Expect High Prices For Consumer Goods

Some shoppers in a supermarket

CONSUMERS HAVE been asked to get ready for an increase in prices of everyday items as global food companies are warning of a possible price rise.

Companies including food giant Unilever and lubricant maker WD-40 gave the hint as they indicated they were grappling with supply difficulties.

The maker of Dove soap and Magnum ice-cream bars has already raised their prices by more than 4% on average last quarter, the biggest jump since 2012, and signaled elevated pricing will continue into next year, a report by Bloomberg indicates.

The new portal further noted that Nestle, Procter & Gamble, and Danone, whose products dominate supermarket aisles and kitchen cupboards, have a made similar refrain.

“We’re in for at least another 12 months of inflationary pressures,” Unilever CEO Alan Jope said in a Bloomberg Television interview. “We are in a once-in-two-decades inflationary environment.”

Companies are facing a dire mix of supply-chain challenges, as well as higher costs for energy, raw materials, packaging and shipping, the interview said.

While most consumer-goods makers this week expressed confidence that they will be able to limit the long-term hit to profitability, that means the pain passes to consumers, tightening the squeeze on pockets as Christmas approaches.

U.S. inflation has accelerated rapidly this year to the strongest since 2008.

Across developed economies, the post-pandemic supply-demand imbalances have pushed the rate above 4% for only the second time in the past two decades.