Today, Compass Minerals reported consolidated revenue growth of 5% year over year, driven primarily by an increase in highway deicing sales volumes of 6%, an 8% improvement in consumer and industrial (C&I) sales volumes, and higher Plant Nutrition and C&I pricing.

“Compass Minerals delivered year-over-year revenue growth during the quarter, in large part enabled by our expanded Salt commitments and strong Plant Nutrition pricing. Unfortunately, intensifying inflationary pressures – particularly related to escalating fuel surcharges – and ongoing SOP production challenges continued to compress profitability to levels below what I believe is our normalized earnings potential,” said Kevin S. Crutchfield, president and CEO. “We are focused on mitigating the impact of these challenges to the extent possible through continued pricing actions, executing a successful North America highway salt bid season, balancing production volumes with expected demand to improve margin capture, and targeted productivity initiatives. Despite these persistent cost headwinds, we continue to advance our position as a premier essential minerals company through our efforts to expand into select, high-value adjacent markets to create long-term value for our shareholders.”

Other second-quarter highlights reported by the company include:

• Achieved revenue of $449 million; profitability tempered by higher distribution and production costs
• Plant Nutrition pricing increased year over year, reflecting global fertilizer supply-demand conditions
• Announced substantial expansion of anticipated annual lithium production capacity to approximately 30 to 40 kMT lithium carbonate equivalent (LCE) from prior range of approximately 20 to 25 kMT LCE
• Completed the sale of the company’s South America chemicals business in April 2022 for cash proceeds of approximately $51 million
• Also in April 2022, received the maximum earnout payment of approximately $18.5 million associated with the July 2021 sale of the company’s South America specialty plant nutrition business

View the full release and Fiscal 2022 Second-Quarter Business Update here.