Ladies and gentlemen, good morning and welcome to the Cello World Q4 FY 2025 Earnings Conference Call hosted by ICICI Securities Limited. As a reminder, all participant lines will remain in the listen-only mode, and there will be an opportunity for you to ask questions after the presentation concludes. Should you need assistance during the conference call, please signal the operator by pressing Star then Zero on your touch-tone telephone. Please note that this conference is being recorded. I now hand the conference over to Mr. Karan Bhuwania from ICICI Securities Limited for opening remarks. Thank you, and over to you, Karan.
Thank you. Good morning, everyone. It's a pleasure at ICICI Securities to host Q4 FY 2025 Results Conference Call of Cello World. From the management, we have Mr. Gaurav Rathod, Joint Managing Director, and Mr. Atul Parolia, CFO. I'll hand over the call to management for their opening remarks post which we can open for the Q&A. Thank you. Over to you, sir.
Thank you. Good morning, everyone, and a very warm welcome to our company's earnings call. Joining me is our CFO, Mr. Atul Parolia, and our Investor Relations Advisor, SGA. The results and presentations are available on the stock exchange and on our website. I hope you had a chance to look at it. Financial year 2025 brought with it a unique set of challenges that tested industries, economies, and business across the globe. In the Indian consumer space specifically saw subdued demand environment. However, at Cello World, we delivered a 7% year-on-year growth backed by a healthy business model and resilient margins. We are proactively adapting to the challenging situation in a timely manner and have started making strategic modifications in our product portfolio and distribution strategies.
We have added some new SKUs and discontinued a few products which were not performing well in terms of volumes, margins, and ROCE perspective. We've also relooked at our distribution strategy as we see a major shift towards quick commerce and e-commerce. This is expected to bring down share of general trade. We have also tied up with most of the quick commerce players and added products that can do very well in this channel. I'm pleased to share that we delivered a healthy performance in Q4, achieving the highest ever quarterly revenue of INR 589 crore, with a growth of 15% year-on-year. While EBITDA and PAT margins remaining stable at 26% and 16%, respectively. This quarter was better as compared to the previous quarters in terms of consumer demand, as well as we continue to benefit from reduction in input costs.
Both of these, along with a boost in our glassware, also contributes towards healthy business growth. Additionally, some correction has also happened during this quarter, hopefully leading towards better upcoming months. Our consumer-based business did exceptionally well with a year-on-year growth of 24%. The glass drinkware products manufactured in-house are well accepted by the customers, and we are getting a good response, especially for the quality of these products. Currently, we are pricing these products on par with the import prices and are able to maintain a similar margin profile. As we are passing through a learning curve this quarter, we primarily focus on improving our cost efficiencies and are aiming to reach to about 75% efficiency levels in the next two to three months. This year, our target is to break even in the glass space, as we expect to exhaust our capacity by FY 2027.
Similarly, our opalware business also performed pretty well, reaching almost 80% of our furnace that is sold until FY 2025. We hope to exhaust the capacity of this furnace in the FY 2026. There was a change in BIS norms for stainless steel vacuum flask bottles due to which import of such products from China has been banned. This resulted in elimination of lots of unorganized players from the market. There is a huge gap that I see now, which we will be able to take advantage of in the longer term. For the time being, we have built up five to six months of inventory for these products and have already ordered machines to be used for manufacturing of such vacuum steel bottles in-house. This is a massive opportunity in the long term.
As I mentioned, we might see short-term stock outs that could affect sales in the near short term. Now, coming to the Writing Instruments vertical, we continue to face challenges in terms of export demand slowdown, due to which the segment revenue stood at INR 78 crore as against INR 87 crore in Q4 last year. However, we see some signs of recovery in demand scenario from exports as well as domestic market and are hoping for things to improve in the coming year. To better manage the situation, we are working towards diversifying our Unomax product baskets by adapting new product lines such as art-related products, geometry boxes, et c. Finally, coming to the furniture business, the performance was in line with the trends of the industry, but we managed to deliver growth of 8%, which is slightly better than the overall industry growth.
We are planning to add up some products into this category, which can help us grow at a faster rate than the industry. We continue to have a premium approach towards our products and focus on expanding our reach and penetrating deeper into all the states of India. On the back of a strong balance sheet position and healthy operating cash flows, the company is well positioned to grow faster Scenario improves. I will now hand over towards the CFO, Mr. Atul Parolia, for the financial highlights. Thank you very much.
Thank you, Gaurav Rathod, and good morning to everyone. I am happy to announce that Board of Directors has recommended a final dividend of INR 1.50 per share, which is 30% of the face value of INR 5 each for financial year 2024-2025. Now I will be sharing the financial details for the quarter gone by. In quarter four, financial year 2025, we achieved a revenue of INR 589 crore and EBITDA of INR 148 crore with a healthy EBITDA margin of 25%. Our PAT stood at INR 88 crore with a margin of 15%. Speaking of the revenue mix, over 69% of revenue came from the consumer wear, 13% came from the Writing Instrument, and remaining 18% from the moulded furniture and allied products. General trade channel contributed 77% of the sales, while export and online sales made up to around 9% and 8% respectively.
Modern trade growing at a faster rate accounted for the remaining 7%. In terms of segment-wise margin, Writing Instrument led with a 58% gross margin, followed by consumer wear 53%, and moulded furniture at 42%. Now coming to the financial 2025 performance, revenue was INR 2,216 crore with a year-on-year growth of 7%. EBITDA stood at INR 555 crore with a margin of 26%. PAT was INR 339 crore with a margin of 16%. Our cash flow from operation stood at INR 262 crore. During the year, we have reduced our entire debt, and as on March 2025, we are at net cash position. For the full year, we entered a CapEx of around INR 166 crore, which mainly include investment for the glassware facility. Going ahead, for financial 2025-2026, we expect to do a CapEx of around INR 100 crore. Now with this, I would like to open the session for question and answers.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, we will now begin the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press Star and One on their touchtone telephone. If you wish to remove yourself from the question queue, you may press Star and Two. Participants are requested to use their handsets while asking a question. One moment please while we poll for questions. The first question comes from the line of Percy Panthaki from IIFL Securities. Please go ahead.
Hi, team. Good morning. Can you just give some idea what is the sales from the new plant that you have recorded this quarter?
Right. So I think it is an INR 20 crore turnover, basically because the plant was commissioned in February, it is only two months data. We have doubled the sale over last year for the two months. Net-net, it is an INR 10 crore increase.
Oh, okay. It was INR 10 crore. Sorry, I did not understand that because this is a new plant.
No. The idea is that, in the first quarter, because we only got about two months of selling from the new plant, which was February and March. Basically, for the two months, for the quarter, we got an INR 10 crore increase net-net in the glassware. We were doing imports right before.
Oh, okay.
Yeah. Those got substituted as well. That is why net-net it was a INR 10 crore increase in the glass segment.
Okay. I was actually looking at what would be your homeware segment growth adjusted for this new plant, because it is 24% that way. I was just looking for that number.
From that perspective, you can just minus about INR 10 crore and then you would get the growth of the homeware segment overall.
Okay. That is still a decent double-digit growth, right?
Correct. Of course. Absolutely.
Okay. There has been a significant improvement versus what we've seen in the last two, three quarters. Just trying to understand what's the reason behind that. Is that just a pre-sale or a pipeline issue, or there's some real underlying improvement in demand?
No, there was improvement in the last quarter for the demand, of course. There is a slight shift which is why we see a better growth. But of course, it is not a continuous growth. It has just been the last quarter that we've seen this. Because the overall year was a little challenging. But yeah, quarter was good. Let's hope it continues.
Okay. Secondly, you mentioned that you have taken some portfolio rationalization decisions. If you could give some idea that the part that you are rationalizing, what is the annualized sale and annualized EBITDA of that part so that we can sort of try and understand the impact on the FY 2026 financials.
No. The idea is overall rationalization across categories. Normally we all do an 80/20 kind of a product analysis, and through that we found a lot of products that don't need to be a part of inventory, because a lot of these products are very similar to our current products. They're probably cannibalizing sales of other products that are doing very well because either we are not producing them because we are producing the other product and there are orders that were pending for those particular items. In effect, it's not really going to hurt any revenue, because at the end of the day, these are products that either become obsolete or they are products that have just cannibalized other good running products. I think the rationalization comes from the fact that some SKUs are not needed anymore in the portfolio, and that is why they are being removed. I think the underlying basis is only that.
Okay. Basically, you're saying no impact on top line or margins on account of this. Any impact on working capital or any sort of one-time provision or charge that you will be taking if these items are obsolete?
No. When I'm talking about obsolete, this is not inventory that is obsolete. These are products that have become old in our portfolio. There is no inventory hit that we take for this, because that inventory doesn't exist. We are just taking it off our price list so that we are not offering this to our customer anymore. That's about that. In terms of the products, there is of course going to be newer products that are going to come in while we replace these. But if we are replacing, if we are getting rid of 10, we probably add only two. Also, this is from the perspective of the channel as well, that lower inventory in the channel will also help the debtor days come down. The idea is to kind of cleanse the pipeline as well to a certain extent, where we can bring down our debtor days further.
Percy, have your questions been answered by the management? Since there is no response from Percy, we move on to the next question. Before that, ladies and gentlemen, if you wish to ask a question, please press Star and One. The next question comes from the line of Ankur Sharma from HDFC Life Insurance. Please go ahead.
Yeah, thanks. Good morning, sir, and thanks as always for your time. First on the glassware segment, if you could help us, what was the full year sales in FY 2025? I think you were earlier guiding to somewhere around that INR 450 crore, INR 470 odd crore number for the full year. How do you kind of see this shaping up over the next year or so as you ramp up these new plants?
Right. I think for the financial year 2026, our aim is to reach about INR 450 crore, INR 475 crore, around that figure, which will exhaust our glassware capacity by about 65%-70% and we still have some capacity left for next year, which we want to exhaust. The idea is to grow this to that level. Plus we have our open wear capacity, which is about 80% utilized and we would like to exhaust this within this year. That's where we stand in terms of the overall glassware scenario.
I'm sorry. What was the number for FY 2025? Where did you close on glassware?
I think we do not disclose numbers separately for glassware. I am not in a position to give you that on the call.
Okay, fair. Second, you spoke about the stainless steel bottles with this whole BIS coming through and of course imports getting banned and therefore the unorganized kind of moving out. Could you help us, how large is the unorganized, as per you, what percentage of the market would be unorganized? What would be your share in this segment and what could be the market share gains that could happen over the coming quarters?
Right. Stainless steel, of course, is a pretty big category in India and a lot of sales has been hit due to unavailability of this stock industry-wide. I think even a small retailer would be able to order a container, so you can see how fragmented the sale actually was. Talking about our numbers, we were about 12%-13% of this segment. Top three players put together would be about 35%-40% of the business, and the rest was unorganized. I think there is significant gains in the long term that we can expect. Having said that, we will be putting up our facility in the next four to five months. In the short term, we might actually see some reduction in sales due to non-availability of this particular item. But in the long run, we have a lot to gain. Even though there will be some OEM players who will also come into the foray, which have already started, I still feel brands overall will really benefit from this BIS implementation.
Okay. I am assuming the top four, five brands would be the largest player, largest gainer, I am sorry, including yourself. That is how we should see it.
Yes, absolutely.
Okay, fair. Just a third question. You spoke about this shift away from GT and more towards Q-com, E-com. If you will just help us, what would be that share at this point? How does that affect profitability in a positive, negative way? Just some color there to understand how it affects our overall business.
Right. I think online we have increased by about percentage overall. Though in percentage terms it is pretty small, but overall it has. Sorry, 2 percentage points we have increased revenue. But in real terms, the quick commerce tail has really helped us to increase this part. Going forward, I see a faster growth in these channels compared to GT. Though GT is also growing, it is not that it is not growing, but I think the pace of growth on these alternative channels, quick com, e-com, will be a lot faster. I would not be surprised if we have 2 percentage point gains every year in the next coming few years.
Okay. And profitability versus GT?
Profitability, we maintain pretty much similar levels. We do this primarily by differentiating the product line online and offline.
Got that. Just last one, if I may. Clearly, when I look at the Q4 numbers and if I adjust for the glassware sales, houseware clearly has done quite well, likely in that low mid-teen kind of growth. If you could just help us understand, is this more of channel filling before the summers? Is this real demand pickup and second halves have also been equally strong? If yes, which pockets? Is this lunchboxes or is it bottles? Just some more color as to what has driven that growth for us in Q4 and how sustainable. Basically trying to understand as we get into 2026, do you think we can get back to maybe the high single, low teen kind of growth? Yeah, fine.
I think, yes, it has been good overall. Consumer wear demand was pretty good actually in Q4. Having said that, we have not seen continuous growth. Even we experienced this growth in the last quarter as well for a couple of months, and then the December month kind of died down a little bit. We are not seeing consistency here. We are seeing spurts of growth, but that consistency is still not back.
It is tough to say that we continue on this ramp. Having said that, what we can expect in the houseware business is you are right about at least a high single-digit number should be possible and achievable in this coming year. Overall, we think that having glassware also in the portfolio, but that will be slightly offset by the steel flask demand. We still expect about a good 12%-15% kind of growth in the next coming year.
Got that. Great. Thank you so much for your time.
Thank you.
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Grishma Shah from Envision Capital. Please go ahead.
Good morning to the management team, and thanks for taking my question. A couple of questions, if you could also help us understand, one, the INR 100 crore CapEx that we have announced includes the BIS related product CapEx also. That is one. Second is the raw material outlook. Those are the first two questions.
Yes, the INR 100 crore CapEx includes the steel, the new facility that we are putting in Rajasthan. That is a part of it. Sorry, I did not get your second question.
Overall for the business, what is the raw material pricing outlook for FY 2026? You said there was some benefit of lower raw material prices in Q4 compared to Q3. Continuing that, what does the outlook look like in FY 2026?
I think we are pretty much at our lowest point in terms of raw material prices due to subdued crude prices. I believe that the crude prices will continue being like this. That is why I think the raw material prices will be at this level. I do not see too much of fluctuations. I think it will clearly be at this level for this financial year.
Okay. This line, how much time would it take to come on stream the steel bottle plant and will it take till the end of the year, or what does it look like?
I think we will only know once we start. I think our idea is to start in the next three to four months, the facility.
It might take a few months to stabilize. But having said that, you can start production, but maybe the efficiencies might be low initially. It is going to be a learning curve because we still do not make the best bottles in India as good as China. We will, of course, take some time to get to that quality. But having said that, we are all in the same boat, so no one has an advantage as such. We will try our best to make sure we are up and running very quickly.
And in terms of OEM tie-ups, we've not tied up with any OEM in the interim. Is that a stop-gap arrangement that we have in place?
Yeah, we have some bottles coming from OEM, but it's very limited because in India, the production itself is. Production is going to a lot of people. It's not only coming to us, it's going to a lot of people. For that reason, that is why we might see some gaps that might come in in the next few months. But yeah, we are trying to plug that gap as soon as possible with our production.
Okay. The other question was on the opalware side with you. What gives you confidence to exhaust the capacity in FY 2026, given that there will be a fourth player who would enter, who also is a formidable player in the other categories? So what are the positive demand trends that you are picking up, due to which you think that the opalware capacity would be exhausted for you?
No, I think we have taken a lot of initiatives to kind of exhaust this capacity, including some additions to our range. So our idea, though there is a fourth player entering, I feel until then and the entry is a little away, it's not going to be pretty soon. So I think for this year, we are pretty confident of exhausting that capacity out. And I think we are pushing for that pretty aggressively. So I think the idea is to exhaust and be at a good position for next year. Though our capacity additions now have taken a back seat for the time being, but at least exhaustion is our first priority.
Okay. Fine. Thank you so much.
Thank you.
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Akshat Mehta from Seven Rivers Holding. Please go ahead.
Am I audible?
Yes.
Yes, Akshat.
Hello?
Hello. Yeah, Akshat. Please go ahead.
Sir, I just want one clarification. This BIS norm that has come out for consumer appliances as well, sir. Those BIS norms, a few days back, there was a notification where they said that they have extended the deadline by another year, till March 2026. So are those norms still applicable for consumer appliances, or what is the scenario there?
No, consumer appliances actually had the BIS implementation about a couple of years back only. So most of the manufacturing that is happening today in India, it's not really happening in China anymore. So consumer appliances, the entire bit is actually local now. You're not allowed to import a finished product from China. So that has happened about a couple of years ago. It's not something new.
Oh, okay.
Yeah.
Okay. Thank you, sir.
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Aniruddha Joshi from ICICI Securities. Please go ahead.
Yeah, sir. Sir, I missed the initial part of the call, but in terms of exports of Writing Instruments, is that only exports suffering or is there exports in other segments too, and that is also suffering? That is question number one. Also, when do we see the, in a way, export normalization? Already four quarters are over, and we still continue to see a decline in the exports business. So what is the outlook here? In a way, if we are not present in that market, probably we will lose the market share permanently itself. So how are we thinking on those lines?
In terms of export, our major export actually comes only from stationery and Writing Instruments. Everything else is pretty meager. It's not a lot of exports in other categories. So Writing Instrument has, of course, been taking a hit. Having said that, it's not that we are losing markets because these markets' demands have dropped, but we are still exporting to all of these markets. The idea is that, of course, the demand or the numbers have to improve for the exports, and probably one initiative that we have taken is to adding more countries. The countries that we were present in, now we are adding some more to kind of stem this problem that we are facing in the other markets. As the demand there would increase, it would definitely have a positive impact.
The Writing Instruments de-growth has pretty much probably been because of the exports only. The export slowdown has really impacted the overall category, while domestic, of course, also did not grow, but it did not decline as well. There, we actually want to push now domestic demand a lot more, because that's where the growth avenue is more than exports.
Okay. Sure, sir. Secondly, at the time of, we had also seen that there are some of the products where we are using the global cartoon character brands on, let's say, on the lunch boxes, etc . But since we don't see that anymore, is that, in a way, agreement over or is the company in process to, in a way, renew that? Or means, in a way, it adds a lot to the branding for kid products. What is the strategy further on that?
No, we were actually. So we have a renewal of these licenses every year, and even this year we have renewed. What we tend to do is we tend to change the characters. It's not that some characters you might not see, but there are others that have been added. So that keeps changing as per the demand scenario. For example, one character might have become popular with kids during the last couple of years. So those are the characters that have been added and some that have been less popular are being removed. So that is just a rejig. It's not that we don't have licenses in place.
Okay, surely. Understood. Last question from my side. Post QIP, the balance sheet is in a way flush with cash, and the company will also continue to generate a good amount of earnings as well. So what will be the plan with the cash which will get accumulated on the balance sheet, whether it will be paid out in terms of dividends or some money may be required in the CapEx that you indicated earlier, but anything on the cash plans in terms of acquisitions? Because media news flows indicated that we were looking for acquire, in a way, some brands definitely in the bags or something like that. So any further thinking on those lines?
So I think, yeah. Gone? Yeah. Sorry. In a way, we are keeping the cash. We are always open to any acquisitions or mergers that come our way, and having cash on the books is always good in such a situation. So though we might be sitting on cash today, if there are good opportunities that come our way, we are quite open to kind of go that path. And yeah, of course, if we don't find any opportunities in the next couple of years, there will be good payouts as well. So I think we are open both ways. We are not shutting down any opportunity that comes our way. So yeah, open to everything, but not currently. As I had mentioned last time, we were looking at a potential buyout of a certain player in the plastic segment.
That is currently off the table because when we did the due diligence, we did not find it appropriate, some of the things, and so we took a back seat on that. But having said that, we are still open to any kind of acquisitions in the future.
Okay, surely, sir. Last question, in the previous call, the Q3 call, you had slightly toned down the EBITDA margin guidance. Now, obviously, revenue growth is coming back, so we will benefit from operating leverage, plus the key raw material, crude oil, has also, in a way, gone down now. So logically, glassware plant should stabilize, and it should also add to the profitability as the initial teething issues may get resolved. So any fresh guidance in terms of the EBITDA margins for FY 2026?
I think EBITDA margins I had guided would be subdued because of the glassware itself, because glassware in the first year, as you know, it takes a little time to stabilize, and even now we are still at only about 55% efficiency levels. The idea is that we might not see any good profitability. Overall, we would be able to break even for the year, and that is why the revenues might rise, but it might not add to the profitability, and that is the reason why I had guided that the profitability could take a percentage point hit for the year. But having said that, of course, we will try not to have that kind of a situation, but just in case this efficiency is the earlier we achieve, the better the position will be, of course.
Okay, sure, sir. This is very helpful. Many thanks.
Thanks. Thank you.
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Ashutosh Khetan from AMSEC. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Hi, sir. I just needed one clarification. That 12%-15% growth that you said that in FY 2026 is for the consumer segment, right?
No, this is for the overall company.
Okay. And segment-wise, if you could just break down this growth.
Yeah. Consumer wear would be a little higher at about 17%-18%, owing to the fact that we are also adding revenues of glassware in this. With the Writing Instrument segment, we are targeting about 10%-12% growth. Furniture, as it is at about 7%-8%. Overall, 12%-15% is the kind of number.
Okay. Got it, sir. That's it. Thank you so much.
Thank you.
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Akhil Parekh from B&K Securities. Please go ahead.
Yeah, thanks for the opportunity. I have three questions. The first question is on the product which we have discontinued or we are planning to discontinue. Would you be able to highlight which are those some of the products, and was the ROCE lower because of the heightened competitive intensity in those categories?
Sorry, I didn't get your second question, please.
No. So my first question is whether the product categories which we have discontinued, the ROCEs are lower, you have highlighted, right? Was it due to the heightened competitive intensity in those product categories? And what are some of those products? That's my first question.
Yeah. I think the returns over time on these product lines, these are not product lines, these are products as such. So for example if there is a bottle, I am not discontinuing the entire range of bottles. They just discontinuing, say two, three products from that range. The idea is either they have become older, so they are probably being sold at slightly lower prices. So they are eating up into the sales of the products that are doing better and have higher margins.
That is the reason why we are discontinuing some of these products, because it brings down the overall margin portfolio, and also it does not let the newer product lines sell as much because the production capacity for a particular month is only that much. A lot of these products are very seasonal. Say, a bottle is very seasonal. In the summer it sells a lot more than the rest of the year. I think that is the reason why we want to do this.
ROCEs are one of the reasons. Another reason is also the inventory buildup that happens at our distributor and our channel partners due to the number of product lines. We are trying to reduce the number and also, in effect, trying to reduce the inventory that our partners carry.
Sure. This will also help us reduce our own inventory, I believe. Is that right? Help us to improve on the working capital.
Absolutely.
Any guidance on the inventory days we expect from this activity?
Inventory days should be at a reducing trend. Currently it is pretty high also because of our steel flask, because we had filled in about inventory of about six, seven months, which is now coming down. We should be able to see about seven, eight days or about 10 days of improvement after all of this is in effect. But you will see it in a phased manner. You might not see it immediately.
Sure. And my third and last question, the opalware, at peak 80% of utilization, what kind of revenues we can generate?
At full capacity, we are looking at about INR 400 crore, INR 425 crore of revenue that can be generated out of this plant.
Okay. That should be 100%+ capacity utilization.
Correct. That is it.
Got it. That is all from my side, and best luck for coming quarter.
Thank you.
Thank you. We take the next question from the line of Karan Bhatelia from AMSEC. Please go ahead.
Hi, good morning. Am I audible?
Yes, absolutely.
Yeah. Hi, Gaurav. Wanted to understand the value volume matrix across categories for FY 2025. That's the first question.
Right. I think volume is slightly higher than value. Though it's very difficult to quantify our products in terms of volume and value because we trend across a lot of different price points. It's not the right way to look at our product line. But having said that, the volumes have been higher because there has been a little more discounting in terms of value. But only about a percentage point difference. So if it's 7% growth overall, we would be at about 8.5%, 9% of volume growth. So you can't actually see this. This number doesn't make sense in our overall scheme of things because there are so many product lines.
Right.
Even say, our Writing Instrument is completely different. Furniture is very different. Also raw material fluctuations also makes a lot of difference in this. So not a very good metric to look at. I think in our portfolio, we should always look at only value which will make more sense.
Yeah. So wanted to understand whether the industry have grown and we have grown better in terms of volumes. So that was the focus. Anyway, on the discounting, you mentioned that. So are we in healthy discounting for the fourth quarter or are we peak in terms of discounting?
No. So discounting has been for the entire year if you see. That is why there is a little drop in your gross profit levels. So it has not been major discounting. It is slight bit of discounting that has happened because of demand pressures. So that has been there for the entire year. It is not only the fourth quarter phenomenon.
Right. While we are not sharing the opal and glass revenue separately, if you can give me at least the growth ex of opal and glassware in the consumer segment for 2025, percentage will be fine.
Yeah. Opalware and glassware grew at about 13% for the entire year.
What's the quantum and what's the decline for this year that's in command?
The export is still about 46% of the sales of the Writing Instrument segment and the decline is about 20% or so, which is the decline that we see in the overall numbers as well.
If it's 46% value in writing was exports-
Yeah.
... and it degrew by 20%.
INR 20 crore.
INR 20 crore.
It degrew by INR 20 crore in absolute numbers. Yeah.
Okay. Yeah. Thank you, Gaurav. That was very helpful.
Thank you.
Thank you. We take the next question from the line of Percy Panthaki from IIFL Securities. Please go ahead.
Hi. Sorry, I got disconnected while I was asking a question. Just to follow up on those questions which I asked. I did the math and I removed that INR 10 crore from the consumer ware. It is still a 20% growth this quarter compared to the first nine months, which is like 7%, 8%. Just trying to understand this very sharp acceleration in this segment. What can I attribute this to?
A couple of factors. Hydration has done very well for us due to early summers. Summer contributed a lot of hydration sales. Uptake in all channels for hydration, that kind of did very well for us. Plus, overall, as I said, demand scenario was much better. These were growth that we were seeing in 2022, 2023 across all quarters. Having said that, these spurts of growth are not consistent, so I wouldn't guide on anything going forward, because the idea is that it has to be consistent for us to tell you that this will continue.
Understood. Excluding the capacity addition, how much would you say that the consumer division could grow for the full year FY 2026? Would it still be a double-digit number, if not 20%?
Yeah, absolutely. About, as I mentioned, about 16%-18%, it should grow at for the year, also because we are adding our glassware capacities also.
No, I'm saying excluding the capacity addition, because I want to take an organic basis, which is a reflection of the underlying demand.
Correct. Sir, excluding it, still could be low double -digits.
Got it. Secondly, on your Writing Instruments portfolio, I understand the exports is in decline, domestic is doing well. But when does this equation tilt so that at an overall level, you come back to a year-over-year growth?
The idea is that the dependency on exports has to come down a little bit, because we've not seen green shoots there in terms of growing demand. While we are adding a few countries, the idea is to grow the domestic market more aggressively this year. That will basically add to the growth.
Sure. But do you think it'll take maybe three, four quarters more till this portfolio is back in a year-over-year growth at overall domestic plus export level?
I think we should start seeing growth in the second half for sure in this category.
Understood. Lastly, on furniture, since crude prices are a little soft and there might be either higher discounting or lower pricing of the products, how do we see the value growth of this segment for this year?
The idea is to keep selling premium products in this range. Until we are able to increase the share of our premium product lines, we should still see a value growth. You are right in terms of saying that revenue will drop in this category when the raw material prices come down. Hopefully that will be offset by selling the premium range.
Got it. That is all from me. Thank you and all the best.
Thank you.
Thank you. We take the next question from the line of Grishma Shah from Envision Capital. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Hi. Two quick follow-ups. What has been the cooler category growth for us this summer, given that Q4 also would help us in that manner?
Last year we saw a big surge in cooler demand. This year was very limited. Not really any growth. We are only meeting last year kind of expectations this year.
Okay. And the second-
There was also. Sorry. There was also a lot of inventory by other players in the channel because everyone kind of anticipated it to be very good, but the summer was short-lived. I think that was another reason.
Okay. Do we also have more inventory in the system, or we didn't have much compared to that?
No, not really. We don't have that much inventory on the cooler bit. We're pretty much sold out on that inventory side. Yeah.
Okay. The second thing was on the distribution side, if you could highlight what is the current reach that we have, and how do we plan to expand in the coming years?
I think in terms of distribution, we're of course there all India. Pan-India distribution is there. There are pockets, of course, that we keep improving where we feel that our sales are lower than, say, a competitor or a peer, or we feel that the potential of that particular territory or area is a lot more. I guess, from that lens, we keep improving it year on year. But having said that, there is no real geographical area that we're missing out on. I think it's just about addition of more and more or penetrating further in those areas. Also other channels, as I mentioned, quick commerce, e-commerce, are also helping us reach customers, and penetration is also increasing from that perspective.
Okay, fine. Thank you and good luck.
Thank you.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, with that, we conclude the question and answer session. I now hand the conference over to the management for their closing comments.
Right. Thank you so much, everyone. Hopefully, we've had a good quarter, and hopefully this momentum continues. That's what we hope, and we hopefully continue to deliver great results. Thank you so much.
Thank you. On behalf of ICICI Securities Limited, that concludes this conference. Thank you for joining us, and you may now disconnect your line.