HUL Revs Up

Riding on better rural demand, growth is back at India’s largest consumer goods company but so is competition

- Samar Srivastava

RECENT QUARTERLY numbers at Hindustan Unilever (HUL) showed why it is so hard to bet against India’s largest consumer goods company. Despite the increased competition from rivals Patanjali Ayurved, Dabur and Marico, the company clocked an 11 percent year on-year volume growth. The better-than-expected numbers can partly be explained by a 4 percent decline in volumes during the same quarter last year but they were equally the result of an uptick in growth in rural India.

“While it would be fair to say that rural markets have shown better growth, I would like to wait for another two quarters before I can point to a definitive trend,” said Sanjiv