Nestle beats first-quarter organic sales estimates

Nestle posted better-than-expected first-quarter organic sales growth on Thursday as the world's biggest packaged food company increased prices for its Kit-Kat chocolate bars and Nescafe-branded coffee.

The Swiss company maintained its 2025 outlook, saying it still expects organic sales growth to improve and estimates an underlying trading operating profit margin at, or above, 16%.

"This is based on our assessment of the direct impact of current tariffs and our ability to adapt," CEO Laurent Freixe said in a statement. "The indirect impacts - on consumers and customers, as well as currencies and commodity prices - remain unclear at this stage."


Organic sales growth, which excludes the impact of currency movements and acquisitions, rose 2.8% in the first quarter ending March 31, Nestle said. Analysts had forecast average organic sales growth of 2.5%.

Nestle's 2.1% price increases were above the average analyst estimate of 1.8%. Real internal growth - or sales volumes - rose 0.7% versus expectations of a 0.8% increase.

Total reported sales increased by 2.3% to 22.6 billion Swiss francs ($27.28 billion), slightly ahead of analyst expectations of 22.5 billion francs. ($1 = 0.8284 Swiss francs)