Nomad Foods (NOMD) Q2 2026 Earnings Call: Pricing, Market Share Recovery and Deleveraging

Nomad Foods (NYSE: NOMD) said pricing supported a return to gross margin growth in the second quarter of 2026, while retail disruptions in Germany and France have been resolved. Management expects sales and market share performance to improve during the second half, although a return to market share neutrality will take longer.

Key Takeaways

• Retail disruptions are resolved in Germany and France, apart from certain small retailers and markets. Management expects better sales and market share performance in Q3 and Q4 2026.
• Nomad Foods does not expect to reach market share neutrality immediately and provided no specific timeline. Its longer-term plan is to stabilize and ultimately gain share.
• The frozen category across the company’s markets grew 3.4% in value and 1.6% in volume year to date. Over the latest three months, value increased 2.8% and volume rose 1.1%.
• The EUR 200 million productivity program remains on track. Management is using savings to support competitive pricing and said Nomad Foods’ price index has declined slightly.
• Pricing drove the return to gross margin growth in Q2. Management also expects to pursue additional cost-justified pricing, primarily in fish, toward the end of 2026.
• The company paused share repurchases during the latest quarter, maintained its dividend and shifted its capital-allocation focus toward deleveraging and reducing interest costs.

Key Financial Data

Business and Operating Performance

Management identified retailer disruption as a meaningful headwind to market share during Q2. Those issues are now considered resolved in Germany and France, positioning the company for improved execution in the second half.

Private-label pricing is also becoming more favorable for Nomad Foods’ competitive position. Management cited increases of 20%-30% at certain UK retailers, 32% on selected Carrefour SKUs in France, and approximately 20% across most fish categories at Aldi, Edeka and Rewe in Germany.

Nomad Foods has used part of this pricing environment to reduce its own price index slightly. The company is still analyzing sell-out data, however, and said it is too early to reach conclusions about price elasticity.

The productivity program continues to include organizational and manufacturing actions. Management referenced restructuring within marketing functions and a factory closure announced during Q2.

Management Outlook

Management expects sales and market share trends to improve in Q3 and Q4 2026 as retailer disruptions recede. However, it cautioned that achieving market share neutrality will require more time and did not provide a target quarter.

Additional pricing discussions with retailers have begun. The increases are primarily related to fish inflation, and management expressed confidence in implementing cost-justified pricing toward the end of 2026.

Nomad Foods plans to present a broader multi-year value-creation plan at its Analyst and Investor Day in October. The plan will cover innovation, marketing, sales execution, productivity and organizational competitiveness.

Risks and Areas to Watch

• Market share recovery may take longer than the second half of 2026, despite the resolution of major retailer disruptions.
• Price elasticity remains uncertain because recent private-label increases have only begun to reach the market.
• Inflation is concentrated mainly in fish and other protein inputs, including chicken.
• A couple of million euros of A&P and overhead timing benefits, plus EUR 1 million-EUR 2 million of technical recipe-related variances, could create later-period reversals or comparisons.
• Water shortages have not had a direct impact so far, but management said the effect on the current harvest remains to be seen.

Analyst Q&A Highlights

Analysts focused on the timing of market share recovery. Management reiterated that performance should improve in the second half but declined to specify when Nomad Foods will return to neutral or positive share growth.

On margins, CFO Ruben Baldew said pricing—not phasing—drove gross margin improvement. Temporary timing effects were limited to A&P, overheads and technical recipe-related variances.

On capital allocation, the company did not set a target leverage ratio or timetable. Management confirmed that no buybacks occurred in the latest quarter, while dividends continue and debt reduction is now the priority.

CEO Dominic Brisby said the category’s continued value and volume growth and the strength of Nomad Foods’ brands were encouraging. He also emphasized the need for leadership, cultural and operating changes to make the company more competitive.

Full Earnings Call Transcript

Complete Earnings Call Transcript

Management Remarks

Operator

Ladies and gentlemen, greetings, and welcome to the Nomad Foods Second Quarter 2026 Earnings Q&A Session. [Operator Instructions] As a reminder, this conference is being recorded.

I would now like to turn the call over to your host, Jason English, Head of Corporate Strategy and Investor Relations. Thank you. You may begin.

Jason English

Thanks, Max. Hello, and welcome to Nomad Foods Second Quarter 2026 Earnings question-and-answer session. We've posted the associated press release, prepared remarks and investor presentation on Nomad Foods website at nomadfoods.com. I hope you all had a chance to review them.

I'm Jason English, Head of Investor Relations and Corporate Strategy, and I'm joined by Dominic Brisby, our CEO; and Ruben Baldew, our CFO.

During this call, we will make forward-looking statements about performance that are based on our view of the company's prospects, expectations and intentions at this time. Actual results may differ due to risks and uncertainties, which are discussed in our press release, our filings with the SEC and our investor presentation, which includes cautionary language.

We will also discuss non-IFRS financial measures during the call today. These non-IFRS financial measures should not be considered a replacement for and should be read together with IFRS results. Users can find the IFRS to non-IFRS reconciliations within our earnings release and in the appendices at the end of the slide presentation available on our website.

Please note that certain financial information within this presentation represents adjusted figures. All adjusted figures have been adjusted primarily for, when applicable, share-based payment expenses, related employer payroll taxes, exceptional items, foreign currency translation charges or gains and hedge ineffectiveness. Unless otherwise noted, comments from here will refer to those adjusted numbers.

With that, Matt, let's open the line to questions.

Operator

[Operator Instructions] Our first question is from Andrew Lazar with Barclays.

Question-and-Answer Session

Andrew Lazar

Maybe to start, Dominic, I guess, as you think through the back part of the year and the cadence of how you expect sort of market share to unfold because I guess that's the one area where as you note in your prepared remarks that some of the disruptions and whatnot in the first half led market share not to be where you wanted despite the category obviously accelerating nicely.

So I guess, is it unreasonable to expect market share to be more neutral by year-end? Or is there something else that would prevent this now that much of the retail disruption is behind you, competitors are also sort of starting to take price. I'm really just trying to get a sense of whether there is something more structural regarding the ability to hold or gain share as you go forward.

Dominic Brisby

So Andrew, thanks for the question. So the retail disruptions were a meaningful headwind to our share in the quarter. And we certainly expect our performance to improve in the second half. As you pointed out, those disruptions are now behind us. And we're also encouraged to see the recent pricing actions of private label. That said, we still have more work to do to improve our competitiveness. We're making significant progress.

We expect to deliver better sales and market share performance in the third and fourth quarter, but it's probably going to take more time to get back to market share neutrality. I don't, however, see any reason that we cannot get there over time. In fact, we've developed what we think are very compelling plans that are designed to achieve just that. And we're looking forward to sharing those plans with you at our Analyst Day in October.

Andrew Lazar

Got it. And then what sort of elasticity are you seeing thus far on your sort of more recent pricing actions? And just how do those compare relative to maybe historical levels?

Dominic Brisby

So it's a little early to talk about where price elasticity is. Of course, in most cases, private label have only just increased prices, although we are starting to see quite meaningful price increases coming through. For example, in the U.K., certain retailers increasing 20% or 30% mid-July, Carrefour increasing on certain SKUs in France by 32%. In Germany, Aldi, Edeka and Rewe all raised prices by about 20% in most of the fish categories. However, we're still analyzing what the real sell-out data is. So at this point, it's a little too early to draw any meaningful conclusion.

Andrew Lazar

But it sounds like you're being at least, correct me if I'm wrong, prudent with respect to elasticity assumptions in the way that you sort of guided to for the full year around organic sales.

Dominic Brisby

Thank you.

Operator

Our next question is from Steve Powers with Deutsche Bank.

Stephen Robert Powers

Going back to the retailer disruptions in Germany and France. I guess in the prepared remarks, you talked about them as being behind you being resolved as you did in response to Andrew's question, but then you also used language that alluded to like largely resolved. So I guess the question is just can you be a little bit more specific on exactly where we are today versus full resolution? And if not fully resolved, how much allowance that you've made for carryover disruption in the third quarter and second half?

Dominic Brisby

So I think with the exception of certain tiny retailers and tiny markets, these are fully resolved. So certainly, in the case of Germany and France, we're now in good shape. So I think you can consider these as resolved.

Stephen Robert Powers

Okay. Very good. Maybe you could also just talk a little bit about the ongoing productivity work that is going on within the business. As I think about the early earnings bridge into '27, I guess, I'm trying to get a sense of the biggest contributors to profit growth. And just, I guess, the ability of you to drive incremental productivity as part of that bridge, just how you're thinking about that and how your plans are evolving on that front?

Ruben Baldew

No. Thanks, Steve. It's a good question. And let me also make the link to the question Andrew just made. So we are on track with our EUR 200 million productivity program. Also, if you look what we post in terms of our nonrecurring spend, you see, by the way, that, that has gone down. But what we are spending, we're spending on programs linked to productivity. We announced a restructuring in some of our marketing function.

You have seen that in quarter 2, we announced a factory closure. So we are moving ahead, and it is in line with the planning. And I think the other point to make is also linked to the elasticity is we're not pricing as much as what we used to do like '22, '23. We're using our productivity program to have competitive pricing to make sure that our price index doesn't go up further. We actually have seen our price index going down a bit, and that is because of that productivity program. So I think the overall message is we will continue to drive it, and it is on track, and we'll use it to be competitive in terms of pricing, and we're seeing the first results of that in the market.

Operator

Our next question is from Scott Marks with Jefferies.

Scott Marks

First thing I wanted to ask about, in the prepared remarks, you called out some of the things that helped support your margin expansion in the quarter, and you actually spoke to some, I think, one-time benefits or phasing benefits that might reverse that later this year. So wondering if you can help us understand maybe what those are, what the magnitude is? And how should we think about timing for those to reverse?

Ruben Baldew

Yes. I think -- thanks, Scott. I think the main message is you see a return to gross margin growth. That is driven by pricing kicking in. That's what we also said after our quarter 1 results. So that's fully going to plan. That's it. There's a bit of phasing. So we see a couple of million of phasing in our phasing of A&P and overheads, and we had a bit of variances on some technical stuff related to variances to your recipes, which is also EUR 1 million or EUR 2 million. But overall, I think the gross margin improvement is coming through to pricing, and there's nothing of a phasing effect there.

Scott Marks

Okay. Understood. Appreciate the thoughts there. And then regarding the pricing actions, I think there were some comments in the prepared remarks about your team feeling confident in being able to take incremental pricing as we get to Q4 and into next year, just given what competitors have been doing, what you're seeing on the inflationary front. So just wondering if you can help us understand maybe have you started having those conversations yet? And if so, what's been the response from retailers?

Dominic Brisby

Yes. So we have started having those conversations. And of course, it's worth saying that most of the inflation that we're seeing, so hence, most of the pricing is centered around fish. As I pointed out, we've started to see private label increase already over the past few weeks in a number of countries. And we've used some of this opportunity to allow our own price index to go down slightly. So the price increases we're talking about are cost-justified price increases. And so we feel fairly confident in our ability to take these successfully towards the end of this year.

Scott Marks

Understood. And then maybe if I could just sneak in one more just on capital allocation. You noted a suspension of share buybacks to pay down debt. What leverage ratio do you believe is appropriate in the current environment? And do you have a time line to get there?

Ruben Baldew

Yes. So we're not putting out a leverage ratio. As Dominic said also, when you go look ahead of the next years, we'll come back with our Analyst and Investor Day, which will be this fall. So allow me not to answer that fully. But I just want to be clear also what we made in our prepared remarks that we haven't done buybacks in the last quarter. We continue to do the dividends. We just announced that again, and we made it clear that we now will focus on deleveraging also to bring the interest payments and the interest cost down.

Operator

Our next question is from Jon Tanwanteng with CJS Securities.

Jonathan Tanwanteng

I was wondering if you could go a little bit more into detail on your market share expectations. I think you said it might take a while to get back to neutral in terms of market share. I was wondering when you -- if you have any more specificity on when you expect to get there? Is it Q1 of next year? And is it in your plan at some point to start retaking market share and have growth above market?

Dominic Brisby

So it's absolutely in our plan ultimately to start taking market share. We also -- and we'll be talking through those plans as we come to our Analyst and Investor Day in October. But as I said before, whilst we're making good progress and we certainly expect to be able to deliver better share performance in the third and fourth quarter, it's going to take a little more time to get back to market share neutrality. Of course, that's against the backdrop of very strong category growth as well.

So it is also worth pointing out that if you look at the category, the frozen category in our markets year-to-date, it's up 3.4% in value terms and up 1.6% in volume terms. Even in the last 3 months, by the way, up 2.8% in value and 1.1% in volume. So once we do get to that point that we're holding share or indeed growing share, it can have a significant impact. What we're not doing today is giving clarity about when that will be.

Jonathan Tanwanteng

Okay. Fair enough. And then I was wondering if you could talk about any potential impacts from things like weather or other external issues like water shortages and how that might be impacting supply or demand in the current quarter, if that's anything more than you normally see.

Ruben Baldew

I think Dominic just said it that the last 3 months, we've seen actually the category roughly in line where it is year-to-date. I think 3.4% versus maybe now the last 3 months, 2.8%. So it has come down a bit, but I wouldn't say it's a big difference. So that is one category remains strong. Second point is water shortages, we're not seeing that directly. We're having the harvest now. It's to be seen what that will mean. And again, I need to also come back to the point. The additional inflation we're seeing this year is some fish. If you also look at our cost of goods, a big part is there is related to proteins, which is basically chicken and fish, and that is less related to kind of water shortages.

Operator

[Operator Instructions] Our next question is from Peter Saleh with BTIG.

Peter Saleh

Great. Dominic, I wanted to ask, you've been in the seat for a couple of quarters now progressing through this turnaround. What, if anything, has surprised you as you progressed? And maybe how has your thinking changed on the turnaround over the past couple of quarters? Anything you can share would be helpful.

Dominic Brisby

Yes, happy to. I think a couple of things which I was aware of before, but have really been clear over the past couple of quarters. Firstly, the robust health of the category is in. So the fact that the category is in very decent levels of both value and volume growth. I think I was aware of it to some extent before I came, but actually, the fact that this has continued through all the geopolitical uncertainty that we had, the consumer uncertainty we've had and so on, that's been something which has been a very positive thing, which has come through.

Secondly, of course, during this time, I've had the chance to get to know the brands well. I've always known the brand as the consumer, but getting to see the real data behind the brand, the strength of the brand equity versus our competitor brands versus our private label brands has also been a very positive. So essentially, we're in a very strong category, and we have the best brands in the category. So those things are great.

It's also been clear to me though that within Nomad, to make ourselves a much more competitive company and a much more successful company, there have been significant changes which have had to come through. And you'll have seen, particularly in terms of the changes I've made to the leadership team and the executive team of the business. There was a need to bring in some very strong new talent whilst keeping the existing very strong talent that we had. And that's meant making a number of quite significant changes to the top of the organization. And that will also have corresponding changes to the culture that we bring about in the organization. But overall, I've been pretty happy with what I've seen, great category, the best brands in the category and now starting to get the organization to where we need to get to, so we can be really competitive in the market in a way that perhaps we haven't been so much historically.

Peter Saleh

Yes. And then just -- my second question, the retail disruptions appear to be behind you. You've implemented some more price. You've changed some of the leadership. I guess, over the next couple of quarters, what's the next area of focus for you? Is it more around innovation, the marketing side? Just help us understand where you'll be focusing your attention over the next 6 months or so.

Dominic Brisby

So we've now produced what we think is a pretty compelling value creation plan for Nomad for the following years. And that includes really every aspect of the business from innovation to how we manage our marketing approach, how we drive our sales organizations across the business, how we improve our productivity and so on. As you can imagine, there's been an enormous amount of very, very intense work that we've put into this over the past 6 months.

And I think we've got to a point where we consider the plan we've got is a very good one, a plan that we're excited about and makes us quite excited about the future of the business. And that's what we're going to be presenting when we have our Analyst Day in October. But this will cover really every aspect of the business. So it's not the fact that we've had some things to cover for the moment, then we're going to cover others. This will cover the entire spectrum of what we're doing, and we hope that you'll be as excited about it as we are.

Operator

We have reached the end of the question-and-answer session. I would like to turn the floor back over to Dominic Brisby for closing comments.

Dominic Brisby

Thank you all for joining us today and for your interest in Nomad Foods. I look forward to speaking with many of you in the days and weeks ahead and then seeing many of you at our Analyst Day this October.

Operator

This concludes today's teleconference. You may disconnect your lines at this time. Thank you for your participation.