Good morning and warm welcome to Fodelia's Q1 business review. My name is Riikka Wulff. I'm the Group CEO, and together with me in studio, we have our CFO, Janne Aalto.
Hello and good morning for everyone also on my behalf.
We'll start with some key highlights on a group level, then I will walk you through our business development and key highlights on a business level, and then Janne will get back on the stage explaining in more thorough way our financial development. Let's hit the road with the key highlights on group level. We have quite nice first quarter behind us. Our net sales on group level grew by 9.1%, totaling to EUR 14.7 million. Also, our profitability improved on the group level compared to the comparison period. We ended up with 5.5% operating profit compared to 5.1% last year. 0.4 percentage point improvement there.
This looks quite different when you look at it on Feelia level or in Oikia level, especially on the top line, I will go back to those later on in the presentation. Anyhow, operating profit, EUR 0.8 million compared to EUR 0.7 million last year. A few points on a group level before moving on to Feelia's and Oikia's highlights. As mentioned already, the growth continued thanks to Feelia's strong performance on a top-line level. Oikia's story was quite different on Q1.
There we had net sales declining, especially on our private label products. I will explain that a bit later on the presentation in more thorough way. The profitability improved slightly compared to the reference period, as I explained with the last slide.
As we've been telling, during the past months and during the past quarters, our structure on the group level has been clarified. We've been focusing more on the core businesses, especially on Feelia's business. That is where we see the highest competitive edge in the market. That is where we are also putting most of our investments on. I would say that the changes that we've been making are starting to show in results, as we can see on our top line. On a group level, we have also continued active development with our IT infrastructure, with AI utilization, and also on our sustainability initiatives. When operating in the food industry, the investments on the sustainability, on the food safety, on the quality are of crucial importance for us.
These are all important projects that we are working on, or not just projects, but processes that we are improving constantly. That on a group level, and let's move into Feelia's. First Feelia's and then Oikia's business development on the company level, and some highlights there. First, a reminder of how we are divided in the business areas. Feelia operates in the Foodservice market. We offer long shelf life ready meals, and our Delimax brand complements these products with a wide range of juices and sauce products.
The production facilities are so far still located in Pyhäntä and Kokkola, but as we have told earlier, we will close down the Kokkola facilities by the end of the year. I will get back to that later on in the presentation.
Oikia focuses on the retail market and still for maybe around a week on the e-commerce, direct to consumer e-commerce. We are here, we have told already before that we will be selling the business and, in the future, Feelia is where we concentrate in this and the entrepreneurs who will continue the web store will be a customer of Feelia. That's quite nice development in that sense, meaning that we will focus purely on Oikia snacks with Oikia. The snack factory is located in Pyhäntä. On a group level, we have a joint venture together with Bravedo, 50% ownership of Fodbar. We will cover that also later on in the presentation by our CFO, Janne Aalto. Let's move to Feelia.
Our net sales grew by 15.5%, adding to EUR 12.3 million in net sales at around same operating profit as last year, EUR 1 million, a few thousand EUR more than last year, but approximately the same level. Operating profit was 8.5% of net sales compared to last year's 9.4%. Here, as we can see on the group level, we were able to improve our relative operating profit. On Feelia level, we've been investing in for example, on our sales team and on our product team to make sure that we are ready to get the future growth that we are constantly looking for. The net sales growth was driven by strong customer development, customer demand, sales development, and increased Delimax product sales. Let's take the next slide to look bit closer into those.
We were able to increase our sales both within our existing customers, but also with many new customers. We were developing new products, for example, in juices. The growth of our top line came from many different sources. Most of it came from new customers, but there was good development also within our existing customer base. It was nice to see that Delimax products, which were quite in a flat level last year, in 2025, we were able to increase our sales quite a bit also there now in the Q1 of 2026. I have told about the investments on our sales team.
We have quite a few new sales guys there. One thing that we've been doing is also organizing again how we operate with our sales. We have a quite a bit more cross-selling at the moment than we used to. Feelia and Delimax products complement each other. Now we also operate on a better level with our sales team as how we are able to help our customers to solve their everyday problems with combining the juice and sauce products with the food products. That is one thing behind as how we operate with our sales. Then we also have more people operating with the customers. Timing of Easter was a bit different this year. Last year, Easter sales were mainly in April, meaning quarter two .
This year, Easter sales were mostly in March, especially with our juices that where how the Easter is on the calendar affects our sales. That was one small part of the sales in March. After the reporting period, we decided to proceed with the plan to exit our frozen food business in Kokkola, meaning that we will close down Kokkola factory and office by the end of 2026. In the future, we will be operating with our production facilities in Pyhäntä. We don't have such a competitive advantage with the frozen food as we have with the Feelia's core product. That was the reasoning behind as why we decided to give up this business and instead concentrate on those foods and those concepts where we have the best competitive edge.
Well, one important thing behind the growing sales is how we have been able to concept our product categories. It's not about products, it's about concepts and solutions for our customers. Everything we do is aimed to help our customers to make their life easier with the food service issues that they have with their everyday life. Concepting that the offering that we have in an easy way for a customer to understand and to buy also helps our sales as how to approach the customers. Preparedness food for exceptional situations is one example of that. There, of course, we also have new products that you can have in room temperature, but also the basic concept of Feelia's food is quite suitable for exceptional situations.
For example, lack of electricity or running water, you can still use our food, and many of them can be eaten with room temperature, no need to warm it up. Of course, that food tastes better if you warm it up, but if the options are not to eat or to eat, you probably eat the food in room temperature. That's one way how we have approached the concepting issue. We have special diets that we cover now better than we used to. We have quite a bit new products there, which all together create a special diet category for our customers. For example, texture modified meals are one thing in that concept. We have created a whole new Nordic Brunch concept, which offers a ready-made combinations of Feelia's products.
We have the food products, and then we have the Delimax soups and sauces there. One part of that concept is our porridge bar, which combines Feelia's porridges and Delimax soups, desserts, and purees into appealing meal solutions. I'm personally a big fan of porridge. We have especially our oatmeal porridge. It's very delicious. If you ever get a chance to taste that, I highly recommend to try it. Very good product. Well, concepting strengthens the commercial value of our products by expanding their use cases and shifting the customer discussions from price to total solutions. It also helps our salespeople to do their work in a easier way, helping the customers even in a better way. It's all about making purchasing easier.
It's not about products, it's about concepts, which is the core idea of whole Feelia, I would say. That about Feelia. Oh, well, yeah. One slide more about the change in the net sales. As I described, we had success with new customers. We have more sales in existing customers, and if we compare the growth from EUR 10.6 million to EUR 12.3 million in net sales in quarter one 2026, most of the growth or the majority of growth came from new customers. New customers meaning customers that had no purchases in the comparison quarter last year. Then we'll move into Oikia. As I mentioned already in the beginning, unfortunately, the story with Oikia's top line is quite different compared to Feelia. There we had close to 16% growth in net sales.
With Oikia, unfortunately, it's the decline a bit over 16%, ending up to EUR 2.5 million net sales. The good news with Oikia is that the sales margin improved clearly. We were not campaigning as much this first quarter this year compared to last year, and we had also good success with the negotiations with our customers, which meant that the sales margin was back on the level where it should have been last year as well. With 16.5% decline in net sales, it wasn't enough to keep up the operating profit. The relative operating profit was 2.5% compared to 3.3% last year, and the operating profit fell by EUR 40,000 here.
Good news is that the outlook for quarter two and the upcoming quarters is a lot better compared to the first quarter . Well, I already explained about the net sales declining but the sales margin improving clearly due to the price changes and returning to the normal pricing and not campaigning that much on Q1 this year compared to last year. We have had good successes in customer negotiations. We have been able to increase our store listings, which is one of the reasons why we expect our sales to look better in Q2 and in the upcoming quarters. We'll be increasing our own campaigning during the Q2. We have a reason to believe that also our customers in private label products will be increasing their own campaigning.
With the private labels, it's of course an issue of how our customers operate with their products. It's not in our hands, but how to campaign with our own Oikia product is in our hands. We've been investing a lot more than we used to on the marketing of Oikia with our own brand. That's one thing behind how to get improving store listings is that we have been more visible with our own brand, and I'm expecting good results with that in the rest of the year. As we told before, the business sale of the oikiaruoka.fi online store in May will clarify the structure and help us as a group to focus on our core business. Oikia will be the snack business in the future.
Feelia will concentrate on the ready-made meals, we'll have their entrepreneurs who take over the web store as customers of Feelia in the future. I'm really happy with this end result, how we were able to find a way as how to still offer the great food for our customers with our web store and keep up with the net sales on Feelia level on that one. Happy to start operating with the entrepreneurs there. Janne will next walk you through the financial development in more detail.
Yes. Thank you, Riikka. Let's have a look, deep dive in our financial development in Q1 2026. First of all, let's go through our performance indicators. Our EBITDA was EUR 0.9 million, and already mentioned before by Riikka, operating profit was EUR 0.8 million. That led for profit for the period, EUR 0.5 million. Our earnings per share were EUR 0.06 per share. Let's move on to other key figures. Our return on equity was 17%, and our equity ratio was 53.1%. Our interest bearing net debt was EUR 2.8 million, and net gearing was 22.8%. As you can see, of the level of our net debt, we have pretty much room for the future investments because the debt level is really low.
As a summary, we can say that we have a strong balance sheet and strong financial position. Cash flow in Q1. Our cash balance increased by EUR 0.9 million in Q1 2026, and the increase was to the strong operating cash flow in the period. Our operating cash flow was EUR 1.4 million, and that ended up to the closing cash balance EUR 1.3 million in Q1. Basically, as well, this strong operating cash flow supports possibilities for the future investments, for example. Also, we held our Annual General Meeting on March 26th.
In our AGM, financial statements were approved following the normal procedures and then AGM granted discharge from liability to the members of the board of directors and the CEO. There were no any changes in the members of board of directors for the upcoming year. AGM decided to approve the original proposal of the board of directors to pay dividends EUR 0.07 per share, and the dividends were paid in April 10th. Key highlights of our joint venture business called Fodbar. As commented already previously, the financial year 2025 was challenging for Fodbar, but also Q1 2026 has been, or basically has continued in the same way than the previous year.
There has been a discussion and also a well-being area called Oma Häme has announced on their website that basically the significant agreement with the Oma Häme is open and under discussion to the reason that Fodbar originally has been operating there under the temporary contractual arrangements since spring 2025. Now the decision which was done by the Market Court. Basically Market Court gave the opposite conclusion and the Supreme Administrative Court decided not to grant leave to appeal in this matter.
That means that the original the Palmia should have been selected as a winner for the Oma Häme catering and facility management services for the Oma Häme well-being area. Discussion is still ongoing. Then the Oma Häme agreement does not have any significant impact.
We estimate that doesn't have any significant impact on Fodelia Group level net sales, profitability or financial situation. Fodbar CEO Nina Rokkila has resigned, the previous COO Mika Rapila has been selected as an acting CEO for the company. Currently, Foodbar is taking measures to streamline its processes and also improve the profitability and the operational efficiency. Our outlook and guidance. We commented earlier the guidance for 2026.
We have commented that the net sales are estimated to be, in 2026, between EUR 59 million and EUR 65 million for the Fodelia Group. Our guidance remains unchanged. Operating profit is estimated to improve significantly as well compared to the previous year. No change in our guidance and our outlook based also on the Q1 figures and how we see the last quarters of the year.
Let's move on to the Q&A session. First of all, the first question, M&A. Riikka, how do you see the situation? Do we have any activity there or do we see any possibility for the mergers and acquisitions?
Well, as we have seen in the history now for the last couple of years, we've been more on the selling side of M&A businesses. Having said that, I see possibility. Our financial situation is quite strong. I see good possibilities for also buying if we find companies that would add up to Feelia's core business. That is, I think one of the very good M&A activities has been the purchasing of Marjavasu, which has ended up in a good situation in our everyday life at the moment. Companies that would provide the same, that would add on something to our existing concept with Fodelia are of interest for us. I see room for that.
Having said that, I think our core focus is on how to grow our core business with Feelia. But yeah, we keep our eyes open on that sense.
Yeah. Also, as we saw, we had a strong operational cash flow. We have low level of the net debt.
Yeah.
Also do you see maybe some investments?
We do have. With the growing production in Pyhäntä, we also have a need for investments in the future if and when we are able to grow our top line as we are planning to. We do need investments there at some point. It's a balance of maybe making some acquisitions and how to invest on ourselves on our new, maybe new product lines or new products, different type of products in the future.
Okay. Foil problems in the factory. We had some issues in the Q3 and Q2 on the last year, some issues also in the Q1.
Yes. Luckily, those are behind us now. What I'm really happy about is that we were at this time able to really analyze the root cause and create a process on how to prevent these type of issues happening in the future in that scale that they happened now. With these type of production plants and with growing kilos and growing capacity, there are always some problems that we enter into in all the plants. It's business as usual. Now we have one part of how we've been improving our business is to focus on the processes, how we run our production plans. Now we have new processes in place also, and that is helping us to prevent these type of escalations as we maybe now had in Q1 2026 and last fall also.
Okay. International possibilities and the export business, has Feelia moved on in the Swedish market?
Well, we have first baby steps in the Swedish market. New contracts with the wholesalers. I do see growth potential in Sweden. Sweden operates in a quite same way in food service as Finland, for example, with schools and kindergartens. I think still that the main focus is in Finland, how to grow Feelia's business here. We have a lot of potential also in Finland still, that is something that we are looking into taking the first baby steps, the core and the focus is mainly in Finland.
Okay. Feelia's net sales grew 15.5%. Was the increase due to increased prices or also the sale, kilos and the production?
Kilos grew also, not just sales. Some price increases, but mainly actually based on new products. Yeah, well, mainly on grow-
Yeah
or being able to grow in what we sell.
One question regarding the guidance that now we have had these investments in Kokkola and the e-commerce business. Do we still see that the guidance is the same?
It is in place still, as we told in previous in the presentation. Of course, the those do have some effect on our sales, but it should be quite doable, and I see no need to renew our guidance in that sense.
The profitability going forward in the next quarters. The question is for the EBITDA margin but basically maybe in overall, how do you see the profitability?
I see a possibility to grow there. We do need some investment still on our processes and how we operate to be able to be ready for the future, growth with, especially with Feelia. Having said that, I still see potential for our relative profitability to be.
Yeah
Growing in the next quarters.
You saw the slide regarding the new customers and then there's one additional question that, basically how do you see the new customers? Are we happy about the development and has the increase of the new customers been strong or strong enough?
Yes, it is strong enough to support our guidance for the whole year. I've been very satisfied how our sales team operates at the moment. We have plenty of discussions going on all the time with potential new customers and with our current customers. It's about how to be even of more help to our existing customers and how to find new customers for our product. I'm quite happy with that.
Those issues, what we have had in the production, what kind of impact those might have been for the profitability in the period? Can you comment?
Yeah. They did have an effect on our profitability and on the sales margin level especially. That is something that I'm not happy with the first quarter results. Without those, I think we would have had a better operating profit in the first quarter . Now that those problems are behind us, that's one reason why I believe that we should be able to improve our profitability level in the future. Having said that, again, we do need some investments to support the first future growth with our production to be able to produce the kilos that we are able to sell.
How do you see the Oikia business situation? You already commented, but there's a additional question about the challenges what the Oikia is facing that do you, do you see the next quarters that the sales will pick up again or the business is still viable?
Yeah, it is still viable. It was more about phasing between different quarters. No campaigning on our side and no campaigning on our customer's side on the first quarter . I see that we can already see the sales picking up in the second quarter , so I expect the whole year to be a lot better than the first quarter of Oikia.
Okay. Anything else you would like to add on?
I think we had several good questions here to add on to our presentation, so thank you for listening to us. Again, news from Fodelia in about three months.
Thank you.
Thank you.