Campbell, the soup and sauce manfacturer, has reported sales of $1.51bn for the fourth quarter of fiscal 2010, a decrease of 1% compared to the same quarter last year. The company said that the decline in sales was mainly due to increased promotional spending.

The company has posted net earnings of $113m or $0.33 per share for the quarter, compared with $69m or $0.20 per share, in the prior year. The increase was primarily due to a lower effective tax rate in the current year and the benefit from a reduction in weighted average diluted shares outstanding.

For the fiscal 2010, the company has posted sales of $7.676bn, an increase of 1% compared to the last year period. Net earnings for the fiscal were $844m or $2.42 per share, compared to $736mor $2.05 per share, a year ago.

Campbell's president and CEO Douglas Conant said that in a challenging year, the company delivered strong earnings growth, overcoming softer-than-expected sales, particularly in their US soup business.

"We had another year of strong cash flow performance, generating more than $1bn in cash flow from operations. For the year, we expanded gross margins through supply chain productivity improvements and previously announced cost-savings initiatives," Conant said.

In fiscal 2011, Campbell expects sales growth of 2% to 3% and adjusted earnings growth before interest and taxes (EBIT) of 4% to 5%. These growth rates are slightly below the company's long-term growth targets, reflecting the challenging economic and consumer conditions in the marketplace. Despite these conditions, Campbell expects fiscal 2011 EPS growth to be within its long-term target range of 5% to 7% from the fiscal 2010 adjusted base of $2.47.