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SunOpta Inc. (STKL)

Q4 2014 Earnings Call· Tue, Mar 3, 2015

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Good morning and welcome to SunOpta's Fiscal 2014 Earnings Conference Call. By now, everyone should have had access to the earnings press release that was issued after the close of business yesterday. The release is available on the Investor Relations' page on SunOpta's website at www.sunopta.com. This call is being webcast and its transcription will be available on the company's website. As a reminder, please note that the prepared remarks, which will follow, contain forward-looking statements, and management may make additional forward-looking statements in response to your questions. These statements do not guarantee future performance and, therefore, undue reliance should not be placed upon them. We refer you to all risk factors contained in SunOpta's press release issued yesterday, the company's fiscal 2014 report on Form 10-K that will be issued at the close of business today, and other filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission for a more detailed discussion of the factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those projections in any forward-looking statements. Finally, we would also like to remind listeners that the company may refer to certain non-GAAP financial measures during the teleconference. A reconciliation of these non-GAAP financial measures was included with the company's press release issued yesterday. Also, please note that unless otherwise stated, all figures discussed today are in U.S. dollars and are occasionally rounded up to the nearest million. And now, I would like to turn the conference call over to SunOpta's CEO, Steve Bromley. Steven R. Bromley - Chief Executive Officer & Director: Good morning, everyone. On the call with me today are Rob McKeracher, our Vice President and Chief Financial Officer; and Rik Jacobs, our President and Chief Operating Officer. On this call today, I will provide you with a brief overview of our fiscal and fourth…

Operator

Operator

Thank you. Our first question comes from Scott Van Winkle with Canaccord Genuity. Your line is open.

Scott Van Winkle - Canaccord Genuity, Inc.

Analyst

Hi. Thanks. So, on Consumer Products, Rik, can we dive into a little bit more detail about what portion of the challenges you had in Q4 you can kind of firmly say where Q4 related things like inventory adjustments or rationalizations on the customer side, to things like disruption at Modesto that would continue into the coming quarters? Hendrik Jacobs - President & Chief Operating Officer: Yeah. Hi, Scott. So, if you look at inventory write-downs, those are obviously one-time events that happened in the fourth quarter. If you look at the aseptic, we got through that process, we're up and running now in February or end of February, beginning of March, so just basically last week and that really unlocks capacity along with new aseptic lines that we have. So, that one has cost us revenue in the fourth quarter. We had to turn away prospects so that one will linger on somewhat. And on the pricing in frozen, we have passed that pricing on to our customers but it is a – there is some lead time to lag in order to get that pricing through. So, basically, net-net, I would say half of it is lingering, half of it is done.

Scott Van Winkle - Canaccord Genuity, Inc.

Analyst

All right. So, we may not see the margins kind of get back to where we thought they should be until maybe at the end of Q2, is that kind of an expectation? Hendrik Jacobs - President & Chief Operating Officer: Yeah. Having said that, we try to manage the overall business. And I think some of the headwinds we're facing in Consumer Products should be recuperated as well by Global Ingredients.

Scott Van Winkle - Canaccord Genuity, Inc.

Analyst

Okay. And then, going into 2015, you've got lower commodity prices kind of across the board, as well as you know, weak foreign currencies, a strong U.S. dollar. Can we talk a little bit about what we should expect on the headwind on commodity pricing? How you pass through that pricing and maintain margin? And then, what's currency net-net to kind of the bottom-line or to revenue from an impact, I guess, specifically the euro, I guess, would be the most impactful? Hendrik Jacobs - President & Chief Operating Officer: Yeah. Scott, I mean I think if you look at the commodity side, the soy and the corn domestic basically has gone down, as you guys have seen. That doesn't necessarily impact our margin so much but it will impact top-line revenue quite significantly. I think in fact, Rob, in 2014, the total impact of lower commodity cost was about, or pricing, was about... Robert McKeracher - Chief Financial Officer & Vice President: Give or take about $22 million influence just on fiscal 2014. And I think it would be fair to assume a similar level heading into 2015. And, as Rik mentioned, it doesn't impact our profitability, but it does impact obviously the top-line number. We're still generating the same or better per pound or per bushel margin. Hendrik Jacobs - President & Chief Operating Officer: Then on the currency Rob, I'll have you... Robert McKeracher - Chief Financial Officer & Vice President: Yeah. And then on the currency, I think it'd be fair to assume that little less than a quarter of our sales in our Global Ingredient platform are generally denominated in euros. So as the euro continues to slide relative to the U.S. dollar that would put downward pressure on the translation certainly of that business into U.S. dollars. It doesn't influence the overall margin. We've got a hedging program that it doesn't impact, if you will, the standalone European business, but certainly on translation that will put some downward pressure, both on the translation of revenue and operating income.

Scott Van Winkle - Canaccord Genuity, Inc.

Analyst

Do you have a kind of percentage number of sales that are denominated in euros? I mean, it's hard for us to kind of flesh out since a lot of your transactions even in Europe are in U.S. dollars? Robert McKeracher - Chief Financial Officer & Vice President: Yeah. And that's where it's roughly about a quarter of that – little less than a quarter of that Global Ingredient business.

Scott Van Winkle - Canaccord Genuity, Inc.

Analyst

Okay, okay. Robert McKeracher - Chief Financial Officer & Vice President: That segment. It's important to note out Scott, that on the foreign exchange, the other movement that we're really exposed, if you will, to euros and Canadian dollars. And so as the Canadian dollar as well, weakens relative to the U.S. dollar, there is SG&A savings there. So from our perspective, the movement in foreign exchange really will stand out on the revenue line, which should not be influential from an earnings perspective.

Scott Van Winkle - Canaccord Genuity, Inc.

Analyst

Okay. Great. I'll yield the floor. Thanks. Robert McKeracher - Chief Financial Officer & Vice President: Yeah.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Christine Healy with Scotiabank. Your line is open.

Christine Healy - Scotiabank GBM

Analyst · Scotiabank. Your line is open.

Thanks. Hi. Good morning. I guess, first I have a couple of questions for Rob. I guess, first of all, just what is the current carrying value of Opta Minerals on your books? I believe the original value was around $30 million, but what is it following these write-downs. That would just be good to know ahead of the pending sale? Robert McKeracher - Chief Financial Officer & Vice President: Yeah, sure. I mean the goodwill impairment we just recorded, Christine, is just under $11 million and, of course, we own two-thirds of the business, and at the end of the day, we consolidate two-thirds of that loss. So you're right that its carrying value was around $30 million and that would be reduced by roughly 66% of that loss.

Christine Healy - Scotiabank GBM

Analyst · Scotiabank. Your line is open.

Okay. I just wanted to see if I was accurate there. Okay. And then next on consumer foods, hoping you can help us out. We can see the operating income margin is just over breakeven, but can you tell us what the gross profit percentage was for the quarter? Hendrik Jacobs - President & Chief Operating Officer: It's included in our K that will come out but we'll dig it out here.

Christine Healy - Scotiabank GBM

Analyst · Scotiabank. Your line is open.

Thanks. And, Rob, I guess, while you're looking for it, when can we expect to see the 10-K and also the 8-K come out? Robert McKeracher - Chief Financial Officer & Vice President: Yeah. There's going to be a 10-K. Our intention is to file that before the close of business today, Christine, the Annual Results. And then before this week is over we're targeting Thursday, if not sooner, we'll have an 8-K published. And in that 8-K, what it will provide you is the quarterly recap of segments for the chain so you'll see what Global Ingredients look like and Consumer Products, sorry, just for the recap. Let me look – you're looking for the annual or the quarterly?

Christine Healy - Scotiabank GBM

Analyst · Scotiabank. Your line is open.

Yeah. Just the quarterly gross profit percentage for consumer foods, just so we can see the movement there? Hendrik Jacobs - President & Chief Operating Officer: I think most of the issues that we've encountered obviously impacted the gross margin line, right?

Christine Healy - Scotiabank GBM

Analyst · Scotiabank. Your line is open.

Yeah. That's what I wanted to see. Hendrik Jacobs - President & Chief Operating Officer: Yeah. Sure.

Christine Healy - Scotiabank GBM

Analyst · Scotiabank. Your line is open.

I guess you can send it to me offline, if you can't find it. Just because it might take a day or two to get that 10-K, so that'll be helpful to know. And then, just lastly, Rik, just wanted to understand better the Healthy Fruit Snacks, I completely get the comments that customers are rationalizing so there were some inventory adjustments there. But I think you also mentioned that you made decisions to rationalize some products. Was that because there's just too many SKUs, maybe too much variety in some areas, can you just talk about that? Hendrik Jacobs - President & Chief Operating Officer: Yeah. I think – well you are exactly right. We were making way too many products and as a result, holding a whole bunch of different ingredients. And then when you start looking at what are you really making, when you're producing these things, you're actually saying, you're not making anything. So, we need to reduce the portfolio of things that we're selling and we need to ensure that we use a lot more of the common ingredients, so to speak, so that we can actually realize the profit in these businesses.

Christine Healy - Scotiabank GBM

Analyst · Scotiabank. Your line is open.

Okay. And has that rationalization already taken place, or is it happening gradually in the first half? Hendrik Jacobs - President & Chief Operating Officer: The rationalization has by and large taken place, and that's why we, at the end of the quarter, took the inventory write-downs.

Christine Healy - Scotiabank GBM

Analyst · Scotiabank. Your line is open.

Okay. Okay, great. Thanks, guys. Steven R. Bromley - Chief Executive Officer & Director: Thanks, Christine.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Tim Tiberio with Miller Tabak. Your line is open. Tim J. Tiberio - Miller Tabak + Co. LLC: Good morning and thanks for taking my question. You had mentioned last quarter that you are targeting I think 10% savings of your overall transportation spend. Can you kind of give us an update of how far along you are in rationalizing out your logistics network and do you also see the recent drop in global ocean shipping rates potentially being a tailwind for your global sourcing business at all? Hendrik Jacobs - President & Chief Operating Officer: Okay. Well, two questions on that one. On the domestic side, we have now contracted a third-party logistics provider to work with us and who is basically going to give us a lot of the insight and a lot of the reductions that we're getting in our freight and you're absolutely right, we're still targeting 5% to 10% savings on that one. That one is going to go live at the end of the second quarter, as you can imagine turning all of our, I think, just in the fourth quarter alone we have something like 29,000 different shipments as a company. So just making sure that that all goes over flawlessly, we are now in testing phase with this particular provider so that should be going live at the end of second quarter. When it comes to the ocean shipments, I mean, there's really two parts of that one. One part is getting our goods to the ports, which has been challenging at least on the rail side. And then secondly – I'm talking from domestic going to be sold in Asia, for example. And obviously some of the strikes that we have going on in the ports…

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Keith Howlett with Desjardins Securities. Your line is open.

Keith Edward Howlett - Desjardins Securities, Inc.

Analyst · Desjardins Securities. Your line is open.

Yes, thanks. So, just a few questions, one on the expectation for capital spending in 2015? Hendrik Jacobs - President & Chief Operating Officer: Sure. Robert McKeracher - Chief Financial Officer & Vice President: Yeah. You're at the looking the range of between $40 million and $50 million, Keith.

Keith Edward Howlett - Desjardins Securities, Inc.

Analyst · Desjardins Securities. Your line is open.

And in terms of the tax rate that you're thinking of in 2015? Robert McKeracher - Chief Financial Officer & Vice President: Yeah. It's coming down a bit from what we had signaled previously. I think it would be fair to assume that the rate would be in the range of 36% to 37% in 2015. Steven R. Bromley - Chief Executive Officer & Director: And, Keith, the rate is coming down because of just some of the strategies that we're employing around leveraging the business platform that we have.

Keith Edward Howlett - Desjardins Securities, Inc.

Analyst · Desjardins Securities. Your line is open.

And just in terms of the San Bernardino facility, which is up and going, was it up and going most of the quarter and so now it's just a question of selling capacity? Hendrik Jacobs - President & Chief Operating Officer: It is indeed a question of selling the capacity and that capacity will get a lot easier to sell once we have our SQF 2 certification, which we expect to get in April. That's when some of the things that we are doing for customers now that we don't have in-house, we can bring back in-house, and obviously also some of the things at Citrusource is doing, we can then start bringing in-house, as well.

Keith Edward Howlett - Desjardins Securities, Inc.

Analyst · Desjardins Securities. Your line is open.

Great. And just finally on the aseptic pouch business, what would – is the industry condition about the same that there is a bit of additional more capacity than the market currently needs or how does that market look? Hendrik Jacobs - President & Chief Operating Officer: Yeah. I mean, there has been a lot of capacity that hasn't been installed. However, I think with our Allentown facility and our West Coast facility, we're in the right locations to deliver the lowest delivered cost and where most of the consumers actually live. So, we feel that we're well positioned in that one and in fact are winning some of the bids that are out there as we speak.

Keith Edward Howlett - Desjardins Securities, Inc.

Analyst · Desjardins Securities. Your line is open.

Great. Thank you. Steven R. Bromley - Chief Executive Officer & Director: Thanks, Keith.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Scott Van Winkle with Canaccord Genuity. Your line is open.

Scott Van Winkle - Canaccord Genuity, Inc.

Analyst · Canaccord Genuity. Your line is open.

Thanks. So following up on pouch in Allentown, the startup cost you expect the timing and magnitude, can we get an update there? Hendrik Jacobs - President & Chief Operating Officer: The timing – so Allentown, we have made the decision as you know to basically put aseptic lines over there and that should be operational and coming online in the fourth quarter. And then if you look at the total investment that we're making there in terms of capital is north of $20 million, start up I would say is about $3 million to $4 million that we will be incurring as we schedule ramp up. Is that right, Rob? Robert McKeracher - Chief Financial Officer & Vice President: Yeah. No, that's in the zone and you'll see that costs really start to come through obviously in advance of the start up, Scott. So, starting now to be honest, but then more predominantly noticed I guess in the second and third quarter.

Scott Van Winkle - Canaccord Genuity, Inc.

Analyst · Canaccord Genuity. Your line is open.

And is the expectation kind of off the bat to kind of relocate existing production into an East Coast facility to save on transportation or is there more an expectation of incremental business because you're on the East Coast now? Hendrik Jacobs - President & Chief Operating Officer: I think it's a combination of both. As you may know, some of the customers that we have as our significant customers, we don't actually have all of their volume. So we're hoping to get that with being the lowest landed cost provider and obviously for some of our customers this will be a lower cost, so they will expect to benefit from that as well.

Scott Van Winkle - Canaccord Genuity, Inc.

Analyst · Canaccord Genuity. Your line is open.

Okay. And then, Rob, with splitting up the remainder of the Ingredient segment and moving part of it into the Global Sourcing, if not Global Ingredients segment and part of it into the Consumer Products segment, what kind of margin impact to those two segments, I would assume the margin might be kind of accretive to the portion of the Ingredients business going into Global Sourcing and maybe a little dilutive for the portion of Ingredients that's going into Consumer Products. Is that the right way to think about it or is it not – just not big enough to really move the overall margin in those two segments? Robert McKeracher - Chief Financial Officer & Vice President: Yeah. No, I – directionally certainly you've hit on it there, Scott, so the more value add that moves into the – what is now Global Ingredients certainly that is accretive, if you will, to the margin profile there and then it's the opposite for Consumer Products. You'll notice in our 10-K that we'll put out later, it'll have our adjusted targets in these two new segments and certainly an explanation of what comprises each of them.

Scott Van Winkle - Canaccord Genuity, Inc.

Analyst · Canaccord Genuity. Your line is open.

Great. And then, Rik, I think you talked about some management changes I believe was in the – is it the frozen fruit and vegetable segment, if I have that right and what was the driver there? I'm wondering if there's been, if this is part of the restructuring and realignment that started I guess a year ago or what were the changes there? Hendrik Jacobs - President & Chief Operating Officer: Yeah. I mean Scott, over the last year we have – certainly have a significant talent upgrade in our organization, especially I would say in the operations side of things. When you look at the supply chain initiatives such as that three-party that is all new, central procurement is new. But what I was specifically referring to in my earlier comments were that, in all honesty, some of the issues that we encountered in the fourth quarter were basically us not executing. And that is not excusable anymore these days. And so as a result of that, we've also made some changes.

Scott Van Winkle - Canaccord Genuity, Inc.

Analyst · Canaccord Genuity. Your line is open.

Great. Thank you. Steven R. Bromley - Chief Executive Officer & Director: Thanks, Scott.

Operator

Operator

And I'm showing no further questions. I will now turn the call back over to Steve Bromley for closing remarks. Steven R. Bromley - Chief Executive Officer & Director: Great. Well, thank you. And thank you to everyone for joining the call today. We appreciate your time. For those that'll be at Expo West, we look forward to seeing you there. And otherwise, we look forward to talk to everyone in the near future. So, thank you and have a great day.

Operator

Operator

Thank you, ladies and gentlemen. That does conclude today's conference. You may all disconnect. And everyone have a great day.