Hi. Good evening to all those who have joined the call.

I would like to begin with a brief overview of the operating environment during the quarter, after which I will take you through our performance and strategic objectives going forward. Demand conditions during the quarter remained stable.

We continue to see the building blocks for a gradual recovery in consumption, supported by moderating inflation, improved affordability following the recent GST rate rationalization, which has been transformative, higher MSPs, and a healthy crop sowing season. We believe these factors provide a constructive backdrop for demand improvement across both urban and rural markets in the coming quarters.

Moving on to our quarterly performance, the India business demonstrated a sequential improvement in volume growth despite an elevated pricing environment, which started tapering off towards the end of the quarter. Revenue momentum remained strong, aided by calibrated pricing actions across core portfolios over the last 12 months in response to the rise in input costs.

Our franchises have continued to record strong off-takes with more than 95% of the business gaining or sustaining market share and about 80% gaining or sustaining penetration on a MAT basis. Among channels, while e-commerce and quick commerce were leading growth drivers, we saw a clear improvement in traditional trade, marking the outcome of consistent investments and targeted actions over the last 2 years.

Project SETU has continued to strengthen our distribution fundamentals, execution capabilities, and the coverage expansion remained firmly on track led by deeper presence in upgraded towns and pan-India rural scale-up. We will now commence the initiatives on targeted expansion in urban channels such as chemist, cosmetic, and specialty food outlets.

These actions are enhancing our direct reach, improving product assortment and availability in rural, and will subsequently accelerate our premiumization and diversification agenda in general trade in the top towns. Delving deeper into the India business, I'll now share the performance of our key categories.

Parachute Rigids continue to demonstrate inherent brand strength. Despite prevailing consumer prices, underlying volume growth after adjusting for MLH reduction remained positive, demonstrating remarkable price inelasticity and deep consumer trust and loyalty.

With correction having set in and copra prices down by around 25% to 30% from peak levels, the brand will be passing on the benefit to the consumer in the coming months as and when we believe it's the right time to do it. While we expect near-term performance to remain stable, easing absolute consumer prices will support a gradual recovery in volume growth over the course of the next year.

Value-added hair oils delivered another strong quarter with accelerated market share gains. Our value share on MAT basis stands at an all-time high of nearly 30%, showing considerable progress towards premiumization of the mix and bridging the gap between volume and value share along with our intended lines and long-term aspiration.

We remain confident of sustaining a double-digit growth trajectory in the near to medium term, supported by sharp strategic focus on the mid and premium segments, consistent innovation across channels, enhanced direct reach through Project SETU, and structural tailwinds from the recent GST rate rationalization, which has driven affordability. Saffola edible oil had a soft quarter in a relatively elevated pricing environment with revenue growth moderating as prior pricing actions largely anniversarized in this quarter.

Like in the previous quarter, we have sacrificed volumes which are below our threshold margins across certain packs and channels. Going forward, the brand will continue to sharpen its premiumization agenda, led by Saffola Gold and Total variants and the recently introduced cold-pressed oils, which is doing quite well.

Backed by strong equity and focused consumer activations, we expect Saffola to chart an improving volume growth trajectory in the coming quarters. The Foods portfolio performed broadly in line with the stated expectations.

As we had talked about in the last call that we will take a pause on our growth as we rectify some of the portfolio which is not delivering high on profitability. Saffola Oats continue to gain market share and consolidate its market leadership.

As we had conveyed earlier, with the portfolio rapidly scaling up to ARR of 1,000 crores, our focus has been on stabilization, strengthening profitability towards building a sustainable, profitable growth engine. We remain very bullish on value-added foods and neutra opportunity in India and our strategy to invest in fewer, bigger, better plays in terms of our portfolio approach.

That being said, we are confident of resuming the accelerated growth trajectory in our organic food business over the next two quarters. We also announced the strategic investment in one of India's leading premium gourmet snacking brands, 4700BC.

This is renowned for its popcorn and also offers a range of innovative snack offerings such as pop chips, makhana, crunchy corn, and the recently launched nachos with avocado oil. Would like to share our perspective on this investment.

When you look at our foods portfolio today, among Saffola, which stands for healthy foods playing in the masstige segment, True Elements, which stands for the clean label premium breakfast cereal, nuts and seed, and snacking segment, and Plix, which does nutraceuticals, there was a gap in our portfolio of a premium gourmet snack which is better for you and can deliver a mix of offerings for all occasions. I'm particularly excited about how the better-for-you gourmet snacking brands are becoming a choice for the consumer who want taste and differentiated flavors as a part of their routine.

We believe 4700BC is an underleveraged and underinvested brand that can, if afforded the required investment and our overall capabilities, including cost, channel, GTM, and with a strong new product pipeline ahead, it will continue to push boundaries in the premium gourmet snacking arena. Together, we will tap the opportunity to leverage our existing scale in Foods and drive synergies and broaden the brand's presence across channels.

It is clocking at about 140 crores ARR in the last 3 months. We see tremendous potential for the brand to scale its ARR to 3x in the next 3 years.

In premium personal care, the portfolio comprising serums, male grooming, and skin care grew in double digits and is expected to exit the year at an ARR of 350-plus crores. In addition, the digital-first portfolio is expected to exit FY '26 with an ARR of 1,000-plus crores.

We are on track to reach 2.5x of FY '24 ARR next year, and we are making concerted efforts to move to double-digit EBITDA in the digital-first portfolio by end of FY '27. Moving on, the international business continued to deliver robust and broad-based growth.

Bangladesh led from the front, supported by a steady core business and a scale-up of new franchises like shampoos. Vietnam and South Africa bounced back to deliver double-digit constant currency growth, driven by targeted initiatives.

MENA continued to deliver strong performance in key franchises across both the Gulf region and Egypt. The NCD business also delivered accelerated growth.

Overall, the international business is now exhibiting a virtuous growth flywheel, and we expect this momentum to sustain across markets over the medium term. To sum up, we delivered a strong and resilient performance in Q3 with both the India and international businesses progressing well in a steady operating environment.

We remain sharply focused on execution, strengthening our franchises, and driving sustainable volume-led growth. In India, we expect to drive improved trajectory in the core portfolio while driving the profitable scale-up of Foods and digital-first businesses.

We aim to sustain the volume growth momentum even as pricing growth is likely to moderate over the course of the next few quarters. With input cost easing and margin pressure subsiding, we expect progressive improvement in operating profit growth rates over the coming quarters.

As we look ahead, we are moving from stability to purposeful acceleration, leveraging a resilient operating model and a disciplined cost architecture. Our priorities are clear: sharp portfolio choices, enabling faster decision-making, and driving agile execution.

Importantly, our agility has enabled us to take targeted initiatives and successfully turn around portfolios within just a few quarters. This is exhibited by the turnaround of VAHO in India and, more recently, the quick recovery in Vietnam and South Africa businesses.

What gives us confidence as we move forward is that this acceleration is grounded in strong fundamentals and a high degree of accountability in the senior management. This balance of resilience and execution discipline, coupled with the tremendous leadership depth which we have developed over the past few years, well positions us to sustain momentum and further accelerate the growth flywheel we have built.

With that, I conclude my remarks. Thank you, and we can now take some questions.

Thanks. My first question is on the new acquisition.

My questions here are, if you want to take it 3x in 3 years, if you could talk about what all are needed apart from the brand support. In terms of distribution, for example, where is the company now?

For example, 140 crore ARR, how much is coming from which kind of distribution channel, and where do you see the delta? Second is, from a pricing, obviously, this is gourmet, it's premium.

Would you plan to have some kind of a offering which also appeals to the smaller box GT? I do understand the larger box GT will have a audience, but the small box GT, is there a pricing or positioning which is possible?

If you could also talk about profitability. I do understand initially investments will be needed, and it's unfair to look at first year profitability for a brand which anyway may not be making profit, but from a 3 years' perspective, what will be the expectation on the profitability?

Okay. I think first of all, I would urge you to look at two interesting brands globally which started off with popcorn and has diversified and has become reasonably blockbuster brands.

One is called LesserEvil in US, and the other brand is called PROPER, which is a UK-based brand. I'm sure we will follow the trajectories and getting inspired from these brands.

There's another big trend in US is a brand called SkinnyPop, which is growing, again, which is a popcorn and better-for-you brand. Now that will give you an idea what is possible in terms of the portfolio.

Now if I look at the overall broad sense of the portfolio of this brand, 4700BC, PVR Cinemas is very low. It's just about double digits.

There's a big institutional business and exports, but they are very, very good because, as these institutional business creates very good sampling opportunities. At the same time, it also ensures there's no marketing cost of doing so.

So 4700BC is available in the following airlines: it's available in all business class lounges of Etihad, it's available in Qatar, Cathay Pacific, in first and business class of Air India, most recently in some of the European routes of IndiGo, it goes to Amsterdam, Manchester, and just recently last week to Athens. It's available in Vande Bharat.

It's available in one or two hotels. That business, plus we just started that business in the Middle East.

We believe there's significant opportunity now with the Marico access to the e-commerce and the other channels. That's around 20% to 25%, the rest is all online, very little retail.

We believe that modern trade, for example, where Marico can give access, and also the top-end food is the best route to grow. If you look at the trajectory of some of the brands, let's take iD, Veeba, Epigamia, they now have significant part of their business in retail, and that business is missing.

I think on terms of investments, we are happy to do. At the same time, you must realize today we already have some digital brands like True Elements.

There will be huge opportunities in shared costs and other things when they come into the Marico fold. Therefore, this will all happen.

There'll be no incremental investment to expand into GT. That takes care, and therefore, I believe it makes maybe 10, 12 crores.

Last year it had made a loss. This plus True Elements together can now have an accelerated path to breaking even with all the tapping of the synergies.

There is a strong innovation pipeline of this brand, and I think we will unfold. If you really look at it, Indians, while they love healthy products, they don't compromise on taste, but perhaps the indulgence, gourmet, this one is going to grow as people habits in terms of binge-watching, OTT, and other things like Friday night in, those things which you see in developed markets.

This progress, the tailwinds towards adoption of this brand is very high. Therefore, this was a missing link in our entire Foods portfolio.

If you look at it, Saffola plays in masstige, health; True Elements in clean, premium seeds and breakfast and snacking. This was a gap out there, and it's a perfect gap.

We also believe we love the founders who have a mindset of built to last rather than built to sell, and we are extremely confident about scaling this brand up. It's a brand we all love.

The products are very nice, and we are very, very optimistic about growing this brand.

Just to add on the profitability, Abneesh, the brand has gross contribution and CM2 which is ahead of the Marico's Foods business at this point in time. It's a premium brand which has a significant pricing power, therefore, of course, we can also expect that the margins can go in even higher in future.

There are significant synergies in the back-end cost and GTM, which will be leveraged in the near term and unlock synergies. Overall, from a profitability context, of course, we'll be investing at this point in time, but whether the brand has path to profitability to reach, let's say, double-digit margin over a period of time, we are fairly confident it can really go there.

Sir, one or two follow-ups there. One is, Saugata, you always mention Marico and you, obviously, want to take bigger bets.

Now this is around 1% of your revenue, does it fit that? Not everything needs to fit.

That was one question. Second is your example of the LesserEvil brand, for example.

Those need a different mindset, and you did say the founders, etc. I wanted to understand, does this signal that now you want to play in the gourmet, in the impulse category much more over a longer term?

Because this is completely new white space. You're opened up.

Till now, Saffola or the other brands have been mostly in the health space. This opens up the impulse and the gourmet.

Obviously, this is too small, I wanted to understand, does this open up much bigger opportunity on your own or, say, even M&A-wise in the longer term?

I think our digital business entire philosophy is think big, start small, scale up fast or drop fast. Therefore, it's a string of pearls strategy to do something big.

Another maybe 2 years from now, we have a 2,500 crore plus digital business, which is bigger than some of the multinationals companies who have stayed in India for 20, 25 years. I think it is big.

I think the digital business and the entire diversification agenda has been big. There are steps to that bigness rather than doing one thing.

We will obviously have done big things. I think our VAHO turnaround is a big thing.

We will see, and I think there are opportunities in organically growing big things. Digital Plix actually, we took it at 150 crores, it should be hitting 1,000 crores.

Again, we have done this. The question is, I don't believe in buying something big and paying 6x for that.

That's something which we don't want to do. We are far more prudent.

We want the founders to have the skin in the game, grow with us, and we learn the business from them. I think the question is we have started small, but there is no reason we develop and bigness together rather than buying something big and then not growing it.

Just for the context, Abneesh, the diversified portfolio a couple of years ago was just about 11%, 12%, and we had taken a target of reaching about 25%. We've already reached about 22%.

It's not about the size of the business when you acquire, it's all about the potential that we assess it can become. For example, Saugata talked about Plix.

Similarly, we are very hopeful that all these businesses will grow bigger over a period of time.

I think to answer your second question, Abneesh, you're absolutely right. I believe that with True Elements plus Saffola, we found that snacking, if I really want to grow snacking, it could become restrictive.

Therefore, we opened up. Having said that, we will continue to play in the premium end, which is organized trade plus maybe metro food outlets.

I don't think we have a right to win today in a paan plus or doing a 5-rupee, 10-rupee product right now. We don't have the GTM, neither the capability.

At least opens up as India progresses and the premium set opens up, I believe there's enough critical mass. You are right.

I think this actually significantly improves the TAM expansion for our Foods business.

Sure. My second and last question is on hair oil.

Overall, excitement in the hair oil is coming back in the minds of investors. We have seen the small hair oil company with a new CEO doing well.

They have also called out hair oil as a category is seeing a somewhat of a revival. You have done exceedingly well past few quarters in VAHO.

My question is, as a category in hair oil, how do you see next 1 year? Last few quarters has been good for VAHO.

Second, adjacent question is, yes, volume growth is still quite strong for Marico as a company, but when Parachute starts seeing deflation, and we have seen already 20%, 25% deflation in copra from top, and next crop is also looking decent. As a company, would you see that challenge that suddenly the sales growth for the company in India business becomes a challenge at some stage?

What will be your take on that?

I think, see, two things. One is this time the absolute inflation was very high, okay, which actually impacted volume growth, and we had done some of the MLH reduction, which anniversarizes in the first quarter next year, okay?

Secondly, I think you will be surprised because we are we were pleasantly surprised with the price elasticity of the brand. Therefore, in this in the when the deflation happens, some deflation has already happened, we will be far better prepared, including a far, far thinner pipeline, to manage it.

As far as hair oil VAHO growth is concerned, if you look at the VAHO growth, the 2-year CAGR is ex of Shanti is 14%. The 2-year, and the, and we ex of Shanti, the quarterly YoY growth is very high teens.

It's how much is it? 19%.

Okay. I think we are and a 2-year CAGR double digit is, I think, a great this one.

I believe that there is enough opportunity, and I think this what is also helping is SETU, because if I look at the biggest impact so far in the states where you have expanded distribution, improved the quality of rural distribution, converted a lot of indirect to direct, has been the growth of the second and the third brand, because that's where range selling happens. SETU, we are today, if you ask me, we are just around we have done 25%, 30%, 35%, there is still 70% to go, and it's a 3, 5-year project.

3 years obviously was initially designed, but I'm sure if we can get it, it is going to continue for the next 3 to 5 years. We are extremely confident about this.

One more interesting thing we are doing is that at one point in time, the volume value share gap in hair oils was 10, it has now gone down to 5. Our focus on abandoning the I won't call it abandoning, but holding fort in the, bottom of pyramid and 10, 20, not doing anything irrational, but, focusing on, the packs like Jasmine, Aloe, Hair & Care, and some of the other brands, is actually helping, and we will focus continue to focus on value share.

As these brands are actually high margin, they're helping in the mix. They're helping in the overall gross margin, improvement over the next couple of years.

Sure. Thanks.

That's all from me. Thank you.

Sorry, just to add, I think just to reassure everyone, this is a category which is very close to India. Not only that, it's a category that is significant even the Middle East, including Middle Eastern countries, Egypt.

This is a category that continues to grow, and we have great faith in this category. We have ensured that we continue to invest behind this habit, and this habit is going to stay.

I think that is something which we have proven in the last 20 years, contrary to some people thinking this category will die down.

Sure. Thank you.

Hi, sir. Thank you for taking my question.

Congrats on a great set of numbers. Just continuing on VAHO, except for SETU, the kind of growth that we are seeing is really sharp, and apparently the other players are also seeing sharper growth.

I don't see them marrying together because each of these subcategories have a different market. They are more ingredient-based hair oils, which are preferred.

What is really driving this growth? What is a sustainable number for VAHO that we can think about over the near term, maybe the next 2 to 4 quarters?

That's part A. Part B is, given VAHO has the highest margin in the core business, higher than Parachute and Saffola, and as copra headwinds start to wane, and those margins will start improving, higher growth from VAHO can add to that margin expansion.

How should one think about that play as well? That's my first question.

Okay. I think, we are extremely confident of delivering double-digit value growth in VAHO.

As you see recent trends, about also a double-digit volume growth is also very much possible. See, it's a combination of different factors.

I think the resource allocation is working. We have converted a lot of moneys which was locked into BTL, below-the-line spends, in the 10, 20 packs of Shanti Amla into ATL.

We believe, as the job of a market leader is to drive equity and not be satisfied if the competitor doesn't spend in a SOV, because ultimately we have significantly invested in SOV. If you look at the reach and the weighted distribution of each of the brands due to SETU has increased sufficiently and far more sharper positioning and a portfolio approach across states.

You are absolutely right about the mix, because the moment the mix of VAHO increases, that will be a margin kind of a tailwind. I will want Pawan to answer with the expectation on the margins.

Yeah.

Mihir, the first thing that you said, yes, of course, value-added hair oil has better margins, and that exactly is the reason as to why we could still deliver reasonably resilient profit growth this year despite significant copra inflation, because the mix has helped. Now as far as next year is concerned, again, giving a guidance with respect to what kind of a percentage margin we can deliver is difficult, but at least we are very confident of delivering at least mid-teens growth.

We could try for more. At least we would strive for improving the operating margin by about 150 basis points to about 200 basis points.

Understood. Got it.

That's that's very clear. Thanks for that.

Second, on the copra-led price cuts, given that this time around the price increases were relatively very sharp, I think there's an expectation that the price cuts also probably will be will be very sharp. Wanted to get a sense on how should one think about the pricing in Parachute as you go down the quarter, given copra's already down 30%, maybe in a in a in a month in a month or two?

You had earlier highlighted that price cuts can probably, start in Feb or March. Wanted to get a sense of that, and how many times do you think that one will have to take price cuts to ensure the trade, channel remains healthy in terms of stocking?

That's the second question.

Mihir, we haven't taken any pricing action so far, and there are two, three reasons for that. Firstly, we had not taken price increase in line with the increase in copra prices.

Copra prices had shot up by more than 200%, but we had taken price increase of 60%. Now that the copra prices have corrected by 25%, 30%, we are not taking any immediate correction from a premium standpoint, as in premium to loose, we are still comfortable.

Therefore, we need not be getting into pricing action immediately. Secondly, we are still awaiting to get a firm handle on how the copra price trajectory will move, which we'll get by March, April, and then take correction in one go rather than taking in multiple steps, because if you take pricing correction in multiple steps, it disturbs the trade rhythm.

That is how we're looking at it. However, we may pass on some benefits through some sort of consumer offers, etc., in lieu of pricing in the interim before we get a firm handle with respect to how the copra will behave, and then we take firmer price cuts.

See, we want to be clear about the visibility of what should be the price cut and take one price cut. We will not take multiple price cuts.

The big change that has happened is that we work with far, far thinner pipeline because of our supply chain efficiencies and our AI-based forecasting models which we do. Therefore, compared to, say, 5 years ago and all that, that the changeover, which used to take 8 weeks, 12 weeks, especially in rural, this is going to be much faster because of what we are doing now.

Got it. That's very clear.

Thank you, Saugata and Pawan. Wishing you all the very best.

Thank you.

Yeah. Hi, good evening.

Just two questions. First is on Foods.

The growth rates, you had already mentioned in the last quarter that you will relook at the profitability, just adjust it, and then see an acceleration in growth. You spoke about 25% CAGR as well in the presentation.

Just wanted to know what is the timeline that we can expect that you see a recovery in the growth rate starting to kind of pick up again on the Foods side? The second question is on Bangladesh.

Again, phenomenal performance in that market as you have continued to do extremely well, but there continue to be some macroeconomic uncertainties. Just wanted your thought, the last time something like this happened, you kind of went relatively unscathed.

Just wanted to get your sense on how do you see the position on ground? These are the two questions.

Thank you.

Okay. As far as food is concerned, I think as far as the organic part of the food is concerned, we will get back into growth of, in the coming two quarters.

When we talk about food 20%, 25% growth, it's a combination of organic, inorganic, and there is we are absolutely certain we'll start getting back into 25% growth of Foods business. Now coming to Bangladesh, yes, I think we are waiting, we are closely monitoring the situation.

Far, we have been extremely resilient. Even in that quarter of that quarter two when, the issues were quite, grim in terms of the I think it was in August that thing happened.

That quarter, I think we grew by 9%. We delivered a 9% value growth.

I think we have taken steps out there, and we don't see any reason to be extremely concerned at this moment in time in terms of delivering business. Understood.

If I could take one more question. The Parachute copra set that you'd mentioned is basically saying that there was a reduction in the RPIs that you were maintaining because you took a much lower price increase than needed, and you'll wait for those RPIs to maybe slightly normalize a little bit, and then you take the one-shot price cut.

That's the

idea? That's right.

That's right. See, if you look at it, copra actually moved almost 80%, 100%.

We took a 60% price hike. At current levels, our price premium is still tolerable, and therefore, we will wait, I think, by a certain time where we get the visibility of what will be the likely input cost for the large part of the year.

When it happens, we will take one price we will take. As I said that the two differences are that we obviously has a far more thinner pipeline and a far better position in terms of our ability to handle this.

Yes, in the past we have struggled, but this time we are confident that there will be no such issues as far as volume growth is concerned. In any case, the absolute pricing was so high this time, that had impacted volume growth.

Good.

Great to hear. Thank you.

Thank you so much. Wish you all the best.

Hmm.

Hi, Saugata. My question is also on the copra pricing only.

Supposing if this price remains where it is, which is like a 20% down, and you're saying that you're comfortable with this kind of a premium to the other players, in that kind of a situation, what kind of margin expansion can we expect on a overall consol basis for the company because of the pricing benefit on the copra?

Percy, I think we didn't say that we'll not take any pricing action. We just want to get a firm handle of what the copra trajectory could be.

If it were to remain in that 20% lower, then still we might take correction, but over a period of time, which may not be doing immediately. Therefore, from a margin standpoint, I just mentioned, very difficult to give a margin percentage guidance, very confident of delivering mid-teens growth.

We'll definitely strive for, as I said earlier, that 150 to 200 basis points margin we should try and improve.

Okay. Mid-teens growth in rupee terms on EBITDA?

On

operating profit, yeah.

That should be our base case.

Got it. Got it.

Got it. Secondly, just wanted to understand on Saffola Foods, this quarter growth is only 5%.

What is the reason for that?

As I told you, two things. One, we are ensuring that profitability.

We take a lot of businesses which we believe is two things. One, we had this things like mayo, peanut butter, and all that we have rationalized, which was there perhaps in the base.

Some of the SKUs which we have reduced complexity, rationalized some of the SKUs. Thirdly, in certain SKUs into customer stroke channel which are not so profitable, we have rationalized that also.

Because I believe, in Foods, you have to continuously, after every 2, 3 years, get into one step jump into profitability.

Got it. Got it.

Would I be right in assuming that if you have sort of rationalized the SKUs itself, this burden will be there for another three quarters before it anniversarizes and your growth would probably

No, no. One to two quarters.

We started this 1.5 quarters ago, over the next two quarters, we will start seeing growth, good growth.

Understood.

In any case, as I said, that our ambition on Foods of 20%, 25% includes organic plus inorganic, you will start seeing 20%-plus growth in any case there from next quarter.

That's because of 4700BC, right?

That's fine, because we've always said that over a long term, our growth ambitions is a mixture of organic and inorganic, it's fine.

Got it, sir. Got it.

That's all from me. Thanks and all the best.

Yes, sir. Saugata, congratulations on the good performance.

Just continuing on the Foods bit of it, as you highlighted, is it mainly a case of moderation in the portfolio on the SKU basis, or are we also, say, optimizing some of the advertising spends in, say, a lot of these online-first brands? Where is the confidence coming, if I leave apart the inorganic element that you mentioned about 4700BC sort of being consolidated, that the growth is going to recover in two quarters?

What is driving that confidence?

I think two things. One, as I said, the so we have stopped rationalized some of the products like we had some flavors, some things like, what I call mayo, peanut butter, and some of the stuff we had launched.

That anniversarization is going to happen. Secondly, obviously, all the investments and has will go focused back into driving penetration of our core and investment.

We have not rationalized A&P spends, and that that should drive some of the growths back. Now, as I said, that as long as this we expect the growth to be back into double digits, and obviously, this doesn't include any innovation, any innovation which we do organically from our base portfolio also add to that.

I think our first step is over the next two quarters to get this into double digits, which we are pretty confident about. Then the overall Foods growth getting, we'll continue because of whatever organic plus inorganic into the 20%, 25%-plus.

Understood. Second is on again on the copra bit, that historically, as you said, whenever there's been a sharp correction in copra on a quarter-on-quarter basis, now we've seen a 30% correction from peak, there's generally two things that play out.

We are obviously sitting on our raw material inventory, so that somewhere limits immediate pricing action, and then there is channel pipeline also, which ends up, say, impacting how the pass-through happens to the channel. That sort of affects volume growth.

On the channel pipeline, you mentioned you're running much thinner, but is there a case where we may have to maybe aggressively reduce our prices, and that can maybe have an impact in terms of seeing the benefits of gross margin play out? Just wanted to understand that would there be a lot of dynamic elements this quarter which could end up impacting the performance of the PCNO category?

No, I don't think so. Now we are talking about 1 month is down the quarter in this quarter, and as I said, two things.

One is that we are comfortable with our price premium as we are today. Number two is that we don't need to take a aggressive price down, because see, you must also realize that I think the brand equity keeps on going stronger.

Usually after such a long inflationary cycle, weaker brands and they really become weak. Number three, which is also gives us hope that at least one of our competitors is being extremely rational on pricing, because we also faced, as irrational pricing from two competitors in the past.

Now at least one of them are, they're following a rational pricing model. Which I believe is good, because at the end of the day, there is no point selling at negative gross margin.

That spoils the market long term and creates equity. Combination of all that, and as I said that today we are sitting on 33% of this quarter is gone, and we are sitting pretty comfortably.

As I said, that also the third thing that will help us is there is a 2%, 3% loss which we were having on MLH, that gets anniversarized from quarter one next year. Combination of that, we are fairly certain.

Obviously, I know because of the past, there could be certain kind of issues which we are far, far in a better shape to cope with all that. I think, as I said, to give positive growth.

I think really look at it this way, that with a 60% price hike in transaction terms, we have still given growth. Now that itself I am yet to see any brand in the world which has done that.

I think we are far more confident, and therefore, there is no need to take, as I said, we will not take multiple price hikes. We'll take one single price hike which will ensure a far more smoother transition, and some of it obviously will go towards margin expansion.

Got that. Just one quick follow-up on the Foods business.

You did mention that the CAGR growth that you're giving includes 4700BC. Now it may be difficult for us to get a sense how acquisitions will play out over the next 3 years, but for this current Foods portfolio, what is the bare minimum organic growth that you will be targeting?

We have always said we will deliver double-digit organic growth, and we have been delivering double-digit organic growth. I think this is an aberration, and we have to get it sorted within the next one or two quarters.

We are confident of.

Got that. Thank you so much.

Wish you all the best.

Thanks for the opportunity. Just wanted to get a sense on the cold-pressed market.

Any thoughts? Are we late in the segment because it's already a competitive market, or the TAM is very large and we see structural opportunities with increasing health awareness?

What's your thought on that? Typically it's more for the Q-com, e-com customer or needs general trade would be lower is what I would guess.

Secondly, Saugata, on the GST cuts, how do we see volume growth picking up? Is there a tailwind for larger players like us where growth can be higher and we can gain market share?

I think coming to cold-pressed oils, it started off as a niche kind of, but it is rapidly catching up. In fact, it's a big trend today in the Western markets.

As India picks up a lot of trend from UK and US, the developed markets, in terms of food habits at the premium end. Yes, it is currently a far more skew in e-com, but we believe we are now seeing this in modern trade, and it will very soon be a critical mass.

We are not late to the party at all. I think I would call ourselves a fast follower with a brand which has significant equity, and we have now a broad participation strategy.

The good thing is it makes significant higher margins than some of the entry-level Saffola, which will also help in the profitability of the Saffola, and we will also invest. Sometimes what happens in a category with low penetration, if you have two, three serious players investing behind the category, the category grows.

This is exactly the position where cold-pressed oil is. It is today a very drop in the ocean in that large edible oil space, but as you had all the premium edible oils which grew.

For example, how we grew Saffola, how the premium part of this one grew, or some of the other species grew, I think this one also will have a critical mass very soon. I think modern trade and premium GT will see a significant presence of cold-pressed oil in the couple of years.

Typically, consumers are ready to pay 2x the price of edible oil? Is that the broader price range one could

See, I'll tell you how it works. Today, at the premium end, while people wanting to pay for a healthy oil, they're also using less oil.

Also if you look at people eating out, people ordering in through food apps, people traveling abroad, actual cooking oil consumption at the premium end is, in terms of total volume actually has gone down a bit. I don't think the outlay is that significant enough for that top end.

That delta for health is absolutely acceptable, because they are doing it for lots of things. For example, on food today, people are willing to spend on health as long as it is actually in something which whether it's nutritionists, whether it's doctors, whether it's some of the influencers are actually advocating for things, and something which have also grown in the Western markets as a health tailwind.

Sure. Understood.

On the mid-term growth with some of these cuts, is there a play for higher growth, because some of these smaller players could get marginalized? How do we see that shaping up?

I didn't get your question. This is for which category you're talking about?

In general, volume growth in the mid-term, given that GST cuts have happened, which was not expected last quarter. From here on, is there a room for higher growth and smaller players could lose market share structurally?

Is that an opportunity?

Absolutely. See, I'll tell you what has happened is that at least in food and packaged food where packaged food penetration in India is low, the fact that the entire packaged food is at 5%, that definitely encourages conversion from unbranded to branded, unpackaged to packaged.

Packaged food is hygienic, packaged food is aspirational. Similarly, in some of the personal care categories, mass categories which have become 5%, there will be a medium to long-term movement towards aspirational brands because of the affordability factor which has now set in with this significant reduction in GST, especially personal care categories which have moved from 18% to 5%, which means a significant reduction and driving affordability.

Because as the country's GDP improves, as the per capita income improves, people want aspirational brands. It's the outlay which sometimes is a restriction.

Therefore, structurally in the medium term, this GST is transformative. It will definitely give added growth to all the brands, especially in categories which have seen a significant GST cut.

Understood. Thank you.

All the best.

Thanks for taking my question. My question is with respect to the 4700BC acquisition.

The first part of the question is, now that, Saugata, you talked about how different the distribution for this brand has been, where they're catering to institutions, airlines, cinema halls, is there a need for us to unlearn with respect to the distribution strategy, or we will just focus on what we are strong at, which is the retail distribution? The second part to this question is, what is the real competition in this category at this point of time?

I'm sure the TAM is still small, but who are the real competitors here?

Let me first address the second question. I think see, you have to see TAM as snacking.

A consumer can take a samosa, a consumer can have a popcorn, they can have a soup, they can have a noodles, and they can have a ragi chips. I think the entire thing that you have to look at, you are playing in a slightly more indulgent, but better-for-you gourmet portion of snacking.

The market is enormous. It doesn't have popcorn to popcorn unless you are going only for a movie, and as I said, that part of the business is extremely low.

There is no need to unlearn. I think this brand has significant legs, and I said that for sampling, people to experience the product, what they're doing in institutional selling will continue.

The brand is still 60%, 70% is still retail. It's only currently mostly e-com.

Therefore, the first thing is obviously to grow that in things like modern trade, premium food outlets using the Marico GTM. In fact, this will help us tomorrow, for example, looking at True Elements for institutional sales.

If a person can have popcorn on a flight, why can't they have some mixed nuts on a flight from True Elements? Therefore, actually it opens up multiple synergies, it opens up multiple vectors of growth.

At the same time, as I said, that with True Elements, this brand, and others, there's a lot of synergies at the back end and cost. Today, each brand has their own sales system and their own this one, their cost structures are when standalone versus Marico.

There will be significant opportunities for which then can be plowed back towards investing behind the brand to grow it further.

All right. Understood, Saugata.

Thank you.

Thanks for dialling in on the call. To conclude, we've continued to deliver high single-digit volume growth and log market shares and penetration gains in India business despite inflationary headwinds in some of the key core categories.

The international business continues to grow from strength to strength, supported by a broad-based performance across markets. We remain focused on advancing our diversification agenda in both India and overseas businesses and will maintain investments to drive the same.

With input cost pressures exhibiting moderating trends, we will aim to sustain the top-quartile volume growth momentum and are confident of strengthening our operating profit growth trajectory in the quarters ahead. That is it from our side.

If you have any further questions, please feel free to reach out to our IR team, and they would be happy to address. Thank you, and have a great evening.