Unilever slashed an estimated 6,000 jobs during its first quarter of trading in 2025.
The reduction in staff forms part of the consumer goods giant’s global restructuring plans announced last year, with an estimated 7,500 jobs to be cut as part of the scheme.
Unilever expects around €550m in savings by the end of 2025 as a result of the programme which aims to streamline the business and improve its category-focused operating model.
The figure was revealed in the Sure and Dove owner’s Q1 trading update, which saw an overall mixed performance.
Underlying sales growth increased by 3% despite “challenging” marketing conditions, and was driven by a boost in volume as well as pricing.
Unilever’s ‘power brands’, such as Dove and Rexona, also bolstered sales and contributed to a standout performance from its beauty division.
Beauty & Wellbeing income jumped by 4.1%, and Personal Care increased 5.1% due to a strong performance from skin cleansing and deodorants in North America.
Turnover fared worse, and saw a decline of 0.9% to €14.8bn as the disposal costs from acquisitions and a negative currency impact dragged down total income.
“We have started the year with a resilient performance,” said Unilever CEO Fernando Fernandez, who succeeded Hein Schumacher in March.
“First quarter underlying sales growth of 3% reflects the strength of our increasingly premium and innovation-led portfolio in developed markets.
“We have interventions in place in some emerging markets to step up growth in the remainder of the year.”
Category-wise, Unilever’s hair care operations came in flat with low single-digit growth, offset slightly by Dove recently relaunching its fibre repair technology.
Sunsilk also saw a subdued performance, impacted by destocking in Brazil, while Nexxus reported double-digit growth thanks to the launch of its HY-Volume range.
A boom in deodorants, particularly whole-body iterations, benefited the consumer giant’s Personal Care division.
Dove, which accounted for 40% of the business’s Personal Care’s turnover, saw increased demand in the US for its serum shower collection and whole-body deodorants during the quarter.
Rexona and Axe, also known as Lynx in the UK, saw more subdued results amid economic pressures in Latin America.
Despite the mixed performance, Unilever has reaffirmed its full year outlook for 2025 – expecting underlying sales growth to fall between 3% to 5%.
Unilever is expecting improvements in both Indonesia and China in the second half of the year due to “decisive actions” taken in both markets.
Fernandez also shrugged off concerns around the recent US tariff hikes and expects the direct impact of the new levies on profitability to be “limited and manageable”.
Fernandez added: “Heightened global macroeconomic uncertainty is a fact; however, the quality of our innovation programme, the strong investment behind our brands and our improving competitiveness give us confidence we will deliver on our full year plans.
“Creating desirability at scale for our brands and brilliant in-market execution are the pillars of our plan to turn Unilever into a consistently higher-performing business.
“We are moving at pace, confident in making progress in 2025 and beyond.”