Earnings Labs

Superior Group of Companies, Inc. (SGC)

Q2 2014 Earnings Call· Wed, Jul 23, 2014

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Good afternoon, everyone, and welcome to the Superior Uniform Group’s Conference Call to discuss the company’s fiscal second quarter 2014 financial results. With us today are Michael Benstock, Chief Executive Officer of Superior Uniform Group and Andrew Demott, Chief Financial Officer. After the speakers’ opening remarks, there will be a question-and-answer period and instructions to ask a question will be given at that time. This call is being recorded and your participation implies consent to the recording of this call. If you do not agree to these terms, please simply drop off the line. I would now like to turn the conference call over to Hala Elsherbini, Senior Vice President of Halliburton Investor Relations who will read the Safe Harbor statement. Please go ahead.

Hala Elsherbini

Analyst

Thank you, Jamie, and good afternoon, everyone. This conference call will contain forward-looking statements regarding Superior Uniform Group’s business opportunities and anticipated results of operations. Please bear in mind that forward-looking information is subject to many risks and uncertainties and actual results may differ from what is projected. May it be risks and uncertainties are described in Superior Uniform Group’s annual report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2013. The company’s recent press release announced this morning and other filings with the SEC. Forward-looking statements in this conference call are based on current expectations and beliefs and management does not undertake any duty to update any of the forward-looking statements made in this conference call or otherwise. Please note that all growth comparisons management makes on today’s call will relate to the corresponding period of last year unless otherwise specified. With that, I will now turn the call over to Michael.

Michael Benstock

Analyst

Thank you, Hala, and good afternoon, everyone. Andy and I are very glad you could join us for Superior Uniform Group’s first earnings call in many years. This signals our renewed commitment to actively communicating with investors. You can expect to hear from us regularly going forward. Here’s what to expect today. I would first like to provide highlights of our financial results for the second quarter that ended June 30th and then I will change my focus to offer some background on what distinguishes Superior and its two primary segments – uniforms and related products and Remote Staffing Solutions. I’ll also provide some perspective on the industry growth drivers we see followed by the progress we have made on our growth strategies that diversify our business model, enhance our market share and expand into complementary product offerings while maintaining our superior standards of customer service. Next, Andy will give you some context on the story behind our financial performance for the second quarter and in the first half. Finally, I’ll return with our general outlook on the second half, after which, we’ll be happy to answer your questions. Let’s begin with the second quarter highlights. This has been a very busy and exciting quarter for the company. In fact, we delivered a record second quarter on our company’s nearly 95-year history. We carried forward momentum from our first quarter’s strong backlog and significantly increased the top line by 72.5% to $53.2 million from $30.9 million in the year ago quarter. From a segment standpoint, our uniform business which is comprised of Fashion Seal Healthcare, HPI Direct and Superior ID executed on a large program rollout for an existing airline customer as well as a large promotional uniform order from an existing supermarket account. This, coupled with stellar sales in…

Andrew Demott

Analyst

Thank you, Michael, and good afternoon everyone. I’m also very pleased with the outstanding financial results for the second quarter. Since our press release is available on our website and our 10-Q was filed this morning, I’m going to add color around some of the key factors in the quarter. Let’s start with the income statement. The 72.5% increase in net sales for the latest three months to $53.2 million from $30.9 million a year ago came largely from our acquisition of HPI. Excluding HPI, sales still grew but 15.6%. Taking a closer look at HPI, net sales expanded by 94% over last year’s second quarter, primarily due to shipments of significant new programs including a transportation customer which accounted for approximately $5 million of our increase in net sales. Sales of the uniforms and related products business without HPI rose 14.3% as a result of our successful market penetration and increased market share and as well as the large promotional uniform program for a large supermarket customer. The Remote Staffing Solutions business experienced a 47.2% improvement in net sales over the last year as it continued to sign new contracts. Cost of goods sold increased by 73.9% to $34.2 million as a result of higher company-wide sales. Gross margins declined slightly to 35.7% for the latest quarter versus 36.2% a year ago. Selling and administrative expenses rose at a much lower rate than sales and increased 43.1% from a year ago to $13 million. As a percent of sales, SG&A dropped to 24.5% compared with 29.5% in the 2013 quarter. The takeaway here is that we have done a good job of integrating the HPI position, leveraging our fixed cost and benefiting from economies of scale. Interest expense increased to $113,000. This resulted from two actions – first, funding…

Michael Benstock

Analyst

Thanks, Andy. We’re pleased with our second quarter results, which by most measures, was out best performing quarter in our history. This is a truly transformational year for our company. Over the past few years, we have jettisoned less than profitable businesses focused on two growing businesses that offered good margins and are growing both organically and through acquisitions. I believe the company has never been in better financial shape and we have the right team in place to continue to execute on our growth strategies. While we do not provide guidance, I’m happy to provide a current outlook. There are few things we’re watching. The uniform business saw some pricing pressure in the first half, so this may continue. The midterm elections could distract some purchasing decisions. The current volatility in the Middle East does not directly affect us. However, it can have an impact on the economy and some of our customers. We also are monitoring the pressures globally to raise minimum wages. Historically, we have done a good job of managing market risks. These have ranged from the cotton crisis to earthquakes to the recession. We’re able to do this by controlling cost, maintaining operating efficiencies through automated distribution systems, redundant manufacturing and innovative sourcing strategies as well as always maintaining a flat organizational structure. More importantly, we have the best team that could possibly be put together to execute on our strategies. They truly rock. As you may imagine several factors came together and well aligned in order for us to deliver a stellar second quarter results in this magnitude. Much of this has to do with the first anniversary of the HPI acquisition. While the level of second quarter earnings is not to be expected each quarter, our overall backlog in the uniforms and related product segment remain strong. And overall we do anticipate healthy increases in the top and bottom line for the second half. I know this is a lot of information. By now I’m sure you have some questions. Andy and I will be happy to answer them. I would like to now open it up for Q&A. Operator?

Operator

Operator

And ladies and gentlemen, at this time we will open the floor for questions. (Operator instructions) We will pause momentarily to assemble the roster. (Operator instructions) And we do have a question from Mike Hughes from SGF Capital. Please go ahead with your question. Michael Hughes – SGF Capital: Yes, a couple of questions for you. Just first on the new airline customer, nice order, nice win on the HPI side. Just the nature of your business, when would they be back in the market for more product? How does that work overtime?

Michael Benstock

Analyst

So in fact there are a lot of ways with this, Michael. And thanks for the question. There are a lot of ways the rollouts are done. But typically we would roll out a program like this and almost immediately we would begin servicing the employees of that account with their individual needs. So there are really – there’s a huge rollout on the frontend but then there’s continued business opportunities every single day. So it winds down a little bit but it doesn’t wind down completely. Michael Hughes – SGF Capital: Okay. And then just the special promotion you ran in the second quarter. I think you said for a supermarket customer, it’s $2.5 million. What’s the background on that deal? Was it just a competitive deal and you needed to run the promo to retain the business?

Michael Benstock

Analyst

No. Let me clarify that. We have a promotional products business. We have products that we sell that – they’re also known as ad specialty items. And they may be T-shirts or caps or mugs and cups and key chains. And so the promotional products that we sold in existing supermarket account, a promotion that they were having, we supplied all the materials for that promotion. Michael Hughes – SGF Capital: Okay. I appreciate the clarification. And then just the operating cash flow, you highlighted in your prepared comments inventory and AR, eating up some cash flow on the first half. Do you think that the back half that completely reverses itself and you could actually generate positive operating cash flow for the full year?

Andrew Demott

Analyst

I definitely expect that we will turn the trend around in the second half. We’ve already seen that through the month of July with some significant collections. So this is associated with those two programs that we discussed. And that we’re in the position to say where we’re going to be for the full year. Michael Hughes – SGF Capital: Right. And then the SG&A at the $13 million a quarter run rate, is that a good number to use for the third and fourth quarter this year?

Michael Benstock

Analyst

It really moves with the sales. It doesn’t increase at the same rate. That sales go up and we typically look at it as the percentage of sales. There’s a fair portion of that SG&A that will remain consistent. But then there’s a variable portion associated with it as well. Michael Hughes – SGF Capital: Okay.

Michael Benstock

Analyst

If you look back in our history, you’ll see the trends on where increases and decreases in our revenues, how they move with the sales. Michael Hughes – SGF Capital: Okay. And then I think there’s a stock comp for the quarter was a 128,000, it was 827 in the first quarter. What accounts for the differences? I would think the stock prices higher, it might be higher but it won’t just – that looked like in the back half?

Andrew Demott

Analyst

Yes. Let me explain the way our stock compensation program runs in a normal year and which is pretty well every year. In February of this year, the compensation committee issues are large grants to our management team, both our section 16 officers as well as the rest of the officers and directors of the company. Mid-year in the second quarter is a grant that is none to our outside directors, our executive board of directors. And then in the third quarter in July or August of each year there’s a ranking file stock ups in grant. So those will happen in each of the three years. There is a significant increase in the cost of our option this year with the combination of two factors. The higher share price, when you’re using the Black-Scholes model that kicks in as well as the fact that our volatility of the stock has increased over the last several years which has led to higher expense as well. Michael Hughes – SGF Capital: All right, okay.

Andrew Demott

Analyst

And the number of options that we’ve been giving have been relatively consistent. Michael Hughes – SGF Capital: Okay. Then one last question for you on remote staffing. I think it was in the Q or the K [ph] that you plan on expanding that and your referenced 600 seats plan there. It’s going to be $7 million. Is that the CapEx number and over what timeframe will they’d be completed?

Michael Benstock

Analyst

Well, I hope to soon be closing on some land in the very near future. And we expect within 12 months after that that we’ll have spent that $7 million and we’ll have a – we’ll be operating at that facility. Michael Hughes – SGF Capital: Okay. And are there operating startup cost when you bring that many seats online that would weigh on margins in just in short term?

Michael Benstock

Analyst

It’s not our intention to bring all those seats online immediately. It’s our intention to, at our current rate of growth, to grow into that over a period of a few years. Michael Hughes – SGF Capital: Okay, thank you very much.

Michael Benstock

Analyst

Thank you.

Andrew Demott

Analyst

Thank you.

Operator

Operator

(Operator instructions) Our next question comes from Tom McGuire who is a private investor. Please go ahead with your question. Tom McGuire – Private Investor: Okay, thank you for taking my question, and a really good quarter. I have a quick follow up question to the gentlemen’s first question. And it is, how unusual is it for HPI or you guys to get an order of the magnitude of $5 million or even $2.5 million from a customer. Is that kind of like one off business or can that happen regularly, it’s just hard to time when they come?

Michael Benstock

Analyst

I wish they happened every month, but it’s not a one off. I mean, in our history almost every year, I could speak to large rollouts that we’ve had, it’s just never quite call comes together at the same time as this did. Last year, we had a large rollout of an auto parts chain and that was significant. We seemed to be able to replace sometimes these bigger ones with smaller incremental business with multiple customers that you don’t see the swings as much as you saw on this one. But we’re pretty confident that we’re positioned now with HPI as our partner to be able to go after more business like this and be able to service it well because truly, they took on a large piece of business, maybe the largest piece of business they’d ever taken on. I’m not certain of that. But they handled this. But certainly, the most complex piece of business they’ve ever taken on and they handled it very, very well. So we’re very confident that we’re open to many more opportunities like this in the future. Tom McGuire – Private Investor: Okay, thank you very much and good job.

Michael Benstock

Analyst

Thank you.

Operator

Operator

And everyone at this time, I’m showing no additional questions. I’d like to turn the conference call back over to Michael Benstock for any closing remarks.

Michael Benstock

Analyst

Thank you, Jamie. I’d like to leave you all with three final thoughts. For the last few years, Superior has focused on transforming itself into a growth company. We did this by getting out of unprofitable businesses, controlling our inventories, cutting cost, hiring the right team and reinvesting in the business even in the face of the recession to improve our competitive position. This means our business model has low overhead and a lot of upside potential in our operating margins as we add new customers. We reached diverse markets and can grow organically and through acquisitions. Because we are low debt levels, we can leverage for the right growth opportunities. Andy and I thank you for taking the time to be with us today. As I mentioned at the top of this call, our management team is committed to keeping you informed about the company. We look forward to providing our third quarter update in October. In the meantime, we hope you have an enjoyable summer.

Operator

Operator

Ladies and gentlemen, that does conclude today’s conference call. We do thank you for attending today’s presentation. You may now disconnect your telephone lines.