Top 10 FMCG Companies in USA 2015
Here is a list of the top 10 FMCG companies in USA in 2015. Fast Moving Consumer Goods (FMCG) are the products that get sold quickly with a low inventory cost. Some of the FMCG products include food, drinks, tobacco, other household and personal care products. They have a short shelf life because of high consumer demand or their perishability. Though the business is a low margin business, the companies and channels earn significant cumulative profit by selling them in large quantities.
FMCG sector has been a growing sector and same is the case in USA. It contributes to nearly 6% of the country’s GDP. The following are the top-10 Fast Moving Consumer Goods (FMCG) companies in United States of America. Procter and Gamble remains at the top with major giants PepsiCo and Coco-Cola taking the next places.
10. Kellogg’s
Kellogg’s is a food manufacturing company which produces cereal and convenience foods.
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Its products include cookies, crackers, toaster pastries, frozen waffles, fruit-flavored snacks, cereal bars, and vegetarian foods. It is headquartered in Battle Creek, Michigan, United States. The stated purpose of the company is to nourish families so that they can flourish and thrive well.
Kellogg's was founded on February 19, 1906, by Will Keith Kellogg. The initial batch of Kellogg’s Corn Flakes was created during that time. The company also introduced the first high-fiber cereal, Bran Flakes in 1915. The company was renamed as the Kellogg Company in 1922. In 1997, they opened W.K. Kellogg Institute for Food and Nutrition Research, which encouraged and enabled the efforts of food scientists and nutritionists to create good-for-family foods from wholesome grains and other ingredients. In 2006, upon completing 100 successful years created Kellogg’s Special K Bars and other innovative food products to give a nutritious diet to the family members. Realizing America’s need to fiber in the food products, it recently increased the fiber content in its products.
The major turning point for the company was the hugely successful Kellogg's Toasted Corn Flakes product which helped them in establishing themselves and to grow in size and their offerings over the period of time. The company's well-known brands include Corn Flakes, Frosted Flakes, Special K, Cocoa Krispies, Keebler, Kashi, Pringles, Cheez-It, Eggo, Rice Krispies, Nutri-Grain, Froot Loops, Morningstar Farms, Pop-Tarts and many more.
It has been part of various social responsible initiatives. W.W Kellogg started W.K. Kellogg Foundation in this context, whose mission is to help children unlock their potential, aligning with the core purpose of the company.
Sales: $14.6 Billion
Profits: $632 Million
9. Con Agra Foods
ConAgra Foods, Inc. is a USA based FMCG company involved in the marketing and selling activities of its various packaged food brands.
Image: Wikimedia
It is headquartered in Nebraska. It has various products under its portfolio including cooking oils, hot cocoa, peanut butter, frozen dinners and others. Some of its popular brands are Hunt’s , Slim Jim, Hebrew National, Bertolli ready meals, Heathy Choice and P.F. Chang’s.
The company founders Frank Little and Alva Kinney brought together four grain mills as NCM (Nebraska Consolidated Mills) to form Con Agra in 1919. The company was successful in its initial decade recording profits till 1936. After which it expanded to other businesses like livestock business in 1942.
In 1951, their venture with Duncan Hines brand of cake mixes was very successful, leading the company to become the third largest flour miller in the United States. But this venture did not last for long as in 1956 it sold off its assets in the company to P&G. With American households increasingly purchasing prepared and instant foods it decided to turn the tables and formulated a strategy that focused more on raw foods like poultry and live stock feed business. But in 1970s, it lost money expanding into many industries like fertilizer, pet products etc and was at the brink of bankruptcy. It was this time it changed its name to Con Agra. It recovered quickly under the leadership of “Mike” Harper and it set off a two-decade long buying spree of over hundred prepared food brands starting with Banquet Foods.
In 1993, it purchased more than 500 million dollars in small firms and in 1998 it purchased another $480 million in brands from Nabisco. Recently also, ConAgra continued its purchasing spree by acquiring Ralcorp and TaiMei Potato Industry Limited.
Sales: $16.2 Billion
Profits: $-786 Million
8. Colgate Palmolive
The Colgate-Palmolive Company is a consumer product company based out in USA.
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It has its business focus on the production and distribution of personal care, health care and household products such as detergents, oral hygiene products (including toothbrushes and toothpaste, and soaps. Its corporate offices are located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City.
William Colgate founded the company in 1806. Initially he established it under the name of “William Colgate & Company” which carried out the production of starch, candle and soap. It introduced its first perfumed soap named Cashmere Bouquet in 1872. Later on in the next year it also introduced its first tooth paste “Colgate Ribbon Dental Cream”. It has been a success story in these products and has introduced several others related to these categories in the subsequent years. Ultimately, In 1928 Peet-Palmolive bought Colgate Company to form Colgate-Peet-Palmolive Company. In 1953 the name was modified to Colgate-Palmolive.
Procter & Gamble has been Colgate- Palmolive long been competitor. In 2005, to overcome the tough competition it has decided to focus on certain brands and leave the others. It was during that time some under-performing brands like Fab, Dynamo, ABC, Cold Power, Fresh Start, Arctic Power etc. were sold.
Presently it has been focusing on its top-selling brands to gain a dominant position in the American market. Some of the company’s brands include Colgate, Palmolive, Fab, Irish Spring, Murphy Oil Soap, Ultra Brite etc. It has also discontinued some of its brands like Palmolive Rapid Shave, Vel, Coleo, Halo shampoo.
Sales: $17.3 Billion
Profits: $2.2 Billion
7. General Mills
General Mills is one of the world’s leading food companies that manufactures and markets more than 100 consumer brands sold through retail stores.
Image: company site
It is headquartered in the Minneapolis suburb of Golden Valley, Minnesota. It operates through three reportable business segments: U.S. Retail, International, and Convenience Stores & Foodservice. Its product portfolio consists of breakfast cereals, baking goods, grain snacks, meal products, organics foods, yogurt, ice cream and other food products. It has 89 brands in its brand portfolio in US some of which are leaders in their respective categories. Some of its well-known brands are Haagen–Dazs, Trix, Cocoa Puffs, Pillsbury, Old El Paso, Lucky Charms and Green Giant. Its also carries out the function of supplying branded and unbranded food products to the commercial baking and foodservice industries.
Cadwallader C. Washburn founded General mills in 1866. But the company can trace its history to 1856 when the Minneapolis Milling Company was incorporated. Minneapolis Milling Company was founded by Robert Smith, but Washburn acquired the company after a short period after its foundation to form General Mills.
Since 2004, General Mills has been concentrating on producing products that cater to the needs of health-conscious consumers. The company has decided to change their entire breakfast line to whole grain. It also started manufacturing child-targeted cereals with less sugar.
General Mills has been constantly featuring in the Forbes 500 list from several decades. In 2014, it has acquired organic food producer Annie’s Inc. for $820 million to expand in the US natural foods market.
Sales: $17.6 Billion
Profits: $1.4 Billion
6. Altria Group
It is one of the world’s largest tobacco corporations. It is based in Henrico Country, Virginia, USA.
Image: company site
It is the holding company of John Middleton, Chateau Ste, Philip Morris USA, U.S. Smokeless Tobacco Company Inc., and Philip Morris Capital Corporation. Michelle Wine Estates. It has its headquarters in Virginia, prior to which it base was located in New York, USA. The group also owns an economic share of 28.7% in SABMiller PLC. In the tobacco segment its brands include Marlboro, Black & Mild, Husky, L&M, Basic Next, Red Seal, Players and others. In the wine segment it has brands like Seven Falls, Erath, and Fourteen Hands etc.
Altria Group spun off Philip Morris International in 2008 citing a reason that Philip Morris International would have more freedom by operating outside the constraints and boundaries of US corporate ownership in terms of legislative restrictions and litigation factors to focus on the sales growth in emerging markets, while Altria can focus on United States of America.
After the spun off of Philip Morris International in 2008, the company tried to expand its product portfolio in USA by not only concentrating on the cigarette business but also on cigar and smokeless tobacco. In 2008, the company went on to purchase John Middleton, a cigar manufacturer from Bradford Holdings. It also purchased UST Inc in 2009 whose products include smokeless tobacco and wine. This helped in ending the competition between Marlboro smokeless tobacco products and UST Inc products.
Sales: $17.9 Billion
Profits: $5.1 Billion
5. Kraft Foods
Kraft Foods Group, Inc. is a leading American grocery manufacturing and processing conglomerate.
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It is headquartered in the Chicago suburb of Northfield, Illinois. The company was founded as a result of a spin off from Kraft Foods Inc., in 2012, which was in turn renamed as Mondelez International. The new Kraft Foods Group is mainly focused on distribution of grocery products for North America, while Mondelez is an international distributor of Kraft Foods snacks and confectionery brands.
The core businesses of the company are in cheese, snack foods, convenience foods, beverage, cheese and dairy foods. Some of its brands are Oscar Mayer, Grey Puopon, Gevalia, Planters, Capri Sun, Kraft Dinner, Kraft Mayo, Maxwell House, Velveeta, Pollu-O, Kool-Aid, Boca Burger, A 1, Grey Poupon etc.
The company is active in associating itself with various sporting events like Major Soccer league and National Hockey League. It has always been on the forefront promoting about itself or its products through different sponsorships and other media. In 2011, it came with an idea of coming out with an iPad app called “ Big Fork Little Fork” which has information regarding Kraft Foods and how to eat them in nutrious ways.
It is also a company which showed responsible ways of doing business when it canceled its contract with Asia Pulp & Paper, the third largest paper producer in the world, when it was labelled as a “forest criminal” causing destruction of the precious natural habitat in Indonesia’s rainforest.
It has recently merged (2nd July, 2015) with Heinz, thereby forming the world’s fifth largest food and beverage company in the world, Kraft Heinz Company. The data given below was before the merger.
Sales: $18.2 Billion
Profits: $1 Billion
4. Kimberly Clark
Kimberly-Clark Corporation is an American personal care corporation that is into producing paper-based consumer products.
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Kimberly-Clark brand name products include Kleenex facial tissue, Kotex feminine hygiene products, Cottonelle, Scott and Andrex toilet paper, Wypall utility wipes, KimWipes scientific cleaning wipes, and Huggies disposable diapers. The subsidiaries under Kimberly-Clark include Kimberly-Clark Health Care and Kimberly-Clark Professional.
John A .Kimberly with the support of few other people founded Kimberly, Clark and Co. in 1872. Paper mills were the group’s first business which the collective expanded through the next decades. Later the company in 1914 developed cellu-cotton, a surgical cotton product. Six years later, its introduction of Kotex brand, the first disposable feminine hygiene product marked a turning point in the company’s product history, as in the later years they developed several other successful personal care and sanitary products according to the requirement of the consumers and established their place in the market.
Initially the company was mainly a business paper company. Its joint venture with The New York Times in 1926 to build a newsprint mill in Canada was an example of this. But later under the leadership of Darwin Smith, the CEO during 1971-1991, the company moved from being a business paper company to a consumer paper products company. The company’s present CEO is Thomas Falk, who has been successfully leading the company from the early 2000s and has been the major driving force in its growth and expansion strategy throughout the world.
The company strives hard for following environmentally-friendly procedures in manufacturing and recycling their products.
Sales: $20.9 Billion
Profits: $1.5 Billion
3. Coca Cola
The Coca-Cola Company is a multinational beverage corporation headquartered in Atlanta.
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It manufactures and markets nonalcoholic beverage concentrates and syrups.
The flagship product of the company is Coca-Cola, which was invented in 1886 by pharmacist John Stith Pemberton. But the formula and brand was bought by Asa Griggs Candler in 1889. It was he who founded the Coca-Cola Company in 1892.
Coca Cola has always been a company of acquisitions. It acquired Minute Maid in 1960. It also acquired Odwalla brand which has fruit juices, bars and smoothies as its product portfolio. The company presently has Muhtar Kent as its Chairman and CEO.
It follows a franchised distribution system. It only produces syrup concentrate that is sold to various bottlers throughout the world. The Coca-Cola Company owns Coca-Cola refreshments its anchor bottler in North America. Generally, the company and subsidiaries only produce the syrup concentrate which will be sold to different bottlers throughout the country who hold the Coca-Cola franchise. The bottlers hold exclusive territorial contracts with the company. They then sell the product to food service distributors, restaurants and retail stores.
The company, particularly the flagship brand Coco-Cola is well-known for its innovating marketing efforts that engage the audience by building a relation with them. Their mission is to refresh the world, create value and make a difference. The company sponsors many events for the promotion of its products. It promotes many sports competitions like NASCAR, NHRA and others. It also sponsors and provides beverages in many theme parks including Walt Disney Parks, Universal Parks, Merlin Entertainment and others.
Sales: $45.9 Billion
Profits: $7.1 Billion
2. Pepsi Co
PepsiCo is an American multinational formed in 1965 with the merger of Pepsi-Cola Company and Frito-Lay, Inc.
Image: pixabay
It is headquartered in Purchase, New York, USA. It manufactures markets and distributes grain-based snack foods, beverages, and other products.
Pepsi was first developed by Caleb Bradman in the 1880s, and was named as “Pepsi Cola” in 1898. The company was later purchased by Charles Guth who reformulated the syrup. In 1941, Pepsi became a part of Loft and was rebranded as Pepsi-Cola Company. Later in 1965, Pepsi-Cola Company merged with Frito-Lay to form Pepsi-Co Inc.
PepsiCo has since expanded from its flagship product Pepsi to a wider range of food and beverage brands which include Lay’s, Quaker and Tropicana. It also added Gatorade to its brand portfolio in addition to the above ones. PepsiCo's product mix consists of 63 percent foods, and 37 percent beverages. PepsiCo previously owned various brands like Pizza Hut, Taco Bell, KFC and others but it later sold them off to concentrate on its primary beverage and snack food lines.
PepsiCo has two business units in America: PepsiCo Americas Foods, PepsiCo Americas Beverages. The Frito-Lay North America segment makes, markets, sells and distributes branded snack foods. These foods include Doritos tortilla chips, Cheetos cheese flavored snacks, Lay’s potato chips etc. The Quaker Foods North America segment makes, markets, sells and distributes cereals, rice, pasta, dairy and other branded products that include Quaker oatmeal, Aunt Jemima mixes and syrups, Quaker Chewy granola etc. PepsiCo, Inc. markets, sells and distributes these products through its operations, authorized bottlers, contract manufacturers and other partners.
Sales: $66.7 Billion
Profits: $6.5 Billion
1. Procter & Gamble
Procter & Gamble Co.( P&G) is a consumer goods company with products in household and personal care .
Image: social media page of company
It is headquartered in Cincinnati, Ohio, USA. The segments in which it has its products are Health care, Home and Baby, Beauty, Grooming, etc. It has some well-known brands like Gillette, Tide, Pantene, Oral-B, and Pampers in different segments
It was founded by William Procter and James Gamble in 1837. They were separately into candle making and soap making business prior to the formation of the company. The company got a boost during the American Civil War where they got contracts from Union Army to supply soaps and candles. From then the company started to expand their manufacturing facilities throughout the country to meet the consumer demand. It now operates in 80 countries with more than a lakh employee.
Procter & Gamble acquired a number of companies to stay ahead in the competition and expand its product line. Folgers, Richardson-Vicks, Shulton’s Old Spice, Max Factor, Iams and Noxell be among the top acquisitions of P&G. In 2005, it acquired Gillette forming the largest consumer goods company overtaking Unilever.
In 2014, P&G announced of narrowing down the focus of the company to only 80 brands leaving aside 100 other brands which were present at that point of time. A. G. Lafley, the company’s chairman and CEO has said that P&G’s future strategy will be to be to become a simpler and less complex company having leading brands that are easy to manage and operate. It sells its products through mass merchandisers, grocery and neighborhood stores, club stores and other retail outlets.
Sales: $81.7Billion
Profits: $9.5Billion
Ranking Criteria
The rankings are assigned based on their revenues.
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