Good morning, and welcome to Kimberly-Clark's fourth quarter 2023 earnings question and answer session. I'll now hand the call over to Chris Jakubik, Vice President, Investor Relations. Please go ahead.
Thank you, and hello, everyone. This is Chris Jakubik, Head of Investor Relations at Kimberly-Clark, and welcome to our Q&A session for our fourth quarter and full year 2023 results. During our remarks today, we will make some forward-looking statements that are based on how we see things today. Actual results may differ due to risks and uncertainties, and these are discussed in our earnings release and our filings with the SEC. We will also discuss some non-GAAP financial measures today. These non-GAAP financial measures should not be considered a replacement for and should be read together with GAAP results. You can find the GAAP to non-GAAP reconciliations within our earnings release and the supplemental materials posted at investor.kimberly-clark.com. Before we begin, I'm gonna hand it over to our Chairman and CEO, Mike Hsu, for a few quick opening comments.
Okay, thank you, Chris. And first of all, I'd like to just welcome Chris to Kimberly-Clark. This is his first earnings call with us, but his probably triple-digit number in earnings calls that he's done in his career. So welcome, welcome to KC, Chris. Hey, I'd like to just start by sharing that we're really proud of our performance in 2023, but of course, we're not yet satisfied. We've built a strong foundation and positioned Kimberly-Clark for our next chapter of growth. These past few years, we've consistently invested to build a consumer-centric organization while navigating unprecedented challenges. Our strategy to elevate our categories and expand our markets is working, and we're on an exciting path and position to deliver durable growth and returns for shareholders in our next chapter.
As we mentioned in our prepared remarks, we're looking forward to detailing our strategic priorities, our long-term algorithm, and outlining the key initiatives behind our plans in March. And so with that, love to open it up for questions.
Certainly. Everyone, at this time, we'll be conducting a question-and-answer session. If you have any questions or comments, please press star one on your phone at this time. We do ask that while posing your question, please pick up your handset if you're listening on speakerphone, to provide optimum sound quality. We do ask that participants please ask one question and one follow-up. If you have any additional questions, please reenter the queue. Once again, if you have any questions or comments, please press star one on your phone. Your first question is coming from Dara Mohsenian from Morgan Stanley. Your line is live.
Hey, guys. I just wanted to touch on the organic sales growth guidance for next year. Low to mid-single digit seems pretty robust relative to the 3% this quarter and just starting out the year lower in Q1. Obviously, you mentioned the 200 basis points from the hyperinflationary markets next year in the prepared remarks, so that's part of it. Maybe, A, give us a sense of how much those markets contributed in Q4. And then just as you look at the base business ex those markets, maybe some commentary on pricing versus volume and what you're expecting. And if you could also just touch on market share performance in Q4, the U.S. tracked channels are weaker, so just any update on how you're feeling about your market share performance and plans on that front as you look out to 2024 would be helpful.
Yeah.
Thanks.
Okay. Hey, thanks, Dara. Yeah, maybe I'll start with maybe as you kinda tee up there, the state of the consumer, particularly in developed markets, you know, I'd say our underlying category growth across personal care, consumer tissue, and professional remains pretty robust, both in absolute terms and I think if you look across in relative to other broader staples. Our products, I'll remind you, our daily essentials, and unlike some categories, substitution of our categories is fairly low. On top of that, you know, we still have a lot of room for penetration and revenue per user gains, and so we're working on that.
So overall, I think the consumer right now still remains despite, you know, what you might argue is a fairly mixed kinda consumer picture, the consumer remains pretty healthy. You know, we're confident in our ability to elevate our categories and expand the markets further. You know, the consumer picture I said is somewhat mixed. You know, employment remains strong, wage growth is up. You know, but I think it's also probably fair to say from our side that, you know, the full effects of all the rate hikes and all the economic policy impacts are not fully materialized in the consumer. So that all said, the categories were pretty robust.
In North America, just to give you a reference point, North America category value was up 6 in the fourth quarter and up 8 for the year. So that's a pretty solid number. Again, I'll chalk that up to the fact that, you know, there's low substitution in our categories, and that makes our categories a lot more resilient than other staples categories that I've worked in in the past. We still also, Dara, see pretty good demand for premium products, and we're seeing that in a broad array of markets, including in North America. You know, surprisingly, you might say, in a market like Argentina, still, Brazil, China, of course.
So we're very enthused about our approach with elevate, you know, elevating our categories and expanding our markets, and we believe that's still working and still appropriate, even though we recognize we've got to be able to offer great value at all price tiers. So I'll pause there. I know that I threw a lot at you, so I know there were multiple parts to your question. I don't know, Dara, if you wanted to... Yeah. Nelson, did you want-
Yeah, there was a question on the decomposition of, you know, our top-line growth for the year and how it relates to Q4. Let me address that a little bit, Dara.
Yes.
I think, to recap, the fourth quarter was a quarter in which we attained, you know, flat volumes, and pricing was only 2% of the contribution, with mix being 1. That 2% was largely hyperinflationary economies.
And as you think about this year, this is going to be a year in which we see volumes beginning to pick up from Q2 on, and we expect pricing to be in that 200 basis point range, right in line with what we saw in the last quarter of the year. And that pricing is really gonna be driven based on what we expect today by hyperinflationary economies. So the profile is really on the pricing side, very similar to what we saw in, in Q4.
Okay, and the volume pickup as we go through the year, is that more pricing moderates? Is it that you've seen some early signs in whatever the geographies or product categories are, that you're seeing some volume recovery, or is it more just sort of a natural assumption over time as pricing recovers? Thanks.
Well, we're pretty pleased, Dara. I think we've made very, very solid progress on volume, and consumers responded very favorably on our categories. You know, so I'd say, you know, first of all, our next chapter, which I think we're turning the page and, you know, shifting to a volume mix-driven plan, you know, which is, you know, returning to that, which that was kind of our approach pre-pandemic, and so we're going back to that. So contribution pricing to help offset the record inflation that we've got is gonna recede and has already started receding. You know, there might be a need to address some particular higher costs in some markets or locations, but that's gonna be pretty surgical. You know, and you know, will likely reflect if there's pricing reflect inflation at local levels.
But overall, I think we're feeling very good about, you know, driving the volume on our business. We have seen our businesses start to improve, including in North America, on a share perspective in the fourth quarter, and believe we have the right mix and growth drivers in our plan to drive the business going forward.
Thanks, guys.
Okay. Thank you, Dara.
Thank you, Dara.
Thank you. Your next question is coming from Lauren Lieberman from Barclays. Your line is live.
Great. Thanks. Good morning. Hi, I wanted to just shift focus maybe a little bit to talk a bit about the cost picture and FORCE savings. Both of those, the benefit from deflation and FORCE savings in the fourth quarter were a bit lighter, I think, than expected, or certainly that we'd modeled. So, it's rare to see that. So if you could just maybe provide some perspective on why and the outlook moving forward, and maybe how FX plays into that, if at all.
Sure. So, let me start, Lauren, by saying that, you know, this phase of cost recovery and supply chain stabilization, we would think of it as largely behind us. A lot of the disruptions and this super cycle that we saw, our expectation is for that to not happen, in the foreseeable future, and certainly in 2024, based on what we know today. So thinking about cost as a whole, first, our aggregate cost basket, is easing in inflation, but there's no deflation, because there are several components that I'd like to unpack. We expect the 2024 cost environment to be more stable, but we will still remain at higher levels of costs, mostly in line with what we've seen in this super cycle, these past three years.
As you know, core commodities like pulp, resin, energy, and dollar terms are expected to be somewhat favorable, following the trends that we saw in the back half of last year. However, if you think of other components of our cost basket, like distribution, logistics, and labor inflation, that's actually going to remain a headwind in this year, in 2024. And that's pretty much offsetting the tailwinds that we're seeing on the core commodities, which leaves us with currency-related inflation on imported materials, largely impacting our emerging market, hyperinflationary markets, which will need to be addressed. And we've been addressing that over the past years, and we intend to do that in the course of the year.
Just as a perspective, the overall net cost headwind, when you include all of the components, is projected to be around 100 basis points for the year, which we see as much more manageable than what we've seen in the past. We've got very strong productivity plans and, you know, little need to price outside of local inflation in these hyperinflationary markets. Turning to FORCE and our productivity targets, the outlook we've provided shows that we feel very good about our ability to continue generating strong productivity. You saw that we ended last year with FORCE results of around $325 million, and it's important to highlight that over the last 20 years, FORCE has delivered a little north of $6 billion of cumulative identified productivity that has flowed to the P&L.
More recently, and we've been talking about it, even at, you know, your conference in September, we're evolving our culture towards an end-to-end integrated cost management perspective, really focused on gross productivity. We're building a proactive multiyear pipeline of initiatives. We see our pipeline of gross productivity out to 36 months, pretty strong, and that should flow to the bottom line, and this is reflected in the outlook we're providing today. I'm excited to talk more about, you know, our transition to gross productivity and integrated margin management at our March meeting, when we talk about the future a little more.
Okay, great. And then if I could just also follow up a bit on Argentina. So I guess a couple parts of this question, path forward for Argentina, whether the devaluation of the monetary assets is one-time in nature, or do we need to build this in? Or how do we think about that in the next kind of quarter or two of the year? And then also, overall, just kind of risk management around FX, because this time last year, there was also kind of a bit, it wasn't hyperinflation, but a bit of a surprise to the street in terms of the expected impact from transactional FX. So, and that's the case again this year. So path forward in Argentina, the devaluation on monetary assets piece, and then all this overall risk management on currency and transaction.
Okay. Hey, Lauren, thanks for the question. Hey, let me start with the overall on the path forward. I will say, hey, we're staying the course, but we're, of course, gonna balance potential against the inherent volatility in the business, and so what we're gonna remain prudent. You know, I do wanna say I'm really inspired, and we've got people operating in some difficult conditions in Argentina and also other markets. So, you know, as a company, we're really inspired by the impact our employees make in these markets and really proud to shoulder that responsibility of serving our consumers in these difficult conditions. At the same time, I will say we will not just hang around where conditions become untenable.
And then, of course, you would double-click and say, "What's untenable?" I'll let you know when we see it. But you know, certainly, you know, if we can't make product or if we can't convert currency, you know, at some point, that becomes somewhat untenable. But you know, right now, we're working our way through it in multiple markets like Argentina, like Ukraine. And so you know, again, that's the high-level answer on path forward is we're staying the course.
Yeah, and Lauren, to build on, you know, what I told Dara on the pricing and hyperinflationary. So a few things: as we think of last year, the full year impact of the mark-to-market of our net monetary position in other income and expense lines-
On the-
Yep.
Sorry, keep going.
Okay. So the impact above the operating profit line was $115 million for the year and about $70 million for the quarter. That netted off some of the interest income that we receive on cash balances in Argentina, led to a net impact of about $0.16 on EPS in the year and about $0.09 of EPS in the quarter. As we fast forward to this year, we are projecting about half of that impact, both in the other income and expense line and then on EPS. We will see a little bit more of that impact in the first half of the year. It's reflected in, in part of our outlook, but that's what's projected at this stage based on what we know.
Okay, great. Thanks so much.
Okay. Thanks, Lauren.
Thank you. Your next question is coming from Jason English from Goldman Sachs. Your line is live.
Hey, good morning, folks. Thanks for popping me in.
Hey, Jason.
Hey, Mike. A couple questions. I wanna bring it back to volume, and specifically, I wanna double-click on your professional segment, where volume was a little bit weaker than we expected this quarter. If I zoom out and just look since 2019, so pre-COVID, volume's down, like, 23%-24%. And I know you mentioned rightsizing in prepared remarks today. So my question is, what's going on there? Where has all the volume gone? And how your margins suggest you're not getting meaningful deleverage. How have you been able to offset the associated deleverage effects of that lost volume?
As always, Jason, you're right on the issue, so but good one. But I think if you look at the margin profile of the business, I think the team has done a great job addressing, I would say, the volume softness or volume change in the environment. And you know, a couple different things. One, we had to adjust rapidly to this work-from-home demand environment that kinda came on in with the advent of COVID, as you might recall. And you may recall our washroom business, which is the majority of our business in KC Professional, tends to be higher development in offices, and so, that's really where the volume has gone.
I would say right now, you know, that volume on a category basis is running about 80%-85% of what it was pre-pandemic, and it's not gonna bounce back that quickly. The reality is, and I, I'm not sure you're in your office at Goldman in New York every day, and so that's the same thing as we look around our offices, you know, we're not fully back in, right? And so it's partial at best. So that's a, I would say, an ongoing challenge in that business, but, you know, I think our team has adjusted to that and treat it as a reality. We have right-sized some of the business, and some of it was from a cost perspective.
The reality is, we were doing a lot of volume and co-packing a lot of volume on the external market, and so I'd say we haven't had to address fixed costs as much as you might have thought of. And I think that's reflected. So I think the team has done a good job of recapturing margins from both a price perspective, mix perspective, and also while growing volumes at the same time behind great innovations like our Icon dispenser, which I believe is really the best dispenser in that side of the business.
So anyways, I think the team's done a great job, and I think you can see that in the margin and, you know, definitely have recovered from pre-2019 margins on that business and actually exceeding at this point.
That's helpful. I appreciate that. I think another headwind to volume this year that you were talking about early in the year, but not talking about so much of late, were supply constraints. So can you remind us where they were, how sizable they were? I assume the lack of conversation around them suggests they're alleviated now, but can you confirm that? I would imagine that cycling those supply constraints should prove to be a tailwind, particularly in the first half of next year. Is that right, and how large of a tailwind?
One could only hope, Jason. We could only hope that, but actually, I think, first of all, a couple things. Yeah, we did have some pretty significant supply constraints in our North American consumer business for the majority of last year, definitely through Q3, and that had to do with some supply conditions with external suppliers, on, for example, on packaging, that made availability difficult across personal care. Also some in our Kleenex business. I think we've talked about, you know, the, a key ingredient that we weren't able to get access to, that we developed a secondary source to during the course of the year. So those were kind of the big factors. I would say, I think we mentioned that on the last quarter call. You know, we didn't make the biggest deal about it.
We were working through this challenge with our suppliers, with our customers, and they were fully aware of it. But, you know, it's not something that we, we communicated publicly, that often. But I, I would say for the, for the better part of the year, that did suppress our share performance. I'm not saying that was the only driver, but I think it was a, a fairly significant, driver. You know, we have addressed those issues. You know, I'd say our commercial execution is gonna be stronger than ever. We're really past all these constraints that I talked about. And, you know, our consumption's moving in the right direction. Our share has moved in the right direction in the fourth quarter as well in North America.
Got it. Good stuff. Thanks a lot. I'll pass it on and look forward to seeing you in March.
Okay. Thanks, Jason.
Thank you. Your next question is coming from Anna Lizzul from Bank of America. Your line is live.
Hi, good morning, and thank you for the question. I wanted to follow up on market share in light of your exposure to private labels, and in your tracked channels, private label share is increasing up in some of your categories. Just wondering, how are you thinking about brand investment with marketing versus promotions in order to maintain and grow market share? Thank you.
Okay. Yeah, great question, Anna. Core to our business, I'd say a couple things. You know, first of all, on market share, I'm confident, you know, that our market share performance this year is gonna improve from last year. You know, definitely, I was not happy with our performance on share last year. For perspective, on a weighted basis, which we use as an internal metric, we don't talk about as much publicly, but on a weighted basis, we are down globally about 40 basis points, okay? So not falling off a cliff, but not what we want. So we wanna be growing weighted share as well. On a cohort basis, which was the one we usually talk to you all about, you know, we're up or even in just under 40%.
So that's below our goal of 50% or more, of which, you know, I'd say we were kind of jumping over that bar back in 2020, 2021. So I think, you know, you know, we are where we are today, and what we're gonna build from here. I'd say a couple things. You know, all that said, you know, probably the biggest challenge has been for us in North America related to the supply constraints that I just talked about. I did want to note, we've had strong gains and really, really strong market positions in most of our largest markets. Just for reference, in South Korea, which is our second-largest business, you know, we're up probably about 20 share points over the last five years.
And in Australia and New Zealand, we're up somewhere between 10 and 15 share points over the last five years. Andrex in the quarter, which is our number, you know, fifth-largest business, was up over 300 basis points on share just in the quarter. So we feel very good. And one more, on China, I think we're approaching almost 300 basis points again on the Huggies in the quarter. So I think we feel very good about our gains in our largest markets. The exception has been North America, where we have underperformed, but that is improving. A lot of that, I think, was just what I discussed with Jason. We had some severe supply constraints, where we weren't able to run our brand plans in the way that we wanted to run last year.
We saw solid improvement in Q4. We were up or even in six of eight categories and sequentially improved in five of eight, and so we feel pretty good about our trajectory. As I said just a while ago, you know, our commercial execution capability's never been better, and we're gonna gain share by, you know, bringing the right innovations, which our customers are excited about, executing well and bringing sustainable cost advantage to our business. You mentioned private label. You know, on the note, I would recognize that, yeah, we have seen an uptick in private label in the past quarter or two. I think if you look at the scanner data, I think it was up or even in seven of eight categories.
You know, I'd say on private label, we are very, very committed to having superior, a superior value proposition in every price tier that we're in. You know, so, you know, versus 2019, if you look on a longer perspective, you know, private label is down a bit, and the premium segment is up significantly. And even today, the premium segment continues to grow. So it is clear that the value tier has picked up a bit, and our shares were impacted in the second and third quarter, although I would say more from our supply constraints than private label trading. I mean, we compete with private label. We're cognizant of that. You know, our approach, Anna, is to bring the right set of innovations, which we are accelerating and have been accelerating, and our customers are very supportive of it.
There are a couple categories where we have a little more value offering. You know, Scott 1000 is a great value brand, and but I, I think it competes very, very well in its tier and, and is really, really accepted by consumers. And so, again, we're cognizant that private label is kind of out there, and that in uncertain or tough economic conditions, value becomes much more important to the consumer, and we're committed to having a great value proposition at every tier.
Great. Very helpful. Thank you.
Okay. Thanks, Anna.
Thank you. Your next question is coming from Steve Powers from Deutsche Bank. Your line is live.
Hey, thanks, guys. Good morning.
Hi, Steve.
... Hey, so maybe to start, you, you talked about a lower rate of organic growth in the first quarter and also, you know, a slightly back half-weighted earnings profile for the year in the prepared remarks, and some of the comments this morning, you know, echo that. I guess, maybe could you provide just a little bit more color on the drivers there, and maybe a little bit more spec- specificity on how to think about, first, first quarter trends relative to the balance of the year? Thanks.
Sure, Steve. So I'll start by reiterating that we're very encouraged by how we finished 2023. You know, a strong foundation for us to build from, and a position in which volumes have stabilized, and we had a quarter in which we were flattened volume, and mix was, you know, another 100 basis points of growth. As we think about the cadence of the year, our first half, second half balance of sales and earnings and our quarterly pacing is reflecting a combination of three things: one, our go-to-market plans, two, our productivity initiatives, and thirdly, you know, the current shape and of currency headwinds that I talked about a little while ago.
On organic sales growth, we see a relatively balanced across the year, but Q1 is somewhat muted due to softer volumes on a sequential basis. We, you know, have more programming coming into play as the year progresses, you know, especially as Q2 kicks in. And this includes incremental innovation that will be going into market at that stage. So we should see progressively improvement in volumes and a mix-led organic growth and margins following Q1. The other bit that, again, as we think about Q1 in terms of volumes, you know, we've built into the plan a gradual improvement across the year. And in Q1, specifically, we're expecting another relatively flat volume quarter, also because of the possibility that retail inventory softness pushes us slightly even below that level.
But that's reflected in our outlook for the full year, and we expect, again, volumes to pick up as the year progresses.
Okay. Okay, thank you for that. And I, I guess, you know, you know, kinda, I guess, stepping back a little bit, you know, there's been a lot of investment that you've highlighted over the course of time in personal care, not just the past year, but the past few years, product quality, marketing, commercialization, et cetera. And, and I think you, you see the results in, you know, relatively strong market share trends and, and, and organic growth. I guess, on the other side, you know, consumer tissue and KCP continue to, you know, lag and, and, and, you know, struggle from a volume perspective.
So, you know, I guess as you think about 2024 and both the relative balance of investment and the relative balance of contribution to growth, can you give us a little insight into how you're thinking about that and how we should think about how those businesses are likely to trend, you know, relative to one another in the year?
Hey, yeah. I just. I'll make a couple comments, and then Nelson maybe can give some additional detail. But I would say we are running our consumer tissue business, you know, some might say externally, a little differently. You know, I look at our consumer tissue business and see it as a, you know, premier consumer franchise, and I'm proud of the strong margin recovery that we've made over a short period of time in this business. You know, on to note, I would say on a volume basis, if you look at North America, you know, for the quarter, our organic and tissue was up 3, and the volume was up 2. I'm very excited about the volume kind of resiliency in that business.
I think it reflects the essential nature of the category, as you know. You know, you're not moving away from the bath category, no matter what the condition is. And so we recognize we have an important kind of responsibility for consumers. But I think the thing that has changed is in the past few years, first of all, the amount of inflation that's occurred on our overall business, but especially tissue, has been, not to be dramatic, but fundamentally historic, right? Two years in a row of two X what the all-time high ever was, right?
And so our teams have done a phenomenal job, I would say, you know, recovering, you know, recovering the margins on the business that were necessary to keep that, you know, franchise, you know, healthy going forward. A couple other things that we've done to improve our ability to manage the business better is, hey, better risk management tools, you know, to get us more stability from costs. And hopefully, you guys are seeing that. We're not talking a lot about that, but, you know, with Nelson coming in, we've changed some of our practices. With Tamera, our Chief Supply Officer, coming in, we've changed some of our supply chain practices, and so we're, we're trying to reduce the volatility of the input costs.
I would say if you looked at the margin recovery, the biggest driver is really, really disciplined application of, you know, we call internally, revenue growth management tools. But you know, that if we, if we had not made those investments over the past five years, we would not have been able to move at the pace we moved over the last two years on revenue management. And then, you know, probably the most important thing going forward is the fact that we're driving value-added innovation. And we recognize, as a consumer franchise, you know, we have to have a great offering, a superior offering. I mentioned in the UK, Andrex, I think we hit about a 33 or 34 share in the quarter.
You know, our price gap has widened in over the past three years, but our quality has improved significantly, and we've invested in new technologies in our European tissue business that's allowing us to differentiate that product. And so we feel good about our position on tissue. There are some pockets of challenge. Some markets, you know, can be very tough, and so we're able to operate in those. But you know, we're really pleased with the kind of rapid recovery of margins and how our teams are managing that business right now.
And just to build on what Mike was saying and address, you know, the investments. You know, over the last few years, as you would have seen, we've stepped it up both on advertising support for our brands and the capabilities that are allowing us to emerge much stronger from this super cycle of inflation that we've seen. Specifically for 2023, you know, our advertising budget overall increased to more than 5% of net sales, which represented roughly about 100 basis points of increase versus the prior year, and that's about $200 million in absolute terms. As you think about this year, Steve, we will still keep expanding that, but it'll be at about half the pace of what we saw in 2023.
The other bit is, in terms of overheads, which would include some of the capabilities we invested in, we are projecting overheads for the year to be largely flat in dollar terms year-over-year. That can give you a perspective of, of what we're seeing in terms of investments and overall spend in 2024, building on what we did in the past few years.
Okay, great. Thanks. Thanks a lot, and I'll pass it on.
Okay. If we could take, maybe one more question, that'd be great.
Certainly. Your next question is coming from Andrea Teixeira from J.P. Morgan. Your line is live.
Thank you. Good morning, and welcome, Chris. So can you, I have one question and a clarification on your comments, Nelson, towards the end of the last question. First, can you break down a bit the 2024 guide by division? I'm assuming you're still looking at, like, between, to get to your number, mid-single digits for personal care, some growth in volume there, because that's where you get most of the growth. And then tissue to be flattish, consumer, consumer tissue to be flattish, or to grow low single, and then professionals to be negative, especially in the first quarter, as you lap those, those contracts. The reason why I ask is that historically, for, for a good reason, it's a better ROI, but you're, you're more dependent on personal care than the others.
So you've been, to your point and to your benefit, getting market share, particularly in the U.S. and China, in diapers and fem care. So I was wondering how you feel about the comps and how you feel about being able to meet this number in between low single and mid-single. I mean, at least at the high end of the guide, it does imply that you have a strong volume growth in personal care. So I was wondering how you feel and how you could decompose by division. And then a clarification on the reinvestment. You said, Nelson, you mentioned $200 million was the actual number, roughly, of the investment, and then this year would be about $100 million. And I was wondering, what is the incrementality? It's more displays and shelf space, promo?
What is gonna be the main source? Because to be fair, you've been, to your point, investing for a while now, since Mike took over five years ago. Thank you.
Yeah. Hey, Andrea, great, great set of questions. Maybe I'll start with the bottom half first and then Nelson can kind of decomp some of the organic drivers. On the investment, again, my priority would have been focused on advertising. You know, I think we get great returns on advertising, both from, you know, certainly from traditional TV and stuff, but more importantly, the digital, and the returns are very, very high. And so our focus is there. I mean, we are gonna be, I would say, competitive on the promotion front, on a trade promotion front, but that's not how we're gonna drive our business.
You know, we do feel like we get great value, and we have great creative, both on things like Huggies, on U by Kotex, across our business on Scott 1000, last long, you know. So we got great copy, and we're gonna invest there.
Yes. So, in terms of kind of the breakdown by segment, I mean, we expect personal care to be growing in the, you know, mid to high single digits. So think of mid single digits overall and at the high end. And, in the other two segments, we will be growing in the low single digits, and that kind of gets you to the algorithm that we've provided. As I stated at the beginning, our plan is a vol mix largely led plan. And keep in mind that pricing will be around 200 basis points of that, and that's largely related to currency-related movements in hyperinflationary economies. So that's kind of the breakdown on how you should be thinking of our segment growth next year.
Thank you.
Thank you. That concludes our Q&A session. I'll now hand the conference back to Chris Jakubik for closing remarks. Please go ahead.
Thanks, everybody, for joining us today. For the analysts that have follow-up questions, I will be around all day. Beyond that, we're looking forward to seeing everybody in March.
Thank you, everyone. This concludes today's event. You may disconnect at this time, and have a wonderful day. Thank you for your participation.