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Armstrong World Industries, Inc. (AWI)

Q4 2015 Earnings Call· Mon, Feb 22, 2016

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Good day, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Armstrong World Industries Fourth Quarter 2015 Earnings Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. Later, we will conduct a question-and-answer session and instructions will follow at that time. [Operator Instructions] And as a reminder, this conference call is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Tom Waters, Vice President, Treasurer and Investor Relations. Please begin.

Tom Waters

Analyst

Thanks, Latoya. Good morning and welcome. Please note that members of the media have been invited to listen to this call and the call is being broadcast live on our Web site at armstrong.com. With me today are Matt Espe, our President and CEO; Dave Schulz, our CFO, Don Maier, CEO of our Worldwide Floor Businesses and Vic Grizzle, CEO of our Worldwide Ceilings Business. Hopefully, you have seen our press release this morning and both the release and the presentation Dave Schulz will reference during this call are posted on our website in the Investor Relations section. I advise you that during this call we will be making forward-looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties. Actual outcomes may differ materially from those expected or implied. For a more detailed discussion of the risks and uncertainties that may affect Armstrong, please review our SEC filings, including the 10-K filed this morning. Forward-looking statements speak only as of the date they are made and we undertake no obligation to update any forward-looking statement beyond what is required by applicable securities law. In addition, our discussion of operating performance will include non-GAAP financial measures within the meaning of SEC Regulation G. A reconciliation of these measures with the most directly comparable GAAP measures is included in the press release and in the appendix of the presentation. Both are available on our website. With that, I'll turn the call over to Matt.

Matt Espe

Analyst

Thanks, Tom. Good morning, everyone on the call. Today I want to briefly discuss our fourth quarter results, provide an overview of our market outlook for 2016 and discuss actions and expectations in light of the macro environment then finally I’ll update you on our separation process and then some key upcoming dates and activities. For the quarter, sales of $577 million were down $10 million or 2% due to weaker year-on-year foreign exchange rates. Adjusting foreign exchange rate sales were up 2% from prior year with all the gain coming in the Americas. The sales result is essentially in line with the guidance we issued last quarter. Adjusted EBITDA for the quarter was $76 million compares to $81 million last year, and for the full year at the top end of our guidance range. The ceilings business posted sales growth of 1% excluding the impact of exchange rate and had an adjusted EBITDA improvement of 2%. In the Americas, sales were up 2.5% with gains in volume, price and mix. EBITDA benefited from year-on-year price versus inflation gains remaining at historical level as well as significant productivity gains and profits from WAVE which were up almost 20% from last year. SG&A cost were higher as we invested in go-to-market initiatives. In Europe sales were flat on a comparable foreign exchange basis but down 14% as reported. Europe had pockets of strength particularly in the UK, but continued weakness in Russia and the Middle East. Continental Europe flat in total but with volatility from market-to-market. European profitability was up marginally year-on-year. In the Pacific Rim sales were down 4% excluding the impact of foreign exchange with particular weakness in China. Southeast Asia was up 20%, Australia and India were up low single-digits. India finished a very strong year with sales…

Dave Schulz

Analyst

Thanks Matt and good morning everyone. In reviewing our fourth quarter results, I’ll be referring to the slides available on our Web site starting with Slide 4, key metrics. As Tom already covered Slide 2 and Slide 3 as an explanation of our standard basis of presentation. Matt already discussed sales and EBITDA for the quarter, so I will note that the EPS is down 34% impacted by $0.08 a share due to a $7 million non-cash charge and other income related to the revaluation of the intercompany loans we have in place to fund our Russian and Chinese investments. As you may remember, we had a larger charge related to these loans last quarter. Net debt is down almost $100 million for the last year as a result of our operational cash generation. Return on invested capital was down due to lower as reported profitability in the trailing 12 months including higher non-cash pension expense and separation costs. Slide 5 details the adjustments we have made to our results and provides a reconciliation to as reported net income. We continue to exclude the non-cash pension expense associated with our main U.S. plan. We incurred $18 million of separation related expenses in the quarter, and I’ll give you more details on those items at the end of my discussion. The $8 million in cost reduction initiatives relates to the actions Matt discussed in China and Europe. Last year we had a $10 million impairment of the Bruce brand name. Taxes in the quarter were $1 million on a small pre-tax loss. For the year, our effective tax rate was 57.5% as we continue to have significant un-benefited foreign losses. And our pre-tax earnings denominator was impacted by the separation cost and increased SG&A spending. Slide 6 provides an overview of…

Matt Espe

Analyst

Thanks Dave. As I reflect back on the last five years, I feel privileged to have served as CEO of a company with such a distinguished legacy, outstanding corporate culture and commitment to excellence. I'm proud of the steps we've taken to strengthen the company and to create the foundation for two successful independent entities. Over the past five years we've upgraded the senior management team and reinvigorated the entire organization with our succession planning efforts. We've exited underperforming businesses in flooring Europe and cabinets. Created an efficient capital structure and introduced lean principles to drive efficiency and working capital improvement. We've invested in important future growth engines in Russia, China, LVT and architectural specialties and we've returned $1.5 billion to shareholders. So I leave here knowing that Armstrong World Industries and the future Armstrong flooring companies are in very capable hands. I look forward to watching these two businesses grow and flourish in the years to come. So with that thank you and we will be happy to take your questions.

Operator

Operator

Thank you, [Operator Instructions] the first question is from Mike Wood of Macquarie Security Group, your line is open.

Mike Wood

Analyst

In light of the CDC update on Lumber Liquidators last night which highlighted that increased cancer risk. Perhaps it'd be useful for you to just update us on your internal processes and how you're different in your own Chinese made resilient [ph] flooring, could you cease investors’ fears about any risk to Armstrong's flooring?

Matt Espe

Analyst

Absolutely. Don, you want to comment?

Don Maier

Analyst

Yes, thanks Mike. Really, we discussed this in detail in our Q3 earnings call and our position really remains unchanged since that discussion. Really since it's really brought back in I guess it was last March we expanded our already comprehensive testing program to ensure that Armstrong products meet or exceed all applicable industry standards. Since June we received results on hundreds of independent raw core and core deconstruction tests. And based on these tests and our strict certification and specification requirements, we continue to remain confident that our laminate flooring products are safe and meet or exceed all applicable standards just as they always have Mike.

Mike Wood

Analyst

Understood and on the hardwood side, I guess you got your operating margins over the past two quarters back to that level that you were before the input cost really had a hit. Going forward here would you expect pricing to become more challenging in that segment and more ranges on margins? Did you still see upside from the repositioning that you’ve done?

Don Maier

Analyst

Yes, so clearly we've benefited over the course of the year with the reduced input cost and that has improved our performance for 2015. I think it would be advisable not to extend or extrapolate that forward into 2016. We've been able to hold on to a lot of that through our pricing discipline. But over the long term, you do see downward pressure as it relates to the sustained lower lumber cost.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. And we do ask that you limit yourself to one question and get back in queue for a follow up. The next question is from Kathryn Thompson of Thompson Research Group. Your line is open.

Kathryn Thompson

Analyst

On ceilings, 2.5% sales increased in Americas, you had 4 million contribution from price mix for the whole segment, how much that 4 million was to the Americas and then further breaking down how much was price mix and then just a follow up from the previous question if you could just remind us what percentage of sales -- laminate sales are all of your total flooring revenue? Thank you.

Matt Espe

Analyst

Vic, do you want to answer the first question and Don can take second.

Vic Grizzle

Analyst

This is Vic. Yes, on the Americas in that fourth quarter we had positive AUVs supported by pricing mix and we also have positive volume that supported that 2% plus growth rate. As far as the split between the price and the mix we don't normally provide that level of granularity, I'd just say that it was nearly, equally contributing from both price and mix in the quarter and again I want to emphasize that also there's a nice volume that was supported that 2.5%.

Don Maier

Analyst

This is Don Maier. Our laminate business is fairly small, it's less than 5% of our total revenue.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. And the next question is from Matt McCall with BB&T Capital Market. Your line is open.

Reuben Garner

Analyst

This is Reuben Garner in for Matt. So, several one-time item, both positive and negative in the foreign business this year, can you -- and I know you're not giving guidance but can you just talk about your general expectations for profitability into '16 and maybe some of the moving parts going away just give us some quick recap. Thank you.

Matt Espe

Analyst

I think, what we're going to do is, we’ll leave the 2016 guidance for Don’s Investor Day. So, we're not giving -- again that's all a change from our custom, but taking advantage of these guys are having their individual sessions in the couple of weeks, we've decided not to issue individual or collected guidance today, I don't know Dave, if you want to comment on any of the one-timers?

Dave Schulz

Analyst

Yes, the one that I'll comment on usually, we've discussed this in the past as the multilayer wood flooring. So we didn't provide you with a reconciliation of that impact during 2015 that was primarily triggered by our previous practice of importing engineered wood products from China from our manufacturing facility there, we have closed that facility so our exposure to that multilayer wood flooring import duty going forward is minimized dramatically.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. And the next question is from Scott Rednor of Zelman & Associates. Your line is now open.

Scott Rednor

Analyst

This question is for Vic or for Matt on SG&A side of ceiling, there was a $5 million headwind for go-to-market initiatives, I was hoping you guys could further dive into that and then is that something that we should think about reversing into 2016?

Matt Espe

Analyst

Thanks Scott. Vic?

Vic Grizzle

Analyst

That $5 million had three components to it, to our private [technical difficulty], number one the timing of the expenses around the new launches that we talked about total fish-stick [ph] launch in the late third quarter disproportionately fell into the fourth quarter that was a good portion of it. We also make some partial -- that was from partially some timing here around some investments and U.S. commercial capacity to support those new product launches. And then the final and small component of it was some expenses related to our change in our European leadership, and those were the three major components that drove the $5 million in incremental SG&A.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. And the next question is from Ken Zener of KeyBanc. Your line is open.

Ken Zener

Analyst

Following up on that last question, I think the higher SG&A in ceilings has -- just a bit clear that’s a $5 million on Slide 7. If you could just go into that, like what that means for the acoustic launch or the commercial capacity that you’re extending, how that’s impacting the SG&A? Because I think people are sensitive to the fact that there is rising pressure that’s offsetting your price mix. So if you could go into that and explain why that’s not related to any change in the industry structure [indiscernible], whoever that would be certainly appreciate it because that’s kind of a lingering thought in people’s mind. Thank you.

Dave Schulz

Analyst

Good question Ken. Let me say this for clarity upfront because maybe this is part of the question. There is no price discounting in the SG&A line. We don’t account for price discounts that way, it’s above the line in our net sales numbers, so to clarify that point first. The investments in our U.S. commercial capacity are incremental investments in key areas that are driving our specification leadership around these new total acoustic products that we talked about in the third quarter. It’s also in support of our design capabilities around architectural specialties, both at the high end of the market, the fastest growing part of the market and these resources are supporting those growth initiatives as we’ve talked about in the past.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. And the next question is from Bob Wetenhall of RBC Capital Markets. Your line is open.

Bob Wetenhall

Analyst

Thanks for taking the question. And Matt good luck on what you do after Armstrong, it's been a fun run, and you did a great job with the Company. Just wanted to ask in ceilings, said low single-digit growth. And I am trying to think about this and any help would be appreciated. I am not looking for guidance. Between North America, EMEA and Pacific Rim, what are your expectations for volume trends? And I think you guys have mentioned there were some negative pricing action at the low end of the product category, that’s showed up in the second quarter. And one of your competitors actually reported earlier and said ceiling tile pricing is accelerating year-over-year. How do we think about North American pricing environment both for entry level and more architectural specked tiles? Thanks a lot and good luck.

Vic Grizzle

Analyst

Okay, two parts here. Let me take the first part. Bob on terms of our -- the way we’re looking at the market overall. I think the way Matt described in the opening comments is, with EMEA and Asia we saw tough market conditions in both of those regions in 2015 and we think that’s going to continue. And that’s really driven by the emerging market portions of those regions. The Middle East is very soft. Russia continues to be very soft based on the very public issues going on there. And then in Asia, China being a very-very soft market as the government cracks down on office and office -- commercial office development there. So we think that’s going to continue through 2016 and that’s the remarks that Matt and Dave, described for you. In North America, as we’ve been talking about on last couple of calls, we’ve seen sequential improvements in really the new office construction segment as we saw the growth in late 2013 and 2014 and new construction starts. And as you remember, in this business, ceilings are the final thing that go into a new construction build-out. As those new starts lag out, we started to see new construction, new business start to show up in our numbers in the second half of 2015. So we saw that in fourth quarter that sequential improvement and based on the new construction starts that continued into early parts -- late parts of ’14 and early parts of ’15, our expectation is that those new construction -- new business activity continues into 2016. And that leads us to the outlook that again Matt and Dave described, which is low single digit growth really being driven by that new office, new construction and the office segment particularly. That’s your…

Operator

Operator

Thank you, the next question is from James Armstrong of Vertical Research Partners, your line is open.

James Armstrong

Analyst

Just as we go into the first quarter, you talked about costs coming down in wood flooring. Do you see any further price erosion in the wood flooring segment as lumber remains down or are you really able to keep that pricing and seeing a more steady price environment with flooring?

Don Maier

Analyst

James, this is Don, I'll try to address that without getting too far in front of my skis here. The -- what we are seeing is a leveling off in the lumber prices and we've obviously been able to hold quite a bit of our price in the wood business over the course of 2015. Our experience is that over time the lumber cost eventually translate into lower wood flooring prices. We remain committed to maintaining our price discipline that we've put in place while staying very competitive in the market place.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. The next question is from Nishu Sood of Deutsche Bank, your line is open.

Nishu Sood

Analyst

I wanted to ask about the resilient flooring division. The go-to-market expenses and the higher SG&A costs that are associated with that. That's something you've talked about pretty clearly from the time that the businesses were intended to be separated. It's seen a real acceleration though just in terms of the pace, you know the $14 million drag compares to $7 million or $8 million in the last couple of quarters. So just wanted to get a sense of the flow of that, what has driven that and how should we expect that to carry forward as we head into '16?

Dave Schulz

Analyst

Thanks Nishu. And in fact I think you saw a lot of the investments at the recent Surpluses [ph] tradeshow as we toured the booth. You know stepping back on our Q4 results, you know our volume on the resilient business and mix gains were just partially offset by price declines leading to the 4% increase sales, in particular we really saw strong sales in the residential tile and the LVT segment which are key strategically to us. Our EBITDA was down as our SG&A investments exceeded our product mix gains. And this was really driven on a number of areas, but significant investments in our go-to-market initiatives, to really restore a presence at retail and on the manufacturing side of our input cost we’re offset by the startup cost related to the LVT plan. So like to share a lot more with you on March 10, but that's really what happened in the quarter.

Operator

Operator

Thank you and the next question is from Keith Hughes of Suntrust, your line is open.

Keith Hughes

Analyst

Kind of building on that last question on SG&A within resilient, that encounterment characterized earlier in the year of spending for 2015 and that would kind of fall away. Is that still the view that at least some of the spending will not be repeated in 2016?

Dave Schulz

Analyst

Again Keith would like to hold off until March 10, but in general terms some of that spending will continue on, we're encouraged by the growth and the strategy that we've got put in place and where it makes sense to do that. On the LVT plant startup, we will continue to ramp that plan up over the course of 2016 and so that will continue to have additional costs associated with it. We see really the LVT plant having meaningful impact on our EBITDA performance as we exit 2016.

Operator

Operator

Thank you the next question is from Stephen Kim of Barclays, your line is open.

John Cleo

Analyst

Hi guys, its John Coyle filling in for Steve. Just want to stay on resilient, in the slide deck you indicated that you saw like a 3% decline in price mix, with mix actually being up. So with price down mid-single digits in the category can you talk about maybe specifically what resilient flooring types are the most pricing pressure. And was this just broad based or was it specific to one competitor that may be trying to regain market share that they lost earlier in the year, thanks.

Matt Espe

Analyst

John, I don't think we disclose down to that segment level, I could tell you that where we are really focusing our energies are n driving our LVT product that is where the market is seeing the most growth opportunities and it's also where we're seeing a nice mix improvement in our products and some of our more traditional and longer legacy lines are where we're seeing the pressure.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. The next question is from Michael Rehaut with JPMorgan. Your line is now open.

Jason Marcus

Analyst

Good morning it’s Jason Marcus in for Mike. My question is around WAVE. So WAVE starts of pretty strong increase in earnings in the quarter and the margins have stranded pretty nicely. Just wanted to see if you can talk a little bit more about the trends that you're seeing there in terms of grid pricing and what the main drivers to margin expansion were in WAVE and how you're thinking about that going into 2016?

Unidentified Company Representative

Analyst

Yes, there was two major drivers of the increase in WAVE and the margins and also the EBITDA generations. One was an acquisition, it was a small tuck-in acquisition that the WAVE joint venture get, it's a backward integration of supplier to one of our components that added some nice meaningful EBITDA and marginal growth and then as you know lower steel prices in the industry contributed as well as those spread through the P&L, those are really the two big drivers of the fourth quarter comparison over the first quarter.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. The next question is from George Staphos with Bank of America. Your line is now open.

Alex Wong

Analyst

Hi it’s actually Alex Wong standing in for George. In ceilings, recent capacity additions have been announced in North America recently, have you had any conversations with your distributors given the strong attachment rate nature of the industry and then related to that does this present any hurdles for the price mix level than has been a nice source of earnings in recent periods?

Vic Grizzle

Analyst

So, let me re-characterized. The announcement around the investment of capacity by one of our competitors in the market place, I've talked about this in a little bit on the last call but just again to reframe the investment is relatively a small investment in the overall capacity of the U.S. market and somewhere in the neighborhood of 3% to 5% once the capacity is fully utilized. So I think that's an important contextual understanding that have about the investment, but with any new competitor or entering into the market place, we at Armstrong are taken it very serious and we are trading the competitive threat as an opportunity for us to extenuate the features and benefits of our products and our capabilities versus this new competitor and so we continue to be very effective at that and we're going to continue that going forward as well.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. The next question is from Will Randow with Citigroup. Your line is now open.

Will Randow

Analyst

I was just curious on two points, one is it appears like there might have been under investment in the flooring business and potentially the ceiling business. I know, you think, you don't losing shares but do you think there is a secular shift in ceilings, I hope not but could you characterized a little bit better in terms of volume growth and what you’re doing to make sure that the ceiling business continues to grow with the market?

Vic Grizzle

Analyst

Let me go first

Matt Espe

Analyst

Yes.

Vic Grizzle

Analyst

Well, let me just be very direct, we don't see a secular shift in the ceilings business and as a way to explain why the repair and renovation part of the market is not rebounded like everybody expected. So we've done lots of market research and testing to evaluate this point and at this point our data doesn't point to any secular shift or our structural change in the industry. So, I wanted to be very clear and direct on that and the other part of your question?

Matt Espe

Analyst

Yes, I think maybe just a quick comment on the deferral some of the investments in the foreign business. Since I was done on my watch, let me take that one. We made cautious decisions with the generally weak overall macro environment the last three or five years. To differ stern investments in the flooring business and so we did that in anticipation of a volume recovery with a broader strike in the market place. That recovery didn’t occurs as robustly as we anticipated and I think we're far from being alone in that outlook. But last year under Don's leadership we went to the board and asked for a fairly significant investment in the go-to-market structure and collateral around the go-to-market structure for primarily our small independent retailers in the form of displays, new displays, new designs with the displays and I think we were regularly updated everybody last year, and we’ve set some 5,000 new displays in 2015 and so consider a significant refresh of that part of our business in that investment and I would say that the business is to beginning the see some return on those it's early days, so we certainly expect that to continue in 2016. So I would consider that a significant catch up, at least that portion of the investment with significant catch up on expenses that we deferred over the last three to five years. And Don, do you want to add anything in that?

Don Maier

Analyst

No, I feel the color, I think you hit right in -- right down the center of the fairway, we're really pleased with the progress we've made on rejuvenating our retail business as Matt articulated we've a very focused and integrated effort in creating consumer demand, better supporting our retailers and our distribution partners to that regard. And I’d say their feedback and the results we’re beginning to see frankly are exceeding our expectations at this time. Obviously, we have a lot more work to do, but encouraged by what we’ve seen thus far.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. And the next question is from Jim Barrett of CL King. Your line is open.

Jim Barrett

Analyst

Don as it relates to the 5,000 new displays at retail, can you give us some sense as to the installation as to what percentage would be the independent volume is now being served by these displays and even directionally what level of sales pick up would you expect to justify the time and the investment in there?

Don Maier

Analyst

I’ll give you a little bit of color, and I am not probably going to share all of the details. But I think what we discussed in Q3 was that we plan to have all 5,000 of our LVT displays deployed by the end of the year and we got that completed in the fourth quarter. That’s being synchronized with the launch of our new Vivero LVT product. And so having these displays in place, we’ve seen a nice increase in our existing product sales, and we really look forward to that propelling our new Vivero line. It's frankly just a little bit too early to give you any sort of read on that at this point in time. But sufficed to say we’re pleased with our investments here and continue to have significant demand and pull from our retailers and distributors.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. And the next question is from Brandon Rollé of Longbow Research. Your line is open. Brandon Rollé: This is Brandon Rollé on for David MacGregor. I had one question relating to the market share trends in hardwood. Could you update us on your share trends on hardwood throughout the year for 2015? Thank you.

Dave Schulz

Analyst

It's Dave Schulz. So just in terms of our overall share position, obviously on engineered wood we saw sizeable growth in that market opportunity. Unfortunately we were not able to service the market completely and so we do believe that we did have some share leakage on the engineered side. We do have a leading position on the solid wood side of the business. We did see considerable volume growth complete in the fourth quarter as it relates to solid wood. Again, we’re willing to give up some of the volume at the lower end of that business in order to focus on the higher end to mix up our overall sales and impact of the margin.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. And the next question is from Justin Bergner of Gabelli & Company. Your line is open.

Justin Bergner

Analyst

I was curious in regards to the earlier comment about some of the tailwind from input costs not continuing or potentially becoming a headwind into 2016. Is there any clarity you can provide us in terms of how much of the headwind we might expect versus the positive $68 million contribution from lower input cost to your EBITDA bridge in 2015 versus 2014?

Don Maier

Analyst

Being able to project what the wood prices are going to do is very difficult. But I would say that we feel like we’ve seen those prices stabilize a bit on versus what we’ve seen in the past several years. And while we’re seeing I would say normal course of business pricing pressure in the market, over the long term, we tend to see the swing that we’ve seen in input cost drive pressure on the pricing. We’re going to continue really to focus on pricing discipline and as we need to we’ll respond to stay competitive in the marketplace. The piece I think I had mentioned earlier was I think the model, a continuation of the trend that we saw in 2015 would probably be aggressive.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. And the next question is from Ken Zener of KeyBanc. Your line is open.

Ken Zener

Analyst

Just thinking back two years ago, when you guys had your last Analyst Day. Matt, Dave, I think you guys talked about housing recovery at that point and then there was stimulating the channel. At that point, you guys started talking about seasonality in the business. So, in regards to Americas and ceiling, I mean, are you guys seeing normal seasonal sequential trends in that business in terms of what your dealers are talking about? Just so we can put that the growth rate in a little better cadence quarter-to-quarter. Thank you.

Matt Espe

Analyst

So Ken I think there is two parts to the question, one is the seasonality of the business. And I can say that we’re not seeing any difference really in the seasonality of the business from quarter-to-quarter, or anything in the construction cycle that is shifting or moving around. As far as the overall demand and the fundamentals that are driving the demand in the marketplace, those fundamentals are still, I would say uneven and choppy which is driving a very uneven recovery as we’ve talked about, both on the new side as well as the R&R side. The new side as we’ve talked about is pretty robust on the office side. But on the healthcare and education we’re not seeing as robust the fundamentals driving demand there and similar in the R&R there is lacking fundamentals that are keeping that from being a very robust part of the overall market demand. So I would say again there is -- we're still you know experiencing the choppiness and an unevenness across the US in terms of the recovery in both the new segment as well the R&R segment.

Operator

Operator

Thank you, and the next question is from Scott Rednor of Zelman and Associates, your line is open.

Scott Rednor

Analyst

Hi, just one quick follow up on ceilings growth to the 9 million of EBITDA improvement for all of 2015. How much of that was Americas and with the actions you announced today should the international results begin to contribute more meaningfully next year?

Matt Espe

Analyst

Yes, the majority of that was the Americas, clearly and then the actions that we are taking to address the lower market expectations for both Europe and Asia should and I expect them fully to contribute to EBITDA and margin generation in 2016.

Operator

Operator

Thank you, and the next question is from --.

Dave Schulz

Analyst

Just to make sure that we provide you with the right information on that, we saw continuation of some of the EBITDA issues we've had in the international markets so I would say that the growth in the Americas was offset then by some of the losses that we had in our international markets and as Vic mentioned we've taken some specific actions to address that in Q4 of 2015 but I did want to clarify that so when you take a look at the year over year increase you know our ceilings division it's the Americas offset by the international markets at this point.

Operator

Operator

Thank you, and the next question is from Stephen Kim of Barclays, your line is open.

Stephen Kim

Analyst

Hey guys, just wanted to follow up, I mean following the plant closure in China in ceilings, the end at that regions probably been the most invested in here over the last five years for a long term growth initiative. Has your long term view on the region changed any, I mean obviously your view for the next 12 months is pretty clear, but how are you thinking about China looking out over the next five years, relevant to maybe where you were three-four years ago when a lot of these investments were being made.

Dave Schulz

Analyst

If I could real quickly like maybe clarify and hand it over to Vic to give you our views, but Stephen we didn't say we were closing the plant, we're idling the plant which is significantly different in terms of how you manage the plant. So there'll be a maintenance presence, the plant will be able to come up and on line in relatively short order when demand returns. So I'm glad you asked the question, we're not closing it by any means, we're just idling it and sort of until we see the market recovery.

Vic Grizzle

Analyst

And I think that's indicative of how we think about the regions frankly, so really if you take a look back or step and look at the entire region we actually had double digit growth in all the other parts of Asia Pacific region in the fourth quarter. So China continues to be the tough spot for us. We did build these plants in China to support our Asia business, they're not just China only plants, but the -- you know the recession and the retreat in the office segment in particular in China has giving us pause and given us the opportunity to idle the plant, to save cost in the meantime. You saw the market does comeback so we do expect it’s to come back, this market still has tremendous potential in it as they adopt the acoustical solution for education and healthcare, we still believe that they will be adopting this technology and there's no disruptive technology out there to replace this so. Longer term we're still optimistic about this market.

Operator

Operator

Thank you the next question is from Keith Hughes of Suntrust, your line is open.

Keith Hughes

Analyst

Thank you, on apples spending reported in the K [ph] came down about $50 something million in '15 versus '14. At least directionally would that be for the two units, is that going to continue to trend down in '16 and '17.

Dave Schulz

Analyst

Hey Keith, it's Dave Schulz. So we're not going to provide that guidance, we'll wait until the March 10th, our meeting, where we'll provide you with more specifics about our capital plans for 2016. You know it is -- you'll be able to see this in the 10K but the reduction in capital spend in 2015 versus 2014 was about the same across both businesses and again that's the capital spending that we had on the ceilings business in Russia and then obviously we had some spending in the flooring business including the first stages of the Project Boltor at the LVT plant.

Operator

Operator

Thank you, and the last question comes from Justin Bergner of Gabelli and Company, your line is open.

Justin Bergner

Analyst

Thank you for taking my follow up. In regards to the asset backed facility for Armstrong flooring why did you opt to go with an asset backed facility versus standard revolver?

Dave Schulz

Analyst

Hi, it's Dave Schulz again, so we looked at various financing options for an independent Armstrong flooring business and we felt that the asset backed loan given the effective collateral we have on the flooring business was a cheaper way for us to go, so that will be a $225 million revolver that will be an asset backed revolver.

Matt Espe

Analyst

Thank you very much for your interest and support in the past five and half years and I just wanted to say that being the CEO of this company has been pleasuring privilege. I look forward to watching both Don and Vic lead both of their businesses forward the months and years to come. So thank you very much.