has already started from January, which actually results into the higher margins?
So, Rajesh, there are multiple levers to play margins. There is MIG. There is DRIVE. There is terms of trade. There is savings agenda. There is overheads. We will continue to do all of that. And we will continue to drive them. Yeah? So there is no one short answer to it. But suffice us to say, we look at all levers. Yeah?
Agreed, sir.
We are conscious of time. I think we also want to take some questions from the web. Amit, if you either way, I can just access it here to pick them up, please, and I can answer. Just one second.
Yeah. Hold on, please. Yeah. So there were questions which came from Vikas Maheshwari as an individual investor. Ideally, I don't answer questions of individual investors on this call. But I think having discussed, there was a question of what is the growth ex GSK? I think you've clarified that excluding GSK, 7% of our USG, 4% is really our UVG, underlying volume growth. So Kirit Kapadia has asked a question, why is the company not taking strong legal action against Sebamed? I think, Kirit, we have taken all legal options. We have taken some of them, and we are also exploring others.
More importantly, we are also taking many actions to educate our consumers because soap is not all about pH. It's about cleansing, and it's also about care. And I think we are doing all the right actions to educate the consumers and communicate our proposition. And you will see more of this going forward. Hasmukh Visharia from SUD Life wanted a color on the growth of the home care subcategories. And I think we have covered that, Hasmukh. Chetan Gindodi from Alfa Accurate Advisors, recent pricing action suggests that focus has shifted from margin improvement to sales growth and market share.
Is there a strategic shift for the company's targets? Does this mean that the margins will remain flat for the next three years? Chetan, we have discussed this in detail. We have discussed this in terms of what is the focus for the next couple of quarters and the rationale for it. I also said that we are committed to a model which is competitive growth and modest margin expansion. But for the next couple of quarters or two, I think we have a clear priority in terms of getting growth while protecting our business model. And that's an important one I keep reiterating.
Protecting the business model means trying to hold it where we are with a certain flex. We are not talking about diluting big. We are not talking about expanding big. Yeah. Important to understand that because we have healthy margins. Our model is one of growth which is competitive and growth which is profitable. Rashmi Utmal from Novazymes has congratulated me. Thank you. She's absolutely said more power to team Sanjiv. For sure. I continue to be always invested into this business and proud of this business. I absolutely agree to more power to Sanjiv team at HUL.
Chetan, I think we have discussed home care in detail. Your question again was on decline on fabric care. Alok Shah from Ambit Capital, has sequential rural growth remained at similar levels or has it decelerated? Would the company focus more on ad spend or channel trade spend and promotions? I think on the first part, rural has continued to be growing well and has been resilient and has been growing in double digits. I think that has held so far. With regard to our spends, look, while the principle is in an environment like this, we would want to give value to the consumers.
We would definitely want to invest behind our brands. That's always been our philosophy. But we will also make sure that our spends in channels are competitive. And with respect to promotions, we will not flinch if we need to do something to defend. And there are certain promotions. Not all of them are bad. They serve purposes of brand growth, channel expansion. And in those cases, we also lead promotions. But if I were to give a priority in an inflationary environment, I will say value to the consumers and invest behind our brands would be, let's say, our first two steps.
Rohit Chordia from White Oak, could you please spend some time on a few brands that have delivered subpar or below our performance in the past few years? Lux, Lifebuoy, Breeze, Lever Ayush, Citra, Pure Derm, and Pepsodent. And what are the learnings? Again, it's a wide question for me to pick it up, Rohit. A couple of headlines, and then we can discuss more of this, hopefully, soon when we'll have an investor conference. Lux has actually picked up quite a bit. Lifebuoy has been stellar performance in the last 12, 18 months.
So therefore, I think Lifebuoy clearly with investments behind product, communication, the benefit that it does has done extremely well. Lux, I think we clarified with some of the relaunch going through with some of the product changes happening, has picked up growth. Yes, clearly there are learnings from Lever Ayush and some of the aspects of Citra and Pure Derm. We are building that into our innovation pipeline, but happy to pick it up when we have a further discussion in the course of our investor conference. So there's a detailed question from Susmit Patodia on Motilal on margins on the GSK bit.
Susmit, may I request you to connect with Amit and the investor relations team, and they will actually be able to address it in detail. Chirag Shah from CLSA, thanks, Chirag, for your good wishes. Yes, most of the hopefully questions have been answered, and thankful for that. It's heartening to see 3.4 lakh onboarded on Shikhar and 6X increase in average. Where do we go from here given the SBI tie-up would have multiple incentives? On ground has SBI help gain acceleration in retail. Big opportunity if you are able to onboard more stores into Shikhar.
Big opportunity if you are able to drive adoption. Clearly then starts to help us get a better demand signal, gets us to service the demand within a certain periodicity, addresses the needs of the retail shop in terms of space and capital. The SBI tie-up is an important element and a leg for us. So in the last couple of months, we have done a lot of work with SBI in terms of getting the technology right in trying to make it simple and seamless for a retailer. It's important that a retail shopkeeper is not the same as you and I. So therefore, there are elements of speed. There are elements of simplicity.
We are piloting in a couple of cities. The traction is picking up, but definitely more to be done. And once we have the solution come through well, it will definitely aid Shikhar. It will also definitely aid growth. Just a clarification from Mihir Shah from Nomura. Just a clarification on GSK SAP. This was expected to conclude in January February, and GSK's portfolio was to get access to its distribution. If you can throw light on where is this in this journey and what percentage of benefits have been captured? So I think I covered some of this in detail in reference to a question from Warren from Barclays.
As far as the IT integration is concerned, we have two important phases. Phase one happens in February when we do the first transition to the SAP system of the financials and the operations. And in the middle of the year is when we will actually start to bring in the full suite of the CD solutions because CD solutions are bolt-on solutions and cover the whole aspects of coverage and assortment and data and analytics. They come in on board. So that will happen towards the middle of the year.
In parallel, we are working through our full distributor strategy, and multiple levers will start to play out as we move into the second half of the year. If I now look at Amit Purohit from InCred, it's heartening to see launches in the premium segment. Could you please provide some insights into the economy brand in each of these categories since rural is witnessing strong growth after many quarters? So I think, Amit, the good news here is that we got a very robust portfolio which actually covers the full segments, whether it is from a price perspective or whether it's benefit.
And therefore, if you see, I also spoke about some sachet offerings coming in nutrition. We also talked about big focus on our Shakti channel. There is also big focus in terms of rural activation and the assets that we have created. From a portfolio perspective, we continue to always look at a pack price architecture, and we continue to introduce formats which are more amenable for rural. In a manner, we are blessed that in most of our portfolio, I think we are well positioned there. I think if we continue to execute it well, we will start to see benefits.
Having said that, we continue to look at opportunities. Premium is an interesting space. I think that's important to capture. Health, hygiene, nutrition is an important space and a space to capture. Mihir Shah from Nomura. During lockdown, there were many cost savings like travel and logistics. Have these costs started to come back? Any structural cost savings ex GSK that we can continue? So Mihir, many aspects to it. Travel, logistics are some aspects. So obviously, we are not spending back at those levels. COVID also brought a lot of on-costs because of safety, health, hygiene.
Hopefully, with cases coming down, some of those costs will also start to come off. And to be honest, we would like to invest back in some of the travel and logistics for our people because we need more feet on the street. We need more of our salespeople on ground to capture the demand. And as far as savings is concerned, and again, we need to invest, we had a lot of reimagined HUL capabilities. As far as savings is concerned, I think we've continued to run always a comprehensive program, one of the best within Unilever in terms of driving synergies, what we have called as Project Symphony.
I think that continues to give us a lot of joy and juice. Our scale gives us lots of benefits. Our ability to use data and analytics gives us lots of benefits. I think a combination of all of that is that, look, it's a way of life for us. Like we think about brands, like we think about channels the same way we think about really generating the fuel for growth, and we continue to use all of this. And as we said, look, once we get a profitable volume growth model enabled for fuel for growth, I think that's when our magic of competitive, responsible, profitable, and sustainable growth happens.
So broadly, that is where we were, so given that we are closer to seven, I would hand it over to Amit to try and bring the call to a close. I'm sure we have addressed most of your questions. This time, we actually made a deliberate effort between Sanjiv and I to cover many of them upfront. And having said that, if there are questions which are still remaining with you, do reach out to Amit and our investor relations team, and they will do their best to answer them for you. Amit, over to you.
Thank you, Sanjiv. With that, now we come to the end of Q&A session. Before we end, let me again remind you that a replay of the event and the transcript will be available on investor relations website in a short while, and you can go back and refer to it. A copy of results and presentation, if not with you, is also already available on the website, and you can go back and refer to the same. With that, we'd like to draw this call to a close. So thank you, everyone, for your participation, and have a great evening ahead. Stay safe, stay well. Thank you.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, on behalf of Hindustan Unilever Limited, that concludes this conference. We thank you all for joining us, and you may now disconnect.