Unilever's Paul Polman won't be championing better business for long if he can't keep numbers up

Exponents of the better sort of capitalism – if there is such a thing – breathed a sigh of relief when their knight in shining armour Paul Polman jumped on his horse, waved his sword and stopped the Kraft Foods dragon from eating Unilever.

Trouble is, he didn’t slay it... and was only able to keep it bottled up in its cave by promising that he would steal away with some treasure for the people who pay for the upkeep of his sword, steed and armour.

Cue some gaudy cost-cutting targets and promises of shiny things.

The latest trading update shows that the shine could use a bit of polish. Connected 4 Growth, the strategy with a silly name aimed at bringing home the pot of gold Kraft had promised, isn’t showing much lustre.

Unilever has an impressive portfolio of brands that people will sometimes pay a bit extra for. It has put that to the test by forcing through price rises, and has kept revenues up by doing so. Volume growth has, however, been harder to find. This is the fifth consecutive quarter of zero, or near zero. That tells its own story.

Unilever did have some excuses for the latest disappointing update. For example, with hurricanes in America and rotten weather in Europe, no one was much interested in buying ice cream, notwithstanding the all-season appeal of Ben & Jerry’s cookie dough and other concoctions.

Businesses often like to blame the weather when they have a wobble, and sometimes investors take them at their word. But they’d better not do it too often.

Reassuringly, the company didn’t alter its forecast for 3-5 per cent underlying sales growth this year, although you can be pretty sure the final figure will be towards the bottom of that. The company is also doing well in emerging markets, and investing in securing further growth there. A review of the headquarters (investors would like it to stick with just the one) is proceeding.

Mr Polman’s horse won’t go short of feed just yet, which is welcome. While unions aren’t exactly delighted over developments at the company, it still has a reputation for at least trying to do things the right way and demonstrating that businesses don’t always need to behave badly to succeed.

As an example, 13 days ago Mr Polman was at the One Young World Summit in Bogota, pledging a commitment to champion the issue of disability in business as part of a global campaign to secure better recognition of the value of the one billion people living with a disability (I am among their number).

That might sound fluffy. Cynics might see it as a PR stunt, an opportunity for Mr Polman to feel good about himself before he gets back to the office and starts firing people.

But Unilever gives the impression that it actually believes in this sort of thing, that there is real buy-in.

The problem is that to maintain a position as one of industry’s knights, Mr Polman also has to keep the numbers up. He needs to hit those end-of-year forecasts, otherwise he’ll be facing the next dragon that flies over the horizon in his business suit, and the result won’t be pretty.