Berry Plastics Profit Rises - Quick Facts

(RTTNews) - Berry Plastics Group Inc (BERY) Thursday reported second-quarter net earnings of $12 million or $0.10 per share compared with $1 million or $0.01 per share last year.

Revenues for the quarter were up 5% at $1.21 billion compared with $1.15 billion in the prior year.Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters estimated revenues of $1.21 billion for the quarter.

Revenue growth was attributed to increased selling prices due to higher material costs along with sales from its acquisitions of Graphic Packaging's Flexible Plastics and Film business and Qingdao P&B, the company said.

"The March 2014 quarter was impacted by challenges related to this year's winter season in the United States and increases in the costs of our raw materials," said Jon Rich, Chairman and CEO of Berry Plastics.

"Despite those effects we still achieved a 5 percent increase in net sales and had similar free cash flow versus the prior year. We took actions on pricing and cost reductions in the quarter and are encouraged by recent increases in demand."

In March, the company agreed to acquire Rexam's Healthcare Containers and Closures business. The proposed acquisition is directly aligned with the company's strategic initiatives and is expected to be deleveraging after achieving synergies.

"As we look ahead to the remainder of fiscal 2014, based on trends we are seeing, we believe that business will improve in the coming quarters and despite the earnings challenges we had in our March ending quarter, we are reconfirming our initial plan of $270 million of adjusted free cash flow," said CEO Rich.