Welcome to this Matas Group annual report for 2025, 2026. Today's call is being recorded. If you have any objections, please disconnect at this time. All participants will be in a listen-only mode during the presentation. Afterwards there will be a question-and-answer session. To ask a question, please press five star on your telephone keypad. I will now hand the call to your speakers, Group CEO Mette Uglebjerg, and Group CFO Per Johannesen Madsen. Mette, you may now begin.
Thank you very much. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us today. I'm Mette Uglebjerg, and this is my Q1 and my first presentation for the full- year as CEO for Matas Group. I joined the group in mid-April, and over the last month, I spent focused on getting closer to the business, and it been very intense but also very inspiring first four weeks. I'm generally impressed by the strength of the business but also the opportunities that lies ahead of us.
Today, I'll start by sharing some of my early observation and some key priorities. Per will set the scene with or I'll set the scene with some of our highlights, and Per will walk us through some of our financial performance and the outlook for next year before we open up for questions. A bit of context on my experience I bring into the group on how that has shaped my first month here. I've more than 30 years of international retail experience across market, formats, and function, including leading Circle K Danmark, but also had international role within operation and commercial and also been part of Alimentation Couche-Tard's executive team. A large part of my experience has been about acquisition.
It's been about integration, but also realizing synergies across markets. One thing that has taught me is that realizing those synergies is not only about processes and structure, it is as much about culture, clear priorities, and identifying that value and understand how we create that value across markets and at the same time staying relevant and super close to the customer and understand the competitive dynamic. What connect those roles and, if I look across that, has been really much about a growth journey, focusing on the integration but also on operational execution and how to turn that into a very clear strategy, concrete performance that results obviously in concrete performance across markets. I think that the experience feels highly relevant here in Matas Group.
We have very strong brands, we have strong position, we have a clear strategy. The task now is to ensure a sharp prioritization and make sure we execute with speed and pace and a very disciplined follow-through. You say that retail is detail, that's very much true, it's about identifying those details that will really move the needles for the customers but also for us commercially. It's about finding that balance between taking out synergies but also staying very relevant to the local markets, that's obviously the mindset I bring with me here in Matas Group. During my first month, I have focused on building a very strong and solid understanding of the business across our markets.
I visit colleagues, I visit stores, competitors, logistics centers, been around Denmark, Norway, Sweden, and Finland, and I spend a lot of time listening, and I spend a lot of time understanding the business across the functions and stores and markets. After one month in the role, I have three observation I would love to share with you. First and foremost, we have a very strong foundation. We have strong brands, leading market positions, we have a broad omnichannel platform, we have loyal customers and very highly capable colleagues across the group. Just to give you a couple of examples, some of the things I've seen that I'm really impressed with is our digital capabilities, loyalty, omnichannel, and how we execute that, but also our supply chain.
That's just a couple of example. There's many of them. We have a lot to build on, and I'm generally impressed with the engagement and capabilities I've seen in the organization. Secondly, the strategy remains unchanged. Win the Nordics is the right strategy for the group, and I see significant potential for us, and we have a lot to build on. My focus is therefore not to change direction. My focus is to accelerate our initiatives and bring that to the market. We already benefit from a lot of synergies, but I also see opportunity over time to unlock even more values as we get closer to each other and work across the different markets and functions, et cetera.
My third observation is that we have an opportunity to further increase the pace of execution as we see our customers or consumers in general, the behavior evolves. We see a change, and particularly in the key markets, where market conditions have changed rapidly. And when I talk about that, we see the biggest change in Sweden. That requires us to move faster. It require us to prioritize even sharper than we do today, and stay very close to the local markets and the local competition and obviously the consumers. To summarize my first month, a very strong foundation. We have a clear strategy and many opportunities. We have a lot to build on.
My focus is now to increase pace of our strategy with the strategic initiative and to strengthen our relevance across our Nordic markets. Let's move on, and turning into the highlights for 2025 and 2026. The group deliver a revenue growth of 4.7% or corresponding to 3.5% currency neutral, which is in line with our guidance for the year. We deliver the highest revenue in the group's history, reaching DKK 8.8 billion, and we also saw a significant improvement in free cash flow compared to last year. In Matas, we continue the very strong development and grew 5.8%, including our subsidiaries, and we see that growth across channels.
We see that across categories, and very importantly, we see that the customers, we have a high engagement scores from our customer, which is super important. KICKS operated in a significant and more challenging market conditions or market environment, and we deliver currency neutral growth for the year. That's very much reflecting the lower consumer confidence and how the change in customer behavior has and a more intense competition in our market, and that is in particular in Sweden. At the same time, we continue to strengthen our business. Operational EBITDA before special items reached DKK 1.23 billion, and we ended the year with an EBITDA margin of 14.1% or 14.4% adjusted for currency effects.
One very solid and a strong aspect of the year is the significant improvement of the cash flow, where we turn around from DKK -2 million to DKK +545 million. If we look ahead, we continue to see growth in 2026 and 2027, but we also remain mindful of the environment we are operating in and the more fierce competition that we are facing. With that, I'll hand it over to you, Per.
Thank you.
To walk us through, the financial results, in more details.
Okay. Thank you, Mette, and welcome.
Thanks a lot.
I will take you through the details of our financial performance. Just looking at Q4, I will also touch upon the full year. Q4, a growth on 4% currency neutral with a 11.4% EBITDA margin, basically in line, close with last year's profit margin. Beneath that is really a little bit of key elements I wanna highlight. Sweden growing 5.9% adjusted for Skincity and Matas, including the subsidiaries, slightly lower, but still at 3.6% growth. Some of the key elements here is really looking at our online business, which grew 13.8%, so almost 14% growth in our online business, which I think is from an overall competitive environment perspective a strong growth continuing on our online business. Turning to the full- year and as Mette just alluded to, 3.5% growth, currency neutral, with a EBITDA margin of 14.1. I'll come back to some more details on that.
On guidance, I just want to highlight here that we posted the guidance for the next year being a revenue growth of 2%-6%. You need to look at this in reflecting the current uncertainty we have in the macroeconomic outlook and all the uncertainties that we are facing right now. Getting rid of those, of course, would be very nice for all of us, but this is the situation, this is the conditions we are in right now. EBITDA margin between 14% and 14.5%, CapEx slightly higher, but I will come back to some more details on that as we move forward. From a capital distribution perspective, we are looking at an unchanged policy with at least 40% of our net adjusted profit.
We will be proposing a DKK 2 dividend per share and continuing our share buyback with up to DKK 100 million next year. That of course is all subject to our general meeting approval. Let me take into some more details in terms of our strategy and some of the key elements of us progressing on our strategy, delivering the strategy as planned for this year. Basically, you know, more for you, closer to you and stronger for you. The more for you, it's really about providing more brands to our consumers, and we continue that throughout the years, both in Matas and in KICKS.
What we're looking at now is actually accelerating that and as Mette just alluded to, how do we increase our pace in terms of doing that, both from a pricing, marketing and assortment perspective? In terms of our in-house brands, which has really been a success this year, Nilens Jord has been launched in KICKS markets with good success. Yeah, as you remember, we also launched [inaudible] last year. We are continuing to expand our footprint on our in-house brands. We actually grew our in-house brands 8% this year, and as you'll see, KICKS almost grew 16% our in-house brands. A very strong launch this year.
Do remember that we launched Nilens Jord in October or September, so still a full year impact to see in the coming years. In terms of closer to you, again, the focus we have on our membership club and our growth on our online business as we move forward. Again, consumer engagement is very high and satisfaction. In terms of stores, net, as you can see, three more stores this year, mainly driven by KICKS opening six more stores. Last but not least, the strong go for you, this is the second year of having two logistics centers and they are operating very efficiently.
We continuously see getting improvements and a even faster response to our consumers in terms of deliveries, which is very encouraging as we move forward and also with the pace we have on our e-com business. In the beginning of the year, we launched a plan to realize synergies for the coming year of DKK 50 million, those are fully phased into our plans for the coming year. Again, on plan, in terms of the key activities from improving our platform to grow from. Here's just some highlights. I think, you know, again, in Q4, we talked about we wanted to accelerate. In Q4, we accelerated.
We launched more brands compared to previously, and thereby, you know, looking at the full- year, actually, we launched 143 brands in Matas, and we launched 67 brands in KICKS. When we talked about acceleration, Matas have been on the journey of assortment expanding for a longer period of time, and of course, have more pace in that. This is some of the things we need to look at as we move forward. I think very successful launches, and I just brought a few of them because this really also demonstrates the power we have as a Nordic beauty business, a beauty company.
We have the size, and thereby we are able to basically attract brands like, you know, Charlotte Tilbury, KIKO Milano. Just on Too Faced, that's actually a, forgot the name. Sephora brand, which is now launched in our business. I think that just demonstrates the strength that we have across the Nordic. Last but not least, the success of Nilens Jord . In terms of our app, you know, we continuously use the Matas app, this year we just launched the KICKS app, that is off for a very good start. That of course, also plays into the fact that we have a very good club member base with 6 million members, which we continue to talk with on a regular basis.
This is all combined with stores, e-com, our app, our club, in both KICKS and Matas, gives us a very high member satisfaction. We continuously see improvement in that as well. Just closing off with our two logistic centers before I move into some more details on the financials. Now been in operation for two years, and I think a lot of you was expecting us or expecting the launch of the Matas Logistics Center after we did the KICKS logistic center one year before. What we're really looking into a very strong performance since opening of the Matas Logistics Center. We're actually looking at cost roughly at 50% compared to the manual operation, which is very strong numbers as we move in and as we continue to grow our e-com business.
Let me just turn to Q4. Q4, 4% growth, and as you'll see on the gross margin, decline on gross margin, which is basically, you know, a couple of factors coming into play. In KICKS, we had a bigger campaign this year on fragrance, which we had in April last year, which of course impacts our gross margin. Then also we were in the market with our campaigns, activities, and as I said, after Q3, a little bit of acceleration also in terms of how we do campaigns in the market, and that was also reflected in the growth you saw in the KICKS market with 5%, 5.9% growth.
In terms of cost, I think this is a continuation of what you've seen most of the year, a strong cost control as we move forward, both in terms of our other external costs, but also in terms of our staff costs. A little bit of timing in the staff costs as we also this year, and I'll come back to some more details, but this year we said goodbye to our previous CEO, and of course, that gives us a little bit of tailwind, so to say. Last but not least, you know, closing the EBITDA for the quarter with a growth of 5%, although a slightly lower EBITDA margin. Just moving into the full year results, we'll look at that. From a banner perspective, as Mette already mentioned, we're looking at Matas growing almost 5%, our other subsidiaries growing 13, and that includes wholesale.
KICKS basically flat compared to last year. If we exclude Skincity, and I think that's probably the right number we need to look at, we see a growth of 2.3%. Going into the different channels, as I already alluded to, a strong growth on online, 11% excluding Skincity. This is the last quarter we will ever talk about Skincity. That will be nice. A small growth in our stores. When we look at the like-for-like growth, really we see a growth in Matas of 1.2%, and KICKS basically in line with last year, a decline of 0.1%. Moving into the gross margin on the different banners, I think you'll find that in our reports as well. A year where we invested also from a growth perspective, we invested part of our growth margin, a 1% decline basically in both markets.
A little bit more in KICKS, where the competition has been even more fierce, but where we also see an impact of the currency effects, as we talked about earlier, as we bought all the products in Swedish krona and we sell in Norwegian, and Norwegian krona has not been as strong last year. A little different today, but last year that was the outcome. That basically combines when we look at from a Group perspective on a currency neutral basis, you know, we're looking at a slight growth in our gross profit, and we're looking at a margin with 1% decline compared to last year.
Turning to cost, and this was what I was talking about earlier, really looking at our cost with a cost discipline this year, where we look at our all external cost growing slightly. You need to take into account that is, of course, part of our online business growing. You know, when our online business is growing, our all external cost is growing with freight and all the packaging material and all the other costs coming from basically delivering the e-com revenues. When we look at our salary cost, you'll basically see a decline compared to last year, and that has to do with both a very strong management of our cost in the stores.
Our salary percentage, managing the cost of operating the stores, as well as when we look at that was the one-off I talked about when our CEO left, there is some reversal of some of the long-term incentives that he was entitled to have, which is basically reversed in our salary cost. Which brings me to a summary for the full- year before I'll move into some of the more capital elements. That is an EBITDA of growing 1%, and at an EBITDA margin if I adjust for the currency impact on the cost of goods in our KICKS business of roughly in line with last year at 14.4 compared to 14.5 last year.
This has been a year really delivering growth on our e-com business with a like-for-like, you know, small growth in our stores, but predominantly driven by e-com, which is also reflecting the competitiveness in our markets. A gross margin decline, as I just alluded to, impacted by product mix, also the FX impact, as I talked about, and all the decisions we make in terms of how do we activate the markets, how do we go against our competitors, and the initiative campaigns we're running in the market. Cost, strong cost control, and a building up to release some of the synergies we talked about, which we'll come into next year.
It also includes investments in the market from a marketing perspective as competition has been more fierce this year compared to previously. That just summarizes the full year for 2025, 2026. Let me just move into some balance sheet items and some cash flows. We present this every quarter in terms of our revenue, or sorry, our inventories. As you'll see on the left side, this is the inventory percentage compared to the last 12 months of sales, and this is just for Matas.
The reason why we bring this just to show, you know, we had the build up with MLC starting, but you'll also see we closed this year below last year and even below the previous year as a percentage. Having said that, our total inventory has increased this year, and we are still looking at how we will, as we move forward, optimize that as we have, you know, even more knowledge with our two logistic centers. That brings me to the cash flow and some of the key elements in the cash flow. As you'll see, you know, we generated roughly DKK 1.3 from the operation. We had a working capital and tax which took almost DKK 300 million.
Part of the working capital is linked into our inventories, but overall, slightly more tied up in working capital end of this year, compared to previously. This is somewhat linked to the acceleration I talked about after Q3, where we accelerated certain thing and we also added more inventory, so we pushed the agenda of further assortment expansion. We had our CapEx generating a free cash flow of DKK 600 million.
We had our special items and we had the closure of the Miild acquisition, which is now finally paid, which generated the cash flow of almost DKK 550 million. When we look at the CapEx and some of the guidance we also have, really looking at the CapEx for the coming year to be a front-loaded CapEx but a totality for the two coming years in line with our guidance. I'll come back to that in more details. In terms of gearing, we're closing the year at 3.3, slightly higher than where we would like to be.
Part of that has linked of course to the overall performance of the year, where we ended up with slightly lower income as compared to our expectations. Again, all linked to the element I talked about before and also thinking about the acceleration we did, which tied up some more working capital. Those two things combined actually means that we close the year at 3.3. Looking at that going forward and also looking at our investment levels and some of the proposed capital distribution, if we just start with what we're looking at from a guidance perspective to next year, 2%-6% growth on a currency neutral basis.
It's slightly higher if we take the current exchange rates, but it's roughly in the same area. We're looking at an EBITDA of 14%-14.5%. Also here being a little cautious with the competitive situation we're looking into for the coming year. Last but not least, we're looking at investment with a front-loading of our electronic shelf labeling. What does that really mean? It basically means that when we look at our guidance where we say 3%-4% or capital allocation, 3%-4% CapEx investments, we're basically front-loading that to make sure that we get electronic shelf labels across all our markets during the coming period to make sure that we become even more efficient in our stores.
Also from a competitive perspective, we'll be even more agile in the way that we can run campaigns and activate activities in the stores and online. With that, moving into the capital allocation. As we have completed the big investments in our logistics centers, we're also looking at generating a significant cash flow next year when we then take the guidance which I just showed you, investing in CapEx. We have a free cash flow, we need to get our gearing between two to three. Looking at that in the coming year, that's where we feel comfortable with proposing a dividend of DKK 2 per share and a continuation of the share buyback with up to DKK 100 million for the coming year.
A total of roughly DKK 177, which is 56%, slightly above our capital allocation that we presented. Just in terms of gearing, proposing a continuation of our share buyback, you know, this year we generated DKK 545 million in free cash flow. You know, with the plans we have for the coming years, with the focus on our inventories and our working capital, we feel comfortable still proposing this and closing the year within our gearing guidance of two to three. With that, I would hand over for Q&A.
Thank you. To ask a question, please press five star on your telephone keypad. To withdraw your question, please press five star again. There will be a brief pause while questions are being registered. Our first question comes from the line of Amina Ashraf from Danske Bank. Please go ahead. Your line will now be unmuted.
Yes. Good morning and good attempt in pronouncing my name, better than I expected actually. My first question is with regards to the strategy of 2027, 2028. I could see that you have maintained the strategy, and this is of sales higher than DKK 10 billion and EBITDA margin of 15%-16%. My question is actually with regards to the underlying assumptions of this strategy, and it was of group sales CAGR of higher than 6% and market growth CAGR of 3.6% in the strategy period.
If I take the sales reported until this year, you have a CAGR of 5.8%, which is below the underlying assumption of higher than 6%. My question is, the signal of maintaining the timing of the, of the strategy, does this mean that the market is growing higher than what you initially expected, or do you expect acceleration in the group sales from now until 2027, 2028?
Thanks for your question, Amina. First and foremost, the strategy remains unchanged. The ambition is the same. We believe that the strategic initiatives, we need to launch them with greater pace. That is what we are doing, and to ramp up to make sure that we deliver on the plan. We are also delivering and operating in uncertain environment, but that's the case. It happens quickly, but it can goes off quickly as well. Our focus is to accelerate our strategy and deliver on the plan. I don't know if you wanna add a couple of-
Mette, is it?
Go on, Amina.
Yeah, I was just about to say, is it then correctly understood that you are slightly behind the schedule right now?
Uh-
At least to the group sales CAGR.
Yeah, if you look at the numbers, Amina, and you draw the line, yes, that means that we would be behind.
Yeah.
I think the guidance we're giving for the coming year is also a reflection of the uncertainty we see in the market. We do not have a clear view of what's going to happen next year. I think what we would focus on is as Mette was saying is really to increase the pace, focus on accelerating the plans, the strategy, but stay on the same strategy.
Yeah. What about the market growth? Is it as expected or is it lower?
I think if we look at some of the, you know, different analyst posing views on the market growth, there is a little uncertainty where we're going, what we're looking into. If you combine one with the other, you see different numbers. That's also reflected in our guidance. I think our guidance 2%-6% really reflects the uncertainty also from a market growth perspective, where we will again, we'll focus on our plans, we'll focus what we can do.
Yeah.
To win in the market.
Understood. My other question is regards to Sweden. Mette, you commented that the biggest change you've seen in the market is actually in the Swedish market. I understand competition is intense, it's a fragmented market, and now you're responding with higher CapEx and electronic shelf labels, which would allow you to be more agile. I think what I'm trying to understand is how long do you expect that intense competition? Is that a permanent change in the Swedish market? Do you expect that to end soon, and are you interested in inorganic growth?
There was a lot of question here. Thank you, Amina. Let me try to answer those questions in order. Otherwise, you need to revert if I'm not answering correctly here. First and foremost, we experience a fierce competition on the Swedish market. We see that from different players. We see that from online players. We see that from physical stores. That in combination with a more softer consumer confidence and changing consumer behavior, that of course, those two in combination is giving us a little bit more fierce marketplace, and that's what we are experiencing. How long that's gonna last, we don't know.
We don't know anything about the geopolitical situation, but we just know that the customer has changed their behavior, and we need to make sure that we adapt. We are in 75% of our assortment is in high-end beauty. We're still gonna be in high-end beauty, but we need to broaden out our assortment and be relevant, more relevant in even more situations. I think that answer at least some of your question. I don't know if there's any open others. Just fill in here, Amina.
I think I would just like to understand the growth strategy. Are you focused at all at inorganic growth, particularly in Sweden?
In general, we are part of our strategy. We talked about the investment we had in electronic shelf label. We are also having investment in our stores, building more stores, expanding stores, and that is part of our plan also for next year in our Nordic Markets.
All right. If I can ask about the CapEx at 4.5%, Per, you have already said that the guidance, the long-term guidance is still between 3%-4%, this is just merely front loading of the electronic shelf labels, for example.
Yeah.
Is that only this investment or is there other investment in cost saving initiatives and if there is an example for these initiatives?
I think, you know, we continue to invest in our digital platforms and the strengths that we have in the online business. I also think, you know, looking at this year and the strength in what we have delivered from a growth perspective online, is a good result of the year, and that of course requires certain investment to, for us to continue to do that. When we then look at the coming year and the investments, that covers these things. It covers the basic maintenance.
We don't have any major investments in our warehouse facilities, but of course, there will be certain investment as business continues to grow. We need to add a few robots in our Logistics Center in Lynge, investing or just to make sure that we can cope with the volume. I think the biggest change is really when we look at the electronic shelf labeling and looking at our normal guidance between two to four if you combine this year. The following year, you would be within that guidance. You know, we made a decision really to front load that because that will enable us to drive a different campaign, a different pricing structure to our consumers and thereby be even better in the competitive space that we're actually operating within.
It also gives a more efficient operation.
More efficient operation, yes.
Yeah.
Okay. My very last question for now would be with regards to a brand you mentioned called Too Faced. Am I confused to understand this is actually owned by Estée Lauder, not by Sephora?
I think it's owned by Sephora.
It is owned by Sephora, not by Estée Lauder?
Yeah. I think so.
We can take it.
We can take that afterward, Amina. I think it's just we have a couple of brands now from Sephora, from their private labels or their own in-house brands that we have now, but we're basically aligned with them that we will, you know, sell those in our markets as we have the strongest position in the Nordics.
If I can just add here, this is.
Okay.
I mean, if I can just add here, I think this is a very good example of how we use our Nordic scale, and we are able to attract much more new products, new products we were never, we didn't have the opportunity to attract early on. I think this is a really good example of that, where we can be even more innovative and more relevant for our customers.
Thank you so much for answering my questions.
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Mads Quistgaard from DNB Carnegie. Please go ahead.
Yeah, thank you, and welcome to you, Mette, and congrats on delivering your first fiscal quarter. I look forward to meeting you in person. I also have a few questions. Maybe just to start here. It seems that you prioritize growth over margins in Q3, and now you do the opposite in KICKS since the gross margin is down six percentage point year-over-year in Q4. Can you elaborate on the impact from FX pricing, campaign activities, Skincity, and then also the sales challenge mix? That would be my first question. Thank you.
Okay. That was a lot of variables you put on the table there, Mads. I'm not sure I can have all those in my head. I think from a From overall perspective, as we came out of Q3, very soft in our KICKS markets. We have Q4, which is our smallest quarter. We had a campaign already planned on fragrance, which is hitting our KICKS market this year in March compared to April last year. That is a campaign we run every year.
We always need to make sure we do it in a, in a timing where competitors does not expect it, so we ran it in March this year, to be a little bit more unpredictable from a competition perspective. In addition to that, we also made some conscious choices from a competition perspective, and we did selective pricing on certain sub-categories in our KICKS markets, really focusing on, you know, getting the consumers into our business.
I think looking at that combined with the results we're getting from the quarter is we are pleased with seeing that, you know, our active activations, our campaigns in the market is connecting with the consumers, and we get the consumers back. Yes, we got almost 6% growth in KICKS. We did some investments, which was deliberate. It was also in a small quarter, not jeopardizing the biggest quarter of the year where a lot of the profit for the year is made, as we do in Q3.
And just in terms of-
Just one point, Mads. I think the FX impact on the gross margin in KICKS for Q4 alone is roughly 0.7 percentage point. 0.7, 0.8. A little percentage is coming from FX.
Perfect. Thank you. I have a question on Matas which delivered 2.7% growth year-over-year in Q4. I think this is the Q1 in, what is it, in four years with negative like-for-like growth in your stores. I know this is a small quarter. Should we be nervous? Are you at least concerned about negative like-for-like growth in your stores?
I think, one quarter, Mads, with a like for like growth as you see for Matas, I would look at the full year. We're delivering 1.2% growth like for like, and I think that should be the focus. You know, it has a little bit of implications when we do different kind of campaigns in one quarter versus the other. But I think from a full year perspective, running 265 stores still delivering a like for like growth is where we need to have the focus.
All right. My final question is on the OpEx run rate from here. If you sort of I know this might be difficult for you to quantify the effects of CEO incentives, but what would be sort of the normalized OpEx rate as a percentage of sales in the quarter so we can extrapolate of something from here, from the, from Q4?
I think, you know, without going into too many details on our previous CEO, and I think that that would not be appropriate. I think, you know, you know, from some of the cost run rates that we saw from a full year perspective, I think that that would be somewhat marginalized, probably more between the quarters. If you take the full year level, I would use that, Mads, instead.
All right. Perfect. Thank you.
As a reminder, please press five star to ask a question. The next question comes from the line of Yiwei Zhou from SEB. Please go ahead. Your line will now be unmuted.
Hi, it's Wei from SEB. Thank you for taking my questions. Also welcome, Mad, and looking forward to meeting you. I have three questions, I'll start one by one. Firstly, also on the gross margin, we have discussed the margin for KICKS. While looking at the Matas brand, it also declined by three percentage points year-over-year. Can you elaborate a bit on the dynamics here?
Uh-
I'll do next question later.
You, you're focused on Q4 alone, right?
Exactly.
Yeah. That's correct. That has to do with basically the product mix and the campaigns that we've been running in that quarter compared to previous quarters. I think, you know, if you look at the full year, we're looking roughly at 1% below on growth margin. That is linked in also as we talked about after Q3, the competitiveness in the market, new players coming in, increasing the competitiveness somewhat a little bit. It also reflects the change a little bit change in the product mix and the way that the consumers behave.
Great. Thank you. As reflecting your guidance for 2026/2027, is it fair to assume that the sort of the campaign and the price initiatives will continue into next year?
I think we're operating in a very uncertain market. I think our guidance with 2%-6% growth and an EBITDA margin at 14%-14.5% is our view on next year. The whole, you know, geopolitical situation and the uncertainties that we see in the markets as we stand right now.
Okay. Clear. Given you have mentioned the uncertainty in America, uncertainty here, my next question is also follow-up on your long-term target, 2027, 2028. I mean, it's not that long anymore, but do you think it is still realistic? I was wondering if Mette, you are looking at a strategy review on, could maybe communicate it to the market in the short term.
First and foremost, thank you for your question. Two things here. First and foremost, the strategy remains unchanged. The ambition remains the same. What we do is to accelerate those initiatives that is within the strategy to make sure that we deliver. We are facing uncertainty times, that's a fact, but it is what it is. That just give us even more urgency to accelerate the initiatives we are seeing. On your questions on your second question, what was that again?
Strategy update.
Yeah, that's a strategy update. Sorry for that.
Maybe you can strategy review.
Yeah. Sorry for that. On the strategy update, I'm four weeks in. It's a little bit early for me to say anything about that, but at a later time when I have more observations and when I'm ready for that, I would love to, and I'm looking forward to share that with you. It's a little bit premature for me to talk about that. Win the Nordics strategy remains unchanged, basically I believe we have the right strategy. We have a very strong platform. I believe we can do more. We just need to work on become even more relevant in particularly in our key markets. A very tangible number here that is in my head that the Matas customer visit our stores 3 x often than a KICKS customers.
For us, the task is now to broaden out to be even more relevant in even more occasions, that's why we are so focused on accelerating assortment, more price points, a more efficient campaign, make sure we execute that properly. Part of that is also working with our in-house brands. We talked about Nilens Jord.
Mm-hmm. Yeah.
You mentioned that. That's a good example. Striberne. There's more to come. We believe we have a lot of potential within the existing platform today. I'm sure also as we get closer and work closer across the markets, more value will be discovered that we can go after.
Great. Very clear. Thank you. If I may ask the last question here, it's regarding AI adoption. We have seen a lot of agentic AI and also physical AI adoption with some of your international peers in retail and e-commerce. I was wondering, does it change your view on where Matas is? Any initiatives already started here?
Yeah. First and foremost, that's one of the things I've seen when I come across the organization. We actually have a lot of strong AI initiatives already, and it's very much in line with we are strong within digital. We need to continue also to secure that we are super strong within AI. What I've seen is really good stuff, a lot of great things. What we have done is, as an example, that all employees in our service office across, they have participated in what we call a internal AI academy. We see a lot of great initiatives come through the organization as well at the same time we are prioritizing AI initiatives across the group. That is definitely something that is on our radar, where we need to make sure that we keep up and is becoming a part of our days and ways of working.
Do you see any cost savings from the AI adoption?
I think-
Is it possible for you to communicate a bit?
Well-
Comment a bit on at the moment.
Yeah. Well, I'm four weeks in. First and foremost, we believe AI is important component of what we are doing also in the long run. First and foremost, we see that as a add for value on how we interact with our customers. We are strong here with the digital, how can AI play a role here so we are delivering even better solution for our customers. That is our primarily focus.
Great. Thank you. We are clear.
This concludes the Q&A. I will now hand it back to Group CEO, Mette Uglebjerg, for concluding remarks.
Yeah. First and foremost, thank you for your great questions. I'm looking forward to meet you in person. I think that what I wanna bring back here is that it is a solid result we are delivering. We are delivering all-time high, but we also have some areas we need to improve. We are fully aware of that, and that is in particular where we've seen customer has changed behavior and lower consumer confidence in our KICKS markets, and we need to react, and we are reacting quickly by accelerating the pace of our strategy.
Remain focused on our strategy, that's what we're focused on. We have a very strong platform. We have a lot of great initiatives ahead of us and a lot of opportunities, so I'm very optimistic looking ahead, even though it is a little bit more bumpy ride, but that's how it is. We'll stay close to the business.