Unilever Sales Lifted by Dove Soap, India Beauty Demand

Unilever Plc posted better-than-expected sales at the end of last year, boosted by premium beauty and home care products in key emerging markets including India and China.

The maker of Dove soap said Thursday underlying fourth-quarter sales rose 4.2 percent, above the 4 percent analysts anticipated. It also announced a €1.5 billion ($1.8 billion) share buyback starting in the second quarter.

The results are the first after Unilever spun off its ice-cream business — which included Ben & Jerry’s — and come as Chief Executive Officer Fernando Fernandez nears his first full year at the helm. Extending a turnaround plan begun by his predecessor, Fernandez is streamlining the sprawling group by selling brands that don’t scale internationally, and focusing on boosting the multinational’s most successful products.

Investors have welcomed that strategy, with shares of Unilever up 9.5 percent this year through Wednesday’s close. They slipped as much as 2 percent in early trading in London on Thursday after opening higher.

The results were “bang in line” with expectations, RBC Capital Markets analyst James Edwardes Jones said in a note, though he warned the 2026 guidance “feels spicy” and that 2 percent volume growth would be a “big ask.”

Unilever expects sales growth this fiscal year to be “at the bottom end” of its 4 percent to 6 percent multiyear target range, in line with analysts’ expectations. It was 3.5 percent in 2025, which was also toward the lower end of its target.

The company cited strong sales of beauty brands including Vaseline, which is enjoying a major resurgence on social media, and a variety of Dove products. China returned to growth in the second half of the year, Unilever said, while Indonesia also grew after struggling for several years.

In the US, Unilever said it gained market share in what it described as a “slower market.”

The company’s strategy to focus on wellbeing, beauty and personal care is right, and helping it outperform competitors like Nestlé SA and Procter & Gamble Co., said RSM UK senior analyst Emily Sawicz.

Unilever’s former CEO Hein Schumacher was pushed out in March last year and replaced with Fernandez, then the company’s chief financial officer, as the board sought a faster revamp.

By Jillian Deutsch

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