Sonoco Products Company (SON) Earnings: Q3 2026 Results

The quarter ended September 27, 2026 and Sonoco published the results on October 21, 2026. Revenue and diluted EPS are shown against Q3 2025, the same quarter a year earlier, which takes seasonal swings out of the comparison. Sonoco reports EPS two ways: GAAP, under the accounting rules every US filer follows, and adjusted, which leaves out items the company considers outside its operating results. The release reconciles the two, and when they diverge, the reconciliation says why.

• Sonoco sold ThermoSafe on November 3, 2025. Q3 2025 net sales of $2,131 million include $79 million from the All Other group (mostly ThermoSafe), which is why the two segment rows for Q3 2025 do not add up to the total.
• From January 1, 2026 Sonoco's Industrial Plastics business is reported in the Industrial segment, and Q3 2025 Industrial figures were recast to include its $29 million of sales. The TFP business sold in 2025 is a discontinued operation and is excluded from net sales.
• Q3 2026 GAAP results include a non-cash goodwill impairment charge of $829 million.

Source: Sonoco Q3 2026 results, October 21, 2026. Also in the Form 10-Q for the quarter ended September 27, 2026. Figures as reported; checked against the release on November 10, 2026.

How Sonoco splits revenue in its own release, under its own labels, for Q3 2026 against Q3 2025. Indented lines are parts of the line above them.

• Sonoco's Consumer Packaging revenue was $1.4 billion in Q3 2026, down 3% from $1.4 billion in Q3 2025, 68% of total revenue.
• Sonoco's Industrial Paper Packaging revenue was $646 million in Q3 2026, up 5% from $614 million in Q3 2025, 32% of total revenue.

Segment lines are the figures writers cite most often, because they show where the growth in a quarter came from. Companies redraw their segments from time to time and restate the prior year to match, so a year-ago figure here can differ from the one printed a year ago. When that has happened, the note above says so.

From the earnings release

Sonoco's revised full-year 2026 guidance. The EPS and EBITDA targets are adjusted (non-GAAP) figures; Sonoco gives no GAAP guidance.

In its Q3 2026 release, Sonoco said:

“Net Sales: $7.20 billion to $7.40 billion”

“Targeting diluted earnings per share between $5.30 to $5.50”

“Cash flow from operating activities: Guidance adjusted to $600 million to $650 million, including the effect of payments of prior year taxes on gains from divestitures and restructuring costs”

“In the fourth quarter of 2026, we expect continued strong performance from our Industrial segment, supported by continued robust URB demand in North America.”

Source: Sonoco Q3 2026 release, Oct 21, 2026.

This is the company's own guidance as of Oct 21, 2026, quoted as given. Walnut does not make forecasts of its own. Analyst estimates for the coming quarters are on the SON forecast page.

Revenue and diluted EPS for the last 5 quarters. Each date links to that quarter's release.

Net sales from continuing operations and GAAP diluted EPS (total, including discontinued operations), each as first reported in that quarter's release. Q4 2025 EPS includes the gain on the ThermoSafe sale; Q3 2026 includes the $829 million goodwill impairment.

We do not hold a confirmed date for Sonoco's next report. Companies post the date on their investor relations site a few weeks ahead, usually with the time of the conference call.

Each quarter keeps its own page with the figures as reported, so a link to one stays pointed at the same numbers after the next report.

• Q3 2026 (this page), reported Oct 21, 2026

Sonoco had net sales of $2,042 million in Q3 2026, down 4.2% from $2,131 million. It reports two segments: Consumer Packaging, $1,396 million, and Industrial Paper Packaging, $646 million. Consumer Packaging covers rigid packaging in paper, metal and plastic for food, beverage, household, personal and pharmaceutical products, and it made up approximately 65% of 2025 net sales. (Sonoco Q3 2026 release, Oct 21, 2026; Sonoco Form 10-K, 2025, Feb 26, 2026)

Sonoco's 10-Q breaks the $89.5 million decline down: the November 2025 sale of ThermoSafe took out $79.3 million and lower volume/mix $44.9 million, while higher selling prices added $46.2 million and foreign currency translation cost $8.5 million. Excluding divestitures, Sonoco describes net sales as essentially flat. (Sonoco Form 10-Q, Q3 2026, Oct 28, 2026; Sonoco Q3 2026 release, Oct 21, 2026)

Sonoco's Consumer Packaging sales fell 2.9% because adverse weather hurt seasonal vegetable harvests in EMEA and the Americas, reducing metal can volumes. Consumer volume/mix fell 3%, while international paper can operations had double-digit volume growth on snack demand in emerging markets. Industrial Paper Packaging sales rose 5.2% on pricing, and North America URB trade ton sales rose 10% with mill utilization at 94%. (Sonoco Q3 2026 release, Oct 21, 2026)

Sonoco's sales are split almost evenly between the U.S. and EMEA. In Q3 2026, United States revenue was $916.5 million and EMEA $925.8 million, each about 45% of the total, and EMEA was $827.4 million of Consumer Packaging's sales. In 2025 the five largest Consumer Packaging customers accounted for approximately 23% of that segment's net sales, and no customer reached 10% of consolidated revenue. (Sonoco Form 10-Q, Q3 2026, Oct 28, 2026; Sonoco Form 10-K, 2025, Feb 26, 2026; Sonoco Q3 2026 release, Oct 21, 2026)

Sonoco reported a GAAP net loss of $732 million, or $7.36 per diluted share, in Q3 2026, against EPS of $1.23 a year earlier. The loss comes from a non-cash goodwill impairment of $829 million: $802 million in the Consumer Packaging EMEA/APAC businesses and $27 million in Industrial Paper Packaging APAC. Restructuring and asset impairment charges account for $8.54 of the $9.03 per share of adjustments between GAAP and adjusted EPS. (Sonoco Q3 2026 release, Oct 21, 2026)

Sonoco's adjusted EPS was $1.67, down 13.0% from $1.92, and adjusted net income was $167 million against $191 million. Besides impairments, Sonoco's adjusted figures exclude amortization of acquisition intangibles ($0.36 per share), acquisition, integration and divestiture costs, non-operating pension costs and certain tax items. Adjusted operating profit fell to $268 million from $308 million because raw material and other operating costs rose faster than prices. (Sonoco Q3 2026 release, Oct 21, 2026)

Sonoco's effective tax rate was (6.4)% on GAAP pre-tax income from continuing operations and 24.6% on the adjusted basis, against 6.0% and 22.9% a year earlier. Diluted weighted average shares were 99,502 thousand. (Sonoco Q3 2026 release, Oct 21, 2026; Sonoco Form 10-Q, Q3 2026, Oct 28, 2026)

Diluted EPS divides net income by the weighted average number of shares outstanding in the quarter, plus the shares that options and other equity awards could add. Buybacks shrink that count and lift EPS for the same profit; share issuance and stock awards enlarge it.

Sonoco gives full-year guidance in its release and revised it in Q3 2026: net sales of $7.20 billion to $7.40 billion, adjusted EPS of $5.30 to $5.50, adjusted EBITDA of $1.20 billion to $1.25 billion, and operating cash flow of $600 million to $650 million including taxes paid on 2025 divestiture gains. It gives no GAAP guidance, citing restructuring, impairment and divestiture items it cannot forecast. (Sonoco Q3 2026 release, Oct 21, 2026)

Sonoco's CFO said the company expects continued strong Industrial performance in the fourth quarter on URB demand in North America and more stable Consumer results. The CEO said Sonoco is cutting costs through a Profitability Performance Plan after a third quarter that fell short of its expectations. (Sonoco Q3 2026 release, Oct 21, 2026)

A consensus figure is the average of the models published by the analysts who cover Sonoco, collected by a data provider and revised up to the day of the report. A quarter that lands above it says how expectations were set as much as how the business did, and the share price on the day also reflects the guidance and the lines no consensus covers.

The consensus figures on this page are Yahoo Finance's, as pulled on the date shown. Each comes with the number of analysts behind it; the smaller that number, the more one revised estimate can move the average.

The figures below are the ones Sonoco's own release and filings put weight on for Q3 2026, with the latest reported value for each.

What the quarter means for a holding is a separate question from what it reported. The case for and against owning SON is on is SON a buy or a sell?, what analysts expect next is on the SON forecast, and what the company does is on the Sonoco Products Company (SON) stock page.

Every number on this page can be traced to a document Sonoco published. Checking one takes a couple of minutes, and it is worth doing before you quote a figure anywhere.

• The results release is the document linked in the source line above. Companies publish it on their investor relations site at the moment results go out, and it carries the headline tables: revenue, operating income, net income and EPS for the quarter and the year-ago quarter.
• The same release is filed with the SEC as Exhibit 99.1 to a Form 8-K under Item 2.02, usually on the day of the report. The SEC copy does not change after the fact, which makes it the safer thing to link when you cite a number.
• The quarterly report (Form 10-Q) follows within a few weeks and carries the full financial statements, the segment note and management's discussion of what changed. The fourth quarter is covered by the annual report (Form 10-K) instead.
• Restated comparisons are flagged in the notes on this page. When a company redraws its segments or changes how it adjusts EPS, it restates the year-ago column, so the year-ago figure in a new release can differ from the one printed a year ago. This page always uses the comparison in the newer release, because that is the like-for-like one.

A walk-through of every line in a release, with what each one tells you, is in how to read an earnings report.