Thank you for standing by, and welcome to the Coles Group FY 2024 Half Year Results Analyst Briefing. All participants are in a listen-only mode. There will be a presentation followed by a question-and-answer session. If you wish to ask a question, you will need to press the star key followed by the number one on your telephone keypad. I would now like to hand the conference over to Leah Weckert, Coles Group CEO. Please go ahead.
Good morning. It's great to be taking you through our first half results this morning. I'm joined in the room today by Charlie Elias, our CFO; Matt Swindells, our Chief Operations and Sustainability Officer; Ben Hassing, our Chief Digital Officer; and Michael Courtney, our Chief Executive of Liquor. Before I begin, I'd like to acknowledge the traditional custodians of the land on which we meet today, the Wurundjeri peoples of the Kulin Nation. We acknowledge their strengths and resilience and pay our respects to their elders, past, present, and emerging. I'm now on slide three. As I reflect on the last six months, I'm pleased to report that we've made good progress against our immediate strategic priorities.
You may recall at our full-year results, I included a slide on my immediate areas of focus around availability, loss, and quality, delivering value for customers, our Simplify and Save to Invest program, as well as the customer experience. We have made good progress in each of these areas, and I'll cover these off in my presentation today. We also made significant investments in value during the half at a time when we know the financial pressures many of our customers are facing. These value investments, together with improvements in availability, underpinned volume growth in our supermarkets business. We also continue to innovate and introduce new products in our exclusive brand portfolios across both supermarkets and liquor, which is a key element of our value proposition.
We experienced strong growth in e-commerce, digital, and loyalty, with e-commerce revenue growth of 29.2% in Supermarkets and 14.9% in Liquor, with 42% growth in the Coles app active users, and the Flybuys active membership grew by 9.5%. Finally, an area that we have faced head-on is loss. We have made solid progress across both waste and markdown and stock loss in the half. When we spoke at the full-year results, I said that we would roll out loss technology solutions to more than 250 stores by the end of December. We have done so. We now have Skip Scan in 305 stores and Smart Gates in 267 stores. We also implemented other operational initiatives to combat loss, and I'll take you through this later in the presentation. Moving now on to the financial highlights on slide four.
At a group level, group EBIT from continuing operations increased by 0.6% to AUD 1.1 billion, and NPAT from continuing operations decreased by 3.6% to AUD 594 million. On an underlying basis, which adjusts for the major project implementation costs relating to our ADCs and CFCs, underlying group EBIT from continuing operations increased by 3.3% to AUD 1.1 billion, and underlying NPAT from continuing operations was broadly flat at AUD 626 million. We reported operating cash flow of AUD 1.9 billion with a cash realization ratio of 102%. For our shareholders, the board has declared an interim dividend of AUD 0.36 per share, fully franked, which is stable on the prior corresponding period. Moving now to slide five. Delivering a solid set of financial results like these allows us to provide sustainable benefits to all of our stakeholders.
At a time when supermarkets are under increased scrutiny, I did want to take a few moments to highlight what that means for the millions of Australians who are touched by Coles. Whether they are a customer, supplier, one of our team members, a community partner, or a shareholder, we are working hard to deliver good outcomes across the board. We have 850 supermarkets in all parts of Australia. From Kununurra to Walla Walla and Port Douglas, we are committed to delivering choice and value to the millions of customers who visit our stores. We, of course, could not do this without the more than 8,000 suppliers that deliver more than 40,000 product lines to our stores and support us through the services they provide. We know the importance of having strong relationships with our suppliers.
We will continue to work with them to deliver value to our customers, and we will continue to support them, including through the Coles Nurture Fund. Having a profitable business also allows us to employ our more than 120,000 team members across Australia. We are proud to be one of the largest private sector employers in Australia and extremely proud of the diversity. We also know that we have an important part to play in the communities in which we operate. We continue to make contributions to community organizations such as Redkite and Little Athletics and support important national fundraising campaigns, including FightMND and Movember. We also have a longstanding partnership with food rescue organizations SecondBite and Foodbank, and in the last six months alone, provided the equivalent of 21 million meals to these organizations. Finally, our shareholders.
We know delivering a sustainable dividend contributes to the financial security of the more than 440,000 direct shareholders and the millions more that would hold Coles shares through their superannuation funds. We are working to get the balance right of delivering for all of our stakeholders. But we do need to deliver sustainable financial results to be able to deliver on these commitments. And I'm confident we will continue to do so. Moving now to slide six. There's no doubt that there are a number of industry dynamics at play. We are well positioned to benefit from Australia's high population growth as well as the shift to in-home consumption. While we are facing cost pressures, we are taking measures to limit the inflationary impacts on our customers as much as possible.
This can be seen in the second chart with five-year food CPI growth in Australia well below other countries who are clearly facing the same inflationary challenges we have here. Moving on to the next slide now, which showcases how we are delivering value for our customers. We know that we need to focus on investing in and delivering value to remain relevant to our customers at this time. We deliver value in many ways, including through our exclusive brands portfolio in both supermarkets and liquor, our weekly specials, offers through our Flybuys loyalty program, and of course, the Big Red Hand, which is synonymous with value. During the half, we launched our Great Value, Hands Down campaign featuring the Big Red Hand, with prices dropped on hundreds of products.
This included, through our Christmas range, where we dropped the price on Christmas products, helping families make the most of their holiday budget. During the half, we also launched the Coles Simply range, where we redesigned the packaging of many of our value-owned brand products. The packaging is bright and yellow, which we know is a beacon for our lower-priced products. While the actual products and recipes have not changed, they have a new look. Our customers can easily identify key owned brand value products. At the end of December, we had over 45 Coles Simply products and are continuing to introduce more and more. In addition to great value, we are also working to deliver great quality products, particularly in fresh, where we have refocused our quality controls on stock we receive into the DC to improve the quality and home life for customers.
Our fresh produce easy ordering is also improving availability, freshness, and waste and markdown across all of our stores. This has all been showcased through our great lengths for quality campaign, which launched in the half, demonstrating the exceptional partnerships we have with our farmers that grow the fresh produce for our customers. Moving now on to slide eight. We are also seeing how our exclusive range is resonating with customers, particularly in the current economic environment. In our Exclusive to Coles range, we have seen revenue growth two times that of proprietary and a similar level in our Exclusive Liquor Brand portfolio. Food volume growth and sales revenue growth has also been strong and outperforming proprietary brands. This has been delivered through our extensive range with more than 6,000 Exclusive to Coles and 1,900 ELB products.
In the half alone, we introduced more than 500 new Exclusive to Coles and almost 200 ELB products. These products are at all price points. At the top tier, for those customers that we see may not want to eat out at a restaurant but still want to treat themselves, we have our Coles Finest range, which saw revenue growth of 22% in the half. And while it is early days, we have seen a really positive customer response and volume growth in our Coles Simply range. Coles was also awarded the most awarded, I should say, supermarket for owned brand products at the prestigious 2024 Product of the Year Awards. With 19 awards across a range of categories, including fresh meat, bakery, pantry, and pet food, Coles was the most awarded retailer for the fourth year in a row. Moving now to slide nine.
Another area where we continue to invest is in our digital channels. We are seeing strong financial results with e-commerce revenue growth of 29.2% in supermarkets and a penetration of 9.1%, and in liquor, e-commerce revenue growth of 14.9%. We have enhanced the customer experience with improved shopping features, including the introduction of shoppable recipes and self-serve refunds for missing or damaged items. Importantly, we are seeing results with significant uplift in NPS across both home delivery and click and collect, with gains in key metrics including ease of shop and ease of checkout. Coles 360, our retail media business, continues to build momentum, with media income increasing by 29% in the half. Finally, on Flybuys, we have seen record engagement and participation as more customers seek value through reward programs and loyalty points.
The swipe rate increased by 7.8% on the prior corresponding period. Unique customers redeeming points more than doubled. We were pleased that Flybuys was awarded the Most Satisfied Customers Award by Canstar for reward programs as voted by Australian consumers. Moving now to slide 10. There's no doubt that the results across our digital platforms, as well as in store, were supported by improvements in availability. We have been very upfront in the past with availability challenges, and this remains a key area of focus for me. Our aim has been to restore availability to pre-COVID levels, and we're getting there. Availability metrics continue to improve with delivered in full and delivered in full on time, increasing to 96% and 92% of pre-COVID-19 levels, respectively.
Our new Simplify and Save to Invest program also delivered benefits of approximately AUD 90 million in the half and helped to offset the cost inflation that we're seeing in the business, particularly in wages and fuel costs. We've delivered a number of initiatives in the half. In stores, we are transforming the way we manage inventory across our network by removing non-value-added team member tasks while optimizing availability for our customers. In the meat department, store-specific ranging has enhanced in-store inventory processes while also reducing our secondary handling of the products as we get them to shop. In supply chain, we continue to optimize transport routes and have also seen benefits from our Faster Fresher Flows, which is focused on improving product flow through the DCs and into stores, ensuring maximum freshness for customers.
Finally, in e-commerce, artificial intelligence and technology automation continue to deliver call center savings and improved system functionality. Store mapping improved the pick efficiency. Moving now on to slide 11. Operational and process initiatives were implemented across all stores to address stock loss and waste and markdown, such as coaching and training to increase our team members' capability. We've also accelerated range optimization programs across high-risk SKUs and increased our collaboration with police through the Auror program to identify and apprehend repeat offenders. We have also made improvements to the flow of our products through DCs to get products on shelves sooner for our customers, improving shelf life and waste and markdown. As I said at the start of the presentation, we committed to roll out loss technology solutions to more than 250 stores by the end of December, and we did.
Skip Scan was in 305 stores and Smart Gate was in 267 stores at the end of December. The results from these stores have been positive. I also said that loss would be a headwind in the first half, and it has been. Total loss represented an approximately 50 basis point headwind in the first half compared to the prior corresponding period. I also said that loss would be a tailwind in the second half. Pleasingly, we saw an improved trajectory throughout the second quarter on our loss rate, with further improvements expected now in the second half, which we are already seeing. We are not there yet. We know that continuing to address stock loss is a significant opportunity for us. The signs are positive, and we're on the right path to continue to turn stock loss around. Turning now to page 12.
Before handing over to Charlie, I'd just like to briefly cover off a few slides on our strategy and the progress we've made over the last six months. You'll recognize the boxes on the right as my immediate focus areas from our FY 2023 results. I'll not cover off all the points here because I've discussed many of them through the presentation already. But it's right to say that I'm pleased with the progress we've made. But we know there's a lot more to do. Moving now to slide 13. In the important area of ESG, we also continue to make good progress in the key areas of focus, including emissions, packaging, the community, and diversity and inclusion. Some of the great work completed over the last half includes the partnership we entered into with Origin Energy to install solar panels on 100 supermarkets and liquor stores.
This is helping to reduce each participating store's electricity use from the grid by approximately 20% on average. We also expanded the use of our methane-reducing feed supplement Bovaer with three Coles Finest certified carbon neutral beef range suppliers, now including it into their feeding programs. In South Australia, we rolled out certified compostable bags in the fruit and veg section, removing 28 million traditional single-use plastic bags from production in one year. We were recognized by the 2023 Giving Large Report as the top corporate giver as a percentage of profit for the fourth year in a row. Coles was ranked fourth in the World Benchmarking Alliance's gender benchmark for the food and agricultural sector. 48 food and agricultural companies were assessed as part of this benchmark, with Coles ranking fourth behind the Hershey Company, Diageo, and Nestlé.
Finally, it is no secret that we are operating in a heightened regulatory environment with a number of regulatory reviews underway, including the Senate inquiry. I look forward to speaking further at this inquiry to demonstrate how Coles is delivering value to our customers. And with that, I will now hand over to Charlie, who'll take us through the financial results in more detail.
Great. Thank you, Leah. Good morning, everyone. If I turn to the group first half 2024 results on slide 15. Firstly, I'll talk to the results on a continuing operations basis. Sales revenue increased by 6.8% to AUD 22.2 billion. Underlying EBITDA increased by 4.1%. Underlying EBIT increased by 3.3%. As Leah mentioned earlier, earnings on an underlying basis adjust for major project implementation costs relating to our ADCs and CFCs only.
Underlying EBITDA and EBIT were supported by continuing sales momentum, improvements in gross margin, as well as the Simplify and Save to Invest benefits of approximately AUD 90 million, which helped offset cost inflation and headwind from loss. Reported net profit after tax declined by 3.6%. Basic earnings per share declined by 3.9% to AUD 0.445. On a continuing and discontinued operations basis, that is, including express segment, net profit after tax declined by 8.4% and basic earnings per share declined by 8.5% to AUD 0.442. The board has declared a fully franked interim dividend of AUD 0.36 per share, stable compared to the prior corresponding period. If I now move to the Supers and Liquor segment financials on slide 16. Starting with supermarkets, strong sales growth with sales increased by 4.9% underpinned by positive volume growth.
The strong sales growth and positive volumes were supported by improved availability, the success execution of key seasonal events, including Christmas, Halloween, and Father's Day, and a positive customer response to the Curtis Stone barbecue and continuity campaign. Investment and value continue to resonate with customers, with Exclusive to Coles sales growth of 7.6%. This included a 13.8% increase in packaged goods as customers increasingly focus on value for money. E-commerce sales were up by 29.2%, with penetration at 9.1% driven by strong performance and seasonal events, particularly Christmas and Black Friday, improvements in availability, enhancements to the customer experience, and continued network expansion. Underlying EBIT increased by 4.5%, with underlying gross margin increasing by 7 basis points as sales growth, range and promotional optimization initiatives, and Simplify and Save benefits offset loss and inflationary pressures.
CODB, as a percentage of sales, were broadly flat if you exclude implementation OpEx and D&A. In liquor, sales increased by 1.8% as customers sought value to manage their overall spend. Transactions continued to grow with modest growth in spend per basket while average units per basket were down. Delivering quality and value to customers through our exclusive liquor brand portfolio continued to be a key focus. E-commerce sales increased by 14.9%, with penetration at 6.4%, underpinned by continued strength in the on-demand channel. EBIT growth of 5% reflected favorable sales mix and improved operating leverage across the business. Turning now to operating cash flow on slide 17. Operating cash flow, excluding interest and tax, was approximately AUD 1.9 billion, with cash realization of 102%.
Within cash flows, net cash flow before financing activities of AUD 806 million decreased by AUD 209 million compared to the prior corresponding period, largely as a result of the timing of period and payments impacting operating cash flow, coupled with higher capital expenditure. Inventory and trade payable days stayed relatively stable compared to the prior corresponding period. Now I'll take you through CapEx on slide 18. Gross operating capital expenditure on an occurred basis was AUD 753 million, an increase of AUD 130 million compared to the prior corresponding period. Within supermarkets, capital expenditure increased largely to the investments in new stores and renewals, with five new supermarkets and 11 renewals completed during the half and further investment in our CFCs. Efficiency initiatives also contribute to the increase with our investments in the ADCs, as well as stock loss initiatives.
In liquor, capital expenditure was driven by new store openings and renewals, with 10 new liquor stores and 71 renewals completed, as well as investments in core IT systems. Coles continued to optimize its property portfolio and net property capital expenditure declining by AUD 2 million compared to the prior corresponding period, as higher property investments in the half offset higher property acquisitions and development, resulting in net property divestments of AUD 71 million. If we turn to the balance sheet on slide 19. As at 31 December, we reported negative working capital of AUD 1.6 billion, capital employed of approximately AUD 11.2 billion, and net assets of over AUD 3.5 billion. We maintain a balance sheet that's strong with investment grade metrics, which provides flexibility for future growth.
Working capital decreased by AUD 93 million compared to 25th June with higher inventory balances, largely driven by the seasonal build of inventory, more than offset by higher trade payables, also impacted by the seasonal build and new year trading activity falling at the end of the half period. Property, plant and equipment of AUD 5.3 billion increased by AUD 267 million compared to the 25th June, in line with our increase in capital expenditure. Cash and cash equivalents increased to AUD 1.1 billion and totaled out to AUD 1.7 billion, largely as a result of the issuance of AUD 600 million Australian dollar medium-term notes, comprising AUD 350 million of seven year notes and AUD 250 million 10-year notes. If we now turn to capital management on slide 20. We've extended our debt maturity profile and continue to maintain access to diversified funding sources. We do not have any debt maturing until FY 2026.
At the half year end, Coles' average maturity of drawn debt was 6.1 years, with undrawn facilities of AUD 2.4 billion. As I said earlier, the Coles board declared a fully franked interim dividend of AUD 0.36 per share with a payment date of the 27th of March. We retain our existing annual dividend payout ratio target of 80%-90% franked to the maximum extent possible. Finally, we've retained headroom within our rating agency credit metrics and a strong balance sheet to support growth initiatives with our current published credit ratings of BBB+ with S&P Global and Baa1 with Moody's. I'll now hand it back to Leah to take us through the concluding comments and outlook.
Thanks, Charlie. So I'm going to turn now to the outlook on slide 28. In the first eight weeks of the third quarter, supermarket sales revenue grew by 4.9%.
This was underpinned by volume growth from strong execution of our value campaigns and improvements in availability compared to last year. Pleasingly for customers, we're also seeing deflation in fresh produce and meat and continued moderation of inflation in packaged and dairy. Operational and process initiatives, together with our loss technology solutions, have started to deliver positive results this quarter, with our total loss rate now at an improved position compared to last year, this time last year. We expect to continue to see progressive improvements across the half. Underlying cost inflation, particularly wage inflation, remains, and we will continue to work to offset this through our Simplify and Save to Invest program. Now turning to Liquor. In the first eight weeks of the third quarter, Liquor sales revenue declined by 2.2% as reduced discretionary spending influenced shopping behaviours.
Our focus for the half will be on inspiring customers, ensuring we've got a strong value proposition, and leveraging our integrated food and liquor businesses to deliver long-term benefits to the group. I'm also excited that we have some key milestones for our major infrastructure projects coming up in the next 12 months. These projects, along with the investments that we've been making in our digital assets and our stores, will improve efficiency and help to create a differentiated service offering for our customers, which will establish the foundation for our long-term sustainable growth. And with that, I'll now hand back to the operator for some Q&A.
Thank you. If you wish to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. If you wish to cancel your request, please press star then two. If you're using a speakerphone, please pick up the handset to ask your question. The first question today comes from Ross Curran from Macquarie. Please go ahead.
Hi, team. Congratulations on a great result. I might just start with inflation. It seems that you're seeing a different outcome on inflation relative to your peers. Are you able to just help us to unpack what you're seeing there?
Obviously, I can't talk to anyone else's numbers. But we certainly would look at ours in comparison to what we're seeing with the ABS. So if I look at the ABS food and non-alcoholic, sorry. Food and non-alcoholic beverage number, it went down from 4.8% to 5 point, sorry, to 4.5%. So that was a 30 basis point decline in inflation in the ABS numbers we saw.
If I then compare that to our supermarkets inflation excluding tobacco, we moved from 3.1% to 2.7%, which is a 40 basis point decline. More or less in line with what we've seen on the ABS number. I'd probably point to that as that gives us some confidence that our number is sort of more or less in line with what we're seeing out there in the industry. In terms of what's going on within the inflation number, fresh produce is in deflation. Some of their key lines are capsicums, avocados, berries. We've got meat in deflation as well. Beef and lamb. We've made significant investments in both the beef and lamb categories as part of our value campaigns over the last six months. The areas where we're still seeing inflation, bakery, dairy, grocery, they're continuing to moderate.
So quarter one to quarter two, we are seeing declines in their inflation rate. But it is still elevated above the total. And then tobacco obviously moved back into higher single-digit inflation in Q2 with the excise.
Thanks. Can I just sneak one quick one in about your first eight weeks trading? You said you've gone to positive unit volume growth. Can you give us a little bit more color? Is that keeping pace with population growth at the moment?
So we were positive volume growth for H1 as well as for the first eight weeks. So it's just continuing the momentum that we've seen moving in. I mean, I think I'd say we're very pleased with the volume growth that we've seen over the last few weeks. We do think that that's driven by a few things. First of all, is the value campaigns.
I think the poster child in terms of the lines for that has been the lamb chops at AUD 16/kl , which we've just had an unbelievable customer reaction to just run out the door. That's the cheapest price we've had on that product now for four years. I think the other thing that is really helping the volume growth is availability. So if I rewind 12 months, we were having a conversation with you about chicken, eggs, water, soft drink at this time last year, and a lot of the challenges that we had in that space. We're in a materially better spot this year in terms of availability across the board versus where we were last year. And then I think the third contributor for me is that we are running a kids' collectible this year with the Pokémon program. It is Pokémon Day today.
So happy Pokémon Day, everyone. And last year, we did not run a kids' collectible, but our major competitors did. And so I think that's also impacting the result.
Thank you so much. And congratulations again.
Thank you. The next question comes from Tom Kierath from Barrenjoey. Please go ahead.
Morning, guys. Just got a couple of quick ones on loss. So you're saying total loss includes stock loss, waste, and markdowns, and that was 50 basis points. Can you maybe comment on what waste and markdown did within that 50 basis points? Was that a headwind or a tailwind? And then I've just got one on the exit rate as well. Thanks.
Yeah. Sure. No problem, Tom. So yeah, as we've talked about before, there's two components that make up the total loss: Waste and Markdown, which is our markdowns on products approaching expiry and then the stuff we have to put in the bin because it can't be sold. And then the Stock Loss, which is theft. So our Waste and Markdown was flat to the PCP. So you can read that that 50 basis points was all theft.
Was all theft. Yeah. Great. And then just on the exit rate of that, so you've made obviously good progress throughout the half. Can you maybe comment on what the exit rate is on a year-on-year basis just to give us some context of how much progress has been made throughout the half?
Yeah. So let me talk you through that in a little bit of a roundabout way. We saw the number increase on Stock Loss for the first couple of months of the half. Then from October onwards, we saw improvements in the rate. Then when we got to January, the line for last year and the line for this year crossed. So for January, we were in the position where the Stock Loss rate was better than January last year. We expect to continue to improve from that position.
Now, the differential between those two numbers of this year and last year is narrow at the moment. It's in a tailwind situation, but the tailwind is small. In terms of what we saw last year in H2, we shared at the time that that was a drag for total loss of about 70 to 80 basis points. What we would expect to see for H2 this year is to recover around half of that in terms of the tailwind. Does that help?
That's really helpful. Great. Thanks very much, Leah.
Thank you. The next question comes from Michael Simotas from Jefferies. Please go ahead.
Happy Pokémon Day to you, Leah, as well. Can I share a quick?
Michael, we had a joke at home about how many analysts on the call would actually be Pokémon fans. But you can all tell me later.
I won't say anymore. Can we talk a little bit more about your start to the third quarter? Because it really seems like you've opened up the gap to your major competitor there. You've given us some of the drivers. I'd just be interested in your view whether you think there's been any customer response to various media and political commentary in recent times that's benefited you.
We've spent a lot of time unpicking the numbers. And the three drivers that I identified, which are the value campaign, the better availability year-on-year, and the collectible program, and the fact that we're running one this year and cycling a position where we did not have one last year, they are by far and away the three major drivers here. Everything else is immaterial.
Okay. All right. Thank you. That's clear. And then the second one from me on the ADC and the Ocado costs. So they've come in a bit lower than what most expected in the first half, and you've pushed out some of the cost guidance. Can I just confirm that that OpEx excludes D&A? And you'd previously guided to about AUD 60 million D&A in 2024 combined across the two buckets. Has that changed in line with the delay into 2025, or should we still think about that as the number for this year?
Right. Thanks. Thanks, Michael. So let me just take you through the numbers. We guided at the beginning of the year that OpEx for the year would be about AUD 150 million excluding D&A, which you've identified as AUD 60 million across both programs. In relation to that spend so the Witron ADCs were about half of that AUD 150 million. Ocado was, again, half of that AUD 150 million. We did guide, though, that a third would be incurred in the first half and 2/3 incurred in the second half. And that is the timing we do expect. So we do expect 2/3 of that to be incurred in the second half.
You will note that we actually did lower, though, our expectation for the full year of about AUD 130 million-AUD 130 million. That AUD 20 million differential is purely just timing of some year-end payments. Just to, again, give you further guidance in relation to that AUD 20 million difference, it was 50/50 between Ocado and Witron. For your modelling purposes, I'd suggest you just add that to the first half of the fiscal 2025 number. You'll note that we gave you the FY 2025 numbers at the previous results. In relation to depreciation, back to your earlier questions, we do still guide to an AUD 60 million depreciation across both of those programs for the year, for 2024.
Thanks, Charlie. That's great.
Thank you. The next question comes from David Errington from Bank of America. Please go ahead.
Morning, Leah. Morning, Charlie. For the record, I'm not a Pokémon fan, but I am a fan of dollars, cents, and return on invested capital. So hopefully, it leads to those things. But anyway, following on from Tom Kierath's question on the loss, on the back of the envelope numbers and please, if you can, again, getting back to dollars and cents, it seems that you're at a run rate in that second half of an extra incremental, about AUD 180 million of extra loss in that second half.
You're doing an extra around about AUD 100 million extra in this half. And in the second half, you're basically saying if you get that back, you're probably going to get it back to an incremental AUD 80 million over and above what it was. So there should be a tailwind of a run rate of about AUD 100 million in the second half on second half.
Is that the sort of numbers? That's the first part of the question. Are they the sorts of numbers that we're looking at? And then going into FY 2025, what sort of level can we expect from these investments? I mean, you've had a bit of a look with this new technology. Can we get that back to where it was? Can it get back down to zero? Or do we just have to accept that it's going to be at a certain level higher than what it was before? So I've thrown a lot of numbers at you there. But if you could have a go at helping us because, jeez, we're talking big numbers here. I mean, we're talking 10% of your profit here in a half. That's a big number.
I agree with you, David. It's a big problem to go after and solve, which is why we have thrown so much focus at it over the last half. So the H2 number last year was we said it was about 70-80 basis points. So I think probably if you're working on the order of AUD 150 million or something like that, that's in the order of what we were talking about as drag that we had in the P&L. And you're right in saying that I'm saying the tailwind we should generate is about half that in H2 of this year. Does that answer that question? And then I might get Matt to talk to.
That's part of it, yeah. Yep.
And then I'll get Matt to talk to what we're doing in terms of the actions and whether we think it's sustainable and will we invest more and can we get it down to the pre-COVID number.
Yeah. Sure. Thanks, Leah. Morning, David. I think if you recall last time, I talked about three areas of focus. And the technology rollout was only one of them. Notwithstanding, delivering Skip Scan into 305 stores and those gates into 267 stores before Christmas is probably one of the largest and fastest end-to-end programs I've ever been involved in at Coles. And credit to the team for delivering that. That technology has delivered in line with our anticipated benefits. And importantly, it is an immediate structural change. So when that technology goes in, you get an immediate effect. And we also see an improvement in some of our customer service experience.
So the number of interventions has halved. So it's not just all about cost. There is an upside there too. The technology was not the only area. The second area we talked about was the end-to-end operational focus. And we've reviewed assortment, space, velocity of products. We've put more products through our faster, fresher, flows network. And we've had a particular focus in certain categories like health and beauty and meat where we've gone really deep and changed everything from the end-to-end supply chain through to stores to see those benefits. That will continue. So we will go beyond the tech rollout and keep refining that process and keep reviewing everything in the end-to-end operation. The third area that we talked to was then data and analytics.
So how do we make sure we've got a radar that can tell us for both internal and external issues where our bigger problems are? We direct our loss teams towards solving those. That's really how you should think about material, key, repeat offenders. While the majority of our customers and store team members do the right thing, we also have 120,000 team members and there's a radar across the operation too. You should think about the improvement as a curve. It takes time for these changes to then be executed and flow through to the results. But in no way are we stopping at the point where the technology rollout has been deployed. We will keep going. The aim is absolutely to get it back to those pre-COVID levels.
What timeframe, Matt?
Well, we don't think we're going to quite get there in H2. So there's going to be more work to do on this going into FY 2025. But we see it as a, it's a real opportunity, to your point, around big numbers that we can go after. We've got a strong plan around now.
Oh, that's encouraging that you think, I mean, I was thinking year 2026, 2027. But it's encouraging to hear that you might be thinking you can get to pre-COVID levels by around that maybe mid-2025. That's encouraging if that's what you're saying.
Let's say the end of FY 2025, David.
I think the point here, David, is it's a bit like the productivity program. The loss piece never goes away. It's always on. What we've done is we've put the real turbos on it to recover a position. And then we've got to make this part of how we operate and keep looking not just at loss but wasting more time on freshness and quality and other parts of our business.
You seem to be making good progress on Simplify and Save to Invest. That seems to be going quite well, AUD 90 million in the first half. I mean, that surprised me a little bit to the upside. I knew that you had another AUD 1 billion. But can you give us a bit of a sketch as to what you're actually doing there, Leah? I mean, there seems to be some interesting things. But is it requiring investment to get those wins, or is it just doing things better that you should have always been doing?
Great, David. It's Charlie. I'll take that question. And great, great question. So as you know, we've had a well-established productivity and efficiency program now for five years. I mean, if you recall the previous program, four years Smarter Selling, we did take AUD 1 billion of or we realised AUD 1 billion of productivity and efficiency savings. And again, as we announced the last results that we are targeting AUD 1 billion over the next four years.
So as you indicated, we actually did realise AUD 90 million of the benefits in this first half. 75% of them actually worked their way into CODB and 25% in the GP line. We do typically, in these sort of programs, expect a fairly even run rate over the four-year sort of program on a year-by-year basis. But it does vary at times between years, slightly over in some and slightly under in others.
Look, any investments that we do make in the Simplify and Save to Invest are actually captured in the capital envelope that we have guided. I think Leah really did mention some of the things that really impacted the first half in that regard, delivered some great savings, and things like transforming the way we manage our inventory, some of the programs around meat-specific ranging, optimizing some of our transport routes, and leading to better logistics costs, but also very much the use of things like artificial intelligence and tech automation to deliver benefits in our call centers and peak efficiencies in stores with respect to e-com. So it's really across the board and across a lot of our end-to-end processes.
Okay. Well, thank you, Leah. Thank you, Charlie. And thank you, Matt, for your answers. Very good.
Thanks, David.
Thank you. The next question comes from Craig Woolford from MST Marquee. Please go ahead.
Good morning, Leah. Certainly a good result overall and encouraging on the stock loss. Just on the gross margin performance excluding stock loss, it was, I guess, essentially a 60 basis point improvement. You've highlighted tobacco and Coles 360. Is there anything else that we should note as a driver of the gross margin outcome in the supermarket business?
So I might just cover it at a high level. So I think, obviously, you've identified we've got the stock loss in terms of a downward pressure. We also made investments in value in the half. And then the key offsets on that, obviously, is the tobacco, which is about 20 basis points. Then Coles 360, the benefits we see from Simplify and Save. And then we did do a little bit on the optimization of promo and range, which we shared with you at the Q1 result, which contributed to that as well. Charlie, did you want to add any more color on that, or is?
Yeah. I think just on the Simplify and Save to Invest, I think, as I sort of mentioned earlier, I think 25% of what we realized really worked their way into gross margin, predominantly in places like that meat-specific ranging and transport logistics optimization.
Right. So I mean, it's just hard to see. There must be some other countervailing factor given there was, obviously, an investment in value in the half. I think the Simplify and Save to Invest was about 11 basis points. Just seems hard to piece it all together given the underlying gross margin performance excluding the stock loss issue was quite an encouraging move higher.
Well, they're the major drivers we've called out. So they're the vast bulk of what we've seen in terms of movements in the line.
Thank you. And just on the operating cost performance, Simplify and Save has done a good job of outlining the transformation. It does look like underlying cost growth excluding those moving parts actually improved compared with the trend in the second half 2023. Are there other things that would fall outside the Simplify and Save program that would have led to a more modest cost growth run rate, mindful that wage rates have, obviously, been a headwind for all retailers?
Yeah. And just to reiterate, firstly, on the cost of doing business in terms of the underlying first half, that only excluded well, when we look at it on an underlying basis there, it only excludes, obviously, the project and implementation costs, not D&A.
All we tried to give you what we've said, though, if you want to look at it on a cash basis, it was broadly flat as a percentage of sales. So if you exclude the D&A uplift, it's broadly flat as a percentage of sales. The major movements and Leah called it out earlier in terms of what are we seeing in terms of cost pressures in the CODB, clearly inflation through wages. If you recall, we had a 6.25% inclusive of super Fair Work decision. We're navigating things like the payroll tax levy here in Victoria that was sort of introduced. This was sort of this approximated about 60% of the sort of increase in costs in the half.
We did see some growth, about 25% increase relates to growth through things like growth in new store investments, e-com channel mix, etc., and 15% in other investments like Coles 360 and tech and digital. But again, as you highlighted, this was largely and we had a real laser focus on costs through the half, including our Simplify and Save to Invest program. And 75% of that AUD 90 million worked its way into CODB.
Thanks, Charlie. Appreciate the clarification.
Thank you. The next question comes from Ben Gilbert from Jarden. Please go ahead.
Morning, team. Just the first question from me, just too, if I could. Just the first one on e-com. It was a great result. And I think sort of Ben, since you've sort of consolidated the sites, looks like it's getting some great traction. Just do you think you need Ocado now?
I know you've, obviously, well advanced and it's coming through. But you're seeing some of the global peers like Kroger deferring, and M&S. There's a bit of a fight with them at the moment over delivery and activity. Is the confidence that you're going to get a material uplift when you launch that still there? Because it seems like you're getting some really good momentum without it at the moment.
So I'll start on that one, Ben. And then I'll hand to Ben to build a bit. So I think from our perspective, the big benefits that we have coming with Ocado is, first of all, that we know from all the other CFCs that have opened around the world that there's a really significant step up in the customer satisfaction.
And that is driven by the really superior perfect order rates that you get out of the facility that are just really difficult to achieve in an in-store environment. And Ben can probably build on that a little bit more. I think the other piece for us, then, is from an operation so that's the customer piece. I think from an operational perspective, we're adding in the ability to service in the order of AUD 1.5 billion of sales out of there. And what we will be doing is taking those sales, primarily in the first instance, out of the home delivery stores in Melbourne and Sydney, which are our most congested stores. They're the most difficult stores to run. That gives a much better experience to the customer that's shopping in those stores because you don't have all the trolleys in the aisles doing the picking.
But it also then creates capacity for us to continue to build our click and collect and immediacy offers that we've got out of those stores and will continue to grow there. So it's a great outcome from a customer perspective. But it also builds our capacity and reduces congestion and affects the customer experience. Ben, you probably would have some builds on that, I imagine.
It's kind of hard to add any top spin to that, Leah. Oh, sorry. I hope I would just reinforce the point. It's customer experience, first and foremost. I mean, we did see some pretty good gains in. Yes. But this would be experience that would be differentiated. It's very hard to replicate the step jump that a customer would get in fill rate.
Again, the major pain point that we have in online grocery, just talking with friends kind of around the world, is I'm a customer. I order 45 items. I get 44. And the 45th, I either don't get or it's a poor substitute. And that's because you're picking from the store. But with a CFC, you drastically minimize that pain point for the customer. And one of the things we did for our customers today is to actually automate the ability for them to self-serve and say, "Hey, I'm missing an item." And we run an AI in the background to make sure the right customer gets the right credit and that sort of thing. But it's really going to be a step jump in customer experience centered around fill rate, expanded range, and also the ability and certainly in fresh items, like you think about mince meat days life.
Those things are going to be really meaningful, we think, in a differentiated way in this market. So I would say yes. We're very excited that CFCs are going to go live soon.
That's great. Thank you. And just take one from me. It's, obviously, it's a great trading update that you provided and appreciate the drivers. Just interested in one, do you think you're starting to see less leakage to some of the non-traditional channels such as sort of your Amazon warehouse, Petbarn, etc.? Do you think you've managed to claw some of that back? I noted you said that was weak last time. And secondly, how do you hold onto these customers? Because they're proving to be pretty promiscuous and people at the moment shopping all over the place. Have you got plans in place to really try and retain the customers?
Because it seems like you've obviously done a very good job getting them through these initiatives in January. I suppose that the key now is to holding onto them.
Yeah. I'll take that in two parts. On the non-food side, I mean, there's no doubt we're seeing a lot more competition in that space and some very assertive pricing and value delivery from the players that have entered into those spaces. I think I shared at the Q1 that we were seeing an impact on our non-food business from that. We did take some actions in Q2. We've taken further actions in Q3 to date to reset what our value proposition to the customer is in that space. We are seeing good levels of improvement of that coming back, which is pleasing. We will continue with that.
I think in terms of the question on how do you hold on, I talked a bit on the media call this morning. We've been doing a lot of survey work and customer focus groups. I think, interestingly, the big trend, I think, that has started to emerge in the last six months that I feel wasn't there as predominantly before that is customers willing to travel now to find low prices. So whereas for many, many years, we held very high that the convenience of the location really was king, I think what we're seeing now is that there's a growing cohort of customers that are willing to not only shop around but to travel distances to get value. Now, that really raises the stakes for us. We're very, very focused on how do we put together a really compelling end-to-end customer value proposition.
Now, that starts with great everyday prices. But the thousands of weekly specials that we run play a big part in it. The Down Down campaign that we ran in January and will continue to run going forward plays a part. But Flybuys is also an important aspect here. And we have really stepped up in the half what we've done on Flybuys. So we have been rolling out instant redemption of points at the POS. We have a large number of stores across the country where that's now in place. A few more to go. But really good progress on that. And that has been very well received by customers. Customers actually have large banks of Flybuys points. And so being able to convert those into dollars off your shop is a way to realize value really quickly for them.
And then we also have relaunched things like What's for Dinner and the Coles Savvy Dinner Plan with Taste and things like that, which are actually helping the customer to identify how to cook meals to a budget. And then in Ben's space, in the e-commerce space, things like in the app where we now have the filters that you can filter by unit price, for example, and the ability to build a shopping list so you know that it's going to fit within your budget. And then you can come into store and you shop that list and see where each item is in the aisle. And you know that it's going to add up to the number that you can afford when you get to the checkout. It's those types of tools that we know customers are increasingly looking to use.
As an executive leadership team, we actually did a shop a couple of weeks ago with customers. They rated us on how we did. Ben and Michael won, which the rest of us are never going to live down. But one of the things that we found out from doing that with the customers is just how many of them were actually building lists in the e-commerce environment before they went to the shop to manage to their budget in a very disciplined way. That's a very long-winded answer, Ben. But I think the answer really is we have to step it up. We're going to have to step it up again in terms of how we're communicating value, delivering value, and making it easier to find value across the store.
That's great, Matt. I really appreciate it. Fantastic.
Thank you. The next question comes from Adrian Lemme from Citi. Please go ahead.
Good morning, Leah, Charlie, and team. My first question was on the supermarket store renewals. I think there were only 11 in the first half. But I think you were planning 50 for the full year. So I just want to understand, was this perhaps impacted by the lost technology rollout, taking resources? And do you still expect to hit the 50 target, please?
Yeah. No. Thanks for the question. No. Look, it's purely just a timing of when those store renewals actually occur. We always do sort of gather momentum in the second half with respect to renewals. We're still targeting to do approximately 40 in the second half. In the same thing, liquor, we did 71 renewals in the first half. And we expect to do over 30 in the second half in that regard.
Thanks, Charlie. And if I could just ask a follow-up, just if you're able to talk to how recent store renewals are performing in terms of sales and profit uplifts, particularly, I guess, for the e-commerce stores that you've done. Thanks.
No. Well, look, we're really comfortable that when we actually make an investment in our store renewals, that they actually do perform, that they actually deliver good sales momentum. And it's one of the things that continues to encourage us in terms of improving that shopping experience for our customers. So we absolutely do see a sales uplift and hence our renewal program.
Okay. Thanks, Charlie.
Thank you. The next question comes from Shaun Cousins from UBS. Please go ahead.
Thanks. Good morning, Leah and Charlie. Maybe just a question regarding Witron. You've been very bullish around Redbank in terms of stockouts.
I think you indicated it was sort of half the level previously for the first 30 stores. Then there seem to be more cost savings that you've identified in store that weren't part of the business case. I mean, has Coles seen a continuation of the reduction in stockouts as more stores are being supplied by the Redbank facility? And is there upside risk to the qualitative return on capital comments you've made, which I think was a return on capital in excess of WACC plus a risk premium, please?
Shaun, it's Matt. I'll let Charlie answer the WACC risk premium part. But on Redbank, yes, we have been very pleased. We went live in our ADC in April. We're very focused upon a smooth ramp and delivering peak trade through Christmas. I was in that site the week before Christmas.
It did in excess of 3 million cartons that week. It's fair to say it was well within its capacity and capability. We are now working through across the site, the transport, and the stores what's the right settings to optimize our end-to-end cost to serve. I would say that at scale, that's reasonably early work. In the stores that we've trialed those settings at, the feedback is incredibly positive. We will continue to work through that with our partner, Witron, to optimize that facility. The outbound performance is really a function of the inbound fulfillment.
When we talk about further improvements in availability, really focusing upon restoring that inbound DIFOT back to the pre-COVID levels is the key to unlocking that ongoing performance in Queensland. There's a bit of work to do in that space. But at this stage, we are still very confident in Redbank's performance and its future potential.
Shaun, there's not much more I'll add to that. I think you're getting the impression you're getting the view from Matt, clearly, that we're really encouraged by where Redbank is at and its early performance. It's far too early to be talking about any sort of further guidance above what we gave you at the Witron site tour.
Okay. No. Thanks. Maybe a question for Michael just on liquor. Maybe just what's driving the weaker performance relative to Endeavour? And there were some comments around e-commerce in terms of the growth rate slowed in the second quarter 2023 as the business reviewed its promotional mix across channels. Is this referring to the 20% off on coles.com.au?
Because there were some sharp online promotions that you've been offering during calendar 2024, which we could never sorry, calendar 2023, which we could never really understand. But can you maybe talk a bit about what's gone wrong or what's driving the different performance relative to Endeavour? And then also maybe what that comment in your release means, please?
Yeah. Happy to do so, Shaun. And thanks for the question. So I might first just talk about the number that was in our outlook. And then I can get a bit more specific around what the comment means in relation to e-commerce. So firstly, the 2.2% sales decline that we mentioned in the trading update. Just as you'll note in the footnote on page 13 is that if we excluded for the change in timing of New Year's Eve, then third quarter to date, we would be at 1.5%.
Timing has a factor on that. I think then with the 1.5%, there's two key factors to speak to. One is bulk sales, as we've called out in the release. Then the other factor is, as you've quite rightly mentioned, the comment we made in relation to the promotional mix across our e-com channels. These choices that we've made, they're a drag on headline sales growth in the second quarter. And that has remained the case in the third quarter. This simply relates to a decision not to cycle some unprofitable sales from the prior year. Excluding those two factors, then our headline sales growth for the quarter to date was marginally positive. Hopefully, that gives you a sense of, from an underlying perspective, where are we at?
While that's causing a near-term headwind for us in terms of sales, we think it's the right thing to do in terms of balancing the sales and profit outcomes over the long term. Now, just on the second part of your question around e-commerce sales, so firstly, there's a number of different channels through which we transact in e-commerce. So firstly, we have our own channels, which is our own web banners in Coles Liquor across the various brands and also Coles Online, as you've mentioned. And then we also have partners, whether that be Uber, DoorDash, or whether it be sales where we attract sales through affiliate channels. The Coles Online component, while we've made some changes to our Coles Online offer throughout the latter part of the half, Coles Online's actually a fairly small part of what our e-commerce business is.
So the changes in promotional mix that we've been talking to are more relevant to our partnering platform. So what we're doing through affiliate sales and the depth and breadth of promotion that we're choosing to run and also across the on-demand platforms. So hopefully, that answers your question.
Fantastic. Thanks, Michael. Thanks, Matt. Thanks, Charlie.
Thank you. The next question comes from Lisa Deng from Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead.
Hi, Leah. Hi, Charlie. Question one would be on depreciation. We talked about AUD 60 million still attributable to the two ADC and CFC. Can we understand how much of that was realized in first half? And secondly, just on that same point, we previously guided for the full year at AUD 1.65 billion. Is that still holding? Thank you.
In relation to the AUD 60 million, I would go about AUD 15 million or so in the first approximately AUD 15 million in the sort of first half. You'll note, in relation to depreciation, we've kept our depreciation guidance. That's in the outlook. That remains at AUD 1.65 billion for the year. So we're not guiding any change to the depreciation. Sorry, the second part of that?
That was the second part.
That was the second part. Yeah.
Yeah. Great. Then a second question is more around our tech investment, ex these major projects. So last year, I think we worked out or we discussed about AUD 90 million in the CODB was in relation to sort of the digital investment. And then we had AUD 13 million of our 50% share of Flybuys.
This year, in terms of a lot more focus, especially on Coles 360 Flybuys, all of that, what should we expect in terms of digital investment and also the full-year sort of Flybuys contribution as well? Thanks.
Yeah. Lisa, look, we have never given any specific guidance of what we actually invest in terms of our tech and digital. I think you can see our tech you can see our efficiency and growth initiatives that we then find our CapEx. We call that out. But we don't actually split out what we invest in tech and digital. Directionally, would it be a higher investment year or a lower investment year? Lisa, we continue to invest in tech and digital. I'm not going to call out what those dollars are or directionally.
Okay. Thank you.
Thanks, Lisa.
Thank you. The next question comes from Bryan Raymond from JP Morgan. Please go ahead.
Good morning. Congrats on a strong result, particularly on costs and in the trading update. Question just maybe a bit taking a step back. Just feedback we're getting and surveys we're seeing externally is sort of pointing to price perception amongst customers for both Woolworths and Coles coming down over the past sort of three to six months. Obviously, there's a lot of talk around the industry. Do you think you need to address this through targeted investment in price? I know you are doing that already. But a step up in that run rate of investment to address this perception issue? Some of it's obviously unwarranted. But it is something that's getting into the public mindset. And just trying to think about ways to get on top of this issue, partnering with suppliers or other opportunities you could have to do it.
But is that something you're thinking about and taking action on? Or do you think that the lower headline inflation that you're seeing at the moment will eventually flow through to this being less of an issue over the next 12 months? Thanks.
Yeah. Thanks for the question, Bryan. I might also take a bit of a macro view on it, if it's okay, which is we are spending a lot of time surveying customers, talking with customers, doing focus groups. We've just completed our January cost of living survey, which we've done on a pretty regular basis now for 18 months. So what we're seeing out of that is that two-thirds of customers are worried about their ability to cover their household needs. Now, that's higher than what it was 18 months ago. But it's flat to where we were in the survey in August 2023.
So it seems to have sort of stabilized in terms of customers that are feeling that sort of level of pressure. What's been interesting in the latest survey is the number one issue now is mortgage costs. And so a number of the other drivers of cost of living pressure, like mortgages and rents and energy and fuel and the like, insurance, they are becoming now more prominent in terms of what customers are calling out, say, where we were six months ago versus what they're saying about grocery. And I do think that some of that is the impact that we're seeing as inflation comes off. We've got fresh produce and meat, obviously, in deflation. And we've seen the moderation in the package space. And if you think about it, supermarkets, ex-tobacco for us, our inflation in Q2 was 2.7%.
That's starting to get back to a level that's sort of sitting in that target inflation range. Now, I think all of that aside, customers are reminded about the price of groceries two or three times a week when they go and do the shop. And so we are acutely aware of that. We are acutely aware that there is a real opportunity here to make sure that we are making investments into value that really impact their basket and to communicate that to them in a thoughtful way that really helps them to find that value and access it. I don't think the focus on that is going away anytime soon. I think that is going to continue to be just an absolute top priority for us to do over the next 12 months.
Your point around the external environment, I mean, what's been pleasing over the last six months is when we look at our customer scores for in-store, we've called out in the release the customer scores for online, which have improved. But we have seen improvements in the customer store scores as well, which have been driven by things like availability and service and quality. And actually, price has been relatively stable in that. It's down year- on- year. But it's relatively stable in terms of what we've seen over the half. It's pleasing that we are actually seeing improvements in how the customer is viewing that overall end-to-end experience they're having with us, both online and in-store.
But there is no doubt that the external environment is impacting what I would describe as sort of the brand customer view, that sort of more strategic NPS that we would look at.
I mean, just to follow up on that, I mean, following from Craig's question earlier around the 60 basis points for underlying gross margin expansion, I mean, it is hard to sort of reconcile that without product margins having improved for you guys year-over-year. It's sort of a similar question to what I put to your competitor last week. Are you getting the balance right around reinvestment? Clearly, your sales are doing a lot better than Woolworths at the moment. So you're ahead on that front.
But just wanting to understand, is there more investment required or reinvestment of some of the gains you're seeing through Coles 360 and other things that you're doing on the cost front through your cost-out programming, etc., in order to really be to really engage customers and be the winner over a more sustained period than what we've seen in the last few months?
Well, on the GP piece, I mean, what I would say is, as we shared with you at the Q1 update, we did really push hard on where could we find ways to help us to offset the downside on stock costs in the GP line. And so we did push really hard on what could 360 deliver to that equation. We pushed hard in what logistics we're able to deliver to that equation.
We also did work in terms of things like really looking hard at the promotions that we were running and optimizing that to take out ones that were not effective for customers and were not where we needed them to be from a GP perspective as well. Then we've also done some range optimization across the half. There are a number of factors that went into the GP line in terms of that optimization work that we did. As I said before, value is our top priority from a customer perspective at the moment. We are absolutely focused on it. We feel like the result that we've got for January so far has been indicating that particularly the summer value campaign has really resonated with customers. You can expect to see more of that promise.
Okay. Great. Thank you for that. Just one final one is just on the interest costs, or finance costs, you did say that they're likely to step up for a number of factors. Is it possible to get sort of a quantum or some sort of guidance around the interest costs just so that's not an uncertainty in the outlook, if possible?
Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah. Let me take that one. So if we look at interest on a continuum basis, interest costs did step up by about AUD 26.5 million. We are actually expecting a similar increase in the second half. But let me just take you through those increases. So in the first half, it really did relate to increased interest on lease liabilities associated with growth, things like new leases and lease renewals. But also, we did have higher borrowings in terms of higher drawn debt on our revolving facilities.
So if you look at the interest, roughly 50% of that increase is, if you like, rate-driven. And about 50% of it is actually driven by higher average borrowings. In terms of the second half, as I said, we do expect a similar increase, so around that sort of mid-20 number, driven by an increase in the average net debt over the half and borrowing costs associated with the ADCs that were previously capitalized. So again, about a 50/50 split between rate and borrowings.
Very helpful. Thanks, Charlie. Thanks, guys.
Thank you. The next question comes from Phil Kimber from E&P Capital. Please go ahead.
Hi, guys. Actually, it was just a clarification question, firstly, on the D&A. I think, based on your guidance, it stepped up, say, AUD 40 million in the first half. And based on your guidance, it'll step up about AUD 80 million in the second. Can I assume that most of that is going to be in relation to the supermarket business? I assume it is. But I just want to double-check.
Yeah. Absolutely. So that step up, as you alluded to, is AUD 40 million in the first half. We've obviously given you a full-year guidance in terms of our expectations at AUD 1.65 billion for the year. And clearly, the vast majority of that increase is in the supermarket side.
Great. And then just a follow-up on Liquor. Michael said something there that the majority of your online sales actually don't come for e-commerce in Liquor don't come from the Coles site. They actually come from partner sites. And I was surprised by that. And maybe I misheard. But I just wanted to clarify that.
No, sorry. Phil, Michael here. Happy to clarify that. And thanks for giving me the opportunity to do so.
So on our own platforms, there is colesonline.com.au, so the supermarket site through which we sell liquor. And then there is the online websites for the various liquor banners. The point that I made in relation to Shaun's comment was that colesonline.com.au is a relatively small percentage of our total e-commerce sales. The reason why I made that comment specifically was because some of the promotions that Shaun was referring to are ones that we have historically run through the coles.com.au site.
But the Vintage Cellars and the Liquorland and the First Choice sites, they are our sites, Phil?
Yeah. And they're the big majority of e-commerce sales, I assume.
Yeah. That's right.
Yeah. Yeah. Sorry. When I heard it, I thought it didn't sound right. But that's why I wanted to clarify. Excellent. Thank you.
Thank you. At this time, we're showing no further questions. I'll hand the conference back to Leah for any closing remarks.
Well, thank you very much for your time this morning. If I can just reiterate the key points for me. So we think we've had a really solid H1 result across both Supermarkets and Liquor. And in CFCs, we believe that our value proposition is really resonating with our customers. This is converting to volume growth for us. Loss continues to be a real focus and has been improving throughout Q2. From January, we're now in a position where the loss rate is better than last year. We expect that to improve progressively now throughout H2. We have our Simplify and Save program in place to drive productivity and efficiency and help offset the cost inflation that we're seeing coming through into the business.
We've got a good start in Supermarkets for Q3 and a more challenging start for Liquor. We've continued to have good progress on the ADCs and CFCs and our strategic focus areas. With that, we look forward to talking with many of you over the course of the week. Thank you very much.
Thank you. That does conclude our conference for today. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.