Hello, everybody. We are sorry, here was a little bit technical problems. Now everything seems to be good. Welcome to participate Puuilo Q3 review presentation. I am Juha Saarela, the CEO of Puuilo. Here is Puuilo CFO, Ville Ranta, also as usually.
Good morning.
In today presentation, we will go through the third quarter and year-to-date results for Puuilo. After the presentation, you will have an opportunity to ask questions. Here is the agenda for today. First, I will go through the key numbers and main events for the reporting period, followed by Ville's presentation of the financial development in more detail. After that, I will restate Puuilo's strategy and long-term financial target, as well as the outlook for the financial year 2022. As we are still a fairly new listed company, I will take the opportunity to present Puuilo as an investment briefly. Finally, we will conclude the presentation with Q&A. First, we will look at the main topics of the Q3. In the third quarter, that will say August to October, our net sales increased by almost 15%, and the like-for-like net sales by almost 11%.
This is a very strong performance. Our growth is clearly higher than the market on average, which means that we continue to get new customers and grow our market share. The growth was again driven by the increase in the number of customers, but also the basket size increased. The net sales increased strongly every month within the third quarter. Our growth was broad-based and generated by both old and new stores and by the online store. The gross margin was slightly decreased, but only moderately concerning the current operating environment. The gross margin was affected by the increase in purchasing prices, including higher cost of logistics.
We have been able to maintain the good level of gross margin because we have been able to pass on the increased purchasing prices onto customer prices, but without losing our price perception. The gross margin was also supported by our private label products, representing constantly growing share of the net sales. In September, we opened our 35th store in Sastamala. The start of the store has completely met our expectations. We are very satisfied with our Q3 performance in the current operating environment. Now we will continue with the year-to-date results covering the period from February to October. The beginning of the financial year was challenging for us, as it was for many others. We had both strong financial performance in Q1 in previous year and the operating environment this year was exceptional.
The outbreak of the war in Ukraine in late February, as well as the late spring, moved the start of the spring season forward by more than a month. Customer confidence lowered and fuel and other energy prices rose rapidly, followed by the rise of inflation. The spring that started in May and the successful summer season turned into strong growth in demand and sales. The number of customers as well as basket size increased, especially in June and July, and the growth of sales has continued since then. We increased our net sales by almost 10% and like-for-like net sales by more than 5% compared to previous year. The Tampere Lielahti store was relocated to the larger premises in May, and Sastamala store was opened in September.
The operation of our new online store picking warehouse in Espoo was started as planned. The effects of the sudden and unexpected events last spring remained short-term, and the sales decrease, it was only temporary. The demand for Puuilo product range quickly returned to normal levels. The sales growth in summer and autumn, and especially the increase in the number of customers, shows that Puuilo's concept is quite defensive and works well in everyday life. Good. Now, Ville, it is your turn, please.
Thank you, Juha. Next, let's go into the figures in more detail and start with the net sales. The net sales for the quarter Q3 was exactly EUR 80 million, it grew by 14.8%. At the same time, the like-for-like net sales grew by 10.8%, which was very strong. The growth came from all store types, old stores, new stores, and online store. The main driver of growth was the increase in customer traffic. Roughly broken down, the number of customers corresponded to about 11% of the increase in net sales, the increase in the basket size then brought the rest, which is about 4%. The increase in the customer basket is due to the moderate price increases we made, but also by the fact that we were able to increase the number of products per receipt.
When analyzing the long trend, the number of sold-out product articles per receipt has been constantly increasing. When looking these figures mentioned above, it's difficult to find any weak point in the current sales development. During Q3, we opened one new store in Sastamala, like, stated before. Cumulatively, our net sales at the end of Q3 was around EUR 228 million, and it grew by 9.8% compared to the last year. Like-for-like, cumulative net sales development was 5.2%. The increase in net sales came from all store types. Here, I recall the previous net sales development of the current financial year. At the beginning of the year in Q1, the growth remained modest, turned into a good flight in the spring-summer period, meaning Q2. This excellent net sales development pipeline continued in Q3.
It seems that the whole year is turning out to be quite good performance, despite the low level of consumer confidence and other challenges in the operating environment. In summary of the growth rates, growth rate of net sales, it could be stated that the Puuilo's concept proved its endurance once again. We are satisfied with the performance. We move on to the gross margin. In Q3, the gross margin was 36.6% of net sales, and it decreased by 0.7% its points compared to the previous year. Taking into account the inflation and the record low level of consumer confidence, we think that the gross margin level is good.
In addition, if we compare the level with the development of the current financial year, we have been able to increase the margin level one quarter after another. The margin level has been supported by moderate price increases, which we have, however, been done reasonably, remembering that the consumer can trust Puuilo's prices. In addition, we have managed to increase the share of sales of own private label brands even further. It is no secret that the sales volume of own brands will break the previous records this year. Cumulatively, our gross margin level was 36.9% of net sales, and it decreased by 0.9 percentage points compared to the previous year.
We see this decrease as temporary, which is still affected by the higher than usual level of inventory, which generates items that affects the gross margin for some time to come. We have been able to turn our inventory level in a clear downward direction, which I tell you more in after two slides. Cumulatively, the gross margin is supported by the already mentioned increase of sales prices and the increase in the share of own products of net sales. In summary, we could therefore say that the current level does not satisfy us, but the level is tolerable in the current operating environment.
We also have some tools to maintain or even increase the current gross margin level, where we have the help of the mentioned measures aimed at reducing inventory levels and further increasing the share of our own products in accordance with our strategy. Next, we look the EBITDA development. Adjusted EBITDA for Q3 was EUR 14.9 million and 18.6% of net sales. Adjusted EBITDA increased by EUR 1.8 million compared to the last year's Q3. The performance was strong, and we are satisfied with the level of EBITDA achieved. The background of good EBITDA level was the increase in net sales, the level of the gross margin, and the excellent control of operating expenses. We were able to squeeze the relative level of operating expenses lower than the comparison period.
We did determined work on almost all operating expense lines. A special mention goes to the improvement of the company's work shift planning process and the training of the store personnel for that. At the same time, we have recruited new personnel in the house. Now you can see the efficiency growth on all these from numbers. Cumulative adjusted EBITDA was EUR 39.1 million, and it increased by EUR 0.5 million compared to the previous year. Cumulatively, we are so to speak back on track in terms of adjusted EBITDA %. Our relative level of adjusted EBITDA reaches our long-term target range, which is 17%-19% of net sales.
In this year, previous result releases, we have promised to pay a special attention to raising the EBITDA level with the help of our list of measures, which can also be seen later in this presentation in CEO's part. The implementation of the measures can be seen nicely in the figures which we reported now. We will continue on this path at least until the end of the financial year or until the goals have been achieved. Next, a few words about inventory levels. Here you can see the development of Puuilo's inventory levels over the past seven quarters.
As you can see from the picture, we increased the inventory levels on purpose, especially for our own products during the last financial year at the beginning of the year in order to ensure the availability of goods in an exceptional operating environment. Due to the delayed spring and consumers' uncertainty caused by Ukrainian war, the level of inventories grew higher than planned, especially during Q1. At that time, we launched a systematic program to reduce inventory levels, which we have carried all out during the last two quarters now. And the results can be seen. In the last six months, the value of inventories has decreased as much as EUR 40 million. All this has been done without significant discount sales campaigns or inventory dumping operations. This has also protected our margins.
Our goal is still to continue the decrease in inventory levels towards the same relative levels where we were at in the first half of last year, meaning to 2021. The decrease in inventory levels is also nicely affected in the cash flow and the company's cash reserves. This can be seen on the following slides. About the cash flow. In Q3, the cash flow strengthened and grew by EUR 13.5 million totaling to EUR 60 million. Cash flow increased due to a good EBITDA and positive change in working capital. Cash conversion % rose to a good level, and we expect that a result of optimizing inventory levels, it will reach an even higher level during the end of the financial year. Cumulatively, Puuilo generated operating free cash flow, EUR 48.8 million.
Cash flow increased by almost EUR 31 million compared to the previous year and was therefore very strong. It should be also be mentioned that the very strong cash flow is the result of actions in the working capital and operating expenses and of course, good sales. Good cash flow, we can only be satisfied with this. A few more words about the balance sheet. The ratio of the company's net debt to adjusted EBITDA decreased, meaning improved compared to the comparison period. The current ratio of net debt to adjusted EBITDA is in line with our goals. Puuilo's cash and cash equivalents at the end of Q3 were EUR 31.5 million, and the company's financial position is stable.
A strong cash position gives Puuilo a financial buffer, defensiveness, and also enables the ability to pay dividends in the future. Here are the figures as a summary, which we already went through. Good numbers, good result during Q3 and cumulatively. Juha will continue from this.
Good. Thank you, Ville. I will go through Puuilo's strategy and targets for the coming years. Despite the changes in the operating environment, there haven't been a need to revise our growth strategy. Our long-term targets are still valid. We will open new stores every year. By the end of the year, we will open one new store along with at least four more next year. Negotiations are underway for 2024 and will be announced once they have been agreed and confirmed. Our store network is rather young. About half of stores are less than five years old. It is therefore reasonable to expect the sales to further increase in the coming years as Puuilo brand awareness increases. Increasing the number of private label products is an important strategic goal for us.
This is how we stand out, have more flexible pricing model, and are able to increase the gross profit. We are profitable company, and we continue to maintain the profitably along with growth. The cost control has been good the whole year. Puuilo is store-based business, but online store is a part of our concept, not only because of online sales, but also as a source of product information, as well as selling price and availability information for our customers. Online store also increases the number of visits in our stores. Our targets have remained the same as communicated before, despite the challenges at the beginning of the financial year and the exceptional operating environment. We aim to net sales above EUR 400 million by the end of the financial year 2025, and adjusted EBITDA margin at least between 17%-19%. Good.
Now we will take a look at Puuilo's outlook for this financial year. We have refined the forecast for adjusted EBITDA to be EUR 46 million-EUR 50 million. Previously, we forecasted the adjusted EBITDA to be between EUR 40 million and EUR 50 million. Our strong summer and autumn season, as well as continued strong sales growth, together with only a moderate drop in gross margin compared to Q3 previous year. We have been able to increase our gross margin compared from Q1 this year. This led to our forecasted adjusted EBITDA to be between EUR 46 million and EUR 50 million. We forecast that our net sales will increase compared to financial year 2021, the net sales growth to remain below the long-term annual growth of 10%. The forecast continues to include more elements of uncertainty than usual.
The war in Ukraine has created uncertainty in everyday life, it affect people's lives in both directly and indirectly in different ways. The electricity price and the higher interest rates, as well as higher cost of living, are weakening purchasing power and increasing price awareness. As we have discussed before, the growth and performance of the past years have proven Puuilo's concept and strategy to work well even in these circumstances. We think that the increased price awareness creates a competitive advantage for Puuilo as a discount retailer. Thus, our relative competitiveness is even better. Our core business is to sell time-lasting, everyday products for handy people. Many retailers have now facing challenges in selling more expensive products. In Puuilo, the share of this type of goods is rather small. Most of the products sold in Puuilo cost less than EUR 10 .
We believe that Puuilo's growth continues, our strategy works, and we are moving towards our targets. We are making determined progress towards our targets. Good. Next, we will take a look at our focus areas in this year. As part of our Q2 reporting, we presented our focus areas for more second half of the financial year 2022, this year. Now I can say that we did what we promised to do. We have one more opening for the current financial year, as we will open a new store in Lieto in January next year, provided no delays occur. Our Sastamala store was successfully opened in the beginning of September. We also opened a store in Tornio last month, and the sales started very well there as well.
I will take the opportunity to once again thank our personnel for their hard work. Puuilo's marketing stands out. It is different and easy to recognize. There are still a lot of potential customers to whom Puuilo is little unknown, and they haven't visited our stores yet. Of course, one reason is that we don't have a fully comprehensive store network in Finland yet. In Puuilo, we focus on the essentials, and it is reflected in our fixed expenses. Our focus is on people, customers, products, price level, and availability because they are the most important factors affecting our performance. Despite the higher operating expenses compared to previous year, we have been able to maintain higher profitability that the retail business on average.
The inventory levels are decreasing as planned, but they are still slightly higher than usually, mainly for summer products. We will continue our work to optimize the stock turnover, which has already improved as planned. Overall, there are no longer any special problems with availability of goods or delivery times. Our purchase operations are back in normal also. A few words about the store network development. In September, we opened a new store in Sastamala, and in November, a store was opened in Tornio. We are currently preparing for the opening of our next store in Lieto, it will be open in next January. In the next financial year, stores will be opened in Kerava and Nummela, along with two more stores with top locations in the Helsinki metropolitan area.
More information about the location will be given in the beginning of next year. We are currently working on years 2024, 2025, and several negotiations are in progress. The growth potential is still significant, and we are continuing with the implementation of our growth strategy. As I mentioned at the beginning of the presentation, we will take a closer look at Puuilo as an investment. The retail industry is very broad and includes many kind of actors and business concepts, which succeed in different ways in different demand and economic situation. Therefore, we think it is important to clarify how we differentiate us from other players at the retail industry. Puuilo is one of the leading players in the retail and especially in the discount retail market in Finland.
Discount retail market is growing all over the world, and we are part of the trend. Customers have no need to decrease shopping at Puuilo. On the contrary, we offer solution, and our assortment helps our customers, especially in the difficult economic times. People are now saving or at least postponing the purchase of more expensive products. Puuilo focuses on affordable products. We don't sell furniture or for example, televisions. Puuilo has a unique business concept with a unique and wide product assortment preserved low price level and convenient shopping experience. This might sound cliché due to our unique concept, but we have our own place within the retail market. We understand our customers and their life and needs better. We strive to ensure that the entire shopping experience serves our busy, precise, and handy customers as well as possible.
Puuilo has a rather young store network and a modern online store which supports us in increasing the number of customers in our like-for-like stores. We are able to almost double our number of stores. Our growth has clearly outperformed the retail market. We have high profitability and strong cash flow. We are cost leader in retail industry. The results turns into money. Our concept stands out. We have our own place within the retail market. Puuilo is not selling everything to everyone. We are neither a traditional hardware store. There are a lot of specialty products in our range, especially within electrical accessories and in HVAC products, but also building and fixing accessories. We offer convenient shopping experience with affordable prices. Our typical customer is a busy and handy person who appreciates easy shopping with reliable prices.
That is why we are different than others. Soon we have 37 stores, and we still have a lot of potential to grow. Our current stores are located in big and middle-sized towns in Finland, but we see that there are several interesting location where Puuilo could have a store or towns that could have a second Puuilo store. It is completely justified to aim for a network of at least 60 stores, if not more. We have a very efficient and a standardized store opening process, and we have opened 80 new stores during the past five years. We could even speed up the opening pace, but we prefer to keep it under control and maintain our high profitability at the same time.
It takes only a few weeks until a store is ready to be opened, and due to the cost-efficient process, typically our stores are profitable after the first full month of opening. We have opened new stores every year, and our average growth has clearly higher than market and economic growth. 10 years ago, our net sales was about EUR 40 million, and during the past two years, we have grown by EUR 100 million, which is exceptional considering Puuilo's size category. Even if it's natural that a small company can have a strong growth, Puuilo's growth is clearly higher than the market average, something we can see this year too. This also shows that there's a room for our concept in the market. We have successfully implemented our effective growth strategy.
As I said earlier today, there is a potential to almost double the number of our stores in coming years. Good. Thank you. Now we will move on to the questions. Moderator, you can open the line, please.
If you wish to ask a question, please dial star five on your telephone keypad to enter the queue. If you wish to withdraw your question, please dial star five again on your telephone keypad. Please state your name and company. Please go ahead.
Svante Krokfors from Nordea. Good morning. Thank you, Juha Saarela and Ville Ranta, for a very good presentation. A couple of questions. First one regarding your strong like-for-like growth, a bit behind the drivers. Can you elaborate a bit on should we assume that half of that is price increases and rest is organic?
Like we said, the most of the sales growth came from the customer traffic growth and the price increases or the inflation part is a minor part of the growth. We see that it's very healthy growth, which we have achieved.
One should assume very moderate price increases then?
Moderate price increases and, like I said, in my part, we have managed also to push more products on the per receipt per customer. The customers, we win more customers, and customers are buying more products per receipt than in history.
Okay. Thank you. Do you have any comments on sales development after Q3 and perhaps was the sales development stable growth within Q3?
Thank you. Yes, Q4 is. Let's say we are in middle of that, but we are quite confident that our concept works in this situation. When customer face it, the difficulties and the price awareness is higher than before, we believe that our concept works well in near future.
Thank you. Do you want to comment on current development of purchase prices and also elaborate a bit on your freight cost development?
Yes. Purchasing prices are higher than, for example, one year ago, and as we mentioned that we have succeeded to increase our selling prices, but same time we have kept our eyes open and take care our price perceptions. Freight cost especially from China and Far East are, let's say, they are in normal level just now. We saw that situation in last summer. Now that the price level is normal, but same time, um, Euro and USD, US dollar currencies are in different state than before.
it means that the situation in compared to one year ago, situation one year ago is quite, let's say, normal, and that is why our purchasing processes and is an organization they works quite a normal mode just now.
Okay. Thank you. Regarding inventory, definitely trending in the right direction. You mentioned that Emergency preparedness products sold well. Did that have a meaningful impact on inventory decline or was it more broad-based?
It's quite broad-based, but like we said, we have managed to push the inventory levels down without any big discount sales or dumping operations. As you know, we are selling mostly the basic and cheap stuff to the customers. We have just made a new orders wisely than before. As we have a big inventory, we have managed to use that for the sales growth. Sales growth purposes, rather than ordering a new products in the warehouse. Basic operations for us, but this has been done really nicely at this point.
Thanks. Coming back to the like-for-like growth, was it, if I understood correctly, that there has been, I mean, the stores that contribute to your like-for-like, there's no difference between the newer ones and older ones in contributing to the like-for-like growth?
Can you repeat? What do you mean? Of course, the like-for-like growth is the same store sales. There is no stores included in that figure which we are opened, let's say, less than two years ago on average.
No, but I thought.
Yep. The like-for-like growth was.
I thought about.
Yes, please.
If there's a difference between the stores opened two years ago or before that. I mean.
Of, of-
The stores that.
Of course, the newer stores are growing faster than the old ones. You mean that is there variation between the like-for-like stores?
Correct, yes.
Okay. Yeah, there is some variation, but I can say that the overall the performance has been really strong. Yeah. Of course, there are some stores which are performing over 20% growth in like-for-like store group. Let's say in general and of course, on average, the performance was really good in all the line.
Okay, thank you. The last question regarding leases. Could you elaborate a bit? I guess they are mostly CPI linked. Could you elaborate on that? Also if the current inflationary level, it appears not to have an impact on your willingness to open new stores.
No, we are proceeding with the growth strategy as stated. Yes, you're right that the most of the contracts are CPI related contracts. We have received already some rent increase, of course, because the inflation rate is now so high. We will see the effect next year fully when the contract updates come one by one. Our estimate, what we have done, some preliminary financial plans for the next year is that the effect in euros will be, well, let's say tolerable.
Okay. Thank you. That's all from me.
Thank you.
The next question comes from Kalle Loikkanen from Danske Bank. Please go ahead.
Yes. Good morning. This is Kalle from Danske Bank. Perhaps a question on the sales. You mentioned in the report that products related to preparing for emergencies, that the demand for these products has been high. Can you elaborate on how big share of the sales growth these products represent in Q3?
Actually, it's quite low. We just want to give you some examples what the consumers are, well, doing at that moment. Like we stated, we have seen a huge growth in aggregators or the firewood accessories and so on. Those products all together are representing, well, I would say that less than 10% of the whole net sales mix. The most of the products we are selling are those everyday fixing and repairing and maintenance products, which we are selling normally anyway.
Okay. Good. Good. That's very helpful. Perhaps on the kind of net sales development, perhaps we touched upon that already, a very strong sales development in the third quarter. Also building on a quite good second quarter, have you seen any changes in the demand or sales trend now in the early parts of the fourth quarter?
Well, it's a difficult question because, of course, officially we don't want to comment the quarter which is not reported. Let's put it that way that it has started nicely and the train usually doesn't stop suddenly.
Okay. Got it. Thank you. Then perhaps lastly on the gross margins. At the Q2 results, you said that you would expect the gross margin to be at the same level in H2 as in H1. Now then in Q3, the margin was a bit higher than that. Should we still expect that the gross margin in H2 will be the same as in H1 or which, I mean, would mean that the margin would drop in Q4?
Is it so that perhaps you know, things have turned out better than you anticipated at the end of the second quarter and gross margin in Q4 should be quite okay?
It should be remembered that of course now the main thing which affects our gross margin at the moment is the inventory and the extra inventory costs is one of the big factor behind that. Like you saw from our presentation that we have managed to push the inventory levels down maybe more faster than we expected. Of course that has a positive effect on the gross margin, and we see that we can continue this development during the Q4. If we look at the cumulative gross margin percentage at the moment, it's 36.1%. I think that you can expect that it will remain more or less on the same level for the whole financial year. Maybe a bit higher, but let's see.
Okay. Okay. That's very helpful. That's all for me. Thank you very much.
Thank you.
As a reminder, if you wish to ask a question, please dial star five on your telephone keypad. There are no more questions at this time, so I hand the conference back to the speakers.
Good. Thank you for the questions. I think that's all. Thank you for all participants. A special thanks to all coworkers in Puuilo for the good work.