Colgate-Palmolive Company (CL) Q1 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

For the period ending March 31, 2023

April 28, 2023 8:30 a.m. ET

Prepared Remarks

Questions and Answers

Call Participants

Prepared Remarks:

Operator

Good morning. Welcome to today's Colgate-Palmolive 2023 First Quarter Earnings Conference Call. This call is being recorded and is being simulcast live at www.colgatepalmolive.com.

Now for opening remarks, I'd like to turn this call over to Chief Investor Relations Officer and Senior Vice President, M&A, John Faucher.

John Faucher - Chief Investor Relations Officer and SVP, M&A

Thanks, Allison. Good morning, and welcome to our 2023 first quarter earnings release conference call. This is John Faucher.

Today's conference call will include forward-looking statements. Actual results could differ materially from these statements. Please refer to the earnings press release and related prepared materials and our most recent filings with the SEC, including our 2022 annual report on Form 10-K and subsequent SEC filings, all available on Colgate's website, for a discussion of the factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from these statements.

This conference call will also include a discussion of non-GAAP financial measures, including those identified in Table 6 of the earnings press release. A full reconciliation to the corresponding GAAP financial measures is included in the earnings press release and is available on Colgate's website.

Joining me on the call this morning are Noel Wallace, Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer; and Stan Sutula, Chief Financial Officer. Noel will provide you with some thoughts on our Q1 results and our 2023 outlook. We will then open it up for Q&A.

Noel?

Noel Wallace - Chairman, President and CEO

Thanks, John, and good morning, everyone. As you can tell from our press release and the earnings materials, we had a strong start to 2023, and the momentum on our business gives us confidence to raise our net and organic sales growth guidance and to raise the lower end of our base business earnings per share growth guidance for the year. We did this because with the quarter of the year gone, we see less risk from some of the macroeconomic and geopolitical issues that we were concerned about earlier in the year. That said, there is still notable uncertainty surrounding the balance of the year, particularly in the second half.

Since the commentary focuses on the results, I want to focus my remarks on three of our priorities that Colgate people are focused on. Priority one is driving organic sales growth as we face tougher comparisons. We will utilize our enterprise-wide capabilities in innovation and revenue growth management, along with a firm commitment to marketing spending to return to a balanced algorithm of pricing and volume growth. The pricing we have taken over the past two years helps provide us with the flexibility to fund increased brand investment to support our pricing, build brand health, and drive volume and household penetration. We know that the competitive environment is going to be difficult, but we have a brand portfolio that is built for times like these, and we look forward to driving growth and market share performance moving now.