Good morning, and very Welcome to Essity's audio presentation of Second Quarter 2024 results. My name is Sandra Åberg, Head of Investor Relations, and joining today are our CEO, Magnus Groth, and our CFO, Fredrik Rystedt. Magnus and Fredrik will take us through the results. After that, you are very welcome with your questions. Now, I leave the line over to you, Magnus, please.
Thank you, Sandra, and welcome everyone to our quarter two interim report 2024. As a summary, Essity had a strong performance in the second quarter with high underlying volume growth, our highest EBITA operating result to date, with higher margins in all three business areas. We continue to show a solid cash flow, and not to forget, during the quarter, we announced a share buyback program and new ambitious financial targets. Summing up the numbers, organic sales growth was slightly down, -0.9%. Underlying, as I mentioned, we had the volume growth of 0.4%, but with the taking into account the restructuring that we've done in primarily professional hygiene and to some extent in health and medical, underlying volume growth was actually 2.9%.
EBITA, excluding IAC, as I said, it's the highest so far, close to SEK 3.4 billion, and increased with 17%, and our EBITA margin ended at 14.7%. I'd like to draw your attention to our return on capital employed development, which is not anymore one of our financial targets. But if you remember, our previous financial target was to achieve a return on capital employed above 17% in 2025, and this was including Vinda, and excluding Vinda, we said that that should be then above 18% because Vinda was a drag on return on capital employed. And we actually hit that 18 number and even 18.5 already in this quarter, so the target that we had actually had for next year.
Since we're now buying back shares, it could be interesting to look at the earnings per share growth, even though, of course, the impact from the share buyback program is very, very small so far. As you can see, there's an increase year over year of 37% there. Looking at the development then over the last number of quarters, it's clear to the left there, the sales and organic sales growth numbers, how we come out of a very inflationary environment and then a period of some extent lower costs, and now in the quarter, close to zero growth again, so a big pickup from Q1. Going forward, as our ambition is to continue to grow volumes, market shares with good margins, of course, we are aiming for continuing a positive growth trajectory.
EBITA and EBITA margin, I think that picture to the right there, graph, it talks for itself, the 14.7%, but actually good margins overall in the last number of quarters. So, a strong development over a number of quarters. Current market situation, just to put things in perspective here, of course, we had the inflationary environment, we had the costs, and then last year when costs were coming down and so on. Currently, I would say that market conditions are quite stable. There's nothing specific. We've seen a subdued consumer, consumers who are downtrading and to some extent, looking for savings. We see raw materials, energy, and so on, moving up and down a little bit. It doesn't impact us as much as it did before, and nothing really dramatic.
It's a business environment that's quite stable currently, and in those conditions, we are delivering these results. Just to remind also about the new financial targets since they were launched in the quarter, annual organic sales growth of above 3%, and EBITA margin excluding IAC about 15%, which we believe are very, very value-creating targets and that we're aiming to achieve in the midterm. Also in the quarter, we announced a share buyback program to allocate our strong operating cash flow, and we saw that also in the second quarter. Just underlining that, the buyback program amounted to SEK 3 billion until next year's AGM. We need a new AGM approval every year. Having said that, our ambition is to use share buyback as a recurring part of our capital allocation.
So, and that's, of course, something that we've never done before, and, and which is now part of our, our capital allocation going forward. So that's overall from a group level. I would like to quickly talk about the three business areas, starting with health and medical, that had strong development volumes, but also fantastic, I would say, EBITA and EBITA margin. So organic sales growth was overall 4.5%, coming both from volumes and higher prices and mix, so across the line. And as you can see, incontinence products, healthcare grew 3.8% and medical solution, 5.5%. Very good momentum here and a sharp improvement of EBITA and EBITA margin compared to a year ago.
I would like to say a few words about this, the little nice blue pack there on the picture to the right, because this is a product launch where we have seen some very, very positive initial reactions from customers and consumers. It's TENA ProSkin II, so it's a new pant launch where we have very, very strong claim. It absorbs 2x faster than our previous products, and it also stays drier for the skin for longer, which is very, very important, especially for people with fragile skin. So very strong claims, a clear upgrade, a new pack, and something that we believe will be very competitive going forward. But because, of course, pants is the biggest-it's not the biggest, but it's the fastest and most attractive part of the incontinence healthcare business.
Moving over to consumer goods, higher volumes in all categories, higher EBITDA and margins. Organic sales growth was slightly down -1.3%, even though we saw higher volumes in all categories, up 3.2%, while price mix was negative 4.5%, and this is more or less all related to price concessions that we did in consumer tissue last year in 2023, when our prices came down dramatically. Since then, they have moved up again. But this is then related to historic movements in our pricing. Looking at where the organic sales growth comes from, we are really happy to see that the incontinence products retail is increasing 9.7%. We have great momentum, but we also have a great go-to-market, good successful product launches, innovation.
So we're very, very competitive now in core retail. Also, in feminine care, continuing to see growth as well as in baby care, which just to mention, it's now very value creating also the baby category that we have where we have a very strong position in Europe. While consumer tissue was negative 4.7 on organic sales though, again, related to price. Higher EBITA and EBITA margin, nonetheless, EBITA up 1%, and EBITA margin up, ending on 12.4%. Another innovation there to the right, this is again, TENA, and it's again, pant. Also improved performance in many ways, but here we have completely other claims that appeal and attract consumers. Close body fit, comfort, and a more discreet design.
So it's a very good upgrade of our Silhouette pants range, which is again an important part of our incontinence retail business. Before moving on to professional hygiene, I'd just like to say something about market shares. There was a period when we were very much focused on margin enhancement, to some extent, to the detriment of market shares. But with our focus that we have now over the last year on regaining growth, volume growth, profitable growth, we are also starting to see a good improvement when it comes to market shares. We have been having 90% of our business now in the consumer goods category, so in the retail, baby, feminine, and consumer tissue. We have been able to retain number one and number two positions in 90% of our sales.
This has been the case over many years now, but what's really improved is the increasing shares, which is now almost half of the business, and actually, mostly related then to the feminine care, incontinence care retail, and baby care. And if you include also stable shares to increasing, we are achieving 70%, which, which is a good improvement over a year ago or two years ago also. It's showing that all our efforts, investments, are really paying off in market share growth in the key categories where we want to grow. Finally, professional hygiene. Again, good underlying volume growth, higher EBITA and margin. Organic sales growth was down 3.9%, price mix was up 3%, and volumes were down, actually, now because of the restructuring that we did a year ago, so a tough comparison here.
Excluding the restructuring, we actually had positive volumes of 1.4%. This means that the overall volume impact from the restructuring in the quarter was a bit over 8%. Going forward, we will continue to see a negative impact from professional hygiene, but in the third quarter, it will be around 6% instead of a bit lower rate, and then again, somewhat lower in the fourth quarter before then lapping that impact. Higher EBITDA, 18% increase with a margin that's also on very attractive levels, 19.2%, and a good improvement over last year. Again, talking about the innovations, we continue to build on our unique compression technology, which has great benefits for everyone handling our tissue products. This is a compressed multi-fold hand towel.
It increases the capacity in the dispensers, it reduces logistics costs, transport costs, take less space. So a very straightforward value creating example of an innovation that we have, where we continue to launch broader and broader assortment. With that, I'd like to hand over to Fredrik to dig into the numbers in more detail. Over to you, Fredrik.
Thank you, Magnus, and I will perhaps sum up a bit what you have been mentioning, looking at the group in total, and as you've said, Magnus, we had a very strong growth of 2.9% underlying, and of course, especially so in health and medical, with 4.4%, and consumer goods with 3.2%. But growth in pretty much all the categories, or actually all of them, and good volume growth, and of course, not least in incontinence, healthcare, and retail, and also medical, so quite, quite proud of that. You mentioned if you look at the total, you can see it on the slide, that restructuring and exits in professional hygiene and incontinence had an impact of -2.5%, which is basically similar to that of the impact we also had in Q1.
This is mainly professional hygiene. Looking at the professional hygiene business area, as you said, Magnus, -8.3%, and for health and medical, 1.2%. If we look forward to Q3, the incontinence impact will basically be gone, so there will be no such impact looking at Q3 and onwards. But PH will remain at roughly about 6% for the business area in Q3, and even lower than in Q4. Looking at Q3 for the group, that 6% in professional hygiene has a group impact in Q3 of roughly about -1.6%.
Price mix -1.3%, and this is relating to price, and as Magnus already alluded to, this is mainly related to the price concessions we did in consumer tissue in 2023, on the back of falling input cost at the time. Sequentially, we actually have an increase in price. And that amounted sequentially to 0.4%. So the current momentum in pricing is actually positive. And the positive mix component is primarily driven by professional hygiene, but we do have a positive mix development in pretty much all of our different categories. And looking at the EBITA margin bridge, obviously, we saw a very strong improvement in gross profit versus the same period in 2023.
If we look at it sequentially, we remained on the same gross profit level as we had in Q1. Despite increasing input cost between the quarters, we remain at the same gross profit margins. The price cost gap, obviously a big part of that. It was favorable for all business areas, and we had a good pricing discipline throughout all of our different areas. We had another quarter of good efficiency gains in cost of goods sold, and this is coming from pretty much all areas. It's procurement discounts, changing suppliers or better negotiations. Material rationalization is a big part. We still have, of course, obviously, the restructuring gains in professional hygiene, and there is a general improvement in the efficiency in our manufacturing and warehouses. We've previously mentioned that we expect...
We did that in Q1. We expect a COGS savings for the full year of pretty close to SEK 1 billion. Now, obviously, as you can see, the performance has been very strong in the first couple of quarters, so it's quite clear that we will deliver more than SEK 1 billion. However, just worth mentioning that we expect the pace to slow down here in the third and the fourth quarter of this year, but once again, clearly very positive picture. We continue, and this is very much in line with our previous statements in previous quarters. We've continued to invest more in A&P, and this is very much in line with our ambition to fuel that profitable growth.
Of course, as you can see, that had an impact on margin of 70 basis points, and we now have approximately 5-5.5% of net sales in A&P spending. If you look at SG&A, excluding A&P, that increased 110 basis points. It's a lower impact than what you saw in Q1, and, but still, it is a high, high impact on the back of the inflationary environment that we saw previously more, so this is gradually coming down a bit. But we also continue to spend quite a lot, primarily in digitalization of the group. It's not a matter of number of people. In fact, if you look at the number of employees compared to one year ago, we're actually slightly fewer employees.
Turning to cash flow, it's a very good development, as you can see on the slide. Normally, Q2 is quite negative, and this is due to a negative development to working capital. But this is not something unusual. This relates to the fact that we, in Q2, always pay the bonuses for the previous year. So most of the working capital development is related to that, and the rest is a bit higher inventory value because we see higher input cost, and therefore the value of the inventory increases. So if you'd look at it in terms of cover days, we're pretty much in very good shape and similar to that of Q1. CapEx remains on pretty or similar levels as we've seen before, but we'll see a gradual increase now in Q3 and Q4.
And if we look at the full year, we expect the full year CapEx number to be in the range of SEK 7 billion-SEK 8 billion, somewhere in that ballpark. And finally, then, we have, despite, you can say, that working capital impact that I showed you on the previous page, we have continued to deleverage and further lowered our net debt position. The share buyback was, of course, launched very late in the quarter, so we have purchased shares to, or our agent has purchased shares to a value a bit over SEK 100 million, so it has had a marginal impact. But despite all of that, we have continued to deleverage and of course, also reached a lower net debt to EBITDA. It's actually slightly below 1.3 that you see on this slide. With those words, I'll leave over to you, Magnus.
Thanks, Fredrik, and I would just sum up with a slide, which is, I think, highlighting our equity story. We have a strong market position in attractive and growing markets around the world. We have leading brands, as I've been showing, but of course, not only in consumer goods, but also in professional hygiene and in health and medical, both in health and in medical, and we have a very strong launch funnel for new innovation. We continue to keep sustainability in focus, and we have a winning corporate culture, maybe most important of all. We have a very motivated and engaged team, and in general, among our 36 employees, high ambitions and high engagement, and a very strong financial position to build from. So I think the second quarter of 2024 is a proof point for this equity story and business case.
Then I would like to invite you or to save the date for the Capital Markets Day that we're planning to have on the third of December, later this year, in our fantastic multi-category production site in Valls, close to Barcelona, in Spain. It's a site where we produce both personal care and tissue products, and this is a picture here just from inaugurating a new machine there, in the background. But, it will be an opportunity for you to see the site, meet our people, meet our new, to a large extent, new executive management team, compared to last time when we had a face-to-face Capital Markets Day, which was actually in 2019, so a long time ago, another reason to do this.
And also, of course, to talk more about our new financial target, the path forward, and also an opportunity to visit our global transportation, logistics, and planning hub in Barcelona, where we are seeing a huge benefit from digitalization, both today and going forward. So welcome very much, save the date for our Capital Markets Day on December 3. With that, I would like to open up for questions.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, if you would like to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone keypad. Thank you. We will now take our first question from Charles Eden of UBS. Your line is open. Please go ahead.
Hi, good morning. Thanks for taking my question. I've got two, please, and it's probably one for each of you. So Fredrik, on the EBITA bridge for Q2, which you show on page three of the press release, the tailwind from cost of goods sold is of nearly SEK 1.7 billion. I appreciate there's sort of SEK 400 million benefit from cost savings, which leaves around SEK 1.3 billion from presumably raw mats and energy. Can you help us understand how much of a benefit energy was here? Because I'd have thought raw materials wouldn't have been a major tailwind, given pulp price trends earlier in this year, but perhaps you're getting some significant rebates from pulp suppliers we need to consider. So sort of any help you can kind of give us with the moving parts there.
Second question, probably for you, Magnus, is just looking at sort of the over 15% adjusted EBITA margin target, which you gave us a few weeks ago for the medium term. Do you see scope for overshooting that 15% level? I appreciate sort of it's quite early after bringing the targets in, because if I look at Q2, you're already at 14.7% margin, and I'd expect continued cost savings, operating leverage from volumes, mix to all continue to favorably contribute going forward. Now, health and medical margins might be at the upper end of the range you'd expect, but probably some scope for profitability improvement in consumer goods. So should we view that 15% margin level as a floor target rather than an ambition? Maybe you can expand on that. Thank you so much.
Yeah, Charles,
Fredrik, do you want to start?
Yeah, I'll be happy to. So I think your question was more specifically on energy, which in the number of SEK 1.7 billion, as you mentioned, was SEK 460 million. So it was a very positive movement compared to last year. We had actually lower raw material cost of a bit over SEK 900 million, totally, just market movement. And of course, obviously, this is gradually gonna turn the other way, and sequentially it's already happened. So we'll see, of course, higher raw material as we call. And the remaining part is exactly, as you say, the cost savings of yeah, close to SEK 400 million. So that's basically the bridge.
Okay, Charles, then over to your second question. We believe that achieving over 15% adjusted EBITA margin, including RIC, it's quite ambitious. Is it a target or a floor? We haven't set a date for achieving this, other than saying that we expect to be there in the medium term. But of course, just the fact that we haven't set a date means that in the medium to long term, we would like to be about 15%. I mean, that's what we say. And it's. I don't see it as easy or obvious. I mean, it's a good quarter we just presented, of course, with 14.17% operating margin. I'm really happy about that.
Most businesses in most geographies, I would say almost all businesses in all geographies are doing well. And so kind of firing on all cylinders from that perspective, in quiet, stable market conditions, there's nothing special, really, one way or the other, as I already said. I mean, typically, maybe, there are challenges to it, one in one or the other places. So I think that achieving about 15% in the medium term is still a very ambitious target.
That's great. Thank you both, and congratulations.
Thank you, and we'll now take our next question from Patrick Folan of Barclays. Your line is open. Please go ahead.
Good morning, Magnus and Fredrik. A few questions from me, please. First, just thinking about your new pricing contracts and ability to cover raw material inflation. Q2 would have been the first quarter we should have seen this in action, but price mix in health and medical was lower quarter-over-quarter, and looks like professional hygiene pricing was stable. So how should we think about your pricing dynamics in the second half, knowing, as you just said, that some of your raw material costs flowing through will be higher? And secondly, within professional hygiene, you gave good color on how we should think about the restructuring phasing in the second half in terms of the impact to volumes. How should we think about the underlying volume performance, excluding restructuring?
What is driving that growth in Q2, and what will support that in the second half? And this is my last one, just on the Capital Markets Day in December, what should we expect to hear? What kind of categories will you be focusing on? What, you know, innovation will you be talking about? Is there any geographic focus to keep in mind? Thank you very much.
Yeah. So starting then with the new pricing, considering raw material. In general, in the group, we're quite happy with our prices and the price cost gap in general, and believe that we will be able to manage that also going forward. As stated a few times, of course, margins are fantastic in Health & Medical and in Professional Hygiene in the quarter. But no need for major changes there, really, going forward. We manage the price cost gap just as we go along. Where we need to raise prices, it's specifically in Consumer Tissue, and that's ongoing. It's so that the increasing costs that we see quarter-over-quarter sequentially, it's all related really to Consumer Tissue, and we are in negotiations also to compensate for that.
But again, this has less an impact now on the group for two reasons. One is we buy half as much tissue, pulp as a year ago, and secondly, we are much faster and much more agile, and we will be able to compensate in one or two quarters, changes in input, costs also in consumer goods. So, that's the dynamics there. Professional hygiene restructuring, we're really, really focused in general on increasing volumes, considering the nice margins that we have, and specifically in professional hygiene, very much with a focus then on our strategic systems, where we have the proprietary dispenser technologies, where we know we create a lot of value for our customers and where we have high gross margins.
And the mix or improvement that you see in the margin jump, that you see in Professional Hygiene, is, to a large extent, related to shedding the restructuring that we did a year ago, but also now focusing all our resources in Professional Hygiene on the remaining high-margin business. And, and, I mean, we'll just see how that plays out going forward, but that's what we're striving for, to have a growth and both the organic sales growth and, and volume growth in, in Professional Hygiene. Capital Markets Day, let's, we'll be back, of course, with a more detailed agenda.
I think our planning right now is to cover the entire company, since we'll have time, since it's a face-to-face meeting on our side, and also gives time for you to meet and talk to many employees in the company, from the MT and other experts. But we'll get back with more detail on the program, and of course, appreciate any input you might have.
Super. Thank you, Magnus.
Thank you, and we'll now move on to our next question from Victoria Nice of Bernstein. Your line is open. Please go ahead.
Hi there. Good morning, everyone. I just wondered if you could come back to better help us understand the impact in the EBITA deviation from raw materials specifically. Just how can we reconcile that, reconcile that with the higher pulp prices year-on-year, which typically hit the P&L with a 45-day lag, I think, based on what you said previously? The remainder of your inputs are seemingly quite stable, or perhaps was there some benefit when it comes to oil-based inputs? Or is it actually that the lag on pulp has increased from when it hits the PNL, or are you actually just working through some lower-priced inventory? So just trying to reconcile the delivery in the quarter with the prices that we see.
And then just wanted to clarify, did you say that raw materials will turn into a drain on the EBITA deviation year on year from Q3? If you could just sort of help us with that. And then just how we should be thinking about that pricing in consumer tissue, is that something that we will start to see building from Q3? Appreciate, obviously, it's a lot quicker than it was previously, but, or basically, could it be something that we might have to wait until Q4 to see? Thanks so much.
I'll take your last question and then leave the first kind of three to Fredrik. So, we should start seeing some benefits from price increases in the third quarter, but most of it in Q4, that's when they actually finish, which is very, very fast considering that raw materials, in this case, relating to consumer tissue, have kind of gradually increased now for a few quarters. So, that's our plan, to be fully back in Q4. I hand over to you, Fredrik, to answer about the EBITA bridge again.
Yeah, thanks, thanks, Magnus. Hi, Victoria. I'll be happy to try at least, but it's generally, of course, it's always a bit trickier to explain the differences, because last year we had a falling trend of pulp, which can kind of continue throughout the year, and this year it's just vice versa. So when we compare quarter to quarter, of course, you gotta kinda think of what actually happened last year. So to give you a bit of perspective, we had more or less, you can say, in comparison then to Q2 2023, not that much impact from pulp, actually. It was rather the same level.
Now, obviously, as I already mentioned, if you compare Q1 to Q2, or Q2 to Q1 this year, then pulp price is obviously up a lot. So in comparison to last year, pulp is really not the major factor. We also had a positive impact from, as an example, recycled fiber. Oil-based material was very positive. There was a lot of positive impact, as I already mentioned, from the cost savings. So there is no magic to it, and obviously, as you already mentioned here, we see now pulp cost, of course, coming through very much sequentially, and that will further then impact in Q3. So if you look at Q3, in Q3, generally, COGS will be higher. It's as simple as that.
Thank you. Just if that will turn into a drain on the EBITA bridge?
Yes, yes, that's exactly right.
Thanks very much. Super helpful.
Thank you, and we'll now move on to our next question from Niklas Ekman of Carnegie. Your line is open. Please go ahead.
Yeah, I'm sorry to follow up on, there's been a lot of questions here on raw material prices and into H2. I'm just wondering, because you sound very confident on margins here, but given the quite massive increase, I mean, when I look at the pulp prices, they're up some 60% compared to the trough one year ago. We're close to peak levels as far as I can see. So you talk about the quite stable environment. Isn't there a clear risk that you could see temporary margin pressure in H2? Or, can you please just elaborate a little bit more on that? Are these price hikes that you're talking about sufficient to kind of mitigate this, given that you're coming from a fairly high starting point here in Q2 with a 14.7% margin?
Yes, I mean, that's, I think you're describing the challenge in a good way. And we'll do our best to manage the price cost gap. That's all I can say. And I also mentioned, I think, to Victoria here, that we still have a lag, not only in how input costs actually affects us, but also in our ability to bring that forward to customers, especially when there's a gradual increase, as we've seen now over a couple of quarters. So yeah, that's the challenge, and that's what we'll do our best to mitigate and feel confident that we are much better in doing that than we have been historically, and that the overall exposure from a group perspective is less than it has been.
Okay. Very, very good. Thank you. Secondly, any news on the bond dispute? Any claims that have come through, or anything else that we need to know?
No.
There is nothing more than what we have previously communicated there.
Very good. Thank you. Thanks for taking my questions.
Thank you, and we'll now take our next question from Linus Larsson of SEB. Your line is open. Please go ahead.
Thank you very much, and good morning to everyone. If I may, just one more follow-up on consumer goods. If we look on a sequential basis, do I understand you right, that you are indeed expecting? input costs to increase, that's Q3 on Q2. But price compensation, you are rather seeing the impact in the fourth quarter. That's my first question. And then secondly, on volumes, I was positively surprised, actually, both in health and medical and consumer goods. Both grew by 3.2% year-on-year. And I just wanted to understand the drivers behind that and where we are in terms of advertising and promotion. Anything, you know, suggesting that we're above some kind of short-term trend or below some kind of short-term trend in terms of volume growth? If you could just put some color on that, would be very helpful. Thank you.
Fredrik, you want to talk about cost in Q3 and prices and kind of?
I think, I'll be happy to, Magnus and Linus, I think actually Magnus said it before. We have, we've said it many time. Now we're talking about a lot of raw material here. There, there's so much other things to talk about, but, we've said it many times, we always compensate cost increases, and we will do that this time as well. There is a time lag, and historically, that's been 3-5 quarters, now it's 1-2. So obviously, there is always a bit of time lag, but we always compensate cost increases. So I think you've already said, we've already said it, basically.
Okay, your second question, if I understood it correctly, is this growth where the volumes, price mix, in the other business areas. Thanks for talking about the fantastic development in professional hygiene and not least, health and medical. Maybe I would even mention health and medical as a golden egg, since I've seen that term being used, sometimes about med tech, other med tech companies. But of course, great development there. I think I mean, I can only reiterate that our ambition is to grow volumes, market shares with the healthy margins that we have, and that would be a balance going forward.
We will have elevated, not elevated, we'll have A&P levels, which are we see today because we see very clearly drives growth, and we also invest in our sales and marketing performance in digitalization and so on. You know, that's on, we think we can do that with the margin levels that we have, so it's very difficult to be more specific.
Great. Thank you.
Thank you. As a reminder, once again, ladies and gentlemen, if you would like to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone keypad. Thank you. We will now move on to our next question from Oskar Lindström of Danske Bank. Your line is open. Please go ahead.
Yes, good morning. Two questions from me. The first one is on pricing. Now, you, you've said that you're currently raising prices for consumer tissue to compensate for higher costs, which are coming from pulp during H2. But earlier on, you talked about sort of a positive price momentum, and I understood that to be generally. So could you perhaps say something a little bit more about sort of what's happening with pricing in your business outside of consumer tissue? You know, is it price mix, you know, other factors? So that's my first question. And the second question is on professional hygiene, which has seen quite a bit of volatility, you know, with the restructuring that you had last year.
Should we view the current margin level as the sort of new normal or base level after the, you know, with the restructuring completed? Yeah, those are my two questions.
Yeah, I can start, and hand over to you about PH, Fredrik. Pricing outside consumer goods, it's in general, we're quite happy with the, you know, the current price levels. There's not, maybe there was a misunderstanding. I wasn't talking about strong price momentum, maybe specifically outside of consumer goods. I was talking about a good management of the price cost gap, so really adapting pricing to the circumstances in each area. And I don't see a big need for price increases actually outside of consumer tissue in any of our other businesses. It's pretty good. Of course, we will continue to, through innovation and new launches, to achieve higher pricing and better mix also going forward for the long term.
But then in the short term, it's all, it's of course, the pricing impacts are more or less promotion. I think the teams are doing this in a very responsible way. So it's... You know, so I'm happy about how that's developing, but there's not a strong focus right now on increasing prices outside of consumer tissue. Fredrik, over to you about PH and current margin level, and if that's sustainable and so on.
Yeah, Oskar, hi. You started by saying it's been a bit volatile, and of course, it's related partly to the restructuring and the impact there. But generally speaking, I think the professional hygiene business has been very stable. Now, obviously, the margin we have in the second quarter is historically very high, and I think you used the word, Magnus, fire in all cylinders. So it's very difficult to give forecasts on margin. We're very happy and pleased with the professional hygiene margin, and of course, it's been further helped this quarter by very good savings in COGS, as we've already talked about. But of course, margins are very high, and time will tell as we go forward.
Thank you. Maybe a third question, if I may. Again, just following up on pulp to clarify this. Did you say that there was no quarter-on-quarter impact from higher pulp prices on your costs in Q2, and that we should instead expect this to hit during Q3? Is that?
Yeah, no. Understand? Oskar, I said when you look at this quarter, Q2, versus last year, the same period, so compared to one year ago, the impact was pretty flat. When you look at the sequential impact, it was quite significant.
Right. So it's still the 45-day delay, you know, the pulp price hitting your costs, that you've had historically?
Yeah, pretty much. You got a bit of process time, but largely, yes. Yeah.
There's no inventory, you know, that you're using up or having costs impacted by any such volatility?
Yeah, there is always that— that's you're referring to well, that's 45 days... You're referring to inventory revaluation, I guess, Oskar, and of course, that's just a delay in the impact, and of course, we have that. As that happens every time cost goes up, you got a bit of a kind of mitigating or positive impact, and when pulp cost comes down, you got the opposite. So there is always that delay in the cost impact. So we'll... Of course, that's part of the movement that we see now in Q2 versus Q1, but we'll also see that in Q3 versus Q2. So obviously, sequentially higher pulp cost.
Right. Thank you very much. No problem. Then I'm happy with my questions.
Thank you, and we'll now take our next question from Jeremy Fialko of HSBC. Your line is open. Please go ahead.
Okay. Hi, morning. Couple of questions from me. So first of all, just a clarification: When we look at the profit bridge for Q3, were you saying that the, you know, that SEK 1.6 billion would swing into a negative number, or are you simply saying that, you know, it will be a smaller positive, year-on-year in Q3? I just was not clear from the previous answer to a question, what you had meant. And then the second question is on the mix that you're getting in professional hygiene. That, yeah, that does look very, very good. So perhaps you could go into a bit more detail on that, and whether you think that the...
You know, the fact that basically the price mix was mostly coming from mix, that type of 3% number, whether you think that is genuinely quite sustainable, given the sort of innovations that you are bringing into the market at the moment? Thanks.
Fredrik, you want to start, and I'll take the next question?
Yeah, I'm not really exactly sure what was unclear there. As I said, we have sequentially, and that's basically what we're guiding on. We are sequentially going to see higher cost, and of course, we'll have a year-on-year negative impact, but largely, sequentially, it is, it's what we typically guide on, and COGS will be higher in the third quarter versus the second. If you look at, I mean, I think you're asking, if I get your question right, exactly how is Q3 2024 versus Q3 of 2023. Was that your question specifically?
Yeah, that was right. Exactly. Yeah. Some color on that.
Exactly. And it will turn slightly to the negative or stable, but sequentially, significantly then higher on COGS, as I've said before. So just to, Is that clear? Because we've got the question now a couple of times here.
Of course, yeah, COGS is not only pulp prices, it's also energy.
Exactly. We are guiding on COGS, and of course, a big part of that change of COGS is relating to pulp. So let's just be super clear. If you look at sequential, COGS will be higher, mainly driven by pulp. And then if you look at it, year on year, so Q3 versus 2024 versus Q3, slightly negative, and of course, the shift there also mainly driven by pulp.
Okay, but then maybe potentially energy could still be a positive in Q3 year-on-year?
Yes.
Okay, that's much clearer. Thank you.
Okay.
Thanks for that clarification.
Yeah. So I appreciate all these questions. When you have big swing and short cycles, again, you mentioned the trend that, yeah, of course, last year, pulp started coming down significantly, now they're coming up again. So it doesn't make it easy with the year-over-year comparisons. It's almost, o h, yeah, it's almost easier to talk sequentially. But of course, we need to look at it year-over-year also. But it's a bit complicated in specifically consumer tissue. I think in the other categories, it's much more stable, as I mentioned several times.
When it comes to professional hygiene, we had a big one-time mix improvement by the restructuring, because if you remember, the capacities that we took out were all kind of low margin businesses, so some even unbranded or very basic qualities with low gross margins and low operating margins. So just the restructuring, we said at the time, it would have a significant contribution to margins for professional hygiene, and that's exactly what we're seeing. So it's a big one-time step up of a few percentage points. Then our ambition is to continue to grow the high margin strategic parts of the business, even if it's a higher share now, but that would be more of a step kind step-by-step process going forward.
Okay, thanks very much. Mm-hmm.
Thank you. We'll now take our next question from Karel Zoete of Kepler Cheuvreux. Your line is open. Please go ahead.
Yes, good morning, thanks for taking the question. I have two questions and one follow-up. The first one is on your retail Inco business growing at 10% in the quarter, so quite strong. Can you comment on some of the regional trends where you've been doing well? And then the other question is basically on the focus on growth. We're seeing now growth coming through. It's been a priority, as you set out at the start of the year. What changes have you made when it comes to targets for the sales team, speeding up innovation, et cetera? How we see the marketing investments, but what other changes have been instrumental here? So those are the questions. Thank you.
Okay. Yeah, starting with the retail, Inco, we see positive development across the geography, EU, Latin America, and the U.S., and we have a strong focus on pants. We just have been now number one in Brazil, that I mentioned before, maybe, I mean, Brazil, we entered 10 years ago. We've grown organically now to be the number one. It's the world's sixth largest hygiene market, and just now we think we also became the number one in Brazilian pants, which again is a top priority, just as an example. We're also seeing some positive signs for the first time in a long time in the U.S., where we are doing really well online, and not least on Amazon.
And then in the EU, we are really, really recovering from, from you know, a tough number of years with intense competition, both from branded and private label competitors. And this is really that we have continued to upgrade our assortment, our go-to-market, our pricing strategies, you know, all over. So, it's a very good feeling to see that that's paying off actually everywhere. But I would say the biggest improvement in this quarter comes from the EU, and but we also see positive development in Latin and in the U.S. And then when it comes to growth, it has very much to do with incentives.
We make sure that our sales incentives and so on, then, are more towards growth, but of course, always with the caveat that it has to be profitable growth with the retained margins. We can see that the investments we're doing in A&P, and we've done a lot of other changes in our go-to-market. In Health & Medical, we've done a complete revamp of the entire organization, entire go-to-market. So we are a much faster and more agile, but also actually leaner organization than before. But it's also done extensive sales training, and it's all these things combined that that's helping us currently.
Okay.
We have better system support. I mean, we do thousands of tenders in healthcare and in medical every year, and we have better system support to make sure that we are setting prices correct and that we are competitive. Also, of course, the pickup in medical, I mean, we haven't spoken about that specifically, but especially in wound care, advanced wound care, and in orthopedics, we are doing really, really well. Again, the result of a lot of hard work over several years.
All right. Interesting. And then I have 1 follow-up question, because we had a lot of questions already on pricing, on lag, on bill cost, et cetera, et cetera. But you also started by saying that you're in a more stable environment nowadays. Does that kinda suggest that your gross margins, quarter-over-quarter, we should see far less swings than before? And then and can you say much about the anticipation for margins in the coming 1 to 2 quarters? I know it's a bit specific, but yeah.
Yeah, I mean, we got, again, we I think we have tried to provide as much color as we can for the next couple of quarters. And, of course, my job is to be very much focused also on the long-term trend, and we, I showed some longer term developments that are quite positive, then it could always swing between individual quarters, and that's why we don't give forecasts, depending on, timing of pricing and costs and, so on. So, I don't really have more clarity to give there. Our long-term, focus, our long-term investment and efforts are clear, and I'm sure they will continue to pay off year-over-year, over year, going forward. But of course, it could be variations in individual quarters.
All right. Thank you.
Thanks. Yeah, we're closing in here on, on 10 o'clock, so maybe we have time for one more question.
Sure. We'll now take our next question from Tom Sykes of Deutsche Bank. Your line is open. Please go ahead.
Yeah, thank you. Morning, everybody. Just to follow up on the professional commentary you've made, please. I mean, the, the drop-through was very high to 440 basis points of gross margin, 360 at EBITA. I think your EBIT, sorry, your SG&A is up maybe a couple of %. Is, is there any or are there any costs that you need to put back in to, to boost the growth in the professional hygiene business? Or for the next six to 12 months, is the SG&A level going to see limited increase? And then when you obviously, you're expanding the categories there, you, you seem to maybe be providing some things that you don't actually manufacture yourselves.
When you do that, do you always take inventory, or are there any elements of the incremental business which are just agency sales, where the gross margin would be quite considerably higher, therefore, than if you were taking inventory?
Okay, starting with the data, it's a good question. I'm not—I don't think I can answer that. But what I can say that when it comes to bought and finished goods, it's still a quite small part of our business, and I don't think that would have any impact on the overall kind of gross margin development. Fredrik, help me here.
No, I guess, Tom, your question was specifically related to professional hygiene on bought-in products. Was that, was that right, or was it a general question on the group?
Well, I mean, we can extend it to the group. It was more directly related to professional, because of the expansion of the categories that you've done there.
Yeah. No, it's actually a very minor impact from that perspective in professional hygiene. We have a little bit more in health and medical, but from a gross profit margin perspective, it doesn't really have a big impact.
Mm. Okay.
When it comes to your first question on professional hygiene, yes, margins are historically very, very high currently, and I'm happy with that. And I'm again convinced that the team, our colleagues who manage the price cost gap and the margins and in relation to growth, going forward in a good way. And of course, that could lead to variations over time, but the long-term trajectory, I feel very confident about.
In terms of your SG&A in professional hygiene, is that a base that only has to modestly increase?
I couldn't say. It's, I think it's a good answer.
Okay.
Not, not that I
Thank you very much.
Not that I'm aware of.
Maybe I can,
Yeah, thank you very much, and-
Maybe I can fill in there, Magnus. Just generally, there is no particular shortage on spending in professional hygiene, so we are at good levels there. We will see higher costs for SG&A in the third quarter, more as a general. I referred to it during my comments there or during my presentation, that we'll see the growth rate come down, but we will see sequential SG&A costs come up in general, of course, but not specifically over balanced towards professional hygiene. So it's more as a group comment.
Okay, perfect. Thank you.
Thank you.
Okay, perfectly-
Thank you
On time. It's, yes, it's 10:00 A.M. So with that, we end the Q&A session of today and our Q2 presentation for Essity. It's a busy day from a reporting perspective. I'll let you go. I just want to thank you for participating and wishing everyone a very good summer, and hope to talk to you and see you soon. Thank you.