Good day, ladies and gentlemen, a warm welcome to today's earnings call of the Fielmann Group AG, following the publication of the Q3 figures of 2026. With this, I am happy to hand over to Fielmann's CFO, Steffen Baetjer.
Thank you very much, Ingmar. Welcome from me as well. Very glad to share with you our Q3 or nine months 2026 results, which I think can get the headline slightly better news. Getting there. Very happy to report these numbers to you. Where do we stand in the summer? In a nutshell, we really accelerated growth in Q3. Our price leadership pays off. Customer uncertainty eased a bit off in Germany, therefore Germany grew. All our European markets continue to grow. We are a dual-engine growth engine company. We have Europe and we have Germany was a little slow, so very, very happy that we are seeing growth in Germany.
We obviously invested in our price leadership, so we took down the pricing of certain frames that amounts to about EUR 15 million in price reductions that we offer to the market, which really helped to reemphasize our view as a price leader. When the going gets tough and people ease a little because the whole geopolitical tension thing became normal and stable, then people go to the place where they know that they get the best price and the best quality and the best products, that is in audio and optics. That is us. We also, as you know from our previous calls, had always the issue in selected stores that we had not enough capacity.
Partially, the weakness in Germany was because people were hesitant and partially because we could not serve those people that were actually in the stores, so we did capacity investments, which enabled us to serve more customers. So, very glad. Sales increased nine months year-to-date to 3.2% at constant currency, of which a third roughly or fourth is M&A, and growth accelerated to 4.9% at constant currency in Q3, up from 2.3% in half year. So, we really see an acceleration, as of today, October, we do not have real numbers, but everything that we look at, we are moving on the same trajectory as we have seen in Q3.
Adjusted EBITDA margin is still stable at 23.4%. We are impacted by our investments in capacity and future growth, so investments or capacity is more personnel, which drives down a little bit, or drives up a little bit the personnel expense ratio.
But more importantly, that's also going to be important for next year. When we talk about next year, every store that we open, and we opened a lot more stores this year so far than last year, and we will open a lot more stores next year than this year. Those stores are obviously not profit generators in the first year, but they need between 13 and 24 months before they actually become profit contributors. So, that has a certain pull on the margins, but it's not significant. So, 23.4% compared to the 23.7% last year. EBT margins are stable, so that's really good sign that despite all the sales movement, we keep our profitability stable. We opened 19 new locations net in Q3. We have a net new openings of 56. So far, the full last year, we did 22.
So, really, really super proud of that, how we're accelerating the growth of our new locations and how we actually get the machine going in terms of optimizing our network and taking opportunities and growing the business where we can. Given those numbers, we obviously feel rather confident to confirm our full-year guidance that we adjusted. So, we are well-positioned to reach those targets, and there is no need to correct those expectations downwards or upwards. If we look at it, total consolidated sales, we talked about those numbers. Organic growth 2.5%, 3.2% at constant currency, so we really see a growth. I talked about the adjusted EBITDA margin. I talked about the adjusted EBT and the margin.
And mind you could say, "Oh, it's only EUR 5 million more," but remember, last year was an absolute profit record year for Fielmann Group, and this year was a really, really, especially in the beginning with all the weather and the strikes and the geopolitical stuff, was a really, really difficult start into the year, and still yet, we're beating the record profitability year from last year so far. So, very, very proud of that and really, really happy with that performance. If you look across the product categories, you see here in dark blue the year-to-date September, so the nine-month growth. This little, I don't even know what color it is, light brown, you see just the Q3 growth. So, you see that across all categories, we're growing.
Contact lens, we talked about that strategic decision that we took to move away from branded to more private label contact lenses, and therefore there's obviously a dip in revenue. But you see across all categories, we grew in Q3, and in all across all product categories, we're growing faster in Q3 than in the nine months. So, you see there has been a growth, a very broad growth momentum in Q3, and let's hope that it keeps up in Q4. Same picture, if you look across the countries, you see that the group grew, same color coding, it's all in constant currency. Group grew at 3% year to date, grew at 5% in Q3, yada, ya. So, you see all countries are basically accelerating their growth. The two things we got to talk about is Spain.
In Spain, you remember that we acquired two businesses in 2020 and 2022, and we are now merging those brands. We have been merging the companies over the last year. We are now merging the brand, so Medical is actually a brand that will disappear. We will write off about EUR 3 million in brand equity in October, and then report it, obviously, with our full year results. We are rebranding the stores, and that puts a little dent into the growth of about a third of our store network in Spain because you rebrand, you retrain. They have slightly different categories, slightly different assortment. There is a bit of sand in our processes that makes us a little slower, but still growing at 7%. I think that is great. The U.S., obviously not happy with it. Business model transformation still ongoing, takes a lot longer than we thought.
We now have nine stores under Fielmann Vision Care banner, and we are looking at that. I think with the store design that we implemented now in July, we have something that we can build on. We are looking at the data. It is a huge investment to rebrand all those stores, so we really need to make sure that once we roll it out, we have sufficient data points that we are doing it. I know a lot of you guys are growing impatient. Trust me, there is also at least one person that is impatient internally on the U.S. numbers. That is me, but also Bastian is impatient. Also, Marc Fielmann is impatient.
We need to make sure that before we move full scale and rebrand and have that new market approach, we need to make sure that we are doing the right thing, because otherwise we are going to waste a lot of money, and that we do not want. Other than that, very happy. Obviously, very happy with Germany. The Sleeping Beauty awakening, which is marvelous, and seeing that we have that growth with targeted investment in capacity and the general easing in consumer confidence. Here are all the numbers. We talked about it. So, 61 stores. This is since September, so this is September to September 2025 to September 2026. These are obviously year-to-date numbers, nine months. The 2.9, the 3.2 at constant currency. The USD effect that we had is also easing out. Adjusted EBITDA, again, higher than last year.
Margin in Europe on 24.9%, which makes us really proud. The U.S. number does not make us proud. There is still a lot of work to be done. Adjusted EBT and the margin, I told you, we are beating a record year, which is, given how we started the year, not a given. Guidance, we confirm around 90% in the customer satisfaction.
The sales, EUR 2.5 billion-EUR 2.55 billion, so 2%-5% growth. Adjusted EBITDA, EUR 560 million-EUR 580 million, and between 22% and 23%. With all the interpretations that I gave you that I always said, it is going to lean more to the 23% than the 22%, and the adjusted EBT margin around the 12%. Very, very happy with all that. One of the drivers, obviously, is new store openings. We really cracked the code on that across Europe, which is important. It is not like we do it in one country.
We do it in Spain, we do it in Germany, we do it in Poland, we do it in the Czech Republic. We are really growing across the board, which is really great to see that acceleration. I mean, look at 2024, 10 stores. Last year, 22, and now we are aiming for 70, and we are on a very, very, very good track. For now, 5th of November, a happy CFO faces the analyst community. With that, I think you read the report, and we go to Q&A if you have any. But there is, as I said, happy CFO here.
Thank you very much for the presentation, and good to see you happy. We are now moving to the Q&A session. To ask a question on the audio line, please give me a signal with a raised hand so I can allow you to unmute yourself. For those dialed in by phone, you can give me the sign to raise your hand by dialing star nine on your telephone keypad. Star nine for the telephone keypad to raise your hand. We move on to Cédric Rossi. You should be able to unmute yourself, switch on the microphone, and ask your question. Mr. Rossi, please.
Yep. Hello?
Yes, you are-
Super. Thank you. Good afternoon to all. I actually had two questions. The first one is regarding the U.S. market. We heard that the business model transformation will probably put some pressure on the revenue growth due to the negative value that is implied by the price repositioning. Do you expect this effect to amplify over the next quarters as you are rolling out the concept on a more broad basis? That's my first question. The second one is coming back on your full-year adjusted EBITDA guidance. It implies a sharp decline in Q4 only. I just wanted to understand if it was due to the challenging comparison base last year, due to the exceptional savings of over EUR 20 million, if I recall correctly, or is it just a matter of being cautious given the limited macro environment? Thank you.
Well, I start with the latter one. Look, we issued the guidance, and so this is where we stand at the moment at 23.4. We issued the guidance when life was a lot more uncertain. I mean, we had one good quarter. I don't even know what October looks like, as I said, because we're still counting the beans. I would say, let's not get overboard just because we had one good quarter. Let's see whether this is a trend. I said in October, we see at least the top-line trend continuing, but we're not expecting a sharp decline. I would be happy to put out a prelim notice in February saying, "Hey, we've done all the numbers, and it looks better than we anticipated." But at the moment, there are so many moving parts that I'm not in a position to give you an updated guidance upwards.
I can say that the probability for a downward guidance adjustment is virtually zero. All right. The business model transformation, yes, I mean, average order value is coming down. That's part of the strategy. I wouldn't think that the U.S. margin will go a lot deeper than this. This is pretty much rock bottom. We're working with the team extensively, and we're saying it's all great about business model transformation, but there's also And yes, we're not quarterly driven because this is a much bigger endeavor for us, the U.S., and we take more a two, three-year horizon, but still, we can't ruin the margin for a year and then move our way back up. We did a reduction in force in the U.S. We reviewed our personnel setup there at headquarters.
We were overstaffed in some stores, not on the doctor's side, but on the optician side, so we corrected that. I wouldn't expect a massive down. I mean, 10.9 is not what we're hoping for, and it's pretty bad. So yeah, it shouldn't go down. Craig has a question. I don't know whether you are here or should I say that?
Yes. Craig Abbott is asking a question on the chat, but he is on the phone as well. I can try to give him the possibility to unmute himself. Craig Abbott, please.
No? Craig?
Mr. Abbott, you should be able to unmute yourself by now.
Craig, probably-
Can you hear me?
Oh. Yes. Hello.
Yeah, it's okay. Very complicated conference call set up here. Okay. Yeah, thank you. Well, my first question was just answered. Thank you, Steffen. I was going to ask for a little bit more, say, bits to the, how should I say, the roadmap for the Q4 guidance for the margin, to what extent maybe you're expecting a slightly lower margin due to the accelerated store ramp-up, marketing campaigns, things like that. If you do have anything left to add to your previous answer, then please.
The second question was just getting back to you, Steffen. You've been pretty clear on that, but it's a little baffling that this go-to-market, getting this go-to-market concept has been taking so long. Like, to decide to go with the Fielmann Vision brand. Yeah, I'm just a little curious about, yeah, I should say, I mean, what changed or why did it take so long to get the concept that you're confident now it's going to work, say, going from 27, 28? Thanks.
Yeah. I mean, what you wrote is the perfect answer. It is store openings that accumulate losses. It is marketing campaigns. It is also consulting costs that are We are finishing at the moment, we are finishing a lot of projects, so consulting costs will go up a little in Q4. That is why we are a bit cautious on the EBITDA, and I am not going back and forth and back and forth.
No, sure.
On the U.S. business model transformation, I think there are a few things that take a little longer than we anticipated and that we would have hoped for. Number one is the task of completely changing the customer experience is not done by just doing it at the management level. We have noticed that we need to go all the way and we need to retrain basically everybody of the 5,000 store employees that we have. We need to get doctors on board, which are very hard to recruit, especially where we are. You find a doctor in Chicago, no worries. But we are looking for doctors in the Dakotas, which is a slightly different animal. Beautiful, but special taste. Every time we try something, we need to or we want to give it a few months to see, do we see changes in customer behavior?
Do we see changes in conversion rates, in day one conversion rates, day three, day 30 conversion rates? Do we see changes in outside scripts? We change something, and then for people to come with their outside prescription to us, so-called outside script, they need to hear about it, they need to understand it. It takes The transmission mechanism are a lot longer than we anticipated. Maybe we were naive, right? We probably were. But all that is taking a lot of time, and then rebranding one store ticks at about half a million. We have 240 stores to convert. That is a three-digit million investment. We need to make damn sure that we are moving in the right direction, and that is basically what we are doing at the moment.
We then saw that the offering is okay, the store design is not what thrills people, so we took the brand strategy, we designed a new store design. We then tried out a new store design in Machesney Park, in one shop in Rockford, in Illinois, so that we see, okay, now we're getting there after three months that we're saying, "That looks pretty good, and that looks like something that we can probably replicate." So we're now, but only after three months, we feel comfortable to do things, and that's why it just takes a lot longer. We're taking baby steps. We wait for the effect of those baby steps, then we take the next one.
Sometimes, we've seen that we needed to take one step back, and we're very, very happy that we don't have to take one step back on 50 stores, but only on eight stores, because otherwise it would be very unpruned. Are we happy with that? No. Are we happy with the way that we chose? Yes.
Okay, that's very detailed. Thank you very much, Steffen. I guess a follow-up others will probably have as well is just, the rate of converting those stores once you're happy with the concept, you're not going to try to do it one year, I would assume, right? It would be over a couple of years.
No, we're planning at the moment, we're planning about half of the stores next year.
Okay. Thank you very much, Steffen.
Yep.
Yes, thank you, Mr. Abbott. We have Mr. Cota, Thierry Cota, on the telephone as well, so please listen to the announcement that you can unmute yourself. Mr. Cota, you should be able to unmute yourself, and you are. I can see that.
Hey, do you hear me? Good afternoon.
Yes.
Okay, now I am unmuted. Good afternoon. Thank you for taking my questions. Two of them. First, quite globally, your revenue growth in Q3, 5%, the store count is at 5%. Is it too simplistic to say that the space effect accounted for a large part of the revenue growth, or can you give us a sort of measure? Firstly. Secondly, on Germany, we see an acceleration. Can you help us understand what happened? Is it volume? Is it the comparison base? Is it audiology pushing? What were the factors of this acceleration, and do we think this could continue for the coming quarters? Thank you.
I'm not so sure I understood the question on the first question. You said?
The revenues are 5% on the ground, and the store count is also at 5%. How do we put the two numbers together? How quite is the space effect that you benefit from? Is that a level that you think will continue in the coming quarters, years, actually? The effort you're doing now on space opening and stores opening. If you could just put the context of the revenue growth.
Okay
In line with the store policy, please.
Okay, got it. It's a plethora of things. If we open a new store, it's not if the 5% would be driven by the 5% stores, that would mean that a new store on opening delivers as much revenue as an established store. As I said, the ramp-up period, depending on where we are, to full growth can be up to five years. So, it's a multitude of things. It's volume growth, actually. We didn't do price increases. Audiology is performing very, very, very nicely. We said that we set up the organization. We have actually a VP Audiology now. We see that we're looking at efficiency measures. All these things that I told you are now paying off. We're really seeing quite an interesting acceleration in audiology. We have that on this slide here. I can't see it because there's a question in front of it.
Here, you actually see on this slide, you actually see the push in audiology. That is driving the growth. Just saying so many more stores, and then that's the revenue growth. Unfortunately, that doesn't work. On Germany, well, I wish I could give you a really super scientific answer. But for some reason, we started hiring people. We see a strong correlation between the additional people that we hired and the increase in sales. We also see an overall improvement in retail sales in Germany. Zeiss told us they see an increase in lenses being sold in Germany. Something happened in July that the German consumer decided to spend a little money, and that's why we're very cautious. To your question, can we assume this to continue? Well, the German consumer has been tough on us and on everybody else as well.
I won't be saying that they won't be tough on us in Q4 or Q1. I think we just need to wait and see until we have a trend that stabilizes. That will be my answers on your two questions on the growth and Germany and what's happening there. But we're growing through audiology, we're growing through volume, we're growing through improved sellout structures. It's across the board that we're seeing a movement.
Thank you very much, Steffen. Just as a follow-up, will you be able to give us a space effect on a regular basis or not, to create a sense of what space brings and all the other factors separately?
Sorry, maybe it's just my connection. I'm really having difficulties to understand the question.
Oh, let me try again. Otherwise, I will take it offline. But the question was, in the revenue growth, will you be able at some point to give us, distinguish the space effect from the like-for-like trend so that we can distinguish what comes from this new policy?
Oh, you mean like Okay.
of opening so many new stores? Mm-hmm.
You mean like the same store growth?
Yeah, like-for-like.
Yeah.
So, space would bring 2 points, let's say, and all the rest, 3 points, for instance. Is that something you could share?
We don't really share that. We say organic and non-organic. Organic for us is also opening of stores. I can tell you that the opening of stores drags us about 0.4, 0.5 percentage points in EBITDA margin. That's the ramp-up losses that I can tell you anecdotally, but that we wouldn't share same footage sales on the same store basis. That's nothing we would feel comfortable doing.
Okay.
Yeah.
No, but this is great. Thank you already.
All right.
Thank you very much for what you said.
Thank you.
Yes, thank you very much. We move on to Mr. Bosse. Volker Bosse, who is dialed in by phone as well. You should be able to unmute yourself. Yes. Should work now.
You should hear me now?
Yes.
Yep.
Speak a little bit louder so we can hear you loud and clear.
Okay. Volker Bosse, Baader Bank. Thank you for my question. Two remainders. First is on Spain. The margin went down here in nine months despite our high single digit sales growth of 7%. Could you elaborate on the reason for the margin decline here in Spain, despite the good sales momentum? The second question would be that we learned historically that the bottleneck for faster growth would be the shortage of experienced workers. Now you triple the number of new stores, which is amazing. But how are you able to solve these historic problems of shortage of experienced workers? Do you work with less staff in the new stores, or how do you tackle that issue from the-
No, no. I start with the staff question. I mean, the economy, I've been complaining for the last 12 months on the German economy and the retail environment. If I do that, then you see that the environment for people working has also become a bit tougher. So, people fleeing to the safe haven, so to say, which is one of the world's largest and really successful and successfully growing optical retail chains. So, it's not just our customers who say, "When the going gets tough, I go to the place where I get the best price and the best value and the best product," but it's also opticians who say, "Look, I rather stay, and fluctuation is okay, and I like working for Fielmann because also we're opening stores." People are not so flexible in terms of where they move and where they work.
I think that general not-so-great economic climate in Germany helped us a lot on that. That is the one question. The other question on Spain is, again, lots of things going on, combining the two businesses, marketing campaigns. We hired people to set up for growth. I mean, two years ago, they were opening eight stores. Now, this year, they are doing 20, 21. Next year, they are going to double that number probably.
We are really building up teams to be ready for growth, and that weighs a bit on the margin. But there is nothing structural going on. We actually very successfully insourced manufacturing logistics, so the whole, how do we do our glasses, so combining a lens with a frame to make it a pair of glasses. We are doing most of that now internally, so we have saved money there. So very, very happy with the Spanish development.
But this quarter-
Yeah, just for clarification. Sorry.
This quarter and next quarter will be a bit of kind of moving it really together to become Óptica Universitaria across the country, and then next year will be a great year for Spain again.
Yeah, for clarification. Would you say that you were able to hire opticians from your competitors actively? Is it a case in Germany, or is it across Europe, or have you even set up a kind of action plan to proactively hire people from others, or how do you
Yeah, yeah.
think about that?
I mean, of course. Look, we have an expansion strategy. An expansion strategy is we have people, as we said. Give you a very tangible example. We have now four people in Spain looking for locations. We used to have one. You then need HR people. We have targeted HR people who just look for where we say, "In the next 12 months, we want to open stores in this, this, this location." So, they actively look for personnel, be it apprentices who have finished their apprenticeship with us, and we can then offer a job in that area where we previously couldn't do that, or they need to come from somewhere. So, if we take them from other sales-related businesses and train them to become optical salespeople in Germany.
All that we're doing, it's a really coordinated effort from finding the locations, to building the locations, to staffing the locations, to doing the advertising for the locations, to really push that expansion, and that's what we're doing. Otherwise-
Okay. Sounds good.
We wouldn't deliver that growth.
Perfect. Thank you very much, and all the best for the rest of the year.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Yes, thank you very much, and we move on to the last participant with a raised hand. This is Hela Zarrouk. You should be able to unmute yourself, switch on the microphone, and ask your question, please. You should be able to unmute yourself first. Yes.
Unmute. Okay.
Yes, we can hear you.
Thank you. Good afternoon, and thank you for taking my questions. I have two questions. The first one is on Germany. How sustainable is the Q3 recovery, and have you seen the stronger momentum continue into October? My second question is, without providing formal guidance, should we view 2027 primarily as another investment year or as a year of stronger earnings conversion, and which factors will have the greatest impact on margins?
Okay, I think, quite honestly, the first question I already answered. I said October looks good across the board, or in line with Q3, and I am definitely not going to comment on where Germany is in Q4 just because we had a good quarter. We just take it day by day, and our 16,000 people in Germany do every day their best to serve our customers as they would be wanted to be served by themselves. Your second question, yes, I mean, we are going to increase, and there is also a typed question here from Hugo. We are going to increase the speed of openings next year, so that will have a little pressure on the margin, as I said. This year was about 0.4, 0.6. If we double, you can expect the same on top of that.
But this is not the time of the year to dwell on margin or on any outlook for 2027. We historically do that in April, when we have a bit more stability in where we are going. I have been telling you this for three and a half years, that stores are not profitable on day one. But in good countries, they are profitable on day 360, and in other countries, they are profitable after three years. That continues to be true. But once they are profitable, we very much know that we have internal rate of return that are really, really, really great, and we believe it is a good use of your money that we are doing here. I think that is the question on, I am not providing guidance, formal or informal, for next year, but that is how we look at the world at the moment.
We have this question from Hugo who says, "Given your comments on net opening, should we fear any additional pressure on your EBITDA margin?" No. You should welcome that we are increasing our opening rate, because if you open the right store, you will have a lot of fun in year three and four. "Do you have countermeasures to offset this effect?" Not really. "More generally, do you feel comfortable with consensus expectations of 50 basis points margin expansion for 2027?" I am not commenting on 2027 numbers, as I said. Unfortunately, I have to stonewall you here, but there is nothing we can do. But do not fear a margin erosion for 2027.
If we open a store, we are looking at massive double-digit internal rate of return over the years, so it makes all the sense in the world to do that, and it is a proven way to grow this business, and that is why we are doing it. That is the end of my answering of the question.
Thank you very much. This definitely concludes all the questions we have for today and the earnings call for today, because there are no more raised hands, no more questions in our chat box. Thank you very much to all the participants for the shown interest in the Fielmann Group. From my side, I wish you all a lovely remaining week and say goodbye. Obviously, Steffen Baetjer, you have the last words of today's call, please.
That was so beautifully said. There's nothing I can add. I wish you all a Merry Christmas, a Happy New Year, and let's speak, or let you hear from us in February with preliminary 2026 results, and then we know where we stand. Thank you very much for your interest, and keep on buying those shares. Thank you very much. Bye.