Jeffrey Sanfilippo
Analyst · Sidoti & Company. Your line is now open
Thank you Mike. Good morning everyone. After reporting record results for our third quarter of fiscal 2020, the company finished the year strong despite significant headwinds from the impact of COVID-19 and the dramatic shift in consumer behavior and consumption trends at the start of our fourth quarter. Navigating through a challenging landscape in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2020, the company still ended the year by breaking records in gross profit which increased by $17.5 million or 11.1% to $175.8 million. Net income reached a record $54.1 million, as Mike mentioned and earnings per share reached a record $4.69. Our five production facilities, our essential businesses have stayed open through the pandemic to sustain the food supply chain. I am so proud of the hard work, dedication and leadership of our team members throughout the company. They showed up to provide essential goods for our customers. They showed up to service our consumers and they showed up to support their families and to support each other. A special thank you to our manufacturing teams who come to work every day and continue to stay focused on operational efficiencies in production to reduce spending per produced pound while at the same time providing best-in-class service levels for our customers and consumers. Our strong financial position allowed us to pay cash dividends for the ninth year in a row. We paid $68.7 million during fiscal 2020 to our stockholders. And we are paying bonuses to each of our exceptional associates throughout the organization who worked together this past year. These are truly extraordinary times for all of us. The pandemic had positive and negative impacts upon our results for the fourth quarter of fiscal 2020. We saw strong evidence of a shift in consumer preferences to shop in smaller store formats like grocery stores and via the Internet. Based on IRi Total U.S. - Multi Outlet market data, consumers are also doing much more cooking and baking at home with the entire baking aisle category sales increasing by 49%. Internet-based sales for our brands increased by 365% led by strong increases in our market-leading Fisher recipe nut line. On the other hand, closures for restaurants and other food service establishments throughout the country negatively impacted our food service business. However, we were encouraged by significant improvement in food service business as some re-openings occurred in the fourth quarter. In April, our food service sales volume declined by 90% compared to April of 2019, while in June our food service sales volume declined by 34% compared to June of 2019. In snack nuts and snack and trail mixes, we saw a significant shift to lower priced private-label products from national branded products. Based on changes in our item mix, we also saw consumer preferences shift from single-serve grab-and-go items to larger pack sizes such as 32 ounce jars and stand up bags. The shift to larger pack sizes allowed us to capture significant efficiencies in manufacturing and distribution. We believe we are well-positioned to take advantage of these dramatic changes in consumer preferences in respect to product line diversity and manufacturing capabilities. In recognition of these changes, we also bolstered our marketing and innovation leadership by adding individuals from major consumer product companies who have significant experience in managing brands in a changing environment. The company's long term objective to drive profitable growth includes three pillars, to continue to grow Fisher, Orchard Valley Harvest, Squirrel brand and Southern Style Nuts into leading nut brands by focusing on consumer insights in the snack, recipe, trail snack mix and produce categories, two, provide integrated nut solutions to grow private brand businesses in each distribution channel and three, expand our offerings into alternative distribution channels. With new resources added to sales, marketing, innovation and research and development, JBSS will execute on our strategic plan to grow our branded business by reaching new consumers via product and packaging innovation, expanding distribution across current and alternative channels and focusing on new ways consumers are purchasing food with an emphasis on e-commerce. Turning to year-end sales review by business channel. In the consumer channel, net sales increased by 7.9% in dollars and 13.7% in sales volume in fiscal 2020 compared to fiscal 2019. Sales volume increase, as Mike mentioned, was driven by increases in trail mixes and snack nuts with new and existing private brand customers. There are significant opportunities in fiscal 2021 to grow our consumer sales with both private brands and with our strong branded portfolio, especially in e-commerce, grocery and club, where we expect those segments to continue to benefit from shifts in consumer buying. Net sales in the commercial ingredient distribution channel decreased by 16% in dollars and 6.9% in sales volume compared to fiscal 2019. Mike talked about the decrease in sales volume due to decreases in food service from restaurant closures, the decline in air travel and the various nationwide stay at home orders as a result of COVID-19. But prior to the start of statewide lockdowns and travel restrictions, our food service business was on track for strong growth. Our commercial ingredient sales and marketing teams have done a great job building customer relationships and expanding distribution. We have since reallocated and repositioned some resources to pursue alternative channels to follow changing demands for our products. In the contract packaging channel, net sales decreased by 20.7% in dollars and 13.8% in sales volume. This channel for JBSS has seen declines in sales volume over the past few years and we have reallocated some resources from contract packaging to focus on other priorities. This channel was particularly impacted in a negative way by COVID-19 as trips to convenience stores declined significantly for a key customer in this channel. Turning to category updates. I will share some brand results and category results for the quarter. As always, market information I will be referring to is IRi reported data and for today it is for the period ending June 21, 2020. When I refer to Q4, I am referring to 13 weeks of the quarter ending June 21. References to changes in volume on price are versus the corresponding period one year ago. We look at the category and IRi Total U.S. definition which includes food, drug, mass, Walmart, military and other outlets, unless otherwise specified. And when we discuss pricing, we are referring to average price per pound. Breakouts of the recipe, snack and produce categories are based on our custom definitions developed in conjunction with IRi. And the term velocity refers to the sales per point of distribution. As has been mentioned COVID-19 had positive and negative impacts upon our results for the fourth quarter. We saw strong evidence of a shift in consumer preferences to shop in smaller store formats like grocery and online. First let's review some category dynamics. The total nut category increased in both sales dollars and pound volume by 5% in the fourth quarter. This was in line with the growth rate we saw in Q3 and ahead of the category growth rate in the first half of our fiscal year. Overall, prices for the quarter were flat versus the prior year. Now I will cover each category in a little more depth, starting with recipe nuts. Based on IRi Total U.S. - Multi Outlet market data, consumers are doing much more cooking and baking at home with the entire baking aisle category sales increasing by 49%. The impact of the pandemic is significant when it comes to people preparing more meals at home. This change in consumer behavior is driving strong recipe nut category growth. In Q4, the category increased 28% in dollars and 24% in pound volume. Despite strong category growth, our overall Fisher brand continues to be challenged by decline in on-shelf placement with a key retailer. Our Fisher recipe nuts decreased 6% in dollar sales and 10% in pound sales for the quarter versus last year. As a result, Fisher share in the category decreased 5.6 pound share points versus last year. The decline in pound volume at retail was due to lost distribution at a major customer in the mass merchandiser sector, which was offset in a large part by pound volume growth in grocery. In traditional grocery, which IRi calls the U.S. food channel, Fisher recipe increased 44% in pound volume behind the COVID-based trend referenced above where consumers shifted their spend to grocery. Fisher continues to be the branded share leader in the recipe category when using a broader multi-outlet definition or within the U.S. food channel. Now let me turn to the snack category. In Q4, the snack category increased 6% in dollar sales and 9% in pound sales. Fisher snack increased 27% in dollar sales and 21% in pound volume in Q4 driven by 19% increase in total points of distribution. This growth was primarily driven by the Fisher Oven Roast Never Fried line, as we continue to expand beyond the core Fisher geography and increased pound sales by 109%. Pound velocity and total points of distribution increased by 31% and 60%, respectively, versus last year. Pound volume for our Southern Style Nuts brand at retail increased by 7% in the quarter due to a distribution gain with a new customer, while pound volume for the total trail and snack mix category decreased by 3% in the quarterly comparison. In Q4, the produce nut category increased 3% in dollar sales and decreased 3% in pound volume sales. Orchard Valley Harvest, our produce nut brand, decreased 30% in pound sales resulting in a pound share declined of 0.5 points versus last year. The volume decline was due to some lost distribution at one key customer. Within traditional grocery, OVH was flat in dollars and declined 1% in pound sales. In closing, fiscal 2020 was a strong year, especially considering the dynamic changes we have all experienced since March. This success is possible because we have talented people across our organization and we invest in them to do what matters most to drive results. We are executing our growth strategies, implementing continuous improvement projects throughout the organization to optimize our cost structure and we continue to invest in our people, brands and processes to better serve our customers and consumers and create value for our shareholders. We will continue to face challenges in our fiscal 2021 as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic continues. Our company continues to follow recommendations made by state and federal regulators and health agencies to ensure the safety and health of our employees. We know there is uncertainty about future local and federal restrictions aimed to mitigate and control the pandemic. As these restrictions were loosened during the fourth quarter of fiscal 2020, we saw a gradual increase in demand from our food service, restaurant, convenience store and nonessential retail customers. While we realize this is a fluid situation, we believe the company is in a very strong position to respond to changes quickly and continue to grow our business. The management team and all our dedicated employees have a steadfast commitment to develop business opportunities that create shareholder value and provide relevant, profitable, innovative products and services to our customers and consumers across all our channels. We appreciate your participation in the call and thank you for your interest in our company. I will now turn the call back over to Mike.