Good morning, and welcome to the TOK Monday First Quarter Presentation. My name is Micah Routian, and together with me today to do the presentation is TOK Manley CFO, Mr. Marco Pireskareen. Let's jump right away into the figures. From our point of view, we had in Tocmanni, we had good performance during the Q1.
Revenue grew by 5.8%, and I'm especially happy about the like for like revenue growth, which was 4.4% compared to last year's 4.1%. So I think that this was a good achievement. And we were able to improve our gross margin, which was 32.1% compared with last year's 31 point 2%. Our target for the Q1 was to have a first time positive result for the Q1 performance. And we're especially happy about the fact that we were able to get the positive we succeeded and we got €2,200,000 €2,000,000 loss.
If we compare TOKMANI's performance with the non food market in Finland based on the stats from Finnish Grocery Trade Association, we performed well as well. At the same time, we all have to take into consideration that these stats, they don't include the online retail sales of, for example, from abroad. But anyway, good performance. Some of the highlights for the Q1. As already mentioned, like for like revenue developed very well.
And for Tochmani, this lack of normal winter season in the southern part of Finland was actually more critical than coronavirus during the Q1 when it comes to revenue performance. Now the southern part of Finland, it's we're talking about 70% of Tochmani customers. And lacking the normal winter season. Of course, it did have an effect on the business, but I think that we managed this quite well. However, some of the winter products were left for the coming season after the end of the winter season.
And as already mentioned, it was like a combination of good sales performance, improved gross margin and efficient operations that we managed to end up with a positive comparable EBIT for the first time in TOK Mainnet's history. Due to coronavirus, we canceled our guidance for 2020 on 26th March and started the changes with the action plan already in the first part of the first half of March. Some facts about the well, impact on coronavirus on Togmani business during the Q1. We have this Togmani Europe is Shanghai Trading Office. And of course, we heard already during the Chinese New Year about the virus itself.
And we started basically daily contacts with our Shanghai office to get more information about, of course, about the delays with the supply chain and deliveries. And at its worst, it was like 3 week 3 to 4 week delays with deliveries. But for the moment, this part of the supply chain is quite okay. Actually, goods coming from China are now even faster over here in Finland than expected. But in the beginning of February, we faced basically 3 to 4 weeks delays.
And of course, the grocery sales increased a lot when the start of the panic buys started, when about, well, toilet papers, cleaning products and things like this. And when the government set the restrictions, then we faced a clear drop with customer visits. From our point of view, the change was quite dramatic because we've basically been able to increase the customer visits during the last 2 years. So suddenly, a drop with the customer visits was, from our point of view, quite dramatic. However, the customer behavior, of course, changed, and basket size increased strongly.
And of course, online sales started a strong growth also in the end of March. Well, from top money point of view, online sales, it's been only 0 0.6% of the total sales during 2019. So we're talking about quite limited part of business, but still the strong growth with our online business started at the end of March. And of course, a small part of the or let's say, the biggest or the strongest sales were coming from the sports and leisure product groups and yard and garden. The spring season almost started in Finland, so the Yard and Garden products had very, very strong sales already in by the end of March.
And of course, cleaning and tidying and home decoration. We started the investments in the development on our digital services and online business already in the beginning of February. And since the customers with our online business, it has well, they're basically more than 5 times more customers than before. So obviously, we're able to also get a lot of customer feedback and we're able to develop our online services based on the customer feedback. And with our online sales, based on the customer feedback, we're the target is also to expand the product range, even multiply that.
It's currently approximately 20,000 SKUs. So the action points expanding the product range are already happening at the moment. Most of the action points regarding the crisis or the coronavirus epidemic and the crisis itself, actually, from Tochmani's point of view, they happened already during the second half of March. A lot of action points were done regarding the safety in stores for our personnel in stores, in our warehouse, in our office and of course, also the safety regarding customer visits. A lot of these action points took place already in March.
And of course, these have a clear effect on additional costs as well. There will be like additional costs regarding the safety for our personnel in stores and in our warehouse also during the Q2, probably during the Q3 as well. But anyway, I'm very happy that we were able to very, very quickly do these action points. And that's why things are already getting better during this or we see already things getting a little bit better during the Q2. Of course, that has something to do with development in the Finnish society as well.
At this point of time, I would like to say many thanks to TOKamani employees. Over here in Finland as well as in Shanghai regarding the commitment and excellent work during these exceptional times. And then let's go to let's dig a little bit deeper to the financial figures. Marco, please go ahead.
Okay. Thank you. So as Mika said, a little bit deeper concerning the financial figures. Let's start it about this quarterly based graph. And this graph is, as said also earlier, tells us that the TOG Mahinde business is clearly seasonal.
Normally, the first quarter is the lowest one, and then in normal situation, 2nd and third quarter is roughly on the same level, and then the 4th quarter is clearly the biggest for Talk Money. Here, you can see the red bars, which is the Q1 figures. And I have to say that we are satisfied for this like for like revenue growth we achieved now during the Q1 2020 with 4.4%. Last year, it was 4.1%. And if we look with 2018 Q1 figure, at that time, we achieved roughly 6% like for like growth.
So that means that we have had now 3 consecutive quarters, which we have had a nice like for like growth. Comparable gross profit. On our long term targets, we have said that we are trying to improve our gross margin. And now when we are looking for Q1 numbers, we see that we managed to achieve 0.9% improvement by ending to 32.1%. And the things which we have already earlier said that we are trying to improve or increase the share of direct imports and private label products.
We managed to do that during the Q1. But of course, at the same time, when this crisis situation started, our product mix changed in March a bit, and then we sold more grocery products, which have a lower margin. And that, of course, affected a bit for Q1 margin figures. As said, we increased the direct import share and ending up to 23.6% during the Q1 now to 2020. And I have to say also at the same time that we were when you look this red portion from that bar, that we were able to utilize our import through Shanghai office, which is, of course, cool to because we have targeted to do that.
Also said, Bradford private label share increased and now up to 29.1 percent last year, 28.1%. Operating expenses. If we look for relative share of these expenses, we have targeted to improve that share. Now we managed to do that a bit, ending to 24 point 4% compared to last year's 24.9%. And as I have said also earlier that when we are able to increase our like for like revenue and also the total revenue and at the same time, we are keeping our expenses well in control.
That will mean that this share will improve. But of course, when we now start the end of Q1, when this crisis started, we have some extra expenses to make our stores and our logistics center on safe places to work. There were different kind of actions, for example, on shifts that the people were not meet each other and so on. And that, of course, affected to the this ratio clearly. And of course, have to remember also at the same time it's obvious that these expenses will continue on some level during the Q2.
Okay. Comparable EBIT, nice improvement, euros 2,500,000 improvement and ending up to on comparable EBIT at the level of €300,000 On that time, I have to say that cash flow and financial position are very critical. And of course, we have put our eyes on that and really concentrate on that. This is on good shape. Starting from inventories.
If you look at balance sheet items here, the increase of inventories were higher compared to the like for like or total revenue increase, and there are 2 different kind of items which affected to that one. If we look at our winter was missing somewhat half of Finland this year. That, of course, affected to that, we have still some products which we were not able to mid-twenty products which we were not able to sell. And of course, they are now on warehouse. And the good thing is, of course, that there are some products which we are able to settle next year.
But for example, if we speak about the winter clothing, that's a bit, bit, bit more difficult issue. Other thing which affected to the level of inventory was that when this panic buying started, we really ordered some products to guarantee that we have products in our stores to sell. And when we look at situation at the end of March, we clearly have more this kind of products in our inventories. And these two issues really affected to the level of inventory. When we look our cash or basically cash or financial position, As you see here that we are we have a certain limits or credit limits which we are able to use, and we are speaking about roughly €58,000,000 at this moment, and that gives us a good space to make our normal activities.
So we can say that the Toquan's Toquanese liquidity is at good level. Looking our debt situation. Total number of interest bearing debt is 4 25,000,000, and the biggest portion out of that is coming of out our rental liabilities based on these IFRS 16 booking principles. But if you look what kind of real bank loans we have, we have noncurrent loans, €100,000,000 and the current loans, €13,900,000 so totaling roughly €114,000,000 which is so called bank loans. So smaller portion out of this €425,000,000 Net capital expenditure.
So investments, a little bit higher level during Q1 compared to last year, now 3,200,000 euros And looking what we're really looking very carefully what kind of investments we are doing and at this situation and consider every detailed investments and investment decision because you have to be very careful with your cash flow. But at this moment, we are estimating that our investments during 2020 is at the level of €15,000,000 So I will transfer speeds for Mikael again. Thank you, Marco. Thanks.
Thank you for the review. In the end of 2019, we decided that our key focus for 2020 will be strengthening the discount retailer business model, which basically means low prices, interesting assortment and very efficient supply chain management. Now in this current situation, this focus, of course, stays and is even stronger at the moment because especially the low price level with all the layoffs and uncertainty, that's very important for our customers. But of course, we are adding or we have to adapt to the changes in the market environment, and that's why we've been really focusing on quick reaction on the different market changes and changes with the whole society, with the whole situation. Some of the impacts of coronavirus from Tochmani's point of view.
As already mentioned earlier, we kind of saw the biggest action points already during the Q1. But of course, the biggest impacts we estimate will happen during the Q2. These have something to do with, of course, with all the restrictions and the decisions of Finnish government and things like this. So of course, there is a big uncertainty, but this is how we see it. The biggest impact on top of my business business will happen during the Q2.
Regarding the Q2, it will be, of course, still a lower level on customer visits, but at the same time, the average basket is higher. So there is like a clear change with the customer behavior. And yes, at the moment, we are all the time, basically every day observing that like how the changes are moving day by day. But at the moment, this is the clear change with the customer behavior. And of course, as already mentioned as well by Marco and myself, there will be additional costs on the safety issues regarding our employees and customers, of course.
And well, we can see a very strong development on our online business all the time. So that's, of course, backing up the situation very nicely. But of course, it's still compared to our 191 stores, it's still a smaller part of the business. We estimate that during the Q3, there will be, of course, already a lot of stabilization happening from a Toquemane's point of view. And of course, there is always the uncertainty.
But still, we have already plans that we will return to normal opening hours at the moment, especially in the Togman is located in shopping malls. We've basically reduced the opening hours because the shopping malls are basically losing most of the customers at the moment. And we can we feel that we can also normalize the workplace arrangements where basically, especially in the warehouse and in the stores, people are our employees are working in the small teams to make sure that they will that people will stay as healthy as possible. And of course, a very clear chance for or a very clear, yes, opportunity for discounter is buying the stock lots, which there exist quite a lot at the moment, and this is something that we will clearly look at already during the Q2. And then, of course, we feel that or we estimate at the moment that the 4th quarter will be a time of recovery.
We can concentrate we estimate that we can fully concentrate on the Christmas season during the Q4. And basically, we can deliver the discount to retailer business model, which is the low price level, an interesting assortment. But of course, everything has to do with the consumer confidence, which is in Finland at the moment, it's on a very, very low level. And of course, the amount of money available for after the layoffs and things like this, these have something to do. And of course, especially with possible new restrictions or how the restrictions will be withdrawn and so on.
These all, of course, they have an effect on Togmani's business. The as mentioned, the economic and the industries outlook has changed rapidly, And we won't be issuing guidance for 2020. Once the visibility improves and uncertainties have cleared, then of course, we will update our outlook and issue a new guidance. Hopefully, this can happen during the half year by the half year financial review, which will be published on in 3 months' time on 29th July. So thank you very much.
And I believe now it's time for questions. Thank you.
Our first question comes from the line of Manon Collon from Erasmus Castellon.
Castellon.
I have 3. First, you thought about extra cost to the COVID-nineteen safety plans. Can you maybe detail more on that one, especially in terms of numbers? You talked as well about cost saving measures. Can you give us a sense of how much it would be?
Same question. And then on flow of customers, you said it decreased significantly end of March. What are you seeing in April? And what are you seeing in the last few days now that looks like the peak is behind us now? And I think some restriction of movement has been lifted.
And in Finland, I'm not sure. So what have you seen so far in April? Thank you very much.
Thank you for the questions. Marco, would you like to start with the first one?
What was the first one?
The line wasn't unfortunately, the line wasn't so clear for us. So could you please repeat the first question?
Sorry. So my first question was on how much do you plan or next track up due to COVID-nineteen?
Sorry. Now I can't follow. I'm very sorry about that. Could you somewhat
repeat that? I'm very sorry. Can you hear me? Hello? So my question was, how much do you plan to have on extra costs due to COVID-nineteen, additional costs?
Okay. Now sorry, sorry. Now I got it. Yes. Of course, it's very difficult to estimate the exact increase of extra costs.
And now we are or at the end of March, we clearly saw some extra costs when we started to make this safety arrangement in our stores and putting different kind of shelters, putting hand hygiene material and this kind of stuff. And of course, they all cost when you have 190 stores. And of course, that will continue. That's clear. And we are speaking, of course, very difficult to estimate exact figures, but some 100 of 1000, that's clear.
And otherwise, of course, it's depending how this situation will develop and how what kind of restrictions we have when we are speaking about, for example, how much we are paying salaries because that's that is dependent and how many different kind of special arrangements we have to have in shifts and in stores or logistic center. And it's absolutely very, very difficult to estimate here at this time. This other issue is easier, but with other side, it's more difficult.
And I think that the second question was regarding the kind of savings program. And well, TOK MONEY first of all, TOK MONEY, we didn't do any layoffs. We actually, we were able to cut actually quite a big part of the hours from our stores. But we at the moment, we're back to almost like normal level because the spring season is the 2nd biggest season for TOKMANI, and we have to make sure that our stores are on a good shape. And all the, for example, garden department as well as springsummer clothing departments are good enough for our customers, even though the level of customer visits are is still a little bit lower.
But otherwise, regarding the savings program, we're basically still negotiating the rental agreements. That's, of course, very difficult. We've basically stopped all the development projects for the moment. And of course, we're being extremely cautious with all the additional costs, But that's how a discounter basically behaves otherwise as well. So it's a little bit limited that we're able to do if we're basically not doing any layoffs on things like this.
And I think that the third question was regarding the customer visits. And yes, it's as mentioned earlier, during the last couple of years, we've used to the fact that customer visits are increasing. And it's of course, in the end of March, it was very dramatic due to the fact that basically the Finnish government was telling everybody in Finland to stay at home. And of course, it showed also in our customers' behavior. Yes, we can see that like it's the situation is improving at the moment, but it's still lower level compared to, for example, last year.
And at the same time, well, there is this consumer behavior change. Well, while people are visiting the stores less often and buying more at the same time. So we definitely need to follow that day by day to see how things will develop. But at the moment, the situation is not that dramatic due to the higher basket size of our customers. I hope that these were good enough answers to your questions.
It was. Thank you very much. Thank you. And there seems to be no further questions at the moment. So I will hand the word back to our speakers for any final comments.
Please go ahead.
Thank you very much, and thank you for following the presentation. As mentioned, we, of course, observe the situation in Finland and for Tochmani daily very, very much. And we of course, we try to make the guidance as quickly as possible. But at the moment, the situation in Finland is still so uncertain that we are not able to give any new guidance in the coming weeks, but we definitely hope to be able to do that during the Q2. And we'll see that latest by the 29th July.
Thank you very much.