Welcome to the Green Landscaping Group Q4 presentation 2024. During the Q&A session, participants are able to ask questions by dialing #5 on their telephone keypad. Now, I will hand the conference over to the CEO, Johan Nordström, and CFO, Markus Holmström. Please begin your meeting.
Thank you, and a warm welcome to you all. As mentioned, my name is Johan Nordström, and today I'm joined by our new CFO, Markus Holmström, who came aboard in, finally came aboard in December after a long wait for him. Markus will walk us through the financial section of the presentation in just a few minutes. But first, let me just give an overview of the performance in 2024. So we conclude the year of 2024 with a 9% sales growth, and we had, I would say, a strong 3% organic, and we reached an EBITA margin of 8.3%. And this is despite the headwinds we have faced in the market during the year. So from a financial perspective, I'm quite happy with the performance we as a company have done for the full year of 2024.
When I look up on the fourth quarter, the final quarter of the year, in my mind, it's an okay quarter where basically you have two major observations that stand out. And on the bright side, I would say that's really the cash flow. I'm quite happy to see it because it has been somewhat up and down during the last quarters, and we did initiate some activities in order to make sure that we had a strong cash flow. And so we did. So we had a very strong cash flow in the fourth quarter, and that, of course, brought down the leverage to a very comfortable 2.5 level.
The not-so-bright or the shortcomings of the fourth quarter, that is really the underperformance of the segments in Sweden, where you can see that neither sales, and in particular not the profit, did not meet our expectation and came in as a bit of a surprise to us. But again, we ended the year and the quarter on a strong note. We also invested in three new companies in the fourth quarter, and that means that we right now are back on track in terms of the investment or the acquisitions in new companies. And the goal we had for 2024 was 8-10 companies, and we did achieve that one. So we do welcome those companies into the Green Landscaping family.
And of course, looking into the year of 2025, we will see a similar pace, I would say, in terms of investments or acquisitions that we're looking forward to into that year. So by that, I do conclude that it was kind of a good year for us with a couple of highlights in the fourth quarter and also one setback in that particular quarter. So let's move back. Let's move into the presentation. Now, we basically only have one slide on the Green Landscaping Group, but again, we are active on a very attractive market, and there are certain characteristics of the market that I would like to highlight. And the first one, it's a large market with low cyclicality and a high degree of stability.
Having a big market really means that we can pick and choose to some extent on how we would like to position ourselves in terms of what customers and what services to perform, and also in terms of what companies we would like to invest in. So being in a big market, we're right now active in six geographies, meaning that we can really, from a strategic perspective, position ourselves in the way we would like to be positioned. The right business model is about the decentralization. And again, we have 60 very skilled entrepreneurs working in 60 different geographies, being close to the customers, making business decisions basically every day, being close to employees. And that has proven to be a very strong model that also makes us fast, nimble, and quite profitable given the market we are in.
And again, then we have the M&A strategy, and we have been doing that for years. We have several criteria in the selection of great companies that we choose to invest in, and having a large pool to choose from really means that we can pick and choose the very best entrepreneurs and the very best companies to join the company. So next slide, please. So to do a summary for the full year of 2024, as I mentioned, net sales increased by 9%, and that means we basically reached SEK 6.3 billion organically, 3%. And again, given the market situation, I think that is a good number to bear in mind that it's headwinds out there, and having a 3% organic, also given some structural changes we've done throughout the year, that is a good number.
Back on track on acquisition, that contributed by 7%, and the profitability increased by 3%, and that means we actually came to SEK 528 million in EBITA. The EBITA margin has roughly been like 0.5% below previous year, and again, given the market condition, I think that is good numbers. We landed at 8.3. We were on a positive track, and for the last, I would say, fourth quarters, we can see that we have kind of leveled out that one. I don't see any reason why we should not be able to come back to a situation where we continue to improve the profit margins, but nonetheless, 8.3, given where we are and the industry we're in, is a good number.
Of course, cash flow from operating activities for the full year, that's SEK 601 million, and in comparison to the EBITA of SEK 528 million, I think that is clearly a very good number. Moving into the fourth quarter, there we saw that the net sales increased by 7%. Of course, the organic, in particular to the segment in Sweden, means we had a -6% on the organic side on net sales. EBITA increased by 3% to SEK 164 million, and the margin that we landed is, as we said before, 9.3% versus 9.6%. It's still a fairly strong margin of 9.3% in the fourth quarter. The cash flow, as I did mention, that's SEK 282 million. That's a kind of a very big number, in particular when you compare it to the previous year or the previous quarter, sorry, where we had SEK 8 million.
Still a very strong cash flow from operating activities. The financial leverage means that we are right now at 2.5 and that we were joined by three companies in the fourth quarter. That's pretty much on that one. Next slide, please. In terms of growth, we have a growth ambition, and we intend to grow by 10% year over year. We took a step back on the M&A activities in the year of 2023. In 2024, we are back on track in the number of companies we are looking for, and that means that we right now are at approximately 10% growth. That's where we are at this point in time, and that's what we have. We have had a higher number in the future. That's really what I'm saying.
As we are coming back on track on the investment, we should see that number start to increase again. Stable market and right business, as I did mention, we are active in a very large market, and that enables us to position ourselves. Having a decentralized model enables us to have a margin that is quite higher than the average of the market. Being above 8%, that's the financial goal we have. I think that is, yeah, we are meeting the target and working on exceeding that one significantly. Next slide, please. Now, moving into Sweden, the full year on Sweden basically means that the net sales decreased by 4%. And that due to basically two factors. We have headwinds in the market, and also, as we have communicated before, we are focusing on increasing the profit margin in Sweden.
To some extent, that means that we are closing down one or two companies. We are getting rid of unprofitable customer contracts, and that's primarily focused on the Swedish market. For the full year, EBITA, we had, given the fourth quarter performance, we saw a decrease of 21% to SEK 135 million. That means that we landed at a margin of 5% versus 6.1% the previous year. That is, of course, below our expectations. Nonetheless, that's where we are. The fourth quarter, net sales decreased by 60% to SEK 670 million, and EBITA decreased by 63% to SEK 21 million gives us a margin of 3.1% versus 7.1%. This is a shortfall that we saw to some extent unexpected. Also, yeah, we're going to say that when I'm sure we're going to have questions coming further on in this one.
I can mention that about 50% of the shortcoming, that one we can refer to, let's say, company-specific events, and the other rest, the 50% of the shortcoming is. It was a tough market in the fourth quarter. So moving on to Norway. What we can see in Norway for the full year of 2024, we saw an increase of 10%. And again, the market conditions in Norway was also quite significant headwind, I would say. So having an increase of 10% in that year is a very strong performance on our Norwegian company. So hats off for those guys. They did a very good job. Organically, they grew by 8%, and then we had the acquired one of 3%. And then, of course, we had the increase of EBITA by 6%, and that meant they landed the year at a healthy 9.9% EBITA.
Quite strong performance in Norway for the full year of 2024. In the fourth quarter, we saw an increase of 30%, and we saw that the EBITA increased by 9%, and they landed at the margin again at 11.6%. Quite a performance of our colleagues in Norway. Moving on to other Europe. As communicated before, other Europe, that's particularly, I would say, Germany, and that's where we have the heavy focus on investments. For the full year performance, they grew by 67%, and they have now reached SEK 1 billion in annual revenue. Also, we saw a very substantial organic growth by 40%. And then again, investing in new companies or acquisitions by 54%. It's a high growth situation for us. EBITA grew by 36%, and that means that we reached SEK 192 million, and that gives us a margin of 18.8%.
So again, significant growth in both revenue as well as in EBITA. Now, in the fourth quarter, we saw that the net sales increased by 86%, and we saw an EBITA growth grew to 70 million SEK, and that gives us a margin of 21% in the fourth quarter. So again, we are building up Europe. We have Munich as a second headquarters. We are focusing on the, so far as I speak, the German-speaking region of Europe at this point of time. And our ambition is to continue the growth in the German market for the coming one or two years. Then going through the companies, we basically are presenting three companies. We made one additional company in Finland, and that is Turun, who was founded back in 1985, operates out of Turku in Finland.
This is actually a sweet spot company in terms of what they are doing because they are doing both landscaping and maintenance services. The majority of the companies we have in Finland are landscaping companies. So here comes the maintenance companies with service contracts, longer public contracts, and so forth. They have annual sales of SEK 3.6 million with 20 employees. So we do welcome Turun to the Finnish organization as well as to the Green Landscaping Group. They are a great addition to us. Then we have Viva Gartenbau in Switzerland. So they are operating in Basel. This is an acquisition that we actually made or an investment that we made a year ago, actually more than a year ago. And then for various reasons, that to some extent is out of our control. We needed permits in order to acquire the buildings down in Basel.
That actually meant that we had to wait 12 months before we concluded this business. Nonetheless, they are much welcome to the group. They have a revenue of CHF 3.2 million, and they have 20 employees. We do welcome that company to the group as well. Then the last company to be presented today is Tiefbau Lenz GmbH that was founded back in 1953. This is the first company in North Rhine-Westphalia. They are located in Bonn, and that is basically in the rural area of Germany. We do expect other companies in that area to be followed by Tiefbau Lenz. They have an annual revenue of EUR 8 million, and they have about 30 employees. This is a very good addition to what we are doing in Germany, and we do welcome Tiefbau Lenz to the Green Landscaping family.
I think that concludes my part of the presentation, and then I hand it over to our, what is it, to our new CFO, Markus Holmström, that we have been waiting for a long time. So Markus, take it away.
Great. Thank you, Johan, and I will cover the main financials. Quarter four showed net sales of SEK 1.8 billion, bringing our rolling 12 months to SEK 6.4 billion, resulting in a total growth of 9% for the year. EBITA in the fourth quarter came in at SEK 164 million, which was ahead of last year, but the margin was slightly below at 9.3%. Positively impacted by the development in Norway and other Europe, but weighted by the development in Sweden, as Johan already mentioned.
I will talk more about cash flow on the following slides, but we are very pleased with the way we ended the year, and as a consequence, financial leverage decreased sequentially to 2.5 times.
Order backlog decreased to SEK 7.3 billion in the quarter, but have in mind that the size fluctuates between quarters, and it should therefore not be used as a short-term leading indicator. Earnings per share in the quarter was SEK 109 compared to SEK 166 last year. It's worth noting that last year we had a positive effect of SEK 0.42 per share related to revaluation of estimated outcome of earn-out considerations. So let's have a look at cash flow. During the quarter, we managed to reduce working capital, supporting the already seasonally strong cash flow quarter, resulting in an operating cash flow of SEK 182 million, which is clearly stronger than last year.
This brings the rolling 12-month cash flow to SEK 601 million, as Johan said, that we're very pleased with. Nonetheless, working capital development and cash flow generation continues to be a focus area for us.
Looking at the cash flow bridge and total cash flow, as said, operating activities contributed with SEK 282 million in the quarter. We completed three acquisitions, totaling SEK 119 million in cash considerations. We then also divested certain assets such as machinery and so on, resulting in a net positive one million from CapEx and other investments. The net difference between new loans and debt amortization was positive SEK 65 million, totaling the cash flow for the period at SEK 228 million. Given the positive cash flow in Q4, in combination with positive effects on EBITA, we sequentially deleveraged to 2.5 times, which is in line with our financial target and gives us headroom to continue the M&A agenda.
The loan maturity profile remains the same as in previous quarters, with maturity at the end of 2026. These are bank loans from three different banks, and we have only one covenant, which is net debt to EBITA pro forma. And financial targets, we have a growth target at 10%, and we're currently shy of it at 9%. But looking at margin, we're ahead at 8.3 and spot on at our leverage 2.5. The board proposes to the AGM that we should not distribute any dividend for fiscal year 2024. And with that, I will hand back to you, Johan.
Okay, so thank you, Markus. Just to sum up the year for 2024, and as I think you all know, given the segment we're in, we have faced some headwinds during the course of the year.
Having a net sales increase by 9%, I think that is a strong performance. I look upon the organic growth at 3% and also that the investment activities have yielded in another 7%. I think that is, it's a strong performance, and to me, it's a quality indication of the companies that we have in the group that we continue to grow even though we are having headwinds. The EBITA increased by 3% to SEK 528 million . And again, if I look upon the margin that we were at, if I compare to previous year, 8.8% and that we are at 8.3%, again, that is a very strong performance of the companies out there.
They really do show a pricing discipline because if it's a tough market conditions, the number of quotes are or the competition is increasing and so forth, and still showing a very strong discipline in what they are doing. I think that is a quality indication of the companies we have. As I did, we did our highlighting the cash flow, being able to deliver SEK 601 million in cash flow, given the EBITA of 528. It's also a very strong performance. All in all, I think it's another successful year for the group, and I'm quite happy with the performance given the market conditions that we have seen. By that, I do believe we are opening up for the Q&A part of this conference call.
If you wish to ask a question, please dial pound key five on your telephone keypad to enter the queue.
If you wish to withdraw your question, please dial pound key six on your telephone keypad. The next question comes from Dan Johansson from SEB. Please go ahead.
Yes, thank you so much, and good morning, Johan and Markus. I think I had three questions here. Maybe not unsurprisingly, I'll start with Sweden. If I understand you correctly, Johan, you said that about half of the shortcoming in Sweden was due to company specifics and credit loss. So does that mean around SEK 15 million-SEK 20 million impact on EBITA, if my math is correct? And how much of that is sort of the credit loss part of that shortcoming? Thank you.
Yeah, kind of a detailed question. You are on, I would use the low side of the span of numbers you used on what was company specifics. If that's understandable.
Yeah, I really don't go into that specific, but it was about one third of the company specific shortcomings that was belonging to the bankruptcy per se. Also, there's a likelihood that we're going to get that money back again because the customer needs to finish the project. Nonetheless, we have to accrue for it, and that's what we did. It's not a super high amount to begin with. What happens when you have companies like in Sweden? We have roughly like 25 companies. Then you have companies who are underperforming. You typically see that you have a volatility, but you also have companies who are overperforming given the expectations you have. What happened in the fourth quarter in Sweden was basically that we had underperformance or that they came in according to plan. We didn't have the upside companies that you typically see.
So even in regions like Norway and Germany, you see that you have companies who are overperforming and companies who are underperforming. What happened in the fourth quarter was basically that we had the underperformance in a handful of companies, while we didn't have the overperformance who basically could contribute, so to say, to the performance. So that's why we saw the shortcoming.
Yeah, thank you. I understand. Thank you for that clarification. And maybe just follow up on Sweden then. And you feel now that you've done enough with the contract portfolio, the leadership changes, etc.? Have you done enough now to see profitability improving going forward, or is there still some efforts that need to be made in order to take it where you want it to be in terms of profitability?
Yeah, we have been talking about Sweden and talking about specific objects, but also, of course, over a number of years. Also, we have basically during the course of 2024, we did increase the efforts in order to improve the profitability because if there are like 5%, 6% EBITA profit margin in Sweden, that is a too low profit margin, and we really don't see a reason why we shouldn't be at a significantly higher profit margin in Sweden. It's the same market in Sweden. We do the same thing. So if I compare to what we're doing in Norway or what we're doing in Germany and so forth, my expectations are clearly higher than 5%, 6%, or even 7%. That is still not acceptable.
So we have been in the process of improving that one in Sweden, and also we did initiate, I would say, increased efforts before we saw the result of the fourth quarter. That was already underway on how to improve and move forward with Sweden. I wouldn't extrapolate too much on the setback I saw in the fourth quarter. So I don't consider that being like a new jump-off point. It was basically a mishap in the fourth quarter. So my expectations from Sweden coming into 2025 is actually that we are still very much focused on improving the profitability in Sweden. And that also means that I do not see any high organic growth. I would actually assume that we're going to be flat or slightly negative in 2025 organically, as we are focusing on improving the profit margins in the contracts we have.
For any new contracts, of course, we should see a profit increase in contracts coming into the portfolio during the course of 2025. Improving profit margins in Sweden is a very high focus and very high up on our agenda for the, I would say, for the coming two, three, four years before we see that we are in a position where we would like to be profit-wise in Sweden.
Yeah, makes sense to prioritize, yeah, profitability or growth right now in Sweden, I guess. Maybe then switching a little bit gear to your M&A ambitions for 2025. You had a very strong cash flow. You saw your net debt coming down a little bit sequentially. Would you say the goal for this year is also to do something like 8-10 acquisitions, or what should we expect from you now in 2025?
Yes, we have communicated. We are on track. We took a step back in 2024, sorry, 2023, given the uncertainty in the marketplace at that point of time. I weren't comfortable with doing eight to 10 acquisitions in that particular year. So I think we landed at three. Now for 2024, we geared up the machine again and landed eight acquisitions in that particular year. And you will see a gradual increase in pace as we move forward into 2026, 2027, and so forth for the 2025. Right now, as everything looks, probably the same number as you saw in 2024. I think if I look upon the pipeline of companies we have, I assume that's, yeah, that's my ambition at this point of time. Eight to 10 investments during the course of 2025. That's the ambition.
Yeah, and that is, of course, maybe a final question.
That is, of course, supported by the balance sheet of the company as well. So we have fundings in order to do it.
Yep, thank you. Maybe a final question, if I may. This one might be a bit difficult to answer, but one month into the new year now, how do you feel about the market situation so far in January? Have you seen any changes, or is it basically the same level as in previous quarter here and during 2024, or is there any changes in any direction you see here? Thank you.
That's a two-fold question. From my perspective, when I look upon the market, and as I did communicate when we had the Copenhagen seminar, that is, I don't see a rapid improvement in the market condition. I don't see the market conditions being worsened.
I think I still see that there will probably be an increased amount of bankruptcies in the market in adjacent sectors, and to some extent, that's something we have to be aware of. So I think it will be, at this point of time, my projection is that you're going to have a sideways movement in the market conditions for 2025. I look upon the order books, and typically in the landscaping companies, the order books are three to six months on the average. And I know that our local managing directors are quite, they are more positive today than a year ago, but I still have to see that positive momentum, so to say, turn into increased or stronger order books. So we don't have weak order books. That's not what I'm saying.
I'm saying that we have the, we basically have the similar size and situation in the beginning of 2025 as we had in the beginning of 2024. And if my outlook is basically six to seven months in the future, that means that the first two, two and a half quarters of this year, given the order book, are pretty much the same as we had in the previous year. So I don't see any rapid positive increase in the market at this point of time. So that's why I'm judging that, yeah, 2025 will pretty much look like 2024. And then, of course, our quarter in Q1, that is really when we have the winter activities, and we're coming from basically two, I would say, good winters historically. And as everybody can see, we have a mild winter in Stockholm and the southern part of Sweden.
It's not the same type of snow removal and activities and so forth so far in this quarter as we have had for the last two years. So that's my take on where we are. So pretty much from a business standpoint and an industrial standpoint, I would say it's the same as 2024 at this point of time. From a winter perspective, somewhat weaker than I saw in 2024. Yep, thank you for that color on the market. I think that was all from me for now, so I'll jump back into the queue.
Thank you so much for answering my question.
Thank you very much for the questions, Dan.
The next question comes from Mads Andersen from DNB Markets. Please go ahead.
Yeah, good morning. Can you hear me, gentlemen?
Hello, Mads. We hear you.
Hi, good morning. Great. So yeah, thank you for taking my question.
So obviously, a challenging quarter, like you alluded to yourself. But if we start on a positive note, I know you just talked a little bit about the free cash flow. But any sort of color you can give on the initiatives that you took during the quarter, but also how sort of sustainable this is going forward, and could we essentially expect somewhat or at least a slight improvement on something like receivable days going forward?
Yeah, I can take that one. No, but it's the result of that we actually, during a few quarters, had weaker than normal cash flow despite Q3 actually being the positive one. But how we started the year, it was weaker than we're used to. But what was done was that we addressed additional focus in making sure in the invoicing and collection process, it was not more advanced than that.
If we actually zoom out over a longer period, we can see that we have a really good cash conversion rate. We will continue the focus on working capital build-up and making sure that we have the positive conversion rate that we now can see on a roughly five-month perspective.
Yeah, understood. Thank you. Maybe on M&A, obviously you said you had just confirmed that you're looking for eight to 10 companies in 2025. I guess also not that many months ago, you basically confirmed that you're looking to double this within a couple of years' time. If you do eight to 10, if that's the goal for 2025, how should we think about something like 2026?
I know it's already a few years away, but should we see that going up already in 2026 or accelerate in 2026, or is it going to be sort of a big ketchup effect in 2027?
No, it will be a gradual increase. When we are looking for, this is just, we are talking about capital allocation, what we're going to use the cash flow for and what cash flow we have available, and of course, which leverage are we at. Those are the parameters you are looking at. But the increase, I would say, is about 20% - 30% in terms of cash available to invest additionally in the year of 2026 versus 2025.
Yeah. Thank you very much.
If that turns in, if I buy a company with SEK 4 million revenue or SEK 10 million revenue, the sweet spot companies that we are referring to, that's a SEK 10 million or SEK 8-10 million revenue company with a 10% margin. Then you turn that into how many companies can you acquire and at what multiple. Typically, we are between five and six, as we have communicated. That equates to roughly eight companies if we are being specific from that perspective. Then you're going to look upon 10-12 companies in 2026. Everything else equal, yeah. Then gradually you're going to increase that with the same amount moving into 2027.
Very clear. Thank you. Maybe just while we are on the topic of M&A, and obviously you've long awaited, but then you've finished the Viva Gartenbau acquisition in Switzerland.
Sort of how confident are you that you can also continue expanding your presence, I mean, not only in Germany, but also in the other German-speaking countries like Switzerland and Austria, and how should we think about that in 2025? And I guess overall, your view of the pipeline as well, please.
From our perspective, we have established the headquarters in Munich, and that is kind of our bridgehead into both Switzerland, Austria, to some extent Poland, actually, and Germany, of course. And then you have kind of the neighboring countries. That is, I would say, the Netherlands. That is a part of, that's within scope, I would say, for the coming two years. And then exactly when it's going to happen, that's basically up to the companies we have. But it's actually Netherlands is closer to North Rhine-Westphalia than North Rhine-Westphalia is to Munich to begin with.
To us, it's a big step between Netherlands, Germany, Switzerland, Austria. We are active in all those areas at this point of time. If we are investing in easily, let's say, for the three years, we're probably going to do 40-50 investments or something, then eventually you're going to cover that marketplace in a good way. Yeah, makes a lot of sense. That's kind of from a growth. I don't see it like moving into Germany was kind of moving into mainland Europe, and that was a big step. Moving into a neighboring country like Netherlands or Austria or Poland or whatever, that's more of an organic M&A growth from my perspective that will be carried out from our Munich hub.
Yeah, no, that makes sense. Thank you.
Maybe just a final one for me on, obviously, the rest of Europe continues to do very well, both from a top line and also from a profitability perspective. I think you also mentioned yourself again that Stebulė in Lithuania is still doing a great job. Any sort of signs of any tapering off in that business or anything that you would like to highlight into 25 and anything we should think of?
We are active in the area. If we're talking about the Baltics, and also we need to keep in mind that Estonia and Latvia are kind of cultural and to some extent connected to, and they have closer ties to Finland. While where we are right now is actually closer down to Poland and that region.
So there's a slight difference between what I'm saying is that if we're going to have benefit of building a cluster, that cluster needs to build where we are. So we are looking upon companies in that area. So far, we haven't made any additional investment. But of course, that is prudent, and it's in line with our strategy to make a follow-up acquisition close to Stebulė where we have. So they're not being a standalone company in that region.
Yeah, no, thank you. That makes sense. I think maybe it was my bad. I wasn't being super clear. Sorry. I was more referring to the fact that obviously Stebule is still highly profitable and whether you have any sort of expectations of any dramatic changes of that in 25 or whether we should see that as small or as steady as she goes from here on.
I agree. They are a very highly profitable company. It's a very well-run company, and at this point of time, I don't see any major changes in contract or the way they operate that in the short term should jeopardize that situation. Then, of course, as everybody knows, having that high profit margin, is that sustainable moving into the future? I can't say, but I don't see any major change in the, let's say, in the 12 months to come. I don't expect any changes.
Understood. Thank you very much.
Thank you.
The next question comes from Julia Sundvall from ABG Sundal Collier. Please go ahead.
Hi. So I have one question, and that is how large and when do you think the work with the Swedish companies' margins will be seen?
Sorry, can you please repeat the question? We had some here.
Yeah, yeah, of course.
So how large and when do you think the work with the Swedish companies' margins can be seen?
You should see signs of improvement by the end. When we close 2025, I do expect the margins to be improved versus 2024. And yeah, if I remember, if my mind is correct here, we were at 6.1 the previous year. And my expectation is that we should be at 6 or above 6 for the final year of 2025. Otherwise, that's clearly a disappointing development.
Thank you.
Thank you.
The next question comes from Alexander Siljeström from Pareto Securities. Please go ahead.
Good morning, guys. So most of my questions have already been answered, but just one question to clarify on Sweden in terms of sort of the non-recurring part of the negative development here in the quarter. Could you shed some light on the amount?
I really don't want to be so specific, but our expectations on Sweden were, if you look upon the development in Sweden, you saw that we were kind of on track. If I compare 2024 development to 2023 development, we were basically, for the first three quarters, on track compared to the previous year. There weren't that big a deviation either, plus or minus. It was pretty much the same, and our expectations were basically that we should have landed 2024 Q4 at the same level as the previous year. That's our expectations, and that gives you the magnitude of the shortfall, so to say, in the fourth quarter. If that was, that's very helpful, then. If that's the answer to your question, that's when I look upon where we firmly believe that, okay, this is what's going to happen, then we were on track.
I weren't too happy with the development, but nonetheless, it was kind of given where we were. Yeah, that's what we expected to land the year. And then we saw the shortfall of 1.1%, and all that landed in the fourth quarter. But still, we have to keep in mind that 5% for the full year of 2024 isn't really a disaster. I'm not happy with the performance, but 5% given the market condition at this point of time, it's below expectations, but it's not a disaster to begin with. And we have seen a steady increase in profitability in the Swedish market given where we're coming from. So if you elevate the view and look upon the development for the last, I would say, four or five years, I know that's long-term in your environment. But for us, who are building companies, that's kind of the horizon we have.
So we have been on a steady improvement of the businesses in Sweden organically for the last four or five years. And I do expect that work to continue in the years to come. So it's not a one-off to begin with.
Yeah, gotcha. And you alluded to it previously, but in terms of the margin trajectory for Sweden, you just said around 6% or above 6%, hopefully in 2025. And then I guess until 2026, 2027, somewhere around there, you should be able to meet maybe the group margin target for the Swedish business. Is that a fair assumption from our end?
Let's have a discussion by end of this year. I would prefer that one. But as I said, in theory, I totally agree with you. There's no reason why we should not see the same margin. It's only where we are coming from.
That's the long story that we had. Green as a centralized company, then we acquired Svensk Markservice, and both of those companies were basically not making money. And then we started to incorporate those businesses and doing the decentralization and so forth. So this is a journey that has been going on for 10 years in this particular market. But there's no difference in the market saying that we shouldn't be able to have similar profit margins as we can see in other countries. So my expectations for profit margins in Sweden is that there's no different market. We provide the same type of services. You have similarities in terms of the customers you have.
So if we are able to produce close to 10% in Norway, for instance, and we have talked about 8% and so forth, as we have as a company goal, from my perspective, that should be achievable in Sweden as well. It's only a matter of when do we reach that one. It's not a matter of if we can reach it. It's only the timing from my perspective. Then, of course, we can't wait 100 years for that to happen. It has to happen in somewhat near-time future, but it's going to take us a couple of years to have the stability and being able to achieve that profit margin in Sweden. But I'm quite convinced that we will achieve it.
Yeah, fair enough. And then just a final one and just thinking about the mild winter that we have seen so far.
Just if you could shed some light on the geographical sort of distribution of sales in terms of snow removal and how much that is tilted towards north of Sweden and then compared to Stockholm and south of Sweden.
Yeah, that is really a good question, and that is something I'm trying to figure out myself. Also, as we are, to some extent, we are a fast-growing company. That means that if I look upon the companies in Germany that we have added to the group, you can see that they actually have quite weak first quarters. The seasonality effects have actually been increased in a negative way given the companies we have added to the group.
When we added companies like Håland and so forth in Norway, that's kind of countered the effect that we had on the seasonality because their high season was in the winter. Given the new companies we have, that means that the seasonality effects are actually growing given the companies we added out of Germany. Now, the biggest snow dependency we have, that is in Norway and northern part of Sweden. So that's where we have to look at in how much snowfall they have had, how much snow removal. And then, of course, you will see a negative impact in Stockholm and, I would say, the southern part of Sweden, given that we haven't had any winter yet. Now we are at the end of January. So yeah, I would say in the companies we have in Stockholm and south of Stockholm, there's no activities.
I assume I don't have the data. It's quite low. Just looking upon the weather forecast, and I do follow where it's snowing and where you have ice and so forth. And we haven't had a strong winter so far. But the true dependency of the company, that is in Norway and northern part of Sweden. And yeah, that's where you have the dependency. Yeah, thanks for that. And then just maybe a final one in terms of then your ability to shift and say maybe if we have a mild February as well, is it possible to start landscaping activities, for instance, earlier, or is the weather still too sort of cold to make that shift? If you could shed some light on that. We're going back in time here when we basically had a very challenging situation.
I believe it was in the winter season of 2019, 2020, when we basically didn't have any winter in Sweden whatsoever. As an effect of that one, we initiated numerous activities. One was, of course, that we invested in companies who are counterintuitive, but we did invest in companies like Håland, who has a high season in regions where you are basically having winter activities, and that is the Austria region. And so far, that strategy has proven to be a good strategy. The second item we did was basically to outsource the winter part of the contracts to subcontractors, meaning that we are to some extent indifferent of the winter, meaning that if you have a good winter, we don't make any money. But if you have a bad winter, you don't lose any money either. So you have predictability.
So that was one activity that we did back in 2021, 2022. And then, of course, we have added the new companies to the groups. I think those are the three differences that make it a bit uncertain what's going to happen if you have a weak winter. But our exposure to a warm winter or a bad winter, if you like, that has been, I would say, significantly reduced compared to what the company looked like four years ago. Okay, that's really interesting. So what you're basically saying then is that sort of you don't have any or way less fixed cost on the snow removal as compared to, I guess, it was Q1 2020 when you had. It's a strong word, but that we are really trying to mitigate the risk or taking care of the risk of a warm winter.
That one we have been working on in order to not have such a bad exposure to a warm winter as we had four or five years ago. So that situation has changed.
Okay, fair enough. Thanks for clarifying. That's it from my end. Thank you, guys.
Thank you.
Thank you.
The next question comes from Karl Bokvist from ABG Sundal Collier. Please go ahead.
Thank you and good morning. My question is a bit on what we've already discussed, but regarding the market here, and if I interpret you correctly, it was perhaps particularly in Sweden, the sense that the market worsened rather than stayed weak. Maybe I'm just hanging on to specific phrasing here.
But on this comment and regarding the competition, is it so that you still see the situation where other companies who are not necessarily active in your market are now increasingly entering your market, or is it that more direct competitors are becoming more intense and pushing on price and so on?
I'm sorry if I'm being unclear here. The competition or the situation isn't worsening. It's the same as you had in 2024. So from that perspective, it's a sideways movement. It's not getting worse. What happened during the last two years is that the competition has increased. So that means that there are more bidders on the contract that's out there. And the size of landscaping projects to bid on has been decreased. And also, there are to some extent fewer contracts to bid on. So that's a scenario.
You have more players who are bidding on smaller projects and fewer projects that you had in '24 . That's the situation that we have had for a year and a half. That situation has not gone worse. It's the same situation today as we had in 2024, and what I'm talking about is basically I don't see this situation easing up in the first half year of this year because we already have those contracts in our order books. So it's not getting worse, and I'm talking about not only Sweden. This is basically Sweden, Norway, and Finland that I'm referring to. Germany is another story, so it's not getting worse. However, the signals I'm receiving from the managing directors, and those are the people who have eyes and ears very close to the ground. They are the people who meet the customers.
They are the ones who do the calculations and the bidding process. These guys are more positive towards 2025 than they were in 2024. My comment is seeing is believing. So I want to see it in the order books before I start saying that I see that the market is easing up and that we have less competition in the marketplace or that we have increased business or quotations to bid on. So it's a sideways movement. It's not getting worse. We have shown that we have a good pricing discipline in our quotations because that's the important part that if the order books are empty and you have a high competition, then it's very easy or tempting for a local managing director to decrease the profit margins in order to win the contract. So pricing discipline is crucial in this scenario.
Of course, I do expect weak players both on the competition side as well as on the customer side to basically we saw Serneke here the last two weeks, whatever, who went into bankruptcy. I believe you're going to see more companies being weeded out, not necessarily a bad thing because the bad competitors and the bad customers will be weeded out in this market environment. In the long run, that's positive for the business. I think I hope I was clear. It's not getting worse. That's not what I'm saying. My local MDs are having a positive view. I'm just being a bit conservative here and saying, yep, let's wait and see. When I see it, I will communicate it at this point of time.
I haven't seen it, but the local MDs who are close to the market, they are more positive on 2025 than they were on 2024.
Yes, that was very clear. Thank you for clarifying.
It's not getting worse, and clearly, as interest rates and everything are moving in the right direction, then of course, you will see I do believe that the market will become better. Clearly, that's what's going to happen, and to some extent, the big players, the construction companies or Hochbau, they will basically go for other types of works as that market is recovering. And that means that it will be easier, but I haven't seen it in reality yet. I strongly believe it will happen, but I'm just being cautious and say, let's wait and see until we clearly see that now the market is recovering.
That's not where we are at this point in time. I do expect it to improve by the end of 2025.
Understood. Just one follow-up is, are we still mainly talking about the project side of a business, or do you also see similar challenges in what we would call kind of ongoing business and service, etc.?
What we've seen is basically that you have the long-term contracts, and those are anything from four to six years. Those contracts were won before we had interest rates going up and so forth. So there you see that they are kind of stable, but you always have additional work being done within the framework. So the customers have a budget, and let's say that 70% of the budget is kind of fixed.
And then you have 30% that is, what do you say, a variable part of that particular contract. And to some extent, we have seen situations where on the buy side, they have been, for some reason, careful with the money. And then a couple of months afterwards, they have released the funds again. So there is some volatility in the fixed agreements, but to a very limited extent compared to the project-based business.
Understood. Thank you.
Okay. Thank you.
As a reminder, if you wish to ask a question, please dial pound key 5 on your telephone keypad. There are no more questions at this time, so I hand the conference back to the speakers for any closing comments.
Okay. So I do appreciate all the questions we got and that you're listening to. I think this is the longest conference we have ever had. This is 57 minutes. So nonetheless, thank you for listening in and have a good day.
Thank you.