‘Other expense’ were mainly on account some receivables write off which they anticipate they will not be able to recover and special sanitation arrangements in manufacturing both as an impact of covid.
On con call they informed that HUL have entered the peanut butter space with their Kisaan brand but mgmt feels confident about the value Sundrop offers to the consumers.
RTC will remain the focus for the co and all media spend for now is being spent on this category alone. The increase in adv and media spend was offset by the saving in travel and overhead expenses as a result of work from home, without jeopardizing the P&L. This was clarified on the question raised by @desaidhwanil.
While they are confident all foods category doing well, the opportunity size is biggest for the chocolate confectionery with their center filled coconut and peanut offering. This festive season they will be experimenting with some gift packs but on a very small scale. Idea here is the explore packaging and also sample peanut butter in small sachets ( my reading ).
They gave a hint of working on developing pasta and noodles as new product in the RTC category but it’s a work in progress and nothing in near future.
Overall the commentary was on the same line as to how they want to decouple themselves from the commodity business of edible oils and become a food company and create long terms sustainable growth with healthy FMCG margins.
They also acknowledged that the superior growth in the RTC category has some share on account of lockdown and therefore people consuming more at home but as such couldn’t quantify how much of the growth is structural and how much is temp. One positive thing to note however is, Aug was better than July and September sales were better than Aug when there was hardly any lockdown. So some of it could be a structural shift in acceptance of the brand. Will get to know more in coming quarters.
Overall a promising story and the only joker in pack is the edible oil business which we need to watch carefully.
Disc: invested and added more after the result and conf call.