At its annual meeting yesterday, Procter & Gamble’s president and chief executive officer, Bob McDonald told the company’s shareholders that it will drive its business by touching and improving more consumers’ lives in more parts of the world more completely.

After one of the toughest years P&G has faced in more than 50 years, McDonald said the company now serves about four billion of the world’s seven billion consumers, but aims to reach five billion over the next five years.Going forward, he said, “Our choices are a natural evolution of the strategies that have been working for nearly a decade. We will grow leading, global brands and core categories. We will build our business with under-served and un-served consumers and we will continue to develop faster growing, structurally attractive businesses with global leadership potential.”

Geographic and portfolio expansion, along with a focus on simplifying business structure and processes, leveraging scale and enhancing execution will all be elements of P&G’s long-term growth success, he added.

McDonald also paid tribute to former president and chief executive and current chairman of the board, A.G. Lafley, lauding the transformation he had led over the last nine years.
“As P&G shareholders, we’ve all benefited substantially from A.G.’s leadership,” McDonald said. “When he took over the helm, P&G’s market capitalization was about $74 billion – 35th highest among the Fortune 500. P&G stock has appreciated approximately 100 percent since then, and today the company’s market capitalization is about $170 billion, making P&G one of the most valuable companies in the world,” he said.

P&G’s net sales for the fiscal year ended June 30, 2009, were $79 billion, with organic sales up 2%.

On average, P&G sales have nearly doubled for each of the past three decades—from $10 billion in 1980 to approximately $80 billion today with earnings increasing from $643 million to $12 billion over the same period. The company’s dividends have also increased every year—more than 9% a year on average, over the past 53 years, and have been paid without interruption since the company was incorporated 119 years ago.

P&G will issue its results for the first fiscal quarter ended September 30, 2009 on October 29, 2009.