Ecolab Inc. (NYSE:ECL) Q2 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

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Scott Schneeberger: I have one for both of you. A quick one for Scott. I’ll ask them both upfront. Scott, the — was — you mentioned headcount down, but SG&A pretty steady through the balance of the year on an absolute level. Is that incentive comp, which is the delta? And how should we think about that? Because you had a few challenging years. This looks like a really good year. How should we think about that in the back half and then going into next year? And Christophe, for you, I was going to ask on paper, but I also want to ask on — in the Industrial segment. I think because you just did cover paper pretty well. But Food and Beverage, a big subsegment there. That’s been double-digit growth for, gosh, 1.5 years. Are you continuing to win a lot of new business?

How does that trajectory look? And maybe if you could bear down a little bit into the submarkets: dairy, beverage and brewing food? And just give us a little bit of color of the strength you’re seeing?

Christophe Beck: I guess, Scott, you start?

Scott Kirkland: Yes. Scott, I’ll start on the SG&A question. Yes, as I said, the big driver in Q2 of the SG&A increase was incentive compensation, and would expect that similar level of sort of incentive compensation headwind as you see it. Granted, it’s — the reason for it is why we’re performing very well and rebuilding on that incentive compensation, but expect that to be the biggest piece of the SG&A year-over-year for the second half as well. But certainly, as we’ve rebuilt on the incentive compensation, we’d expect it to be less of a headwind next year. But really, more importantly, as we’ve talked about continuing to drive this SG&A ratio, which we’ve done very well over the last few years, the 300 basis points and would expect, although for this year, because of the incentive compensation, the SG&A sort of productivity or leverage will be more modest than we saw over the last few years, would expect to continue to drive that leverage in the future, especially as we’re leveraging the investments we made, the cost savings programs that we have to continue to drive great opportunity on the SG&A productivity going forward.

Christophe Beck: Then the second part of your question, I believe, difference on our F&B business, one of our largest businesses. I’m really pleased with the work that the team has done in this business, they’ve been able to work well on both growth and margin recovery. They’ve been impacted, obviously, by the inflationary costs and delivered product cost, but managed well to manage new business and the margin performance. Second, it’s a positive industry. So it’s serving consumer goods industries. You’re familiar with most of them. They’ve done quite well over the last few years, and they’re still doing well today. So, it’s a good place to be as an industry. And the third point I’ll make is that it’s one of those industries that’s very interested in what we do.

It’s about food safety, which is essential for them. It’s non-negotiable, obviously, for their brands and our customers do very well with it. And at the same time, they are the most advanced companies in terms of commitment on carbon footprint, on water usage, on waste management at a lower total cost, which is exactly what we do for them. So, they are very interested in what we do. And the last point I’ll make is we have this unique position of bringing water management and food safety in one offering, which no company today can offer. We’re uniquely positioned to offer that to our customers. And we perfect that model all the time, and I like a lot where we’re heading because that’s exactly what those customers are looking for, which are the reasons why this business is doing so well.

Operator: Our next question is a follow-up from the line of John Roberts from Credit Suisse.

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