Before and after the Spring Festival, some sanitary ware companies announced price increases. Japanese companies TOTO and KVK have raised prices this time. Among them, TOTO will increase by 2%-20%, and KVK will increase by 2%-60%. Previously, companies such as Moen, Hansgrohe, and Geberit had launched a new round of price increases in January, and American Standard China also raised product prices in February (click here to view). A price surge” is imminent.
TOTO and KVK announced price increases one after another
On January 28, TOTO announced that it will increase the suggested retail price of some products from October 1, 2022. TOTO said that the company has used the entire company to improve production efficiency, reduce production costs and cut a number of expenses. However, due to the continuous rise in raw material prices, the company’s efforts alone cannot curb the increase in costs. Therefore, the decision to increase the price was made.
TOTO’s price increase mainly involves the Japanese market, including many of its bathroom products. Among them, the price of sanitary ceramics will increase by 3%-8%, the price of washlet (including intelligent all-in-one machine and intelligent toilet cover) will increase by 2%-13%, the price of faucet hardware will increase by 6%-12%, and the price of the overall bathroom will increase by 6%- 20%, the price of the washstand will increase by 4%-8%, and the price of the whole kitchen will increase by 2%-7%.
It is understood that rising raw material prices continue to affect TOTO’s operations. According to the April-December 2021 financial report released not long ago, the rising prices of raw materials such as copper, resin, and steel plates have reduced TOTO’s operating profit by 7.6 billion yen (approximately RMB 419 million) during the same period. The negative factors that have the greatest impact on TOTO’s profits.
In addition to TOTO, another Japanese sanitary ware company KVK also announced its price increase plan on February 7. According to the announcement, KVK plans to adjust the prices of some faucets, water valves and accessories from April 1, 2022, ranging from 2% to 60%, becoming one of the health enterprises with the largest price increase in recent years. The reason for KVK’s price increase is also the high price of raw materials, saying that it is difficult for the company to deal with it by itself, saying that it hopes customers will understand.
According to KVK’s previously released financial report, although the company’s sales increased by 11.5% to 20.745 billion yen (about 1.143 billion yuan) from April to December 2021, its operating profit and net profit decreased by more than 15% during the same period. Among them, the net profit was 1.347 billion yen (about 74 million yuan), and the profitability needs to be improved. In fact, this is the first price increase publicly announced by KVK in the past year. Looking back on 2021, the company has not publicly issued similar announcements to the market and customers.
More than 7 health companies have implemented or announced price increases this year
Since 2022, there have been constant voices of price increases in all walks of life. In the semiconductor industry, TSMC announced that the price of mature process products will increase by 15%-20% this year, and the price of advanced process products will increase by 10%. McDonald’s has also launched a price increase, which is expected to increase menu prices this year by 6% compared to 2020.
Back to the bathroom industry, in just over a month in 2022, a large number of companies have implemented or announced price increases, involving well-known foreign companies such as Geberit, American Standard, Moen, Hansgrohe, and LIXIL. Judging from the implementation time of the price increase, many companies have already started price increases in January, some companies are expected to increase prices from February to April, and some companies will implement the price increase measures later in October.
Judging from the price adjustment announcements announced by various companies, the general price increase of European and American companies is 2%-10%, while that of Hansgrohe is about 5%, and the price increase is not large. Although Japanese companies have the lowest increase of 2%, the highest increase of all companies is in double digits, and the highest is 60%, reflecting the high cost pressure.
According to statistics, in the past week (February 7-February 11), the prices of major domestic industrial metals such as copper, aluminum and lead have all increased by more than 2%, and tin, nickel and zinc have also increased by more than 1%. On the first working day of this week (February 14), although copper and tin prices have fallen considerably, nickel, lead and other metal prices still maintain an upward trend. Some analysts pointed out that the factors driving the price of metal raw materials in 2022 have already emerged, and low inventory will continue to be one of the important factors until 2023.
In addition, the outbreak of the epidemic in some areas has also affected the production capacity of industrial metals. For example, Baise, Guangxi is an important aluminum industry area in my country. Electrolytic aluminum accounts for more than 80% of the total production capacity of Guangxi. The epidemic may affect the production of alumina and electrolytic aluminum in the region. Production, to a certain extent, boosted the price of electrolytic aluminum.
Energy is also dominated by price increases. Since February, the international crude oil prices have generally been stable and rising, and the fundamentals are mostly positive. US crude oil once reached the $90/barrel mark. As of the close on February 11, the price of light sweet crude oil futures for March on the New York Mercantile Exchange rose $3.22 to close at $93.10 per barrel, an increase of 3.58%, approaching the $100/barrel mark. Under the situation that raw material and energy prices continue to rise, it is expected that the price increase in the sanitary ware industry will continue for a longer period of time in 2022.
Post time: May-06-2022