Card Factory plc

Welcome to our full year results presentation for FY23. So thank you for joining us today, whether you're here in person at UBS's office or joining us online. Let me start with an apology. So my sincere apologies that we had to reschedule today's presentation at short notice from last week. But I am really grateful that so many of you are still able to join us both here and online. As you know, I'm Darcy Wilson Reimer, CEO of Card Factory, and joining me today for our interim presentation is Simon Comer, our interim CFO. So following an overview of our highlights from the past year, Simon will provide the financial summary update for FY23. I'll then provide an update on the progress we've made on our opening our new future growth strategy and the outlook for the remainder of the year. I also hope that you'll be able to join us after the presentation of our results for our capital market strategy update, where Simon and I will be joined by a number of our Card Factory CEO leadership team to give a more detailed update on our strategic growth plans through to FY27. And that'll be at 11.30 today. So it's now two years since I joined Card Factory, and I'm proud of the progress that we're making. We have a clear and ambitious plan to transform Card Factory into a market-leading omnichannel retailer of cards and gifts. And we've achieved significant milestones on that journey in FY23. Our progress reflects the hard work and commitment of Card Factory colleagues who have a shared passion about driving our business forward. And I just want to take the moment to personally thank each and every colleague at Card Factory and recognize their outstanding contribution over the past year, which has enabled the growth that we're now enjoying. So thank you, colleagues. I'm pleased to say that we have positive momentum across our business, which alongside the shift of customer spend back towards the high street is driving revenue growth. As a result, our performance in FY23 was ahead of expectations with two profit upgrades announced in the year. And our one-year like-for-like revenue growth of plus 6.7 was underpinned by the strong performance in store-based sales and our everyday card ranges driven by initiatives around range curation and availability improvements. The strength of our expanding gifting offer was a sales driver throughout FY23, as was the successful implementation of targeted price increases, which resulted in minimal impact on customer switching. The key Christmas trading season saw increased store transactions and average basket value, supported by new ranges and a compelling value for money offer, which really resonated with customers. Royal Mail strikes around the festive period did, however, impact our online sales. So like-for-like sales in store were at plus 7.6%, and they're now slightly ahead of pre-pandemic performance, which proves the value of having a nationwide store estate, which will also become an enabler for our omnichannel ambitions. We've continued to successfully mitigate against the significant inflationary cost pressures, and this is achieved through a combination of proactive measures, including efficient management of costs and working capital, improved store efficiencies, targeted price increases, alongside benefits from our hedging policy across both energy and foreign exchange. So we've continued to strengthen the balance sheet with a significant reduction in net debt versus three years ago. And this was all supported by the successful completion of our refinancing at FY23. Delivery of our opening our new future growth strategy is now well underway with significant milestones achieved in FY23. We now have the right foundations in place to deliver on this strategy, and I'm going to discuss this in more detail later. So on that note, I want to hand over to Simon, who's going to share with you the detail of our financial performance. So please, Simon.

Thank you. Thank you, Darcy, and good morning. I have the pleasure of reporting the financial results for the year, the first full year outside of the pandemic. Card Factory has delivered ahead of management expectations for revenue, margin and net debt in the year. Sales of 463.4 million, we're 99 million ahead of last year, with Card Factory like-for-like sales of plus 6.7%. This translated to a PBT of £52.4 million, £41.3 million ahead of prior year, an accreted position of 42% and ahead of guidance given in the January 2023 trading update of PBT of approximately £48 million. We achieved this despite a challenging backdrop of inflationary pressures from material and freight costs as well as labour. We have also seen net debt before lease liabilities improved by a further 17 million to 57.2 million, with a new facility agreement delivered in April 2022. Our operating cash flow before tax, payments of 107.8 million, reflects a cash conversion of 96%. This is down on prior year where we benefited from the unwind of trade working capital post-pandemic. Moving on to look at sales. Total store sales are now slightly ahead of pre-pandemic levels, with like-for-like sales on a three-year basis at minus 0.3%. One-year LFLs for stores was plus 7.6%, with both transactions and average basket values up. This was especially seen in the everyday ranges for both card and gifting, as well as wedding, life moments and children's categories. The impact from targeted pricing activities accounted for two thirds of this total. The LFL performance month on month remained positive throughout the year, with the only exception being April 2022 due to the bounce in sales in April 2021 post the lockdown. Trading in the first few weeks of the new financial year has been encouraging and slightly ahead of the board's expectations. Overall, our store estate has seen a net growth of 12 stores to 1,032, with continued focus in under-penetrated markets in particular, with the opening of three trial stores in central London and continued expansion in the Republic of Ireland. We constantly monitor our store portfolio and maintain a position with less than 1% being loss-making. Moving on to non-store sales. Partnerships delivered a positive 10% growth in sales. This is in a year where we have started to put in place the foundations to drive the international expansion expected over the coming years. This will be discussed in further detail in the capital market strategy update later today. Sales to the reject shop in Australia have grown by 26% on the back of stores being fully reopened post-lockdown. with Aldi down 18% due to space reduction and returns of card purchasing to the high street post lockdowns. Both online businesses were impacted by the Royal Mail strikes over Christmas and the return of customers to the high street. Even with the disruption over Christmas, Cardfactory.co.uk sales were 86.4% above pre-pandemic levels. The phased expansion of the product range to include flowers, gift experiences and alcohol generated an 11% uplift in online gifting sales in the second half of FY23. This sets the online business up well for future growth. The replatforming of Getting Personal was completed in March 2023, which enables the opportunity for range development and further functionality. So let's have a look at margins and cost. Overall PBT of 52.4 million and 11.3% was 8.1 percentage points ahead of last year. This was achieved through a combination of targeted price increases initiated during the first half of FY23, cost control by managing inflationary pressures through efficient currency and utility hedging, labour productivity and active supply chain management. On a constant currency basis, cost of goods sold improved by 2.4 percentage points with currency rates achieved in line with prior year. We are also well hedged into FY24 with 90% cover in excess of $1.275. Store wages were held in line as a percentage with prior year on an underlying basis when taking into account the one-off CGRS provision release with national living wage increases of two percentage points being offset by price and productivity. The 1.4 percentage points increase seen in property costs is due to the cessation of rate support in Q1 of FY23. Other direct expenses is benefited by the energy hedging agreements in place, which saved the company between £4 and £5 million in the year. We are fully hedged on energy out to September 2024 at similar rates to current year. Operating expenses has improved by 0.2 percentage points. This includes investment in people and infrastructure in support of our opening our new future strategy to provide a platform for future growth. Depreciation and amortization charges, including impairments, reduced by 5.9 million compared to the prior year. This reflects a reduction in impairments of 2.2 million, reflecting the improved trading performance and our future expectations regarding store performance and cost inflation. The remaining 3.7 million largely reflects a reduction in depreciation charges on right of use assets. Store rents and therefore the related right of use assets have continued to fall since the pandemic. Our dynamic, flexible approach to the store portfolio has enabled us to continue to capture these reductions as part of lease renewals or relocations. FY23 further includes a £1 million credit associated with the refinancing of debt facilities in April 2022. As we look ahead, we continue to have confidence in our ability to mitigate future cost inflation through a combination of productivity initiatives and targeted price actions. So let's have a look at net debt. There's been a significant improvement to net debt with a three year reduction of 86 million. The year delivered 17 million net debt reduction, which included 10.8 million of agreed rent deferrals from the pandemic period. Cash generated a 59.5 million from EBITDA less rent payments was utilized by increased capex financing of 18.2 million, 12.5 million of debt servicing, A return to paying corporation tax of 7.9 million and working capital increases of 3.9 million in support of the growth delivered in the year. It should be noted that the capex was 12 million over the equivalent investment in prior year. CapEx in the year supported phase two of our ERP implementation, as well as investments in our inventory management system, store expansion and development of our online platforms. The group leverage calculation on a pre-lease liability basis has also continued to improve and exited the year at 0.5 times. Moving on to cash flow. Operating cash flow before working capital of £104.1 million significantly increased over prior year, which reflects the improved trading performance and includes returning to paying corporation tax at £7.9 million. Working capital movement for FY22 includes the impact from the supply chain disruptions that resulted in decreased inventory holdings and the COVID related government support. Inventory has returned in FY23 to a more normalized position, 11 million higher than prior year. However, stock management has reduced overall net inventories by 9 million since FY20. Lease liabilities includes deferred payments of 10.8 million related to store rents from FY21, which is not expected to repeat going forward. Net interest paid has increased by 0.9 million, with the interest hedging policy delivering savings of circa 0.6 million against the current rise in Sonia. Taking into account the increased capex associated with the investment cycle for future growth, free cash flow for FY23 was 18.5 million. So let's have a look at our liquidity. The company agreed new facilities in April 2022 with a mix of RCF, term loans and CL bills. The agreement matures in full by September 2025 with term loan A and the CL bills being fully repaid by January 2024. As at the year end, the company had headroom of 75 million. The repayment of term loan A and the CL bills allows the company to consider dividend payments after this point. So to summarise, a strong set of financials with a return to pre-pandemic levels of trade and positive one year like for likes. Improved margins with inflationary pressures being managed through targeted pricing, active hedging policies and productivity savings across the group. The year saw the refinancing of the company's banking facilities on the back of a substantial net debt improvement. All of the above has put in place a foundation for strategic growth and a pathway to recommencing dividends. So thank you for your time, and now I'll hand back to Darcy.

Thank you very much, Simon. So as I mentioned in my introduction we'll provide a more detailed update on our strategic plans at the capital markets day. But right now what I'll do is provide a summary for the progress that we've been making in in FY 23. So I'll just spend a few minutes on that. So FY23 was the launch year of our business transformation, and we have achieved significant milestones across all our areas of focus. By delivering on our strategy, Card Factory is well positioned to become the UK's number one destination for all customers seeking unrivaled quality, value, choice, convenience and experience. We're working to transform Card Factory into the leading omnichannel brand in our space to help customers celebrate life's moments. And we're achieving this by being customer-centric in our thinking and approach and placing customer data at the heart of our decision-making. So this customer-centric focus also forms the basis for our refreshed brand strategy that we completed in FY23. And by placing customers at the heart of our business, we're building our brand and developing our strategic plans from a core customer truth that life needs celebration. something I'm sure we can all agree and has never been more relevant given the backdrop of all of the recent events that have happened in recent years. So starting with our core cards business, we've continued to build upon our position of strength with focused range development and curation, as well as targeted price increases, which has driven revenue growth in FY23. A permanent three for two mechanic on general card has delivered sales growth on the selected lines included within this offer. And we've also focused on increasing our diversity across our card ranges to ensure that all of our customers feel included for all of life's moments of celebration. I'd like to turn now to the growth opportunity in gifts and celebration essentials. So we previously referred to this under the single complementary categories heading. But we've now split this out partly to conform with industry recognized market analysis. But it's also easier and enables clear measurement for us internally. So by targeting the gifts and the celebration essentials market, we've also been able to recalculate the total addressable UK market. The opportunity stands at 13.4 billion. In FY23, we saw total everyday like-for-like growth through our stores of 11.4%, with confectionery being the largest sales growth area at plus 111%. and tableware saw the largest volume increase at 124%. We've also built upon the success of our extensive in-house design ranges by introducing relevant third-party brands and some licensed ranges. We've broadened our range of soft toys and added boxed and pocket money focused products. And finally, we've introduced five new categories of flowers, gift experience, alcohol, chocolate and books, generating an 11% uplift in online gifting sales in the second half of FY23. So in summary, we're making significant progress on addressing the growth opportunity in gifts and celebration essentials. The delivery of our omnichannel ambitions has begun in earnest in FY23. We successfully trialed the first of our omnichannel propositions with the launch of Click and Collect. We started the trial in 87 stores. From that trial, we saw average order value 16% higher than the online average and an indication of in-store basket uplift of 7% purchasing an additional item in store. So as a result, we've recently completed the UK nationwide rollout, so we accelerated that. And there's further developments to the service planned in FY24. As we look to build upon the milestones achieved at FY23 to deliver our omnichannel ambitions, we've focused, so we've continued to progress the delivery of phase two of our ERP program. This is due to complete in the first half of FY24, and this will provide us with the ability to view stock in all areas of the business and enable integration with future partners, both in the UK and internationally. And from a digital-only perspective, we focused on improving the customer experience. And this included launching multi-ship functionality, enabling customers to send cards and gifts to multiple addresses from a single order. Alongside this, we've launched a major app update with additional features and continued our program of continuous improvement to drive online user experience. We also completed the replatforming of Cardfactory.co.uk and Getting Personal. It's now on a new shared platform, and this is vital to enabling the phased expansion of online ranges and further functionality. As mentioned earlier, the strength of our store estate across the UK and Ireland is driving growth and is fundamental for unlocking our omnichannel ambition. Our new model store format trial was launched in 10 stores in FY23, with a further five stores opening in January, testing an additional capitalized version of the approach. So the stores were selected so that the format could be tested in a wide variety of different locations, demographics, and store sizes. So having now concluded the model store trial, we are rolling out the learnings through our store evolution program, and this has three components. Firstly, space realignment, which we will apply to the majority of our stores, reallocating space so there's slightly more priority for gifts than before. Having identified which stores will benefit, we'll be applying this change across 750 stores this year. This is a capital light initiative and we get payback within the year. Secondly, display reorganization. This will see us modify how we present cards and gifts in our store, with cards arranged around the perimeter while gifts will be placed in the central aisles. So this layout not only improves customer navigation and makes it easier for them to locate products, but also ensures that we can get the proper product adjacencies. So we plan to complete this adjustment in around 50 stores this year as we continue to fine-tune the costs and the returns associated with that. And finally, the third component, an updated store design, which we will use in new stores and a select number of full refurbishments. So the costs of this are in line with our existing refit costs, and so there's no impact to kind of our store capex forecasts. So in addition, through FY23, we continue to expand our store footprint into underpenetrated markets. So this included the opening of our three trial stores in central London and 13 new stores in the Republic of Ireland. Assessment of the trial Central London stores is still ongoing. So partly we experienced disruption due to the train strikes, but partly we continue to adapt the range mix to ensure that we have the right offer to meet the needs of Central London customers. And we'll decide on the roadmap for Central London once we've concluded the trial. So the final building block of our future growth is partnerships, which represents the opportunity for us to grow both in the UK and internationally, and we're making good progress. I'm pleased to say that we've now signed our first master franchise partnership for the Middle East, our exclusive franchise partner, Leeward Trading Enterprises. They're an experienced specialist retail franchisee of both premium and value brands throughout the region. LIWA are targeting the opening of 36 Card Factory branded stores in the Middle East over the next five years. Last week, we announced the acquisition of South Africa Greetings, meaning we now have our first presence within this market, both as a retailer and a wholesaler. So the acquisition of South Africa Greetings supports our partnership strategy by providing access to key wholesale accounts through the company's printing, merchandising, and warehouse capacity. We can also learn how we can deliver similar local capability in our target international markets. Other notable progress on partnerships over the last year has included the completion of a large-scale piece of research, and this has enabled us to identify the opportunity for both card and gifting and validated our seven international markets of interest. The foundations for our partnership model have now been scoped and are in development to support both franchise and wholesale partnership models, which we will discuss in more detail at the capital market strategy update shortly. And finally, the delivery of our opening our new future strategy is underpinned by our commitment to operate sustainably across all areas of the business. But given the extraordinary context of the past 12 months, we begin work to update our five-year ESG strategy and roadmap. So this started with a refreshed materiality assessment and the assessment of our scope three greenhouse gas emissions, which will ensure the priorities reflect the changing world around us and remain aligned with those of our stakeholders. So as I highlighted at the start of today's presentation, our commitment to the thousands of passionate colleagues who are driving forwards the Card Factory business is paramount. And we continue to focus on developing a diverse, inclusive, and socially responsible culture at Card Factory, supported through our progressive DE&I strategy. And we're delighted to see this commitment and the importance placed on developing our workplace culture is reflected in us being awarded a two-star outstanding accreditation from best companies. We're also ranked number one best big retail business in the UK and third best big company to work for in the UK in their Q1 league tables. So looking ahead, I want to start by summarizing the highlights of our performance over the last year. As I reflect on FY23, I'm greatly encouraged by the positive momentum we have across the business and that our value for money proposition is resonating with customers across an increasing range of products and price points driving our business performance. We've demonstrated our ability to proactively manage significant inflationary headwinds, executed our pricing strategy as part of this with minimal impact on customer switching. We are clear on the strategic priorities that will enable our future growth and we've invested in the systems and the IT infrastructure required to create a strong foundation from which we can deliver. Delivery of our strategy is now underway and we've made positive progress in FY23 with some significant milestones achieved, which is now starting to show through our financial performance. Finally, a strengthened balance sheet is now in place, delivering a highly profitable business with strong cash generation and a significant reduction in net debt. As we look ahead to FY24, we expect our performance to reflect continued progress on our strategic growth initiatives. Trading in the first weeks of the new financial year have been encouraging and slightly ahead of expectations. Both our everyday and seasonal ranges have performed strongly during this time, underpinned by new ranges, the strength of our expanding gifting offer and strong value for money proposition. Our FY24 Valentine's Day and Mother's Day offer also landed well with our customers, resulting in a robust performance of these spring seasons. So together with our clear growth strategy and the strength of our value-led proposition, this gives us confidence that we'll continue to make strategic and financial progress in the year ahead. Having made a strong start in FY23, the board remained confident in the compelling growth opportunity for the business and our ability to use our expertise and the flexibility in our business model to drive profitability and return for shareholders over the long term. So as part of our capital market strategy update, I and members of the Card Factory executive team will outline a pathway for revenues of around $650 million with PBT margins of around 14% in FY27. So thanks again for attending our results presentation, and Simon and I will now be happy to take any questions you have. Is that right, Simon? Okay. Any questions, if I could just ask you so the feed can get it and they can hear it online, if I could ask you to use the microphone, that would be great. If you could just tell us for the benefit of who you are and what you do. Go on, Kate.