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Consumer Staples: pay and profit in the S&P 500

Coca-Cola posts a ratio of 1,559:1 and Altria 140:1. Both are large, profitable beverage and tobacco companies. The difference is that one bottles and distributes globally and the other does almost nothing itself.

Consumer Staples has the second-widest median ratio in the index at 263:1 and the second-lowest median worker pay at $57,720. Like Consumer Discretionary, it is a sector where the numbers are dominated by workforce structure, but the mechanism is different, because far less of the workforce is part-time.

Scale retail and global operations

Walmart is the sector's defining company and the largest private employer in the world at 2,100,000 people. It reports a median of $30,520 and a ratio of 913:1 on three-year average CEO compensation of $27.9 million. That package is not unusual, since PepsiCo's is $28.9 million and Coca-Cola's $28.0 million, but dividing it by the midpoint of a two-million-person retail workforce produces a very large number.

Coca-Cola posts the sector's widest ratio at 1,559:1, on a median of just $17,947. This is the lowest median of any company in the sector and reflects a bottling and distribution workforce spread across many low-cost markets. The contrast with Altria, at 140:1 on a median of $166,721, is instructive: both sell a consumer product at enormous margin, but Altria's 5,900 employees are almost entirely US-based professional and manufacturing staff, while Coca-Cola's 65,900 span the world.

The dollar stores follow the retail pattern: Dollar Tree at 564:1 on a $16,214 median across 150,000 employees, and Dollar General at 341:1 on $18,876 across 194,000. Casey's at 586:1 on $18,148 reflects convenience-store staffing.

Tyson Foods at 543:1 on a $43,206 median deserves separate mention. Its median is not especially low for the sector, and its $23.5 million package is ordinary. What makes Tyson notable is elsewhere: it generates just $1,579 of profit per employee across 133,000 people, the lowest figure in the entire S&P 500.

The narrow end

The sector's narrowest ratios belong to companies with concentrated, well-paid domestic workforces: Church & Dwight at 74:1 on $81,203 across 5,550 employees, Kenvue at 107:1, Molson Coors at 119:1 on $97,029, Hormel at 129:1, J.M. Smucker at 138:1 on $77,698.

These are packaged-goods companies with US manufacturing and no retail estate. None employs a large low-wage population, and none pays its chief executive more than about $12 million.

Profit per employee: the sector's real story

The sector median is $53,191, but the distribution is bimodal in a way that matters.

At the top sit the brand owners who outsource nearly everything. Altria generates $1,488,136 of profit per employee, the highest in the sector by a wide margin, across 5,900 people. Hershey reaches $811,736 across just 2,045. Monster Beverage $243,796 across 6,891. These companies own brands and licences; manufacturing, bottling and distribution are largely performed by others.

At the bottom sit the companies that actually employ people at scale. Kroger generates $4,839 per employee across 403,000. Tyson $1,579 across 133,000. Estée Lauder $1,613 across 62,000.

On Fair500's second measure this inverts the headline picture substantially. Coca-Cola's $174,203 of profit per employee against a $17,947 median is a small share; Kroger's $34,552 median against $4,839 of profit per head is a very large one. The supermarket pays poorly and shares most of what little it makes; the beverage company pays much less relative to what each worker's labour is associated with producing.

Four loss-makers

Dollar Tree, Kraft Heinz, Molson Coors and J.M. Smucker each averaged a loss across the three-year window, mostly through large goodwill and intangible impairments rather than operating losses. They appear in the map's "lost money" band and are scored neutrally on the pay-versus-profit measure, since there is no profit to share.

Every consumer staples company in the S&P 500

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