Campbell Soup's CEO Discusses F1Q 2013 Results - Earnings Call Transcript

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Campbell Soup (CPB)

Q1 2013 Earnings Call

November 20, 2012 10:00 am ET

Executives

Jennifer Driscoll - Vice President of Investor Relations

Denise M. Morrison - Chief Executive Officer, President and Director

B. Craig Owens - Chief Administrative Officer, Chief Financial Officer and Senior Vice President

Anthony P. DiSilvestro - Senior Vice President of Finance

Analysts

Andrew Lazar - Barclays Capital, Research Division

Edward Aaron - RBC Capital Markets, LLC, Research Division

Jason English - Goldman Sachs Group Inc., Research Division

David Driscoll - Citigroup Inc, Research Division

Alexia Howard - Sanford C. Bernstein & Co., LLC., Research Division

Matthew C. Grainger - Morgan Stanley, Research Division

David Palmer - UBS Investment Bank, Research Division

Christopher R. Growe - Stifel, Nicolaus & Co., Inc., Research Division

Eric R. Katzman - Deutsche Bank AG, Research Division

Jonathan P. Feeney - Janney Montgomery Scott LLC, Research Division

Bryan D. Spillane - BofA Merrill Lynch, Research Division

Kenneth Goldman - JP Morgan Chase & Co, Research Division

Thilo Wrede - Jefferies & Company, Inc., Research Division

Robert Moskow - Crédit Suisse AG, Research Division

Diane Geissler - Credit Agricole Securities (USA) Inc., Research Division

Akshay S. Jagdale - KeyBanc Capital Markets Inc., Research Division

Presentation

Operator

Good day, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Campbell Soup First Quarter Earnings Conference Call. [Operator Instructions] As a reminder, today's conference call is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to your host, Jennifer Driscoll, Vice President, Investor Relations. Please begin.

Jennifer Driscoll

Thank you. Good morning, everyone. Welcome to the first quarter earnings call and webcast for Campbell Soup Company. With me here in New Jersey today are Denise Morrison, President and CEO; Craig Owens, Senior Vice President, CFO and Chief Administrative Officer; and Anthony DiSilvestro, Senior Vice President of Finance; as well as Stephanie Varnum, Senior Manager in Investor Relations.

Denise will kick us off today with a strategic update, a few thoughts on Hurricane Sandy, the highlights of our results for the first quarter and a few comments on the year. Then Craig will offer his take on the quarter, including our segment results and then our guidance. After we take your questions, Denise will make a few closing remarks.

As usual, we've created slides to accompany our earnings presentation. You'll find the slides posted on our website this morning at investor.campbellsoupcompany.com. Please keep in mind that this call is open to members of the media who are participating in listen-only mode.

As a reminder, our presentation today includes forward-looking statements, which reflect the company's current expectations about future plans and performance. These forward-looking statements rely on a number of assumptions and estimates which could be inaccurate and are subject to inherent risks. Please refer to Slide 3 in the presentation or to the company's most recent Form 10-K and subsequent SEC filings for a list of the factors that could cause our actual results to vary materially from those anticipated in any forward-looking statements that we might make.

As you know, Campbell completed the acquisition of Bolthouse Farms on August 6, 1 week into the quarter. The acquisition is now included in our results, and it drove most of the year-over-year changes in the first quarter. The quarter also includes $10 million in transaction costs related to the acquisition, which are included in our reported results.

In September 27, we announced a $115-million restructuring program designed to improve our U.S. supply chain cost structure. Our first quarter reported results reflect $43 million of costs associated with that restructuring program.

Our remarks today for the balance of our presentation will be on an adjusted basis, including Bolthouse Farms' operating results for 12 of the 13 weeks of the quarter, but excluding the transaction costs and the restructuring charges.

Since our presentation includes non-GAAP measures as defined by SEC rules, we've provided a reconciliation of the measures to the mostly -- most directly comparable GAAP measures as an appendix to the slides accompanying our presentation. These slides, along with our earnings release and selected quarterly financials, also can be found on our website and one other place.

One last item. To make it easier for our iPad and iPhone users to follow Campbell, we've made available to you in the Apple App Store and Google Play Market a new app for viewing Campbell news releases, SEC filings and more on smaller screens. You need to have iTunes installed, but the cost is reasonable, 0. Just search for "Campbell IR." We'd love to get your input on your experience with it as we continue to be interested in improving the way we communicate with you.

And with that, now let me turn the call over to Denise.

Denise M. Morrison

Good morning, everyone, and thanks for joining us for Campbell's first quarter earnings call.

A few months ago, I marked a year as the CEO of this great company. We have committed ourselves to focus forward relentlessly on a new strategic vision that is centered on driving sustainable, profitable net sales growth. Our 3 growth strategies are focused on accelerating the momentum of our existing businesses and extending our platforms into new higher-growth segments and geographies.

We are working diligently to be a more agile and innovative company that is resolutely focused on the consumer, a company that better satisfies the needs of our core baby boomer consumers and is also responsive to new consumer needs, to demographic and generational change, to the increased demand for fresh foods, to the explosion of digital and social media and to the evolving global culture of food. We know we are witnessing major shifts in the drivers of consumer choice. And at Campbell, our rallying cry is "consumer first."

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