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Informist, Thursday, Aug. 13, 2026

 

--Page Ind: Price hikes in May to strengthen Q2 top line 

--CONTEXT: Page Ind mgmt's comments in post-earnings analyst concall 

--Page Ind: Expect raw material cost to be stable going ahead 

--Page Ind: May price hikes insufficient to cover rise in raw material costs 

--Page Ind: May price hikes won't upset targeted FY27 EBITDA growth of 19-21%

 

By Avishek Rakshit and Ruchira Kagita

 

KOLKATA/MUMBAI – Page Industries Ltd., which increased prices for the second time in the current calendar year, is banking on consumers to absorb the price hikes while aiming for "double-digit" volume growth in the current financial year. The underwear and athleisure major is optimistic that its raw material costs will remain stable going forward and there may not be a need for further price hikes.

 

Page Industries increased prices by 2.5% in January and then, after the West Asia war led to a rise in raw material costs, it again increased prices by 2.2% in May. However, the price increase in May did not fully cover the rise in input costs and the company was reluctant to fully pass on cost pressures to consumers fearing consumer demand being negatively impacted. The concern was more pronounced as it was the second time in the current calendar year that the company raised prices. 

 

"We have undertaken a price increase partially to absorb the input cost in Q1 (June quarter). This was done sometime in mid of May. However, the full gains of the price increase has still not been realised and that is something we will be realising in Q2 (September quarter)", Karthik Yathindra, the company's chief executive officer, told sector analysts Thursday in a post-earnings call.

 

Not only did the company face an increase in its cloth costs which are derived from petrochemicals, it also faced significant challenges on the logistics front as well, as fuel costs increased for its third-party logistics vendors. Usually, the company faces three-four days of undelivered billing in a normal financial quarter. Essentially, it means that the company gets the payment from its distributors in advance but sends out the shipment usually after 3-4 days. 

 

"This year (June quarter of current financial year) that moved to about seven days. So, a delta of about three days of invoiced revenue," Yathindra said. "While we did pre-positioning of supplies, we couldn't fully absorb the extreme increase that happened. But yes, end of June and even now, the situation has to a large extent normalised. And going forward, we expect things to be stable."

 

The senior company official said that such increase in raw material costs as well as operational costs such as logistics were temporary in nature and going forward, no further price hike would be needed, which would keep the company competitive in the market and also help maintain consumer demand.

 

However, if input costs continue to increase or return to the level they were in April and May, the quantum of price increase will not be enough to absorb the complete input costs, Yathindra said. He added that such price hikes, which can be absorbed by conusmers in the coming quarters may help the company maintain earnings before interest, tax, depreciation, and amortisation growth of 19-21% in the current financial year. 

 

"We are hopeful that it (input cost increase) will not escalate to the extent that we need to come up with another price intervention," he said. 

 

The exclusive licensee of JOCKEY International Inc. (USA) for manufacture, distribution and marketing of the JOCKEY® brand in India, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Nepal, Oman, Qatar, Maldives, Bhutan, UAE, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Bahrain, Page Industries reported a sales volume increase of around 6% on year to 61.2 million units in the June quarter.

 

The innerwear major reported a net profit of INR 1.93 billion for the June quarter, down 4% from INR 2 billion in the year-ago quarter. Sequentially, the net profit rose 8% from INR 1.79 billion. The company's revenue from operations grew 8% to INR 14.20 billion from INR 13.17 billion in the year-ago quarter. Sequentially, the revenue increased 13% from INR 12.53 billion. 

 

Shares of Page Industries were down 2.6% from Wednesday at INR 37,305 apiece on the National Stock Exchange at 1438 IST, before the company announced its results. The stock ended at INR 36,520, down 4.6%.  End

 

IST, or Indian Standard Time, is five-and-a-half hours ahead of GMT

 

Edited by Avishek Dutta

 

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