Welcome to the RevolutionRace Q4 presentation for the year 2022, 2023. During the questions and answer session, participants are able to ask questions by dialing star five on their telephone keypad. Now, I will hand the conference over to CEO, Pål Fischbein, and CFO, Jesper Alm. Please go ahead.
Thank you, operator. Good morning, everyone, and welcome to this conference call, where we will address the report for RevolutionRace for the fourth quarter and full year 2022 and 2023. My name is Pål Fischbein, and I am the CEO of RevolutionRace. With me for today's conference call, I have the company's Chief Financial Officer, Jesper Alm. For those of you who are not familiar with RevolutionRace, I will start by give you a brief introduction. RevolutionRace is an outdoor brand offering a wide range of outdoor products for people with an active lifestyle. We operate with a digital D2C model, meaning that we skip the middleman and sell our products directly to our customers. By doing so, we can offer quality products at an unmatched value.
RevolutionRace was founded in 2013 and has been listed on Nasdaq Stockholm since 2021. Our headquarter is located in Borås in Sweden, and we have approximately 120 employees. What really makes us stand out is our engaged customer community. We know how to communicate with our customers, resulting in more than 500,000 unique product reviews and more than 1.3 million followers and fans on our social platforms. How do we generate value? Well, our vision is to become the most recommended outdoor brand in the world, and our mission is to make nature accessible to everyone, and that we do with through an unmatched value. I already mentioned our D2C business model. We create value by skipping the middleman and selling directly to consumers.
Let's take a look at the net sales development for the quarter and also for the full fiscal year that we are now reporting. We are proud to say that we achieved a net sales growth of 14% in the last quarter of the fiscal year, arriving at SEK 362 million, compared to SEK 318 million a year ago. The fiscal year resulted in net sales of almost SEK 1.6 billion, which is a growth of 17%, and this growth is being achieved in a period of significant market uncertainty and turbulence. RevolutionRace continues its international journey, with now 77% of net sales in the quarter being generated outside of the Nordic region and close to 90% being generated outside of Sweden.
The DACH region grew by 22%, and the Rest of the World region grew by a very encouraging 42% in the quarter. We experienced decreasing sales in the Nordics and believe that the Nordic market as a whole decreased in the same period. We believe that we retained our market share in the region. U.K. and Netherlands remain the biggest markets in the Rest of the World region. U.S. is showing strongest growth, however, for still low numbers. As I mentioned before, RevolutionRace is an international brand. We now have customers in around 40 countries with a total of 18 localized webshop. Today, we opened up RevolutionRace for customers in three new and interesting and exciting markets: Canada, Japan, and South Korea.
We are currently fulfilling orders at 2 main third-party logistics hubs in Germany and Sweden, with a smaller location also in, in the U.S. We design all our products in-house and work together with more than 25 suppliers in the production process. Now, let's take a look on the highlights during the 4th quarter, and we are pleased to see that RevolutionRace continues to report solid financial numbers with good profitability. In fact, the underlying, the operating result, is improved compared to last year. EBIT for the quarter amounted to SEK 68 million, corresponding to an EBIT margin of 19%.
This is an operating margin that we are pleased with, given the challenging market climate and noting the difference compared to last year in net other operating income and expenses of SEK 16 million between the quarters, and that is related to currency effects on balance, indicating that the underlying operating result and margin for the fourth quarter is stronger relative to the comparison quarter last year. This is important and also relevant to understand and take into account when looking at the result. We are still observing substantial discounts in the market due to high inventory levels, but we managed to keep a gross margin at a good level. The margin came in at 74.5%, and that also includes a positive net impact of SEK 2.5 million from a one-time event.
Full-year adjusted EBIT came in at SEK 322 million, resulting in an adjusted operating or EBIT margin of 20.6%. Our inventory levels remain healthy, with a slight reduction in inventory compared to the same time last year. We are currently now in the process of building up the inventories levels as a preparation for the upcoming peak season. At the end of the financial year, we have net cash position of SEK 139 million, and also on top of that, an undrawn credit facility of SEK 600 million. We are pleased with that, as it feels extremely strong in the current market and also provides a foundation for our future.
The customer dialogue is central to our success, and together with reviews and followers on our social media channels, this is a very important asset and success factor. During the quarter, we passed yet another milestone, with now more than 500,000 product reviews by our, by our customers, with an average score of our products of 4.6 out of 5. Social media following is continuing also to increase very fast and now amounts to more than 1.3 million followers. Our range of lightweight products tailored for warmer climates continues to also gain momentum. In the fourth quarter, we, for example, saw increased demand for shorts, zip-off trousers, short and long-sleeved T-shirts. The footwear line is also on an upward trend.
Additionally, the summer sale was well received, helping us to successfully clear out older inventory as planned and in a balanced way. Looking forward into the next fiscal year, during Q1, we are excited now to introduce several product news within our existing categories. We are introducing a new footwear model called Trailknit Mid, which is a water-resistant hiking shoe. We are, in fact, today, also introducing a new water-resistant dog blanket called Cyclone Dog. We are launching a new collection for high-intensity outdoor activities, such as trail running. We are launching new mid layers, base layers, shirts, short shirts, and also making a bigger push into vests. Later in the fall, we'll also bringing in what winter updates and expanding our range of bags. As you can imagine, we are excited for the upcoming outdoor season.
Our work with sustainability and what we call A Responsible Race also continues, and we are preparing to report our progress in the upcoming sustainability report due out in October. We will come back to you on this important topic during the fall. We are currently in a final year covered by our financial goals, and we are happy to report net sales of almost SEK 1.6 billion, and an adjusted EBIT of 20.6% for the financial year just ended. Further, the board of directors today also proposing to increase the dividend of SEK 0.86 per share. This will mean that the dividend is increased again for the third time in a row since our IPO, and this corresponds to a payout ratio of 40% of our results.
With that, I would like to hand over to the company's CFO, Jesper Alm, who will present and walk through the financial performance. Jesper, please go ahead.
Well, thank you, Pål. Good morning, everyone. I'll talk you through our financial performance during the fourth quarter and the full year. Looking into gross profit, we notice a good development with a growth of 17% to SEK 269 million, up from SEK 230 million a year ago. This equals a gross margin of 74.5% and includes a net effect of SEK 2.5 million from the implementation of a new obsolescence model and certain other adjustments to the inventory. The gross margin has been positively affected by a favorable market mix, including effect from sales in Euro, but offset by increasing costs of goods sold following the continued stronger U.S. dollar.
The full year gross profit amounts to SEK 1.1 billion, compared to SEK 963 million a year ago, and that represents an increase of 17%. Moving on to operational expenses, we see a limited increase in personnel expenses compared to the same quarter last year, and this primarily due to the salary review carried out during the quarter. Other external expenses increased to SEK 173 million, compared to SEK 147 million a year ago. This increase is primarily explained by this cost being variable in relation to sales, marketing, and logistics. Other external expenses as share of net sales, went from 54% to 55.5% when comparing the fourth quarters, and this is following a high inflation year.
Moving on to slide 16, EBIT. EBIT for the quarter amounted to SEK 68 million, corresponding to a margin of 18.9%. The lower margin compared to the same quarter last year, is mainly explained by the difference in the net of other operating income expenses that went from a positive SEK 15 million last year to a negative SEK 1 billion in this quarter. The full year adjusted EBIT margin came in at 20.6%, based on an adjusted EBIT of SEK 322 million, compared to SEK 367 million a year ago. Balance sheet. When it comes to the balance sheet, we see only minor overall differences. Net working capital has increased slightly following a reduction of current liabilities. Inventory development. Inventory levels remain healthy. We've seen a decrease during the financial year, as previously discussed.
We're now receiving inbound shipments for the upcoming peak season, we'll as a consequence, short-term, see a planned increase in inventory. Our financial position has continued to strengthen, we had a cash position of SEK 150 million at quarter end, or a net cash position of SEK 139. The adjustment is for lease liabilities. We have a credit facility of SEK 600 million available and undrawn, it has now been extended for a year and matures in 2028. In conclusion, RevolutionRace has a solid financial position. We're growing profitable with strong cash flows. I think that sums up my part, I'll hand over back to you, Pål.
Thank you, Jesper. To sum things up, an update on current trading, we have a well-positioned customer offering with a unique combination of a strong brand, high-quality design, and competitive prices. We have a scalable and digital business model, enable an international presence with great potential to continue to win market share. We are very excited about our new products being launched soon, and also welcoming customers in new markets to join our community. We are focusing on continued long-term, profitable growth, and also we have made a strong start to the new financial year, with growth in July and also in early August, that exceeds the growth level we reported for the fourth quarter in the last financial year. That concludes our comments on the result.
Before we finish, I would like to take the opportunity also to thank the whole team at RevolutionRace, our customers, shareholders, and partners. I look very much forward to continuing to build on RevolutionRace success together with all of you. With that, we are now also happy to answer questions. Operator, do we have any questions?
If you wish to ask a question, please dial star five on your telephone keypad to enter the queue. If you wish to withdraw your question, please dial star five again on your telephone keypad. The next question comes from Niklas Ekman, from Carnegie. Please go ahead.
Thank you. Yes, I have a couple of questions. Firstly, is there any way for you to quantify your current trading comment, or at least put it in relation to the 5% local currency growth that you reported in Q4? Is there a substantial pickup that you've seen in July, August, or is it just a, a minor acceleration? That's, that's my first question.
I can start by answering that. We've seen a strong start to the new financial year. What we do see so far is that the growth in July and also in early August, up until now, we have seen that we are seeing growth level that is higher than what we reported in the fourth quarter, which is the 14%. That is what we have seen so far and what we comment. We're pleased with the start of a strong start of this financial year also.
Okay. Okay, fair enough. Also, maybe you could sort out these one-off elements that you talk about, the SEK 2.5 million in change of obsolescence. What is that related to? Is that purely a one-off in Q4, or is that something that will also impact the coming three quarters? The same thing when you talk about the FX impact of SEK 16 million. I assume here you're talking about the theoretical impact of currency movements, not related to what kind of price changes you have potentially done during the same period. Is that correct?
The, the, other operating income and expense difference that is related to balance sheet items, and we expect that, the magnitude of those line items to come down during the year. When it comes to the one-time effects, we have implemented a, a new obsolescence, model, which contributed positively to the gross profit and offset by write-downs of parts of the inventory as well. The net effect of positives and negatives is the SEK 2.5 million.
Yeah, may I also add on the currency effect that the impact this year is actually only -SEK 1 million? It's the comparison that is, sort of, important to understand where we had a positive impact last year of SEK 15 million. The impact of this year's Q4 results is only SEK 1 million, but if you compare the results to last year, then you get the significant difference.
Okay, fair, fair enough, thanks for, for clarifying. Can you talk a bit about Rest of the World? A clear acceleration here from previous quarters. Which markets do you see as the key drivers here in this quarter?
Well, we, we do see that the two biggest markets in that region is of course, is Netherlands, where we continue to see a very promising, promising trend growing nicely and also, you know, getting bigger and impacting the total number significantly. U.K., it has, is one of the biggest markets in that region, but then we also see significant growth in U.S. However, still much smaller numbers than Netherlands and U.K., but, you know, if we can continue to see these kind of growth levels in U.S., it will in the future, also have a, have a positive impact. However, it is important for us to, to grow that market and all our markets in a balanced way.
It's important for us to secure that we grow, that we, we, we can secure profitable growth. We are not, you know, heavily investing into marketing or, and in launching activities in any markets. Our model is to grow it in a balanced way, we are very pleased to see that many markets are actually taking off in that region, which of course is, is promising and, promising and also important. On top of that, we're now introducing RevolutionRace to 3 more markets in, in big outdoor markets also, maybe important to, to, to, to highlight. Hopefully that can also give us some, some positive impact in the future. We are very excited about that.
Thanks. That was gonna be my next question. Canada, South Korea, and Japan, are these markets where you have launched or where you're about to launch? How are you going about this? Is this through Amazon or through your own platform? Any initial reception you can tell us about?
Yeah, it was. This is very early. We launched it today, or actually, we have sort of opened up. It's our own site, it's RevolutionRace, where we open up the possibility for customers in Canada, Japan, and South Korea to buy from RevolutionRace. We have secured the logistics process so that we can handle all the operations behind it. As we have done before, when we enter new markets, we do it in a very balanced way. It will, it will be a, if I guess, a slow process, we don't expect big volumes coming in immediately, but we will start, you know, slowly introducing it by with some small marketing activities.
It's a sort of a dip our toe strategy, as we have done before in other markets. If we feel that we get the positive response, we will accelerate our activities and maybe also look at, you know, further adapting, locally adapt, the business and operations into the different markets.
Super clear. Thank you. Just a final one. If I look at your OpEx, we have seen 5 consecutive quarters now where OpEx has been growing at a much higher rate than sales. What is your forecast here for the coming quarters? Do you see that continuing, or do you see a reversal anytime soon? Just to, not least here on back of your margin target of 25% for the current year, where you are currently quite a bit below.
Yeah. If we look at the FTEs, for example, which of course is an important component of the OpEx, we, we now see that we are at the same level as we were a year ago. So, I think we have highlighted that in the report also. We don't expect that to grow significantly. I think we are in a good place when it comes to our staff, and when it comes to other kind of costs like marketing, logistics, we expect it to grow more or less in line with, with our sales. We don't have any, any sort of plans to do any, any, any big investments on that with those areas either.
Okay. Very clear. Thank you very much for taking my questions.
Thank you.
The next question comes from Benjamin Wahlstedt from ABG. Please go ahead.
Good morning, guys. A couple questions from me as well. First of all, gross margins were very strong. I appreciate that there's a geography mix here, that's supportive and also a small one effect. Could you, could you perhaps give us some idea of what you expect for next year here, please?
Well, that's the crystal ball, isn't it? We have benefited from the growth in Continental Europe, that is both from a pricing level and from a currency perspective. We see, I mean, if, if we're guessing where we'll be seeing the growth for the coming periods, it is most likely going to be in Continental Europe. Price levels, they remain currency fluctuates, so I'm not going to give a firm answer, but rather reasoning, and I think that's my reasoning.
Yeah, but I, I can maybe also give some flavor on that. I think, I mean, we have seen a situation in many of markets with high inventory levels for many, many players in the market. We have seen high discounts. We are pleased to see that we have been able to keep a pretty stable, stable growth margin, and our strategy is to provide or offer unmatched value at all times. So we haven't been that aggressive with clearances. We have seen over obviously, we have the currency effects of the U.S. dollar have increased compared to the Swedish krona, but however, we are from a sales point of view, more exposed to the Euro.
I think it's when it comes to currency, one should understand the sort of, the relation between those two currencies. It during the last year, we have seen. We are pleased to see stable gross margin and yeah, I think that the history may give you some help on how to predict the future.
Yeah, sure. Sort of to, to follow on, on the comments on, on campaign intensity and so on, and, and also what was asked about last quarterly presentation, could you perhaps comment on what you see in terms of, say, Nordic campaign pressures? I believe, I believe that's the, the segment which, which sees the highest, highest levels of discounts. Is this, is this about to end soon, or, or what do you see here?
Yeah. It's hard to guess. I, if I may, but if I guess, I think one can expect at some point, obviously things to slow down. It has been very aggressive. We have seen that many players have had high inventories, and hopefully those came down. However, we are also internationally exposed right now, so what we are referring to now is more on the Nordic market, how it looked like. I guess now entering a new season with autumn, winter season, my hope and maybe also guess, is that we have seen the worst and don't expect such, you know, a clearance aggressiveness to the same extent going forward as we have seen in the last maybe 9-12 months.
Perfect. Thank you. Could you perhaps also give some additional flavor on cost inflation? Specifically, I was wondering about the external cost line item, other external cost line item. I believe a year ago, what was driving the perhaps cost inflation was marketing costs. In Q3, we saw higher fulfillment costs, maybe. Could you give some flavor on Q4? What, what, what is driving the higher, higher external cost ratio, please?
Yeah. On a, on a general level, we've seen some cost inflation when it comes to logistics, for example. When it comes to marketing, we, we do the, the, the vast majority of our investments go into what we call online performance-related marketing, and there it's more like an auction process. So it's not necessarily so that the prices have increased within that space. We, we, we, you can maybe expect if competitors or, or, or companies or players are, are, are facing challenging times, maybe they will be a bit more, you know, prudent or, or act in a more balanced way. So it's hard to say how, how it will impact on, on, on, online performance marketing, but we've seen some cost inflation when it comes to logistics-related costs.
Also when it comes to staff costs, we, we, we, we follow the market trends and, and, see that, we, we, we can expect some, some cost increases, this year and also next year.
Mm. Loud and clear. Is it possible to... I, I believe last, last quarter in presentation, we talked about increased costs from, I guess you could call it cross-market availability of, of, of products. Is it possible to give us an idea of, of the magnitude of the, these increased costs, please?
Yeah, just to give you an idea, we, when it comes to splitting orders, roughly just about 5, maybe, maybe between 5% and 10% of our shipments are being shipped from, you know, for, for example, Germany to Sweden to a Swedish customer in order to fulfill a full, full order. It's that magnitude, just about 5%. I think it's important for us from a cost level, but also from a sustainability level, to, to really secure that we can, we can fulfill our, sort of obligations to customers from the local, local warehouses. That, that gives you an idea of the magnitude, at least, of the split order.
Yeah, perfect.
By split order, I, I define it as, you know, one order being shipped from, from more than one warehouse.
Yeah, got it. Thank you. One final question from me. It would be interesting to hear your thoughts on the proposed dividend, EUR 0.86 per share, 40% net profits. That's the lower end of your capital distribution target. You're, you're currently at quite a, quite a nice net cash position. What, why not distribute more cash? I guess is my, is my question. Would be interesting to hear your thoughts on that.
Yeah. You know, when, when, when deciding or when the board is now proposing a dividend level one, you're, you're taking many things into account. Obviously, the, the result that we are now presenting, forecast, but also, you know, the uncertainty that, you know, the world is in. We have a dividend policy of distributing between 40% and 60%. I think it's and the board is now proposing 40%, so it is within that range that we have said that we're going to distribute. Also worth also highlighting is that this is the third time in a row where we are increasing the dividend level since the IPO.
We, we feel that we have a strong position with a net cash position, no, no debts, and, and, so we are, we are very pleased with the, with that dividend level. Also bear in mind that the, the, the dividend policy was sort of decided and taken in a sort of a different time. Being able to, to, to uphold that, that, that level is, is very pleasant to see.
Thank you very much. Those were all of my questions.
As a reminder, if you wish to ask a question, please dial star five on your telephone keypad. The next question comes from Philip Waloszynski Tadayoni from Medium Invest. Please go ahead.
My first question is on your comments about short-term development. During the Q3 report, you stated that the quarter ended stronger than it started, and that it carried on to this quarter, Q4. You're now stating that the Q1 started even stronger. Could you clarify for me, are these comments based on organic or reported growth?
I'm sorry, I don't really get the question. I, I, I heard flavors of it, I, I think it was related to our guidance, where we last quarter saw that we, we said that we, we saw a start that was stronger than the quarter before. What, what we do, we don't really guide on what we think. What we are doing is now presenting what we have seen. We have now seen a strong start of this current quarter, and, and that the, the sales growth level is higher than what we are now presenting. Higher than 14%. That is what we have seen so far. I don't know if that answers your question, because I didn't really got the question really,-
If when you, in your comments here, it's been stronger than in July and August. Is that on an organic level or on recorded growth numbers?
yeah, it's or, or, or organic, full, so sort of full top line number is, is, is, is stronger than 14%.
Okay. Yeah, but, but it is in reported numbers, correct? Because organically in Q4, you only grew 5%, and reportedly you-
We, we, we compare reported to what would have been reported for the same period.
Okay. My second question would be, if you could comment on how the development has been in July and August on an organic basis, is that better than what you have seen in Q3?
I think the only thing we can comment is that we are seeing a better growth number than the 14%. That we are commenting today, when it comes to the current trading.
All right. That's fine. That was all my questions. Thanks.
Thank you.
Okay, thank you.
The next question comes from Emmanuel Jansson, from Danske Bank. Please go ahead.
Good morning, Pål and Jesper. Thank you for taking my questions. I think at this stage, most of my questions have already been answered, but I didn't fully get on the last question here. Were you able to comment anything if you have seen a higher pickup in pace in August compared to July?
We, we, we haven't really comment on that, so it's difficult to us for us to say something about it. I think we have to speak to what we have or, or, commenting in the report. We are seeing a strong start of this quarter, and it's, it's higher than the 14%, but we have, we have not, we're not, quantifying that in more detail than that for the moment.
Okay, thank you. Also in the report, you also are reiterating or at least maintaining your financial targets of reaching-... SEK 2 billion in, in the end of, by the end of last year, you, you, you still feel confident that the, the sales growth will be able to pick up in order to reach that target at Norrøna given these market conditions?
Yeah, well, as you just comment here, I mean, first of all, these financial, long-term financial targets, they were set 2, 3 years ago, in a different time, in a different world. But with that said, of course, it's, as CEO, it's my focus and, and our ambition and aim to continue to grow and build this company in order to reach those targets that we, we, we decided on prior to the IPO. I think we are delivering on a, on a strong growth internationally. Of course, we are seeing the declining market in the Nordics, so it's important that we can turn that around. Since I came on board as CEO, during the last 3 quarters, we've grown by 19%.
Of course, it will require a slightly higher growth than the 19% in order to reach the financial targets. We are seeing a strong, strong start of this fiscal year. So we are aiming for it, but it's a goal, it's not a guidance, and it's a long-term goal set 3 years ago. Yeah, we are still aiming for that. Of course, those financial targets are ending to 10 months from now. At the time, at some point of time, we will, of course, have to look into an exact time plan to when we will come back on the financial targets.
Great, thank you for clarifying, that. Could you also mention some, also something on the Nordics? Have you seen any pickup in recovering in that region, or is it still very depressed and more or less heading south?
Well, in the last quarter, as you can see, we've seen a decline of 16%, that is, of course, a number that we are not happy with. Our estimate is that we are keeping our market share, which is, of course, important. We hope that things will look brighter in the future. We've had a good start, I would say, across the group. That without going into detail, that, that, yeah, can give you some flavor, maybe that, that, it looks better maybe in the Nordics, but, but I can't guide on that.
What we can see that, I mean, we are not exposed to any weather effects, but as you are asking about, asking about the Nordics, it has been a sort of a helpful summer when it comes to rains. That is, I would guess, a bit positive for us, maybe.
Perfect. Thank you very much. Maybe last question from my side. Now, with the year just ended, could you give us some flavor on the, or maybe some product split in terms of revenue? Have you seen any other product category starting to get a bigger share of the pie when it comes in, of your sales? I know that the hiking pants has been a substantial part of your revenue historically. Have you seen any other product category that you want to highlight?
Yeah, I, I can do that. I mean, during the fourth quarter, we saw a big increased demand of shorts. Zip-off trousers also had a strong, a strong demand. We saw an increased demand for short and long-sleeve T-shirts also. As we have mentioned in previous presentations, we have also seen that our shoe collection is, is very well-received in the market, so we are excited about that. We are-- I mean, I'm, I'm really very excited about the, the, the, the new products that we are now introducing for the upcoming autumn and winter season. Today, we are launching the, the, the, the water-resistant Cyclone blanket for dogs. We are looking at...
We will soon launch an alpine collection that we are excited about, and we will make a bigger push into vests, for example. I think there are many exciting product news coming in the upcoming weeks when we now enter the autumn and winter season. Yeah, we are excited about the collection coming up.
Great, Pål. Thank you very much. I think that was all for me for now. Thank you very much, Pål, for taking my questions.
One moment.
The next question comes from Daniel Ovin from Nordea. Please go ahead.
Yes, good morning, Paul and Jesper, and thank you for taking my questions. I just have a few small follow-ups here. The first one is regarding the average number of employees, because you've now only written the average number, not the total number here. If you look at the average number, it's 119 this quarter, and in the previous quarter, the average was 128. I just wonder, do you have any big cut in the workforce, or is there anything else explaining this? This is the first question. Thank you.
Yeah. No, no, we haven't had any, any cuts. It has been on a very stable level. What we have chosen to do now is to report the FTE number, 'cause we feel that is the more relevant number to look at, because that is the one driving costs. The other number could be more misleading as it includes employees not working 100% and, and some of them very, a small part. That is the reason why we're now choosing only to, to expose that FTE number, 'cause it's, it's mainly the cost driver. No, no other sort of reasons behind that.
Okay, great. Then just one last question here, and that's you're talking quite a lot about the success now of garments that is more summer related, like T-shirt like, and now you're talking about launching products here more for the winter season. Would you say that with these launches or, or the direction you're taking, you are getting more exposed to the different seasons? Or could you still say that you're relatively not so impacted by different seasonalities? So that's just a final question on your direction there. Thanks.
Yeah, I think, I mean, it's important for us to broaden the assortment in order to, to, you know, build a, a strong outdoor, international outdoor brand. Pants is definitely the biggest product category still, but I think it, it's, it's important for us, you know, to be credible in order, in order to sort of capitalize on the, the, on all the nice customer relations we have. That we widen the assortment with new exciting products at an unmatched value, you know, on a regular basis. There will probably always be seasonality effects because of the average order value, if you compare lightweight summer products compared to winter products. One should, of course, take that into account.
We are definitely seeing that our company is, is growing, not only in terms of sales numbers, but also in terms of new exciting products and, and, and product categories. Hope that gives you a feeling.
Yes, that's perfect. That's all my questions. Thank you very much.
Thank you for coming.
The next question comes from Benjamin Wahlstedt from ABG. Please go ahead.
Hi again. Just a quick follow-up. You talked very quickly about marketing and logistics costs growing in line with sales. I was just wondering if you could clarify, is that in Q4 levels that you expect the ratio to be constant? Or is that in LTM terms, or what level should we expect to see flattening out, essentially then?
We're not quantifying that in, in more detail. I think I only wanted to give you sort of a feeling that one should not expect any, you know, on, above the line investments or, or anything like that, on top of, on top of sort of normal operations. And, and, yeah. So.
Right. Yeah. I was just trying to get a feel if we should expect another external cost ratio of 48%, that would be significantly above what you've done in recent years. Oh, right. I, I, I understand. Thank you very much.
Okay.
There are no more questions at this time. I hand the conference back to the speakers for any closing comments.
Thank you, operator. Before we wrap up, let's see if we have any questions online. If you have that, I will read the question and then try to answer it also. Yeah, we have a first question about container prices that have decreased a lot from 2021, it says here. The question is how if that will impact our margins positively over the upcoming quarters? I think I mean, going back when container prices were higher, we saw that the impact on our costs on goods sold was limited. With that, we don't expect any big impact when the container prices are going south either.
I think the first, the, the answer is no significant impact. Second, it goes into the inventory, so if there would be an impact, it would be sort of, we, we will see the impact in, in the P&L over a longer time. The second question is how will you distribute in three new markets? Will you have local inventory? Today we have warehouses in Sweden, we have warehouses in a warehouse in Germany, and one also in U.S. on top of the, and on, and on top of that, we're also working with Amazon when it comes to the marketplace business, helping us with, with fulfilling orders generated from that.
We will continue with these three new markets to fulfill the orders from the existing three warehouse we have. We are not investing into any new warehouses at the moment to fulfill those three new markets. That, I think, concludes the questions online also. All in all, we are seeing exciting days and look forward to the coming months with new product news and new markets. Thank you all for participating today and for your interest in us. We look forward to speaking to you again over the coming weeks and months. May I also remind you that our Q1 report will be announced on November 7th. With that, thank you and goodbye.