Special Charges

12 Months Ended

Nov. 30, 2021

SPECIAL CHARGESIn our consolidated income statement, we include a separate line item captioned “Special charges” in arriving at our consolidated operating income. Special charges consist of expenses, including related impairment charges, associated with certain actions undertaken to reduce fixed costs, simplify or improve processes, and improve our competitiveness and are of such significance in terms of both up-front costs and organizational/structural impact to require advance approval by our Management Committee, comprised of our senior management, including our Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer. Upon presentation of any such proposed action (generally including details with respect to estimated costs, which typically consist principally of employee severance and related benefits, together with ancillary costs associated with the action that may include a non-cash component, such as an asset impairment, or a component which relates to inventory adjustments that are included in cost of goods sold; impacted employees or operations; expected timing; and expected savings) to the Management Committee and the Committee’s advance approval, expenses associated with the approved action are classified as special charges upon recognition and monitored on an on-going basis through completion. Certain ancillary expenses related to these actions approved by our Management Committee do not qualify for accrual upon approval but are included as special charges as incurred during the course of the actions.

The following is a summary of special charges recognized for the years ended November 30 (in millions):


	2021		2020		2019

Employee severance and related benefits in the income statement	$	10.5	$	4.1	$	6.2
Other costs in the income statement(1)	35.9		2.8		14.6
Special charges	$	46.4	$	6.9	$	20.8
Special charges included in Cost of goods sold	4.7		—		—
Total special charges	$	51.1	$	6.9	$	20.8

(1) Included in other costs for 2021 are non-cash intangible asset impairment charges of $11.2 million and a non-cash fixed asset impairment charge of $6.0 million.

The following is a summary of special charges by business segments for the years ended November 30 (in millions):


	2021		2020		2019
Consumer segment	$	36.3	$	5.5	$	13.1
Flavor solutions segment	14.8		1.4		7.7
Total special charges	$	51.1	$	6.9	$	20.8

We continue to evaluate changes to our organization structure to reduce fixed costs, simplify or improve processes, and improve our competitiveness.

During 2021, we recorded $51.1 million of special charges, of which $46.4 million was recognized in Special charges and $4.7 million was recognized in Cost of goods sold on our consolidated income statement. Special charges in 2021 consist principally of $19.5 million associated with our exit of our rice product line in India, as more fully described below, $6.2 million associated with the transition of a manufacturing facility in EMEA, streamlining actions of $10.3 million in the Americas region, $4.8 million in the EMEA region and $0.8 million in the APAC region, and $0.8 million related to our GE initiative, together with a non-cash asset impairment charge of $6.0 million associated with an administrative site that was sold in conjunction with our decision to employ a hybrid work environment. As of November 30, 2021, reserves associated with special charges are included in the line entitled "Trade accounts payable" and "Other accrued liabilities" in our consolidated balance sheet.

In 2021, we recorded a total of $19.5 million of special charges related to the exit of our Kohinoor rice product line in India. This action principally relates to the discontinuance of Kohinoor's rice business consistent with our focus on higher margin products to enable the business to focus on both its flavor solutions and non-rice consumer business. As a result of the Kohinoor rice product line exit, we determined that an impairment of the Kohinoor brand name had occurred in 2021 and recorded a non-cash impairment charge of $7.4 million reducing its carrying value to zero. Also, as a result of this action, we determined that the value of our customer relationship asset in India was also impaired as a result of the lower level of anticipated sales and recorded a non-cash impairment charge of $3.8 million. We also recorded $3.6 million of employee severance and other related exit costs associated directly associated with the exit plan. We anticipate that these costs will be paid within the next twelve months. In addition, as a result of the Kohinoor product line discontinuance in 2021, we recognized a $4.7 million charge in cost of goods sold, which represents a provision for the excess of the carrying value of rice inventories over the estimated net realizable value of such discontinued inventories and a contractual obligation associated with terminating a rice supply agreement.

During 2020, we recorded $6.9 million of special charges, consisting of (i) $5.3 million related to streamlining actions in our EMEA region, including $3.8 million related to severance and related benefits and $1.0 million of third party expenses and $0.5 million related to other costs; and (ii) $1.6 million related to our GE initiative. Of the $6.9 million in special charges recorded during 2020, approximately $4.8 million were paid in cash, with the remaining accrual paid in 2021.

During 2019, we recorded $20.8 million of special charges, consisting primarily of (i) $14.1 million related to our GE initiative, including $10.6 million of third-party expenses, $2.1 million related to severance and related benefits, and $1.4 million related to other costs, (ii) $2.3 million of employee severance and related benefits associated with streamlining actions in the Americas and (iii) $3.9 million related to streamlining actions in our EMEA region. Of the $20.8 million in special charges recorded during 2019, approximately $16.8 million were paid in cash, with the remaining accrual paid in 2020.

During 2017, our Management Committee approved a multi-year initiative during which we have executed and expect to continue to execute significant changes to our global processes, capabilities and operating model to provide a scalable platform for future growth. We expect this initiative to enable us to accelerate our ability to work globally and cross-functionally by aligning and simplifying processes throughout McCormick, in part building upon our current shared services foundation and expanding the end-to-end processes presently under that foundation. We expect this initiative, which we refer to as Global Enablement (GE), to enable this scalable platform for future growth while reducing costs, enabling faster decision making, increasing agility and creating capacity within our organization.

While we are continuing to fully develop the details of our GE operating model, we expect the cost of the GE initiative—to be recognized as “Special charges” in our consolidated income statement over its multi-year course—to range from approximately $60 million to $65 million. Of that $60 million to $65 million, we estimate that approximately sixty percent will be attributable to cash payments associated with related costs of GE implementation and transition, including outside consulting and other costs and approximately forty percent will be attributable to employee severance and related benefit payments both directly related to the initiative. Since its inception through November 30, 2021, we have recognized a total of $40.7 million of special charges associated with our GE initiative.