Heineken sold more beer in the first quarter, reporting its first quarterly year-on-year growth in volumes in a year, and stuck to its forecast for profit growth in 2024.

The world’s second-largest brewer said on Wednesday (Apr 24) that beer sales by volume rose 4.7 per cent organically in the January-March period, beating the 2.5 per cent growth expected by analysts in a company-provided poll.

Heineken is focused on restoring volume growth this year, which was hurt in 2023 as it hiked its prices to offset rising costs of everything from energy to barley.

CEO Dolf van den Brink said in a statement that all regions posted higher volume and net revenue, and the company continued to see a sequential improvement in its business performance.

He added the quarter was helped by an earlier Easter and one-off effects.

Still, the brewer said it continued to see the economic environment as “challenging and uncertain”.

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“Despite the solid start to the year, we cannot extrapolate the reported top-line growth to the rest of the year,” it said.

The brewer disappointed investors in February with its wide range for forecast operating profit growth, which it said could be anywhere between a low and high single-digit percentage this year.

Its cautious view early in the year had been in part caused by the uncertainty in two of its important markets, Vietnam and Nigeria, where economic conditions dragged on its performance last year.

Heineken said total volume in Nigeria grew close to 20 per cent. In Vietnam, where Heineken had to destock last year, volume rose in the low-teens.

Net revenue before one-offs rose 9.4 per cent organically to US$7.33 billion), above the 7.2 per cent growth expected by analysts. REUTERS