Garry Ridge
Analyst · Wunderlich. Please proceed with your question
Thank you, Wendy. Good day everyone and thanks for joining us for today's conference call. Today we reported net sales of 96.5 million for the second quarter of fiscal 2017 which was an increase of 2% from the second quarter of last fiscal year. Additionally we reported operating income of 18.9 million which was an increase of 5% from the second quarter of last fiscal year. Although we do not normally discuss operating income on these calls, we thought it was worth mentioning because there are some non-operating items which are distorting our net income and diluted earnings per share for the quarter. Net income for the second quarter was 12.4 million compared to 13.7 million in the second quarter of last fiscal year, a decrease of 10% year-over-year. Our net income was negatively impacted as a result of fluctuations in some non-operating currency related items period-over-period as well as an adjustment that was rerecorded to our income tax expense in the second quarter of this year. Diluted earnings per share for the second quarter were $0.87 compared to $0.94 for the same period last fiscal year. Now let's start with a discussion about our strategic initiatives. Strategic initiative number one is to grow WD-40 Multi-Use product. Our most important strategic initiative is to take the blue and yellow can with a little red top to more places for more people who will find more uses more frequently. We believe we can grow WD-40 Multi-Use product to approximately 600 million in revenue by the end of fiscal year 2025. In the second quarter global sales of multiuse products were up 4% driven by increased product sales in all three trading blocks. In addition WD-40 EZ-REACH Flexible Straw continues to perform well in the U.S. and we have just launched this product offering in Australia in the second quarter. Strategic initiative number two is to grow WD-40 Specialist product line. Once we build our brand equity and established the power of the shield in a particular geography we can leverage the brand recognition to develop new product lines like WD-40 Specialist. We believe we can grow WD-40 Specialist to approximately 125 million in revenues by the end of fiscal year 2025. In the second quarter sales of WD-40 Specialist was 5.5 million which represents a 1% increase over the second quarter of last year. Year-to-date global sales of WD-40 Specialist was up 17%. We continue to launch new Specialist categories in markets around the world although each market, country, and segment experiences different short-term trends relating to the sales of WD-40 Specialist product line due to the timing of promotions in the building of distribution. We continue to believe that WD-40 Specialist will be a significant revenue and earnings growth engine for many years to come. Strategic initiative number three is to broaden the product and revenue base. [Indiscernible] under this initiative is to leverage the recognized strengths of the WD-40 company to derive revenue from new sources and brands. We continue to expand the product offerings within our 3-IN-ONE, GT85 brands as well as WD-40 BIKE. WD-40 BIKE continues to gain traction and global sales of the product line increased 40% in the second quarter with particular strength in EMEA where we've experienced solid growth for WD-40 BIKE. We see a lot of opportunity with these maintenance products. Strategic initiative number four is to attract, develop, and obtain outstanding tribe members. [Indiscernible] under this initiative is to attract, develop, and retain talented tribe members. At the end of the second quarter we had a total of 445 tribe members globally. Our long-term target under this initiative is to grow employment and employee engagement to greater than 95%. In support of this objective, early this fiscal year we completed the acquisition of a new building that will house our WD-40 San Diego based tribe members. We are currently in the process of renovating the property and expect to make a total investment of approximately 18.5 million in this facility. This includes 10.7 million for our recent purchase of the land and building and the remaining cost being associated with building improvements as well as the purchase of new furniture, fixtures, and IT equipment. This dovetails nicely into strategic initiative number five operation excellence. We are continuously focused on optimizing resources, systems, and processes as well as applying rigorous commitment to quality assurance, regulatory compliance, and intellectual property protection. Part of the investment in the new facility is being made on information technology infrastructure equipment which will enhance our ability to operate more effectively as a tribe. We look forward to providing you updates on these initiatives throughout the remainder of this year. That completes the update on the strategic initiatives, so let's move on to the details of the second quarter results starting with sales. Consolidated net sales were 96.5 million in the quarter up 2 million versus last year. If we were to remove all foreign currency exchange impacts, our consolidated revenue would have been about 98.6 million up 4% compared to the second quarter of last year. This 2.1 million difference is due to the fact that in the second quarter we generated approximately 40% of our sales in currencies other than U.S. dollar and changes in foreign currency exchange rates continue to negatively impact our consolidated results. Translation of our foreign subsidiary results from the functional currencies to the U.S. dollar had an unfavorable impact on sales. On a constant currency basis total net sales would have been 102.9 million, an increase of 9% compared to the last year. In the second quarter our net sales were reduced by about 6.4 million due to the strengthening of the U.S. dollar against the functional currencies of our subsidiaries. That is what we refer to as translation related exposures and it impacts reported results from Canada, Australia, China, and the EMEA segment. However due to the changing foreign currency exchange rate our consolidated net sales were actually improved this quarter by 4.3 million due to transaction related impacts. This currency exposure only impacts reported results in EMEA segment and was primarily due to the impact of the strengthening of the euro and the U.S. dollar against the pound sterling. Now let's take a closer look at what's happening in the individual segments. We will start with the Americas, consolidated net sales in the Americas which includes the United States, Latin America, and Canada decreased to 45.1 million in the second quarter, down about 1% from last year. Sales of maintenance products in the Americas increased just over 1% in the second quarter primarily due to a 25% increase in sales of maintenance products in Canada. This quarter's results in this region can be linked to some of the successful promotional programs and the improving market and economic conditions and we're very pleased to see this improvement in our Canadian market. We believe that we've reached a turning point in Canada and that this market will continue to see growth in the coming quarters. Maintenance product sales in Latin America were down 3% in the quarter primarily due to the continuing uncertain business conditions in Mexico as a result of the current political climate. Though maintenance products sales in the United States were relatively flat in the second quarter, our WD-40 EZ-REACH Flexible Straw product continues to make good traction and favorably impacted sales in the U.S. during the quarter due to added distribution. As a reminder our maintenance products exclude our home care and cleaning products. We continue to consider our home care and cleaning products particularly those in the U.S. as harvest trends that continue to generate meaningful contributions and cash flows but I generally expect it to become a small part of the business over time. Sales of our home care and cleaning products in the Americas decreased 10% in the second quarter compared to the same period of last year. Now on to EMA, consolidated net sales in EMEA which include Europe, Middle East, Africa, and India increased to 36.2 million in the second quarter, up 2% from last year. EMEA's reported results in the second quarter were negatively impacted by foreign currency exchange headwinds. On a constant currency basis sales in EMEA would have been 42.6 million, an increase of 7 million or 20% compared to the last year. However, these constant currency numbers do not kind of complete currency pictures since we experienced favorable impact of 4.3 million from the transaction related exposures in the second quarter. We think the best way to give you a complete look at how market is performing is to look at our results in local currencies which we conduct sales transactions in our direct markets in EMEA. Although the overall sales in direct markets decreased 2% in U.S. dollars in the second quarter, sales in our Europe based direct markets increased by 7% driven by growth in continental Europe mainly due to the expanded distribution. These sales increases were more than offset by a sales decrease in our pound sterling base market of 5% primarily due to decreased sales of the 1001 brand as a result of loss distribution in the UK. Now EMEA direct markets accounted for 64% of the region sales. The remaining 36% of the EMEA sales during the quarter were generated by our EMEA distributor markets. Distributor market sales increased 10% in the second quarter due primarily to an increase of 20% in sales in Russia. Although the market conditions in Russia have began to stabilize and sales have increased in the second quarter of fiscal 2017, our year-to-date sales have not returned to the level we experienced prior to the political and economic crisis in Russia. We would like to remind our investors that the political and economic instability in the region makes it difficult for us to predict what level of sales we will have in this market in the future. Now let's pop down to Asia Pacific. Consolidated net sales in Asia Pacific which includes Australia, China, and other countries in the region increased to 15.2 million in the second quarter, up 14% from last year. In Australia net sales in U.S. dollars were 3.9 million in the second quarter flat compared to last year. Changes in foreign currency exchange rates had a favorable impact on these results and its functional currency, the Australian dollar sales were down 2% for the quarter primarily due to the timing of promotional activities and certain promotional programs that were conducted in the second quarter of last year but not repeated this year. In China, sales in U.S. dollars were 3.4 million in the second quarter up 17% compared to last year. Changes in foreign currency exchange rates had a negative impact on these results. In its functional currency, the Chinese RMB sales were up 25% in the quarter. The growth in China was due to new distribution and increased promotional activities. We continue to remain optimistic about the long-term opportunities in China although we expect a lot of volatility along the way due to the timing of promotional programs, the building of distribution, and shifting economic patterns and varying of industrial activities. In our Asian distributor markets net sales was 7.9 million in the quarter up 21% compared to last year. The sales increases were driven primarily by higher levels of promotional activities particularly in Indonesia, the Philippines, Malaysia, and Thailand and the timing of some customer orders. Our Asian distributor markets are not impacted by currency since we will -- we sell that product in U.S. dollars in that region. I will pull out now, and turn over to Jay who will continue to review the financials.