The objective of this paper is the profitability of an investment project of the large food company by using various financial criteria: net present value, internal rate of return, payback period, discounted payback period and profitability index. For better access to evaluation of an investment project, the research on the frequency of use of the financial decision-making criteria in a sample of companies from the USA has been analysed in this paper. The research results from the practice of the business systems of the world's strongest economy confirmed the above theoretical framework and choice of methods of financial decision making. The results of the comparative analysis of the investment in food production in Croatia are determined by trends in the size, forms of financing and the regional distribution of investments. From them emerges the importance of efficient management of the investment segment for the national economy as well as the need for their growth by financing investment projects from EU funds and the higher level of their regional dispersion and distribution. With two previous analyzes that serve as a basis, the concrete analysis of the investment project in the expansion of the large food company showed that the investment project is payable. Therefore, the sensitivity analysis has been carried out by reducing the planned sales volume. The result of the sensitivity analysis did not change the assessment of the cost-effectiveness of the investment project