Good morning. My name is Eric, and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the Andrew Peller Limited Fourth Quarter and Year-End Results Conference Call. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speaker's remarks, there will be a question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question during this time, simply press Star, then the number one on your telephone keypad. If you would like to withdraw your question, please press star, then the number two. I will now turn the call over to David Mills. Please go ahead, Mr. Mills.
Thank you. Good morning, everyone. Before we begin, this is a reminder that during this conference call, management may make statements containing forward-looking information. This forward-looking information is based on a number of assumptions and is subject to a number of unknown risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those disclosed or implied. Please refer to our earnings release, MD&A and other securities filings for additional information about these assumptions, risks and uncertainties. I'll turn things over to John Peller, Chief Executive Officer.
Thank you, David, good morning, everyone. Great to be with you. Obviously we've released our results last evening and I'm looking forward to discussing with you all the things that are going on in our company. I think I'd like to start by just, you know, reviewing with you what I've always presented to you, kind of as the three kind of phases of COVID that we've gone through in the first year, fiscal 21. You know, we were actually incredibly surprised that despite all the business closures, we actually accelerated revenue and earnings in that first year. In the second year, as the second wave came through and with the impact of significant estate winery and retail or restaurant closures, we had a significant 5%-6% revenue drop.
That, and the beginning of cost increases that had our revenue come down, as I said, our EBITDA fell to CAD 39 million in that year, but largely as a result of revenue reduction. This last year that we've just completed, our revenue has returned back up to its normal level. We had a good revenue performance of 2.5% increase, and our EBITDA has stayed flat. While that may be modest in terms of its appearance, from a managerial perspective, it was a very significant achievement, and that's what I'm going to explain to you now. Without a doubt, the most difficult part of those three years has been this last year, where we had total disruption in our supply chain.
You know, the whole issue of inflation and supply chain disruption was very different depending what industry that you were in. For us, you know, we're a global supply chain of import wine, glass and packaging components. We definitely took the teeth of that disruption. I'd like to explain from just a wine liquid perspective, the cost that we were purchasing the wine around the world was up in double digits, but it was the least impactful. Our freight costs in one year went up over 200% from CAD 10 million last year. Our glass and packaging components went up CAD 20 million, which is a 50% increase, that's compared to in no year in the last 20 years, do we ever recall any of those costs going up 5%.
You can see that they were extraordinary increases. You know, due to the incredible hard work and effort of our management team, we were able to offset over 50% of that impact with pricing, sales of more premium priced products and cost saving projects so that we were successful. I know we were successful because I have a very close network with the people we compete with in our industry here in Canada and in California. All of those other companies that I've spoken with have said they have fared much worse than us. What all this means is, as we look ahead, is already all those costs are coming down, and they are coming down at a very good pace, although there is some stickiness in a few areas.
What I have to do, you know, today in terms of managing your expectations, is help you understand that all those high costs that we have impacted us last year are now in our inventory, and they will come out of our inventory at their high cost over the next six to nine months. Already we are purchasing at lower cost levels so that we have a high level of confidence that those margins are coming down and that we would expect to get to our, what we would call more normal margins within two years. As I said, I'm proud of the achievement of our team. In addition to those efforts, and they are our most significant managerial focus, is cost reduction. We've had other profit improvement initiatives. You know, our overhead in SG&A has come down over CAD 5 million.
You would have seen in the one-time write-off of CAD 2.8 million in the fourth quarter. We have cost-saving projects going in every aspect of our business, from IT, hospitality, marketing, and sales. The team remains focused and committed to further cost reductions. You know, looking at our sales numbers, last year's effort of plus 2.5% was a solid performance. We would have been up as much as 4% last year, but we were supply constrained in the first two quarters. Already in our first quarter of this year, with only two weeks left, we anticipate our revenue will be up 3%, which, if you compare it to the base of last year, would be +5%, because this year we are now paying excise tax, whereas in the year prior, we weren't.
It's a very good performance. My comments on sales in the market today is that certainly we're seeing the impact of inflation on consumers, you know, as they struggle to meet their grocery bills. Certainly all those sales of hard goods in the consumer markets are down considerably. Our sales remain solid, and having said that, there's a clear preference for value priced markets or products, value priced products in the retail store system. That's the LCBOs, our wine shop stores, independent retail stores across the country and at restaurants as well, where value price products are performing more strongly. Premium are a little soft, although our premium products are selling well in our estate wineries in the destination tourism areas.
You know, as part of our company's strength in those value products, CAD 9-CAD 12 price, 750 bottles. You know, our Peller Family Vineyards brand is a market leader. This year we've also launched imported products in that segment from Chile and Argentina. We have a brand called Vivo, that's been in the market two years. It's performing extremely well. We've launched an Australian product called Natural Selection, and a Californian product called Neon Coast, also doing extremely well. We have a new product that we launched called Honest Lot, which is zero grams sugar, and we're very, very pleased with its launch, and it's growing very nicely. Additionally, we launched the line extension, Ice Storm Vodka, to our Gretzky spirit line. It's had a very, very successful first year in the market.
Our Noble cider, which is a premium positioned cider, is performing very well. On the whole, we're very happy with our marketing and sales performance, and we're looking forward to the rest of the year. Another key initiative, Bill, I want to draw to your attention, which we announced, was our asset-backed loan facility. This was part of an initiative that when I went to talk to my friends and competitors in California, it was made clear to me that everybody in the California wine industry has an asset-backed loan facility, as opposed to a term loan that has a EBITDA covenant, because it recognizes all the asset values there, critical component to the wine business model. You know, when you look at our current share price now, we're trading below our net book value.
If you now adjust for the valuations the banks have put on our assets, that share price is less than double, the value of those fixed assets are more than double the price of the current share price. I'm anxious to highlight our asset-backed loan facility. First of all, we get an immediate cash savings of CAD 5 million-CAD 6 million annually because of our lower interest rates. Secondly, demonstrates the strength and sustainability of our balance sheet, which also is critical to our being able to go through mergers and acquisitions going forward. You know, as part of our cash management, we've also managed our CapEx down and to conserve cash in the short term as we watch ourselves emerge from this recessionary economy.
Last item I want to highlight is just our Port Moody property in British Columbia. As many of you know, we're in the process of monetizing the value of a non-core asset. Indeed, we're in the final stages of crystallizing our entitlements. We have a date of either June the 27th or July the 11th. We've filed for our development permit. All the filings, and they are considerable for a development permit, all those filings are now complete, and the city's indicated that they're pleased with what we've put forward. This will allow us to receive our fourth bylaw approval on either of those two dates, and it will crystallize the entitlements and the significant increase in value of that property from its pre-zoned value.
As I've said in past calls, we realize that we are not a developer. Our goal is to maximize the value, monetize the value of the property and pay down debt. The Vancouver market for condos and rental apartments is the strongest in the country. It is grossly underserved in terms of a demand perspective. You may have read in The Globe a week or two ago that the premier is so concerned about the lack of supply for condos and rental apartments, that they shamed several communities. At the top of the list was Port Moody, for under-delivering to their commitments. I think that will bode very positively for us going forward and the potential for increased entitlements. The interest rates are very high, as you know, for people buying houses and condos.
In the short term, the market is a little soft, but the long term, i.e., more than one year, demand looks very, very strong. There's also inflation and construction costs in that market. They've more than doubled, and while they anticipated them to have come down by now, in fact, they've ticked up a little, which is to say that there is some short-term, you know, noise in this market, but the medium to long-term market for our property and its amenities is very, very strong. With that, operator, I'm prepared to pass it over to you, Paul, for some comments on the financial statements.
Thanks, John. I'm happy to be here with everyone today. Turning to our results, sales in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2023 decreased CAD 1.1 million, or 1.4%, to CAD 77.7 million. This decrease was driven by a CAD 1.4 million revenue impact related to the repeal of the federal excise exemption. Excluding this impact, sales for the fourth quarter would have been up slightly to the prior year. The new Wine Sector Support Program, which was introduced in fiscal 2023 as the excise exemption ended, is accounted for as a reduction of cost of goods sold and does not flow through sales. For the full year of fiscal 2023, sales increased CAD 8.2 million, or 2.2%, to CAD 382.1 million.
As noted previously, sales was reduced by CAD 1.4 million due to the repeal of the Excise Exemption Program. The increases in sales for the year were driven by growth across the majority of our trade channels, including restaurant, hospitality, retail, export, and our estate wineries. A number of positive factors supported this growth, including price increases implemented throughout the fiscal period to help offset ongoing inflation and supply chain pressures, and increased sales of our premium higher-margin VQA products to our Ontario retail network, at our estate wineries, and through our direct-to-consumer wine clubs. Growth in our key trade channels was partially offset by the underperformance of our Personal Winemaking Business, which is experiencing softer post-pandemic demand and distribution. As John mentioned, sales growth in fiscal 2023 was impacted by ongoing supply chain issues throughout the majority of the year.
While our supply chain has largely normalized now, we continue to closely manage the timely delivery of wines from international producers and the sourcing of glass bottles and other input components from our suppliers. To help us meet demand in fiscal 2023, we had to source liquid and other components from domestic and international suppliers at higher costs. Moving to margins. Margin in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2023 landed at CAD 22.1 million, down CAD 1.0 million, or 4.2%, to the prior year. For the full year, margin landed at CAD 141.9 million, up CAD 2.9 million, or 2.1%, to the prior year. Margin as a percentage of sales for the full year of fiscal 2023 was 37.1%, relatively consistent with the prior year of 37.2%.
Margin in the quarter and year-to-date was supported by the company's recognition and accounting of the Wine Sector Support Program benefit, as described in our financial statements and MD&A. Margin in the fourth quarter and for the full year of fiscal 2023 period was affected by higher-than-normal costs of raw materials, particularly glass bottles and packaging, with international freight, shipping charges and fuel surcharges remaining well above historical levels for the majority of the year. Additionally, sourcing certain inputs from alternative suppliers has increased our production costs. In response to these margin pressures, as John mentioned, the company has implemented price increases throughout fiscal 2023 and is focusing on increasing sales of higher-margin products.
In addition, the company is executing numerous production efficiency and savings programs aimed at enhancing operating margins, including rationalizing stock-keeping units, evaluating alternative sourcing of imported wine and glass bottles, and optimizing our logistics and freight. As John mentioned in his remarks, we are confident that our cost savings initiatives will drive further recovery of our margin in fiscal 2024, with full recovery back to normal levels in the next few years, as it will take time for cost reductions to work their way through our system. Sales and admin expenses landed at CAD 23.3 million for the quarter, up CAD 0.4 million or 1.6% to the prior year, and at CAD 103.9 million, up CAD 4.1 million or 3.9% to the prior year for the 12 months ended March 31st.
As a percentage of sales, expenses were 27.2% in fiscal 2023, up marginally from 26.7% in the prior year. Sales and admin expenses have increased this year as the Ontario minimum wage increase took effect and as we return to full operations at our estates post-pandemic. EBITDA landed at -CAD 1.2 million and CAD 38 million for the three and 12 months ended March 31st, compared to -CAD 0.6 million and CAD 39.2 million, respectively, last year. Interest expense was higher for the year due to increased debt levels and higher interest rates. I'll have more to say about this in the balance sheet section when I discuss our new credit facility. We also incurred CAD 2.8 million in one-time costs related to overhead cost restructuring initiatives completed in the fourth quarter.
We will realize the savings from this restructuring in fiscal 2024 and going forward. As a result of the inflationary impact on margins, increased interest expense, and the one-time restructuring costs in the fourth quarter, we incurred a net loss of CAD 3.4 million, or CAD 0.08 per Class A share for the year. This compares to earnings of CAD 12.5 million, or CAD 0.29 per Class A share in fiscal 2022. It should be noted that in fiscal 2022's second quarter, we did recognize a realized gain of CAD 7.5 million, or CAD 0.21 per share on the sale of Port Coquitlam, BC, property and assets. Turning to our balance sheet, total debt increased to CAD 208 million from CAD 192.1 million at the end of fiscal 2022.
At March 31st, 2023, we had capacity on our revolving credit facility of approximately CAD 141.9 million, with shareholders' equity standing at CAD 5.87 per Class A share. Subsequent to year-end, on June 13, we announced the company had entered into a CAD 275 million asset- backed lending credit facility effective June 13, 2023, maturing on June 13, 2027. The credit facility replaces the company's existing credit facility, entered into on December 8, 2020, will result in significant interest savings for the company. At comparative debt level, using interest rates today on an annualized basis, we anticipate CAD 5 million-CAD 6 million in interest savings under the new facility.
These savings estimates are subject to change based on debt levels and interest rate movement and are reflective of the annual savings as of today, not what would be accounted for in the financial statements. Thank you for your time this morning. I'll now pass it back to John.
Thank you very much, Paul. You know, kind of in summary, we're aware that there's kind of considerable instability in the economy these days that's going to continue for a year or so. Notwithstanding that, the overall sales of our company's products remains strong. As many years I've highlighted to you all that, if you go back in the last 25 years to the fourth recessions we've gone through, we've always emerged from every recession a stronger, more capable company, and that will be the case again this time around. Our costs, as we've explained, though they were high in our inventory valuations, currently come out over the next six to nine months, and we're confident we'll return to normal margins within the next two years.
As we see the recession kind of pass going forward, we're going to be in a very strong position from a mergers and acquisition point to participate in many opportunities that are out there. I wanted just to, on a final note, kind of draw your attention that the Niagara Region will be issuing an economic development report in the next two weeks that was produced by Deloitte. It required the participation of all the economic stakeholders of the Niagara Region, certainly including, you know, growers and wineries, but also all the hotel, hospitality and tourism providers, all the cultural industries of the region. It included all the housing developers. All 16 mayors of the Niagara Region participated with their economic development people, along with the universities and colleges and the transportation infrastructure providers to the region.
In other words, it was every stakeholder in the economy of the Niagara Region. The report will highlight the fact that there is an incredible opportunity for economic growth in the Niagara Region, and the opportunity is in all those aspects of the economy that I just reviewed, but it identifies the role the wine industry plays as a catalyst for this economic growth. We hosted an event at the Gretzky Estate facility. It was attended broadly by 90 stakeholders of the region. It included senior people from government, and everybody is excited with the opportunities to grow. You know, when we look at British Columbia, with a population of 4.5 million, it supports two international travel destinations, Whistler and Kelowna. In fact, Kelowna is the fastest growing city in Canada these days. Its hospitality and tourism business is strong.
There's been, you know, multiple billion dollars of investment into that industry over the last five years. Notwithstanding the fact that the Okanagan Valley is about a four-hour drive from Vancouver and a six to eight-hour drive from Edmonton and Calgary. You know, looking at Ontario in the Niagara region, we have a 16 million population that's about to grow to 20 over the next decade or so, within an hour or two-hour drive of our wine region. When you extend that into the U.S., the population goes up to 30- 40 million within a short drive.
The government has recognized now that, you know, as a province, we've grossly underdeveloped the our hospitality and tourism industries, and they're working to see how they can help support capital investment and growth in our region, along with the housing developers, the Beamsville, Vineland, Pelham, and you know, St. David's, Niagara-on-the-Lake. These are all very compelling communities that people want to live in, largely because of their proximity to the wine region. We're excited about that. You'll see this economic report be published shortly, and I think it augurs very, very well for our industry in the region. With that, operator, I'm prepared to pull for questions.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, we will now begin the question and answer session. Should you have a question, please press the star followed by the one on your touchtone phone. You will hear a three-tone prompt acknowledging your request. Questions will be taken in the order received. Should you wish to withdraw your question, please press star followed by the two. If you're using a speakerphone, please lift the handset before pressing any keys. One moment, please, for your first question. Your first question comes from Nick Corcoran from Acumen Capital. Please go ahead.
Good morning. I have a few questions for me. The first is, how are your brands performing relative to the industry?
I'm sorry, Nick, could you repeat that?
Yeah. How are your brands performing relative to the, to the industry?
We've had a strong year for brand performance. We've gained share, you know, in the wine industry in every region. I think we were a little short in BC on the VQA side because of a short crop from the year earlier. Nationally, our market share and brand performance has been very strong and positive.
Great. Then you mentioned restructuring costs of CAD 2.8 million in the fourth quarter. What do you expect the annual savings from that to be?
I mean, I'll let Paul add on to it, but that was part of a CAD 5 million cost savings initiative, and the CAD 2.5, we restructured the costs associated with that. That program is continuing going forward. That was its first initiative, and we have, you know, facilitated projects in every segment and function of our business now to increase our savings going forward. You want to add to that, Paul?
No, I think, I think you captured it, John. I think that, you know, that was a one-time expense in Q4, and, you know, a more significant expense to incur that restructuring, and I think John highlighted the savings. There are, you know, broader savings initiatives across the organization just to ensure that we're, you know, maintaining kind of smart spend within the business as we fight back against these inflationary pressures.
With the first quarter almost done, how is traffic and bookings being kind of this fiscal year to date?
You know, I would say, you know, what we're seeing that's somewhat of a change is a much stronger performance at retail. As I said before, it's even, it's most strong in, in value products. The estate wineries are very, very busy as well. Having said that, you know, they've grown in each of the last. There's plus 25%, plus 30%, which is like growth far, far beyond anything we've ever contemplated. It reflected the fact that people were anxious to get out, tour, and travel, and they didn't necessarily want to travel beyond the Canadian borders. I mean, this is, this is like way beyond where we were, revenue levels beyond where we were in 2020 and 2021, where we're at right now.
There's a little bit of softness, you know, in the 5% range, the first month that we think, you know, reflects that, you know, people are still being cautious with their spending, you know, a bit. Overall, you know, the retail performance, restaurant performance, our export business is up nicely. You know, our TIC business has stabilized, showing potential to grow this year. We really have good performance in all our trade channels.
Have you seen a recovery in the export business, particularly the duty-free?
What I would say there is that, you know, we've recovered in and around, say, the 60% level of that, of those sales, 60%-70%. Interestingly, a lot of our recovery has become, is coming from other products other than ice wine, in travel goods, and on airlines as well, we've done well. You know, the component that is missing is Chinese destination travelers. There are a lot of, you know, consumer discretionary and retailers hoping that the Chinese travelers will return. I would say that from what their normal level was two or three years ago, they're coming, they're traveling in at about 10%-15% of what they used to travel. The good story is there, we've done much better building new business in travel, retail, and export.
We expect that Chinese travel business to come back. We've actually opened up an e-commerce trade channel in China, that's doing very well as a business startup, so that, our performance has been good and should get, you know, much better as the travel patterns come back to normal.
Good. You mentioned that revenue is expected to be up about 3% in the first quarter. Can you give any indication what you're targeting for the full year?
You know, I, at this point in time, we obviously do have a budgeted plan, you know, to come in in the 2%-3% range level. You know, we're kind of used to having significant fluctuations throughout the last three years. It feels to me like things are coming, you know, back at a, at a more normal kind of shopping basis, as, you know, people are aware that the economy is, as I said, in unstable at this point in time, but our segment is performing very well, so we're optimistic we'll hit those targets.
Good. Then one last question from me. With the fourth reading of the bylaws for Port Moody, have you had any more advanced conversations to monetize that asset?
I mean, we're speaking obviously to people in the market. Our project represents a very, very large-scale project so that, you know, it's, there's only a handful of developers doing it, and we're having good discussions with most of them. You know, we're focused on getting our fourth bylaw reading. Like everybody else, we're watching interest rates and costs in the marketplace, but we're in a very strong position to monetize that asset going forward, and we'll do it appropriately and carefully.
That's all great. Thanks. Thanks for taking my questions.
Thanks, Nick.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, as a reminder, should you have a question, please press the star followed by the 1. At this time, there are no further questions. Please proceed with your closing remarks.
Thank you very much, everyone, for joining us today. As always, I encourage you to call us if you have any other questions or things you'd like to discuss with us. We're out in the market a fair amount in the next, you know, four to six weeks with talking with shareholders and investors. If you're interested in booking something with us, please give us a call. We're pleased to inform you that we will have an AGM in the fall that will be back in the market. It won't be a virtual AGM. We'll be inviting people to come and join us, and we'll keep you posted on that as well. We look forward to connecting with all of you soon.
Thanks for your support and attention, and, have a pleasant day. Thank you.
This does conclude your conference for today. You may now disconnect your lines.