David Robson
Analyst · Sidoti. Your line is open
Thanks, Mike. Before I begin I would just like to briefly expand on Mike comments regarding our delayed earnings report. As we stated in our 8-K okay on September 12, a delay of the announcement of full results is due to the additional time we needed to complete the review, testing and evaluation of internal control procedures for the fiscal year. We have been working as quickly and diligently as possible to conclude this process and be able to report our full and final financial results for the fiscal year. Now that we have completed this work, we will also be filing our 10-K today with the sign up from our auditors. Turning now to some more detail on our results, as all of you had a chance to review the press release, I will only touch on a few key areas. Beginning with the income statement, net sales for the quarter were a $133.8 million, representing a decrease of $400,000 or 0.3% as compared to the prior year quarter. When you exclude West Coast Coffee, China Mist and the sales we generated last year related to our spice business, we divested net sales increased 0.2%. Green coffee process and sold increased 0.9% and excluding West Coast Coffee volume was flat with last year. As Mike mentioned, our fourth quarter coffee pounds and net sales growth was slower than we anticipated due to the softness in our national account business late in Q4. Going forward, we still expect our business - based business coffee pounds to grow in the 3% to 5% range annually. However, there can be fluctuation between quarters, especially with our large national accounts. This is demonstrated in our full year results for fiscal ’17, where coffee pounds excluding the benefit of West Coast coffee increased 5% year-over-ear with quarterly volume fluctuating. Looking at gross margin in the fourth quarter it was 40.1% compared to 39.1% of sales in the prior quarter, an increase of 100 basis points to our highest quarterly gross margin in three years. The year-over-year gross margin increase of 100 basis points in the fourth quarter demonstrates our ability to drive higher levels of profitability through the business. Although our new Northlake facility was a drag on margins in the fourth quarter, once we began to drive meaningful incremental volumes through the state of the art facility we can expect further economies of scale allowing us to drive further margin improvement. In Q4 the 100 basis point improvement in gross margin over the last year was primarily due to the combination of higher DSD pricing and lower green coffee hedge cost, as well as the benefit from the contribution of China Mist and West Coast Coffee which carry higher gross margins than the base business. The drag to gross margin in the fourth quarter from Northlake due to the higher depreciation and overhead costs is approximately 120 basis points. Turning to operating expenses, operating expenses in the quarter were $51.9 million or 38.8% of sales compared to $49.4 million or 36.8% of sales recorded in the prior year period, which is an increase of $2.5 million or 200 basis points. However, when excluding restructuring and other transition expenses, acquisition costs and net gains and losses from the sale of assets, net operating expenses declined by $374,000 or 20 basis points to $49.1 million or 36.7% of sales. The restructuring charges we incurred in the fourth quarter include $1.1 million in expenses associated with the company’s DSD restructuring plan. The acquisition cost report in the fourth quarter relate to consulting and legal expenses incurred in connection with the agreement to acquire Boyd’s Coffee company. Looking at interest expense, we incurred interest expense of $755,000 in the fourth quarter, up from $840,000 last year due to higher borrowings compared to a year ago. We expect interest expense to climb [ph] in fiscal ‘18 for fiscal ‘17 given our higher existing debt levels and additional borrowings under our letter of credit facility for the anticipated acquisition of Boyd’s which we expect to close the second quarter fiscal ’18. Now turning to income taxes, our income tax rate in the fourth quarter was 3.8% which is lower than our expected marginal rate of 40% due to a reduction in certain non-deductible operating expenses in the fourth quarter versus what we estimated in our fiscal year ‘17 tax provisions through year-to-date Q3. Going forward we continue to expect our marginal tax rate to range between 39% to 40% and our cash tax rate to range between 3% to 4%. For the full year our marginal tax rate was 39.5%. Diluted shares outstanding were $16.8 million compared to 16.7 million shares last year. Net income was $1.1 million this quarter or $0.07 per diluted share, as compared to $84.2 million or $5 and $0.05 [ph] per diluted share in the prior year period. Excluding onetime and non-recurring items, non-GAAP net income this Q4 was $3.2 million or $0.19 per diluted common share compared to $3.8 million or $0.23 per diluted share in the fourth quarter last year. The $0.04 decline in non-GAAP net income per diluted common share was primarily due to higher year-over-year depreciation expense of $1.3 million [ph] $0.05 per diluted common share. Adjusted EBITDA was $11.6 million for the quarter, as compared to $8.9 million in the prior year period and adjusted EBITDA margin was 8.7%, as compared to 6.6% in the prior year period. The $11.6 million in adjusted EBITDA is approximately $0.5 million lower than we anticipated going into the quarter, as a result of softer sales volume. That being said, the adjusted EBITDA margin at 8.7% compares favourably with the prior year period. Our full year adjusted EBITDA was $46 million or 8.5% of sales compared to last year of $41.4 million or 7.6% of sales, a $4.6 million or 90 basis point increase. Now turning to the balance sheet. At the end of the quarter we had $6.6 million in cash and short term investments. We had $27.6 million borrowed on our revolving credit facility. Our debt net of cash and short term investments was $21 million this quarter compared to $11.9 million at March 31st 2017. The increase in debt net of cash and short term investments over the quarter was $9.1 million which was used to fund a portion of our CapEx spend during the quarter, with the balance of the CapEx funding coming from operating cash flows. As we previously announced, we amended our credit facility increasing our maximum credit line to $125 million from $75 million. Some of this incremental capacity will be used to fund the acquisition of Boyd’s Coffee with estimated cash to closing at $39 million which we continue to anticipate will close in our second quarter of fiscal year ‘18. Now turning to capital expenditures for the current quarter our capital expenditures in cash were $14.1 million to $12.6 in spend for our new facility and $1.5 million in spend for maintenance CapEx. The total CapEx spend on a cash basis was lower than the $19 million to $22 million we projected for the quarter, due to the timing of payments coming due. Depreciation and amortization expense was $6.4 million this quarter versus $5.1 million in the prior year quarter. Depreciation expense increased as a result of our investment made in our new DFW facility and amortization of intangibles added from the China Mist and the West Coast Coffee acquisitions. We continue to forecast depreciation and amortization expense to run at approximately $8 million to $8.5 million per quarter in fiscal year ’18 based on our existing fixed asset commitments and the useful lives of our intangible assets. Excluding the impact of Boyd's Coffee acquisition. Turning to inventory, at the end of the quarter we had $56.3 million in total inventory consisting of $31.2 million in coffee inventory, $20.8 million in tea and culinary inventory and $4.3 million in coffee brewing equipment parts. Total inventory increased $9.9 million or 21.3% over last year, primarily due to abnormally low inventory levels last year at our Torrance facility given its anticipated closure, as well as incremental inventory this year associated with the acquisition of China Mist and West Coast Coffee. At the end of the quarter we held coffee related derivatives of 35 million notional pounds of green coffee compared to 12 million notional pounds covered as of March 31st 2017. In addition, we had green coffee fixed price contract commitments of $66.7 million at the end of this quarter versus $68.9 million as of March 31 2017. The use of coffee derivatives and green coffee contract commitments helps to increase the price certainty of our green coffee costs. Now I'd like to discuss some of the details relating to our relocation plan. With our corporate relocation plan now complete, our total incurred expenditures through the end of ‘17 was $31.8 million, including employee retention and separation benefits of $17.4 million, facility related costs of $7 million for a temporary office space and $7.4 million associated with the move and relocation of the Torrance operations and other related cost. As of June 30th 2017, we had accrued $300,000 and incurred corporate relocation expenses to be paid in fiscal ‘18. Turning to construction costs with phase one of our new facility now complete, our final construction costs for the building facilities and land were $60.8 million and total cost for machinery and equipment, furniture and fixtures was $33.2 million. As of June 30th 2017, we had aggregate cash spend of $89.6 million with the balance of approximately $4 million to be paid in Q1 of fiscal year ’18. Regarding our announced agreement to acquire Boyd’s Coffee company, many of you have requested more information regarding their financial profile. We have mentioned Boyd’s had approximately $95 million in revenue for their most recent trailing 12 months provided to us and their margin profile is similar to Farmer Brothers. If the transaction closes early in Q2, we expect the business to deliver between $4 million to $5 million in incremental adjusted EBITDA in fiscal ’18, ultimately increasing to $13 million to $16 million on an annual basis 12 to 18 months after the close of the transaction. Nearly all of the onetime costs will be incurred within the first 12 months after the transaction closes. These estimates could change depending on the actual closing date of the transaction. Finally, earlier in the year we provided the fiscal year 2018 outlook, predicated on what the base business would look like on a steady state basis with no material customer wins or acquisitions. We gave guidance of coffee pound growth at market rates are faster and gross profit dollar growth of 2% to 3% and adjusted EBITDA margin rate improvement of 50 basis points to 100 basis points. Our opinion of that outlook currently remains the same which puts our adjusted EBITDA range between $50 million to $53 million for fiscal ’18, excluding the benefit of the Boyd's acquisition. If you include the Boyd’s acquisition, we expect adjusted EBITDA for fiscal ‘18 to range between $54 million to $58 million. Looking out to Q1, we expect both coffee £ and net sales to be flat to slightly positive compared to Q1 last year with net sales currently expected to range between $131 million to $132 million. We currently estimate that hurricane Harvey and Irma will impact Q1 pounds and net sales by approximately 2%. We will again update our outlook later this year assuming the transaction with Boyd’s is closed. Now I'll turn the call back to Mike for closing remarks.