General Mills raises annual sales, profit forecast on higher prices

[March 23, 2022]  (Reuters) - General Mills Inc raised its full-year core sales and profit forecast on Wednesday, encouraged by higher prices and strong demand for the Cheerios maker's cereals, snack bars and pet food.

The pandemic-driven uptick in grocery demand has held strong, boosting sales at General Mills, as people stick to cooking more at home at a time when restaurants have bumped up menu prices to offset inflation.

The sustained demand, coupled with price hikes across the board, has helped packaged food peers including Kraft Heinz, Kellogg and Conagra Brands top profit expectations in recent months.

The company now expects organic net sales to rise by about 5% in fiscal 2022. It had earlier forecast annual organic sales to increase 4% to 5%.

The company forecast adjusted per-share profit to range between flat and an increase of 2%, compared with its earlier range of a 2% decline to a 1% rise.

The company's net sales rose to $4.54 billion in the third quarter ended Feb. 27 from $4.52 billion a year earlier. Analysts on average had estimated sales of $4.55 billion, according to Refinitiv IBES data.

(Reporting by Deborah Sophia and Mehr Bedi in Bengaluru; Editing by Vinay Dwivedi)

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