Kimberly-Clark to Raise Prices in North America for Huggies, Other Brands--update

By Aisha Al-Muslim

Kimberly-Clark Corp. is increasing its list prices and changing package counts in the U.S. and Canada for several brands, including Cottonelle bathroom tissue and Huggies diapers.

The Dallas-based company is notifying customers of its plans to increase selling prices across a majority of its North America consumer-products businesses, Kimberly-Clark said Wednesday. The increases are to help offset significant commodity cost inflation, the company said.

The move follows price increases by several consumer-products makers including rival Procter & Gamble Co., which said last month it was raising prices for Pampers diapers, Bounty paper towels and other products in North America.

Kimberly-Clark's percentage increases of mid-to-high single digits on average will mostly affect Cottonelle, Huggies, Scott 1000 bathroom tissue, Kleenex facial tissue, Viva paper towels, Pull-Ups training pants and GoodNites youth pants.

The increases on Cottonelle and Viva will occur in the fourth quarter of this year. Most of the remaining increases will occur in the first quarter of 2019.

Kimberly-Clark sells products directly to supermarkets, drugstores, warehouse clubs, department stores and other retail outlets, as well as distributors, and lodging, office building and food-service facilities. Walmart Inc. made up about 14% of Kimberly-Clark's net sales in 2017.

Write to Aisha Al-Muslim at aisha.al-muslim@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

August 15, 2018 11:21 ET (15:21 GMT)

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