If fewer of us pick up a bout of the sniffles or a touch of the chills over the winter months, it can mean that Reckitt Benckiser catches the cold. The blue-chip consumer goods group yesterday blamed a slow cold and flu season in the first three months of the year for a lacklustre trading performance that means it will have to pick up the pace in order to meet its target for the full year.
Treatments for colds and flu are just one of a number of moving parts at this business, which traces its history to 1819 and a mill in Boston, Lincolnshire, built by Isaac and Thomas Reckitt. The group was created in its current form in 1999 through the merger of