Hello, and welcome to the Duni Group Q2 Interim Report 2024. Throughout the call, all participants will be in a listen-only mode, and afterwards, there will be a question and answer session. Please note, this call is being recorded. Today, I am pleased to present Mr. Robert Dackeskog. Please begin your meeting.
Thank you. Yeah, first, I have to apologize that the report came out late. The board meeting took longer than expected this morning, and the practical reasons delayed it. So sorry for any inconvenience. And thanks for calling in, and now we kick off. So, the agenda for today is the highlights and market outlook. We do a Q2 summary of the group and the business areas, innovations, and also sustainability targets, and then financials at the end, and then finishing off with the Q&A. Top highlights for the quarter. So regarding the market, it's still a bit of a soft market, but with mixed development signals. Net sales and profit is the second best Q2 in the company history, next to the particular high Q2 last year.
And the third highlight is that we are in a strong financial position. If we look a little bit on the market outlook, we still see that the HoReCa market is volatile. There are some mixed signals. The left graph shows OpenTable Germany, and reports increases in bookings, but still volatile and a bit bumpy, as you can see. Bottom right is the HoReCa trend versus 2023, and Q1 2024 versus 2023. So where the start of the year has been tough with minus 12.9%, and the Gaststätten has minus 14%, which is an important segment for us. And then top right, we see the consumer confidence, and that shows that after a very steep increase in 2023, it went down end of 2023, but now starting to increase again.
So there seems to be a turn upwards, and with interest rates and inflation on food coming down, we believe in a stable recovery. And we also have two business areas that provides resilience and a good financial position that enable us to address long-term growth opportunities. Yeah, looking high level on the key financial net sales ended up at SEK 1.875 billion, which is SEK 61 million less than last year. Our operating income ended up at SEK 135 million, which is SEK 35 million less than last year. And our margin at 7.2% versus 8.8% last year in the quarter. We'll come back to the details more later on as well. So, Q2 comments here, net sales dropped 3%.
So the main reason for sales drop is that there has been a general decrease in most markets and product categories as sales reached record levels in comparison periods last year. The biggest drop is coming from Germany and also Benelux. More positive is Nordics and Poland. We have done some price decreases last year that actually decreased the sales this year. Also, a bit of a negative mix effect between retail and HoReCa in the quarter. So a bit softer market and volatile market with some negative signals, such as bankruptcy increases 10 times versus last year in Germany. Looking at the operating income, it is the second highest quarter in history, but lower than last year, coming from a last year government support for electricity of SEK 20 million.
Also price decreases and a lower turnover within business area dining solutions. After turning down, we are seeing increasing raw material and cost for sea freight, which puts further pressure on the result in the quarter. Newly acquired Decent Packaging and Huskee contributes with positive results to the operating income, while innovative startup Relevo lowers Duni Group's result. So now I am handing over to Magnus to look deeper into the business areas.
Thank you, Robert, and good afternoon, everyone. So as Robert said, I will now go through our two business areas a little bit more in detail. And as usual, I'll start with business area dining solutions, which represents our products for setting the table. So a quick look at the numbers. Sales is down with SEK 80 million versus previous year, and that equals 8%, roughly. Operating income is also down from the previous year of SEK 134 million to SEK 93 million, and that is a margin of 8.7%. So if we look a little bit more in detail, we can confirm we do see a similar development as in the first quarter. We see an effect from the weak market consumption in lower volumes in the HoReCa sector, explaining roughly half of the decrease in the quarter.
It is especially noticeable in DACH region, where Germany, it's our most important market, is struggling. But there are also positive exceptions. Napkins, our biggest product group, continue to be strong, and we have seen that the smart lighting with LED lamps, some of you might have seen on the restaurant tables, has been very well received in the market and growing strong. So in addition to the slightly lower volumes, we have also made selective price decreases, starting already last year, when we saw the raw materials were bottoming out exactly a year ago, summer 2023, from very high levels in the second half of 2022. So the decrease is mainly directed to tenders and certain customer segments that is in scope for this, I would say, fierce price competition.
It's for us to secure our relevance in some of these areas. However, we also focus very much on our gross margin, meaning that we deliberately step out from some volume contracts if the margin has been deemed too low. So this has resulted in a positive mix effect and contributed to the gross margin. So nevertheless, the last years, you might hear, has been very volatile when it comes to cost increases, pulp, energy costs, freight, and not least inflation in general, although we heard some positive news this morning, at least from Sweden, it's going down. But consequently, I think the need to work with our operational excellence is crucial, and we also need to stay close to our customers and manage competition, which is, in some markets, have increased sharply when the volume is going down.
So this means that the customer contracts are continuously evaluated, as we said, in some areas. Sometimes we need to be more aggressive, sometimes we are stepping out. What is crystal clear is that we need both our premium offer with high margins, but also healthy levels of volumes to secure a good utilization in production, which has been suffering in the second quarter when the volumes are down. If we move to food packaging solutions, focusing on products with sustainable food packaging, we can see that the sales has increased with 2% in the quarter. The profit has improved from SEK 36 million to SEK 42 million. That's a 5.1% margin.
So if we look a little bit more in the details and the developments, so if we start focusing on the sales, we do see that both volumes in the APAC area, as well also, the acquisitions we have done in the previous quarters, that contributes to the growth in the quarter. However, contrary, we can also confirm that volumes in Europe continues to be a challenge and falls behind last year. And similar to the situation in dining solutions, we have also made selective price decreases when the sea freight fell back from the extreme levels, also at, in the end of 2022. But we have, in the quarter, seen the, a sharp increase again. They are up with 200%-300% versus a year ago.
It's still slightly below the extreme levels we saw end of 2022, but still quite dramatic. So again, I think this puts some emphasis that we are in an environment where we need to follow this closely, and we are trying to be very agile in this volatile environment. But the profit improvement in the quarter, it comes from lower stock levels we have seen in Europe, and a significant improvement in the inventory costs, and I would say higher quality with less write-downs. However, a bit unfortunately, we have in the APAC region and Australia, also seen a sharp increase since the year end with higher storage costs. So I think we are rapidly trying to shift the portfolio to stay well ahead of competition when it comes to the best products, not least from a sustainability perspective.
We have the non-PFAS added products that we have been launching in the last quarter, is one example. Another example is Liplid. Robert will talk about it more, where we replace single-use plastics with fiber. So I think all these innovations and changes come with high demand in planning and managing rapidly shifting customer demands or changes in the legislation. That is also a factor here. But we do see a competitive advantage in doing this better than our peers. So I'll hand over to Robert again.
Yeah, and on that topic, of course, we want to be the trusted sustainability leader in our industry. So we are engaging in different sustainable and circular innovations. We presented some of them before, but important is that in our own lab, we have launched a non-fossil free binder, the Bio Dunisoft and Bio Dunicel. And this, we've done with a cooperation with OrganoClick. And this is very important for us to do a lot of collaborations because I think this is the way forward to do business and come up with really great innovations. And one new thing then in the quarter, as Magnus mentioned, is the launch together with Liplid of a renewable coffee cup lid, which is really great to drink from. So a fantastic innovation, a Swedish company as well.
When it comes to our startup projects, in particular, the reusable part, as presented last report, we have taken the majority share over the Relevo, and we are now consolidating the brand Idun under the Relevo brand, which will be the lead brand for us in Europe. The reusable market is still very young, but growing slowly. And if we look at our sustainability initiatives, we have Becoming Circular at Scale, Going Net Zero, and Living the Change. And if we move into the how, how's that going and what kind of activities we've done in the quarter, we've done collaboration, as I said, with Liplid, changing the plastic. Also, collaboration with the Notpla and launch of that product, also to reduce plastic and PFAS-free products and the barriers.
So, when it comes to the KPI for Becoming Circular at Scale, we have the use of virgin fossil plastic for single-use item. So we have an aim for 50% by 2025. At the moment, we are at Index 64, so we have a reduction with 36%. So things are moving. Going Net Zero, there we have a new and more efficient production equipment installed in the paper mill up in Skoghall. And here, the aim is then to measure Scope 1 and 2 carbon intensity. So the KPI we have for end of 2024 is 38 in Index, with a comparison to the base in 2019. And at the moment, we are at Index 40 by the end of Q2 2024. So a reduction with 60% from the base.
Also, we're looking on living the change as a company, and here we do a lot of good stuff. We are getting awards and recognized for doing good, new products launches, and so on. And here we are at gold level, and we wanna go to platinum for EcoVadis. That's our KPI. So now moving into the financials.
All right. Thank you, Robert. So if we start looking at the income statement, we can see that the gross margin has strengthened compared to last year. We have a positive development in the last 12 months. The focus on improving the gross margin has, I would say, been very sharp. I think it's especially important in a volatile environment, as we have experienced in the last years. It's also crucial, crucial for us that we are getting rewarded from our customers on all the investments we are doing in staying in the forefront, as Robert just mentioned, for having the best offer in terms of sustainability, but also with high ambitions in customer excellence and being the trusted sustainability leader.
You can also see that we have some extraordinary positive effects in the previous year's quarter, as previously mentioned, in terms of energy support being paid out. So if we look a little bit on the business areas, as you can see on, on the breakdown, the profit improvement comes from BioPak, from food packaging solutions, which continues to improve in, in margin. However, still behind the levels we saw before 2022, and the turbulence we have seen in the supply chain on deliveries from Asia. Dining solutions on 8.7% margin, again, mainly impacted by lower volumes and utilization degree in, in our production facilities. The operating cash flow is SEK 76 million in the quarter. I would say this is seasonally normal for the first half year.
The difference, as you can see, is that we had a significant stock reduction last year, very strong one, and that contributed to historical strong cash conversion at that time. CapEx is also higher this year, but I would say on depreciation level and coming from very low levels that we started already in 2020 during the pandemic, and it's been very low since then. But again, it's now more on a normal level. Our financial position remains very strong, as Robert mentioned in the beginning. Net debt is down by SEK 220 million from Q2 last year. And during this time, we have made three acquisitions, and we're back on dividend with a yield around 5%.
As you can see, return on capital is above the 25%, although we're slightly down from the very strong level seen a year ago. Lastly, some comments on our financial targets. First, looking at our target for organic growth, we are down, as you can see, on -5%. This can mainly be explained by two effects. The first and most important is that we have said, I think during the whole presentation, that we continue to see a weak consumption and demand, and that goes for basically all our markets, but particularly so for the DACH region. Also, the long period of inflation has resulted in a hesitation for consumers to go out and eat. But also that the HoReCa industry is still struggling with getting qualified personnel to keep the restaurant open.
On a positive note is that, as Robert mentioned, the consumer confidence has improved during the quarter, however, maybe still on low levels if compared to history. But that is an important factor for increased consumption in the future. Second, since three quarters back, we have seen an effect from the selected price reductions to keep relevance in certain areas, when energy and pulp fell back last year, and that also had a negative effect on the sales. Our operating margin is still stable, I would say, on 9.2% growing twelve months, slightly below the 10% target. And finally, the dividend of 5 SEK is above the 40% target to be paid out of net income. So with this, I thank you for listening. I hand over to Robert to sum up.
Yeah, and, yes, to end before the Q&A, and, the three highlights then, still, yeah, and we discussed this, lots of market with mixed development signals. We have the second best Q2 in the company history, next to the particular high Q2 last year, and then Duni Group's strong financial position is there. So, yeah, thank you, and, yeah, moving over to Q&A.
Thank you, sir. If you do wish to ask an audio question, please press star one on your telephone keypad. If you wish to withdraw your question, you may do so by pressing star two again to cancel. Once again, please press star one to register for a question. There will be a brief pause while questions are being registered. Our first question comes from the line of Johan Fred from SEB. Go ahead, please.
Hi, guys. Thank you for taking my questions. My first question is on Germany. Obviously performed quite poorly, worse than expected, despite the European Championship and a positive development in restaurants bookings during the quarters. Is there any way for you to quantify the impact from the Euros in the quarter?
... Yeah, it's a bit hard maybe, but I think on a general level, I think with what we heard and see now is that the Euro impacts a lot the pubs, you know, where they eat and they drink mainly. So maybe people, we saw that during the Eurovision in Malmö, actually, the restaurant had a bit actually tougher with the booking. So I think it's a little bit the same with these events nowadays, that people eat, like in at Benelux, they have beer and these bitterballen and all those kind of fast food products instead, maybe. So there we see maybe a shift during these big events. Then, it's a bit hard to quantify, maybe, I don't know.
Okay, fair enough. My second question is on the gross margin development, which improved yet again year-over-year, and has done so for the last couple of quarters, which I gather is largely from an improvement in mix. How, how should we think about this trend going forward? And, when will this potentially translate into a higher operating margin?
Thank you for the question, anyway. Yeah, you're right. As we said, there's been, and as mentioned, a very sharp focus on the gross margin, and to have that stable, especially so in turbulent times, and to improve it, we think that is very important. Going forward, I think this will continue to be important, but it's always a balance between the cost, the price, and the volumes, which we continuously try to evaluate. And as I said, we need to be in the premium segment, but we also need the volume contracts, even though they are a lower volume, because of the utilization in our factories.
So that's a delicate balance that we continuously need to work with, and if we do that right, the higher volumes will have good cost absorption, and then you will also see an effect on the operating income as we have seen in the gross margin.
Okay, very clear. Thank you so much. And my third question is on Dining Solution. What's the underlying margin potential in a, in, like, a normalized market climate with normalized volume, given your higher gross margin?
Yeah, I mean, if you only refer to where we're coming from, and a little bit what we have said previously, is that this is where we are vertically integrated. And if we get good utilization, if we get a healthy product mix, and we stay in the forefront of innovation in the premium segment, we should be clearly above our 10% target. That's where we need to be, because we know the margins on the food packaging is normally slightly lower. So that's the logic in that. But it's also when we see tougher market climate, that when you are vertically integrated, you also get a bit punished, which Q2 is an example.
So, historically, we have been higher, and of course, that is something we're also working for.
Okay, got it. And my next question is on the pricing dynamics. You talked about having lower prices due to lower raw mat cost and input and freight costs, et cetera, last year. Yet we've seen a quite significant reversal, as you mentioned, during Q2, with higher input prices. Is it fair to assume that you've started raising prices again during the quarter? And in that case, when will we see the effects of these increases? Thank you.
Yeah, I think we always look at what's happening in the market and act to that. And sometimes, of course, it's hard to actually hit the right spot, and then you have some lag maybe in it. Yeah, so we follow that and act on it, and I think that's historically been quite good, but always a bit lagging, maybe. Yeah, if we refer to old-
And how big is this lag, if you don't mind me asking? Like, I get that, get that you have a lot of contracts which are on fixed length, probably longer than a couple of months. But how big of a share of your total portfolio can you, on average, manage prices on a quarter-to-quarter basis?
On average, I would say, but it varies, but I would say 3-6 months for us to come through on the majority of our portfolio. That's my for the big one.
Okay, great. And how should we think about this dynamic going into Q3? Is it fair to assume that price will continue to be an impeding factor on both sales and margins?
You mean the price on raw material?
Yeah, exactly.
Yeah. Yeah, yeah, we follow it closely, so we'll see where it goes in a way. But, I think that's what I... Yeah, we can say, well, we follow it really close and, yeah, act on it, yeah.
Mm.
-when necessary. Yeah.
I think the history in these turbulent times has shown that there is actually a good understanding from customers when we're seeing these quite dramatic shifts-
Mm.
in the underlying cost components, like pulp, energy, and so on. What is more difficult, I would say, is the general inflation, which has been high for quite some time, even though it's going down. I think that is a more challenging part
Yeah.
-but nevertheless, a very significant part, actually, of our cost.
Mm.
That's something you need to work with to stay efficient, but also something you need to address, of course.
Got it. Got it. The final one on food packaging. Sales in or from Europe continue to be sluggish and have been so for the last couple of quarters. If markets were to normalize, what is a realistic growth rate for food packaging for the segment going forward?
Yeah, I mean, it is, it's... Food packaging, in general, is a growing market, and it depends a little bit on segments. But, yeah, it looks like it's between maybe 5 and upwards, actually, in that 5-10, depending on segments, I think. So it's definitely a higher pace than maybe the more, yeah, dining part.
Okay, got it. Those were all of my questions for now. Thank you so much.
Thank you.
Thank you.