After a sluggish year, Dutch brewery group Heineken sees its volumes are on the rise again -especially in Asia. Still, the brewing giant remains cautious as some of that growth was caused by this year’s early Easter.
Early Easter
Both organic turnover and volume increased again in the first quarter, even more so than analysts had expected. Net sales rose 9.4 % to 6.8 billion euros, even if currency effects had a negative impact of almost 300 million euros.
Organic volume growth of 4.7 % was quite welcome after the decrease in volume in 2023: the brewery group especially managed to sell more beer in Vietnam, Heineken’s second most profitable market. European volumes grew as well, but that growth was partly driven by the fact that Easter fell in the first quarter this year.
Therefore, Heineken does not think that this quarter’s growth is certain to continue for the rest of the year. The Dutch group remains cautious, sticking to less than 10 % operating profit growth for 2024 in its annual projections.
