Branded Food & Beverage
World’s Most Productive Companies
Branded Food & Beverage: A Demand-Led Reset
Branded Food and Beverage covers the large packaged-food and non-alcoholic-beverage companies. It is a scale game built on brand strength, distribution, and operational excellence, but the group has faced a demand-led reset as shoppers trade down to private label and shift consumption habits.
2025 was the hardest year in the group, which finished well below its 2019 baseline as volumes softened across much of branded packaged food. Danone and JM Smucker bucked the trend as World’s Most Productive Companies, using focused portfolios and steady operational improvement to hold productivity above the pack while most peers gave back ground.
Branded Food & Beverage World's Most Productive Companies
Productivity Snapshot
- Branded Food and Beverage ranks fifth of five Food and Beverage peer groups in 2025, at an Industrial Productivity Index of 0.90, about 10% below its 2019 baseline.
- It was a difficult year: only 2 of 18 companies grew productivity in 2025 as demand softened across branded packaged food.
- Danone and JM Smucker are the group’s World’s Most Productive Companies, both above 1.05 on focused portfolios and steady operational improvement.
- Trading down to private label and shifting consumption habits weighed on the rest of the group.
Interested in learning more about how you stack up, where to improve, and the impact on margin, cash, inventory, and assets?