The Consumer Staples group has plenty of great stocks, but investors should always be looking for companies that are outperforming their peers. Is Clorox (CLX) one of those stocks right now? A quick glance at the company's year-to-date performance in comparison to the rest of the Consumer Staples sector should help us answer this question.

Clorox is one of 184 companies in the Consumer Staples group. The Consumer Staples group currently sits at #14 within the Zacks Sector Rank. The Zacks Sector Rank includes 16 different groups and is listed in order from best to worst in terms of the average Zacks Rank of the individual companies within each of these sectors.

The Zacks Rank is a successful stock-picking model that emphasizes earnings estimates and estimate revisions. The system highlights a number of different stocks that could be poised to outperform the broader market over the next one to three months. Clorox is currently sporting a Zacks Rank of #2 (Buy).

Over the past three months, the Zacks Consensus Estimate for CLX's full-year earnings has moved 3.4% higher. This signals that analyst sentiment is improving and the stock's earnings outlook is more positive.

Our latest available data shows that CLX has returned about 18.7% since the start of the calendar year. Meanwhile, stocks in the Consumer Staples group have gained about 4.1% on average. This means that Clorox is outperforming the sector as a whole this year.

Another Consumer Staples stock, which has outperformed the sector so far this year, is US Foods (USFD). The stock has returned 52.9% year-to-date.

Over the past three months, US Foods' consensus EPS estimate for the current year has increased 1.2%. The stock currently has a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy).

To break things down more, Clorox belongs to the Consumer Products - Staples industry, a group that includes 27 individual companies and currently sits at #144 in the Zacks Industry Rank. Stocks in this group have gained about 63.3% so far this year, so CLX is slightly underperforming its industry this group in terms of year-to-date returns.

On the other hand, US Foods belongs to the Food - Miscellaneous industry. This 46-stock industry is currently ranked #152. The industry has moved -2.6% year to date.

Going forward, investors interested in Consumer Staples stocks should continue to pay close attention to Clorox and US Foods as they could maintain their solid performance.

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