P&G invests $ 1 billion in production until 2015

Procter Gamble &, largest manufacturer of consumer goods in the world and owner of brands such as Pantene, Pampers, Gillette and Ariel, will invest $ 1 billion to expand production capacity in Brazil, where it has six factories and employs 5 thousand people. The information was given yesterday by the President of the P&G Value in Brazil, Alberto Carvalho.
The resources of the company box, will be disbursed this year and in 2015. According to the Executive, will be enough to prepare the company's growth over the next four or five years.
Carvalho will earmark more than half of the $ 1 billion in the plant located in Louveira (SP), where the P&G currently produces nappies (Pampers) and tampons (Always). "We want to enlarge Louveira so that it becomes a multicategorias factory of products," said Carvalho. This factory can, when completed the works, also produce the liquid portion of the portfolio, for example. The company owns the Pantene hair products and soaps and detergents Ariel.
In the last three to four years, Procter Gamble & invested around r $ 500 million in Brazil, said Carvalho. The resources foreseen for the next two years are being applied to purchase of machinery, land and buildings in the expansion. In addition, the remaining Louveira unit five P&G factories in the country will also receive investments this fiscal year which begins in July 2014.
"We're also doing studies to see if there is need for more distribution centers," says Carvalho, who reported that the annual growth rate of sales of P&G is two digits in the country. Hence the need to expand production capacity. The products imported by the company amount to less than 10% of the portfolio.
Carvalho informed that, between releases and re-releases, the P&G is putting on the Brazilian market about 300 items from July 2013-June 2014. The same number is being planned for the next fiscal year. The goal for 2013/2014 era of 200 items.
The largest number of launches, says Carvalho, led Procter to lead some categories in recent months. Pantene, according to him, since the end of last year the brand of hair products most sold in the country in drugstores and supermarkets. Gillette, which already owned more than 70% of the market for razors, has over 80% now. Always, five months ago, also leads the tampon category, says the Executive. And the Oral B electric toothbrush, launched in September, already accounted for about 10% of the total sales of toothbrushes.
The middle class, he says, even with higher inflation, not turned to cheaper products. In the consumer sector, the categories that have suffered with the involvement of the consumer's Pocket are the food and beverage, but new products of personal hygiene and household cleaning and categories "premium" have not been abandoned by the Brazilian consumer-on the contrary, he says.
"The middle-class consumer is still in phase of experimentation, of better quality premium products. And once he experiences, he doesn't go back to the product cheaper, "said he, who has seen the same behavior is repeated in countries such as India, China and Turkey.
This desire to try something new opens space for the company continue releasing premium products and readjusting their prices. The P&G raised the prices of its portfolio in the country, "in line with inflation" in January, said Carvalho. He estimates that the premium products and mid-tier price they pay for 60 percent of the company's portfolio in Brazil.
In the list of new products and brands to be presented to Brazilians in the coming months is that of electric shavers Braun. "We're going to start selling these shavers in July at retail," says Carvalho.
The restructuring of the global business P&G, which has been promoted by the world CEO A.G. Lafley, affected little company's sales in Brazil, according to Carvalho. In the early days of this April, Lafley announced the sale of three brands of dog food for pets, for $ 2.9 billion, to Mars. "This category was little here in Brazil. The impact has been small for us, "said Carvalho. The P&G there was market entry of pet feed in 1999, when he bought the Iams and Eukanuba, for $ 2.3 billion.
Before assuming the Presidency of the P&G in Brazil in December 2012, Carvalho, engineer born in Pernambuco, was Vice President of Gillette. He was out of P&G, in Brazil, 15 years before, to work on various posts of the company in South America and in the United States.
According to the magazine "Valor 1000", Procter Gamble of Brazil & S.A. had net revenue of r $ 3.2 billion in 2012 in the country, with loss of r $ 683,2 million. The results pertaining to 2013 were not informed by the company.