Good afternoon, and welcome back to ABG Sundal Collier's Investor Days. My name is Benjamin Wahlstedt. I am an Equity Research Analyst here at the Stockholm office. With me on stage today, I have Embellence Group and the perhaps newest CEO in town, Johan, to present the company. Without further ado, please go ahead.
Thank you very much. My name is Johan Andgren, and I recently started as the CEO and President of Embellence Group. I am going to present the company today, starting off with some fast facts. In 2024, Embellence Group, we had net sales of SEK 778 million. We had an EBITDA margin of 14.4%, and we employed somewhat 225 employees in various geographies. Our ambition as a group is to be a leader in interior decoration with a focus on premium brands within the wallpaper segment. This should be complemented by other color and patterns-driven interior designs, such as textiles and rugs. We have a long heritage as a group, lasting already back to 150 years ago when our first brand was founded, Cole & Son. The group consists of two segments. We have a brand segment, and we have a manufacturing segment.
On the brand side, we have five different brands: Cole & Son, the most iconic and oldest, 150 years old. The second oldest is Boråst apeter, who has a history of 120 years back. We have three other brands also: Wall&decò, Pappelina, and Artscape. Our brands are sold in more than 100 countries, where Sweden, U.K., Italy, and U.S. are the main markets. Looking at key locations, we have our head office in Borås, and we have brand offices in U.K. London. We have it in Serbia, Italy, and we have it in Portland in the United States. When it comes to the manufacturing segment, it's a segment where we have mainly for our internal brands. The manufacturing segment is in Borås, where we have a big production, and we also have it in Leksand in Sweden, and we also have it in Serbia in Italy.
Looking at our strategy, it basically consists of two different elements. Our strategic foundation on the bottom, we have sound and strong finances, which we see are very important. We have an entrepreneurial and creative culture, which we really think is important to drive the growth. We have a decentralized operating model that we use throughout the company. Looking on the top of the strategic framework, we have different focus areas, six of them. Starting off on the left, we have organic growth focus, and we have one area which is building exciting brands. These two areas are very important for us because we want to build the organic growth focus, and building the exciting brands are very important. Product innovation and design innovation are very important for us. We want to focus on expanding our brands into selected geographies and different channels.
Our main two areas of growth are coming from the DTC Channel and from the Hospitality Channels that we have. In order to also make sure that we build our brands, we want to utilize our group synergies. This we do best because we have five different brands out in the different markets. It's quite natural that these five brands don't have the resources enough to have strong people that can build up the brands in different areas, such as IT, HR, etc. Here we can use the group synergies in order to better help the brands do what they do the best, which is building the brands and commercializing them in the different markets. In parallel to our strategic frameworks, we have an additional focus area, which is adding strategic M&As to strengthen the group further. All of this, we believe, will then build shareholder value.
If we look at the wallpaper market, there is starting off with a global interior decoration market. It is a big one, $800 billion, including several different product categories. If we break that one down into our main market, which is the global wallpaper market, it is a business roughly consisting of $10 billion. This market consists of two different areas. We have 60%, which is the residential, and 40%, which is the contract or what we call hospitality. Think about it as 60% are bought by consumers and 40% are businesses. If we then look into the Embellence part of this, where we focus, it is mainly the premium aspect of this segment because we want to build the premium brands. Europe and U.S. are the main areas for this and consisting of 60% of the market.
Looking at the market, it's been quite challenging for the total market since the pandemic hit. The house owner renovation index that you see on the graph has gone down, yet the company has made very good progress during these years. Now, because we are a product-focused company, I wanted to shed some light on the five different brands that we have in our portfolio. Starting off with Boråst apeter, which is a historic brand founded in 1905 by Waldemar Andrén in Borås. He started the brand off because he wanted to help consumers decorate their home and make them more beautiful with the aid of wallpaper. Today, this is our largest brand, SEK 273 million in sales, and we're selling it in more than 65 countries. Sweden is the biggest home market, and we are selling the brand in different channels.
We have distributors across the globe. We have a direct-to-consumer market, and we're also selling it through retailers. 95% of everything that we're selling for Boråst apeter is consisting of wallpapers. And what we should not forget about Boråst apeter is that this year, 2025, we are celebrating 120 years as a brand. So very, very strong, and we're launching new decorations throughout the year. Looking at the oldest of the brands, Cole & Son, a British heritage brand established in 1875. This year, we're celebrating 150 years as a brand, and we are launching two new different collections. One classic design that we're doing now, and we're doing a Classic Design Volume II that we're dropping after the summer. The brand sales SEK 141 million in 2024, and it's sold across more than 75 countries, where the U.S. and the U.K. market is the largest ones.
Most of these products are sold through consumers and the hospitality segment and really the luxury residential sectors. The brand is widely distributed in very many historical buildings, such as the House of Parliament, the White House, and Buckingham Palace. Very, very strong brand. Also, 90% of the brand is within wallpapers. Moving on with the third brand in our portfolio, Wall&decò, an Italian brand founded in 2005 in Serbia and Italy. This is also a very strong and historical brand focusing on more of the hospitality segment, and we have very many technical solutions within the wallpaper brand. 100% of the brand is wallpaper, and there are several different technologies. One of them is called AQUABOUT. Think about it as a wallpaper that we can put in every single wet system in the world. You have it in spas, kitchens, showers, bathrooms, etc.
Sales in 2024, almost SEK 100 million, SEK 94 million, and it's sold in more than 100 countries. This wet system that we have is sold in more than 24,000 different showers across the globe. Also here, focusing on the premium retailer and hospitality segment. We also have a brand called Artscape, founded in Portland in the U.S. in 1995, 30 years old, HQ in Portland, and sales in 2024, SEK 139 million. The brand is focused on window films, and think about it as a wallpaper that you put on glass to not get your privacy or just to get a good look of it. Sold DTC channel in North America and also through brick and mortar. 98% of the brand is window films, so very much focus on that category.
We also have a complementary brand, not in wallpaper, but selling rugs called Pappelina, Swedish brand founded in Dalarna in Sweden in 1999. We have moved HQ to Borås in Sweden. We still have the manufacturing unit up in Leksand, and the brand's sales in 2024 was almost SEK 50 million. This brand is widely distributed across the globe as well. Sweden, home market is the biggest one, but it's widely distributed both in the U.S., Germany, and as well as the online channel. Moving on, the group also has a manufacturing segment, as I mentioned in the beginning. Borås Tapetfabrik is a wallpaper manufacturing unit, mostly supplying our own brands. At the same time, in order for us to gain economies of scale, we have also taken in external customers, but our main focus with this segment is to supply the internal brands.
The manufacturing segment with external sales is roughly 10%-11% of our total business. External sales 2024, SEK 84 million. This has been a segment that has been growing very heavily. In Q2 last year, we grew 110%, Q3 95%, and Q4 60%. Now we are hitting the high targets of 2024 sales, so we should not expect to see the same growth levels as we had before. Still, a very nice segment for us as a complement to our own internal production. We are doing 100% of production in wallpaper, both with several different printings of traditional wallpaper and also some lines with digital printing wallpapers. Looking at all of this, since the IPO, we have had a nice CAGR of 8% growth since 2020. Looking at the EBITDA margin, we have also had a CAGR of 12% on that one.
Solid sales and profitability growth since the IPO, yet despite the challenging market conditions that I showed before. All in all, if we look at the financial long-term targets as we have as a company, we have a financial target of net sales, which is our long-term one, SEK 1 billion by 2028. We want to have an EBITDA margin higher than 15%. The dividend level should be 30%-50% in relation to our net income, and we should have a leverage below 2.5x the EBITDA level. Looking at how we performed in 2024, you see we increased the sales to SEK 778 million, which was a 5% uplift in sales. We grew our EBITDA margin to 14.4%, and we had an ordinary dividend in relation to our income with 50%. The leverage level for the company decreased over the year down to 0.7x the EBITDA.
Very nice performance towards our long-term targets. What is important to understand here is that we are working very hard in order to achieve our long-term profitability target. At the same time, we believe that we will reach this one before we will reach the net sales target. Looking at Q1, which we delivered last week, we had net sales of SEK 202 million, down versus a year ago with SEK 12 million, - 6%. What is important to know with these numbers is that it was affected by two extraordinary happenings at Artscape. Artscape business is one where we have a big brick and mortar side of the business where larger retailers are ordering pipe fill for new collections.
We had two extraordinary happenings from 2024 where they first in Q1 2024 had a big pipe fill, and then in Q4 2024, they took in an order which was planned for Q1. We had two very, very big happenings making sure that Artscape declined with SEK 21 million in Q1. This is not something that we see as a trend, but the Artscape business will return to growth during the Q2 quarter. We had a good improvement of the margin, 3.7% to 62%, driven by product mix and by efficiency improvements. What is good to understand here as well is that the margin level that we have is consisting of several different factors.
When it comes to the 3.7%, so when a brand such as Artscape is declining in the business, it has a worse margin than the rest of the brands, which means that then the overall margin level will increase and vice versa. We should not expect to see the same 62% levels going forward, but more in line with last year's numbers. Both Boråst apeter and Cole & Son went back to growth. Good to see that those returned to growth after some quarters with negative sales growth. We had a still continued strong growth in the manufacturing segment, which grew 39%. At the same time, as I said before, manufacturing segment are hitting harder comparison numbers as of Q2 this year. We should not expect to see the same growth levels as we did last year.
EBITDA margin during the quarter, 16%, up 0.3 percentage points versus a year ago, is still a target helping us to improve the continued journey versus our long-term profitability target of 15%. Looking at Q1 in summary, sales growth in our large wallpaper brands, Boråst apeter and Cole & Son, Artscape impacted the sales negative. We had an improved gross margin and EBITDA margin linked to product mix, linked to brand mix, and linked to manufacturing efficiencies. The more external, the more higher economies of scale we gain with the higher volumes in the factory, the more efficiencies we get, and we can get a higher margin out of the factory. During the quarter, we also had a new bank agreement in place, which gives us more flexibility and better terms.
This is not something that we will see immediately affecting the business since our leverage still is very low. You saw it was 0.7 times EBITDA, but it gives us more flexibility in the future. It is very much a better agreement than the previous one that we had in the group. Looking ahead for me to come in, I mean, I'm seven days into my job. I had the luxury of joining the group in a very good time. We have a strong and very solid strategy in place, which I very much buy into, which was presented at the Capital Markets Day last year. We have unique designs and marketing capabilities and very strong brands within the group. We are looking into profitable growth through investments in sales and marketing, and we want to continue to build the product development within the group.
What I'm also going to focus a lot on in the company is to make sure that we use the synergies as a group. We have very much five different brands where we are having multiple different systems, multiple different aspects of doing business, and it's natural that where our brands are very strong is building the brands and commercializing them. Maybe not so much as making sure that we have the right systems in place. If we can help from a group level to make sure that we have the right systems, we have the right setup for the brands so that they can work with the things that they are good at, which is building the brands and making sure that we have a profitable growth going forward. With that, I wanted to say thank you very much.
Thank you.
I think we have time for a few questions as well, and perhaps the first one for you. What made you decide to accept the job as CEO of Embellence Group?
I think looking at the group, it's a very solid group with a strong strategy in place. We have strong and sound finances, and when I went in, I also looked at what are the different potentials within the group. One of the things that I saw, which was strong brands in the portfolio, that's very good. We have a strong foundation with strong brands, commercial efforts around the globe. One thing that we do not have is a strong DTC channel, and I've worked with e-com business for the past 20-25 years and with brand building.
For me to have those two, I really feel that I can make an effort in helping the group also build these segments up. It is very important that when you go into something that you have somewhat of a plan for how to make sure that you deliver on the different targets that you have in place, and I believe definitely that I can do that.
What's top of the list then looking at Embellence Group's DTC efforts?
I think, as I said before, we have five different brands, and they have several different systems when it comes to how they do the DTC channel, and I think that's probably not the right way to go about it.
I think what we can do smarter is that we find synergies and help them to make sure that we have maybe one system where we then tag on different frontends to them to make sure that we have a robust system in the backend. We help them maybe have one system where we can have all the customer service levels, one PIM system, etc., in order for us to make sure that we use one person to negotiate versus five different brands negotiating their own things. I think utilizing the synergies as a group and make sure that the brands then still stand on their own in the different markets and doing what they do the best, which is building the brands, coming up with very, very good designs that we can then roll out and commercialize in the markets.
Perfect.
When speaking about DTC in this market, we are talking about online primarily, right? One question I have, if you have an opinion or if you know, what is the overall e-commerce penetration or online penetration in the wallpaper market? Have you seen any market data?
I've not seen any market data per se on how much the percent penetration is, and I would not speculate in how it is, but we can see that there are different players in the market which are having substantial sales in the segment, and we still believe that there is plenty of room for us to grow as a group.
Perfect. Now, when new to the group, I assume you're in meetings all day speaking to the organization. What are some impressions about current market trends? Are they feeling optimistic? Are they feeling pessimistic?
Has anything changed in the last month, month and a half?
I think the one thing that has changed last month that everybody talks about is, of course, the tariff situation, which also changed yesterday and is probably changing now as we speak. That is the one thing, and I saw some numbers from the Consumer Confidence Index that went down. In general, I think what we can see is that we have had solid numbers past time. We have some listed players in the U.K. market, such as Sanderson Group, which are still struggling with, I think they had a 10% decrease of the brand sales, and also the manufacturing unit was decreasing, and we are seeing that we are gaining market share. We are doing something right in the market, which is good. We feel confident.
At the same time, we need to seriously watch what's happening in the world and continue to do what we do best, which is building our brand and making sure to commercialize them out in the markets.
Perfect. I think that's all we have time for currently. So thank you very much for listening in. Be right back .