Companies in the consumer staples industry make and sell products that are considered necessities. Products that fall under the category of "consumer staples" include those used in maintaining one's home and personal hygiene and health.

These businesses are immune to economic fluctuations and able to develop steadily regardless of conditions. Companies like Procter & Gamble, Coca-Cola, and General Mills are among the most well-known in the industry. Best consumer staples stocks to buy now.

Consumer Staples Stock Benefits

Stocks in the consumer staples sector are relatively immune to economic downturns because of their non-cyclical nature. Businesses selling necessities like food and cleaning supplies tend to do well in bad economic times because consumers need them regardless of the status of the economy.

In the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic, for example, many industries that produce best american consumer staples stocks to buy now les saw increased profits as people stockpiled necessities while cutting back on non-essentials like travel and eating out.

Recent trends indicate that consumers are shifting their spending priorities back to discretionary categories, which negatively impacts the performance of stocks of consumer staples like Clorox that had benefitted from the increased demand for cleaning supplies.

Investing in Consumer Staples: Top Stocks to Buy

Many of the major stocks in the consumer staples category, such as Procter & Gamble, PepsiCo, and Estee Lauder, will also be known to you. Unilever is an excellent option for anyone looking for a polarizing brand name.

Procter & Gamble

Products like Tide detergent, Gillette razors, and Crest toothpaste have become Procter & Gamble household names. Nearly 200 years have passed since the founding of this household and personal care goods corporation.

In several product categories, such as paper goods, laundry detergent, diapers, and beauty aids, its brands are either the undisputed leaders or close runners-up. Similarly, P&G is a Dividend Aristocrat. Zevo, a non-toxic insect repellent, is just one of the cutting-edge new products P&G is working on.

The company introduced its Home Made Simple plant-based cleaning products in 2019. P&G is better after it streamlined its operations by selling off non-core brands, reorganizing, and reducing expenses.

P&G's business benefited greatly from the epidemic, like those of other staples manufacturers. Organic revenues increased 10% for the fiscal third quarter that ended June 30, 2022, and the company's earnings have been good overall.

PepsiCo

There's a lot more to PepsiCo than just its eponymous soft drink. Frito-Lay, Quaker, Mountain Dew, and Gatorade are a few beverage and snack brands owned by the conglomerate. Sales of its Frito-Lay snacks in North America are almost as high as those of its drinks, and this division has been a growth driver while soda sales have declined in the United States and elsewhere.

Pepsi has many of the same benefits as industry heavyweights P&G and beverage major competition Coca-Cola, thanks to its worldwide brands and distribution. Pepsi felt the early effects of the epidemic more acutely than other companies because of its proximity to the food service industry.

It maintained its momentum through the first half of 2022, with organic sales growth of 13.3%. Even Pepsi has expanded through mergers and purchases. Its 2018 purchase of SodaStream put it in the driver's seat of the home soda-making market.

Estee Lauder

The cosmetics market is more unstable than other segments of the consumer staples market. That's because the cosmetics industry, which follows the broader fashion industry's lead, sees its trends come and go more rapidly, attracting a correspondingly smaller number of businesses.

In addition, the COVID-19 epidemic had a more severe impact on the cosmetics industry than on other essential retailers because of the drop in demand for makeup and scents due to people avoiding each other.

The S&P 500 has returned over 60% over the previous five years, while Estee Lauder has more than doubled that. But there also contains a more spectacular rise and a sharper collapse during the lousy market of 2022, illustrating the sector's inherent volatility.

Estee Lauder, with its strong roster of luxury beauty brands including Clinique, Aveda, La Mer, and MAC, is the world's second-largest pure-play cosmetics corporation, behind only L'Oreal.

Unilever

Unilever is attempting a corporate turnaround, which is good news for contrarian investors. The drawbacks, including the inability to complete a high-profile acquisition, have resulted in a historically high dividend yield for the shares.

Most intriguing, though, is that activist investor Nelson Peltz, who played a crucial role in revitalizing Procter & Gamble's company, has joined Unilever's board of directors.

Unilever is already reorganizing its operations to raise the responsibility of top leaders, which Peltz has acknowledged is vital but is unlikely to result in a quick cure to the company's difficulties.