Britain's Cadbury, the world's biggest confectionery group, said today its second-quarter sales growth is likely to be modestly higher than the 7 per cent growth in the first quarter.
The London-based group, which is in the process of cutting 450 staff from its 1,100-strong Irish workforce, said in a trading statement that despite the challenging economic outlook and further increases in input costs in the second half it is confident of a successful outcome for 2008.
The company is therefore expecting first-half growth above the top end of its 4 to 6 per cent target and margin growth of at least 1.5 percentage points.
"We're off to a strong start as a focused confectionery business and expect first-half revenues above our goal range and good progress on margins," group chief executive Todd Stitzer said in a statement.
But the group cautioned it expects some bias in revenue and margin growth towards the first half, with commodity cost increases for the year in the range of 5 to 6 per cent being weighted towards the second half.
The group is likely to see increased competition after Mars agreed to buy Wrigley in a $23 billion deal in April, which when completed will replace Cadbury as the world's biggest confectionery group.
Last year the company said its new confectionery strategy would mean a 15 per cent reduction in its 50,000 workforce and the closure of up to 60 factories.