Good day, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Natuzzi second quarter 2022 financial results conference call. As a reminder, interested persons can join this conference call live via telephone by dialing in the following number, (+1) 412 717 9633, then passcode 39252103#. Once again, to dial in, please dial (+1) 412 717 9633, then passcode 39252103#. In addition to the link already provided for the video to join. At this time, all participants are in listen-only mode. Following the introduction, we'll conduct a question and answer session. Instructions will be provided at that time for you to queue for questions.
Joining us on today's call are Mr. Antonio Achille, Natuzzi's Chief Executive Officer, Mr. Jason Camp, President of Natuzzi Americas, Piero Direnzo, Investor Relations, and Mr. Pasquale Natuzzi will join us in a few minutes. As a reminder, today's call is being recorded. I will now turn the conference over to Piero. Please go ahead.
Thank you, Kevin. Good day to everyone, and thank you for joining the Natuzzi's conference call for the second quarter 2022 financial results. After a brief introduction, we will give room for a Q&A session. Before proceeding, we would like to advise our listeners that our discussion today could contain certain statements that constitute forward-looking statements under the United States securities laws. Obviously, actual results may differ materially from those in the forward-looking statements because of risks and uncertainties that can affect our results of operations and financial condition. Please refer to our most recent annual report on Form 20-F filed with the SEC for a complete review of those risks. The company assumes no obligation to update or revise any forward-looking matters discussed during this call. Now, I would like to turn the call over to the company's Chief Executive Officer. Please, Antonio.
Thank you, Piero, for the introduction, and good morning, good afternoon, all respected investors and analysts. As usual, let me start sharing a bit what has been the quarter results. As you've seen from our press release, we closed the quarter on a positive note, both in terms of sales, which were high single digit above 2021. That as you know has been a very strong year for the industry as well as for Natuzzi. We closed 2021 30% above 2020. Having a quarter and a half which closed 7.8% on first half, I believe has been a good result. Of course, we are very much higher than 2018, which has been the last year of normal condition for the market before COVID.
We closed roughly 27% above 2018. The driving force of the growth has been the branded business. We will be commenting more in detail, but our branded business now represent 90%. As you know, this is the future of the company. We are on a journey to become a brand retailer, and the branded business now is more than 90%, sorry, overall turnover. It's also the sixth sequential quarter in positive, with positive results, after quite a significant track record of investment of the company that resulted in negative operating profit. We close with EUR 1 million operating profit in the second quarter.
We spell out that in comparing this figure to 2021, you need to take into account the one-off measure that was still in place because of COVID that accounted EUR 1.5 million in 2021. In other words, the operating profit of EUR 1.1 million for the second quarter compared to EUR 0.1 operating profit of 2021 once the official number is netted by the one-off measures. We continue paying a significant attention to cash also given the uncertain times every business is running through. Our cash position is close to EUR 60 million, roughly the double that we need to manage our daily operation. This is a bit the picture in essence of the business.
We will be discussing the specific action we're taking as a leadership team to face a market context that remain not only for us, but I would say for the whole furniture industry, and I would say for the whole economy quite challenging because of multiple factors. Those factors have also been affecting our business in terms of orders. In fact, last weeks we are seeing a trend less positive than what has been at the start of the year. We are taking and I will discuss later both the top line measure and cost measure to ensure that these difficult condition are not impacting our financial and our long-term plan. Let me stop here.
I'd rather, you know, continue the discussion in more a Q&A session rather than you know in this opening.
Thank you. We'll now be conducting your question-and-answer session. If you'd like to ask a question, please use the Raise Your Hand feature. Once again, the question-and-answer session is now open. One moment, please, while we poll for questions. Our first question is coming from Steven Regan from [Regan Analytics]. Your line is now live.
Yeah, good morning.
Morning.
Good morning. It's good we have connection here. Yeah, or should I say good afternoon, rather. Recently we-
British morning, afternoon. It's 4:00 P.M.
Yeah.
As you can see the.
Okay. Well, enjoy your evening after this call. Can you please just explain your FX strategies? Obviously, we're in unprecedented times within the FX markets globally. Can you please explain how Natuzzi is taking steps to mitigate that? Where is most of our money, is it in the euro? I thank you for taking my call or my question.
Thank you, Steve. Let me start from the last part of your question. We work in end markets. When you look at the buying is predominantly in dollars because some of our, let's say, key ingredients, like the wet blue, so the leather, is negotiated in dollar. We buy from China where we source typically motion and other, the same metallic part in dollars. When it comes to selling, our business has a significant portion in US which more than offset the purchasing in dollars. At the moment we rather benefit than suffering from a stronger dollar. More in general, we're working with several currency. The way we do through our, let's say, financial treasury department, we don't do covering because the covering will be too costly.
We look and develop the position short term to offset the FX fluctuation. We basically do short-term coverage to offset the FX fluctuation. I think from what I've seen so far, our, you know, treasury department is being quite successful in doing so and navigating quite nicely through these FX volatility periods.
Excellent. That's really good news. A follow-up question. The stock trading on the New York is trading at cash, basically US dollar, trading at cash. What does the company think about that, number one? What steps can we take to improve shareholder value? Thank you for taking my questions.
I will use the polite version of what I think about it. I definitely see a bit of an asymmetry here, maybe given the past history of the company of not being systematic in providing returns to investors. Last year, we closed with EUR 27 million EBITDA. As you said, we traded cash, not even considering the cash that we don't have on our balance sheet, but we have in our JV, with EUR 60 million or $60 million right now, where we have a minority, and actually it is not considered in our balance sheet. But also that in a sense is part of the broader value creation story on Natuzzi. Let me take the positive angle.
I believe as a CEO and as a leadership team, we need to do two things. It's actually in this order. First is to systematically deliver value to shareholders and ensuring marginality and profit and cash return on capital employed. This is, let's say, entirely in our hands. Of course, these years are a bit more exciting than we wish. The second element is that we're trying to as well do to bring some spotlight or clarity on the story of Natuzzi, which as you know, is a micro-cap in the U.S. We run the risk of being neglected by investors and also not benefiting from analyst coverage. It's our duty not to do too much romance about what we're doing, but at least to provide clarity.
As part of that, we are doing quite regular call with potential investors. We're also planning to join some events late October, like LD Micro. Maybe it's not the right time, but again, it's not a roadshow. We're simply sharing our story and what we're doing in a transparent manner.
Thank you.
Thank you. Next question is coming from David Kanen from Kanen Wealth Management. Your line is now live.
Good morning, guys.
Good morning, David.
Congratulations on turning a profit, you know, with all of the challenges that you were facing in the quarter, China, inflation, et cetera. Just to scratch beneath the surface in terms of some of the operating lines, it looks like the operating expenses were down from like EUR 37.7 million down to EUR 35.6 million, despite revenues being up about 6.5%, and it looks like that was mostly transportation. Can you just confirm that for me? Or were there other items that contributed to that reduction in OpEx? As we get into the second half of the year, I mean, when we look at spot rates and container costs, it looks like it's going in the right direction, but can you give us a little bit of update there?
I may start, but definitely I will have Jason jump in, and I'll tell you why. Your reading is spot on, Dave, as typically happens. Transportation helped us. 80% of our transportation costs, which are significant, in the range of EUR 60 million, are towards US. Given the fact the US does not have production and sourced from different region, sourced from Italy, and then branded business from Vietnam, in addition from China. Quite long routes. What we're seeing is definitely a significant decrease in freight surcharge.
Not yet at the level of pre-COVID, but significantly lower than what we experienced in the most dramatic part of the industry last year, especially last year also this year when, you know, during the Chinese New Year, the tariffs were reaching all-time records. There we see a long-term trend on inland transportation, which again, for U.S. is a bit of an issue. The fuel and other things are contributing not to the same sharp decrease. We are passing some of these, let's say, cost decreases to our clients, but always in a very cautious manner, not to jeopardize our marginality.
Having said that, given the fact that U.S. is really central for this, maybe I will ask Jason, and if you allow me, Jason, maybe you can also share a bit how we deal with freight to Natuzzi Italia as opposite to Natuzzi Edition, and take it also from there.
Sure. Happy to. You know, during spring last year, we probably adjusted our landed pricing to our customers, three to four times, depending on the brand, as freight was rising. You know, we're definitely seeing, you know, a strong downward trajectory and, you know, together with our global freight team, you know, watching things carefully and adjusting our surcharges downward, as it seems prudent and, you know, keeping a careful eye on our competition as well, as they make moves with their surcharges and landed pricing. It's a big focus of ours to make sure that we're protecting our marginality but, you know, staying competitive as well.
Okay. In other words, the reduction in transportation costs is persisting into the second half of the year. Now when I look at, for example, commodity prices, many of the raw materials that go into your products, we're seeing them decrease now. I know that there's a lag between the price increases and, you know, the invoice sale and when we, through the P&L, start to realize the improved gross margins. But I see every indication that that's going to happen between Factory 4.0, reduction in raw material costs, you guys taking price increases, transportation being down, all of that points to better gross margins in the future. My question is, will we see that in the back half of the year start to see it, and then, will it be better in 2023?
Let me start answering for what I have visibility on. As you know, Dave, we don't provide guidance, but let me try to be explicit to your question. In quarter three, we see benefit, also because our price increase typically are embedded in the system in March. April will start being visible in terms of top line. The second half results don't yet include the impact of 2022 price increase for the business cycle of our order to revenue business that you mentioned. That will happen. Transportation, I share the direction, the trend. Material, I keep reviewing that with our team. It's a bit of a mixed picture. There are some materials which are starting to decrease, notably leather. Others, like fabrics, they're not decreasing.
Most of them, they're not decreasing. Because yes, there is less demand, but also, those industries are quite energy intensive. We all know the dynamics about energy these days. For materials, the picture is more average. There are materials where there is less demand and hence, costs are starting normalizing or they clearly inverted the decreasing trends, like leather, which is a by-product of meat production. Fabrics, which again is quite relevant to ethical business and other metallic parts, they're not decreasing because of the cost of production for those materials has suffered from higher energy costs.
Okay.
Dave, maybe it's a long story. The short story. Clearly, the idea is to keep managing the company for margin. That's obvious.
Understood. Then, quick question for Jason, then I'll go back in queue. Can you give us an update on the North American branded product expansion, in particular Italia, how we're doing, any stores that have been opened subsequent to our last update and what the next six to 12 months looks like?
Happy to, Dave. By the time 2022 ends, we'll have opened seven stores, six of those are Editions and one Italia. Then in the first half of 2023 with signed leases, we'll open another five stores, all of which will be Italia. That's maybe a, you know, a quick summary of the openings ahead and happy to kind of answer any more specific questions that come. With the six openings that we'll open in Italia will include locations like La Jolla, in the suburbs of San Diego, Manhasset, Houston, west side of Atlanta, we're really excited to get, you know, to get this going.
I'm sorry, Jason, you partially broke up. Tell me how many have you opened so far this year, and then the six new openings, when will they be complete?
In total for 2022, we will open seven stores. Six of those which are Natuzzi Editions, and one which will be Italia. That our first Italia opening will be right around December first of this year in La Jolla, CA. Then in the first half of next year, all the signed leases and, you know, design complete, we'll open five Italia stores in key markets around the country.
Understood. Thanks, guys.
You bet.
Once again, the question and answer session is now open. Please use the raise your hand icon in order to ask a question today. One moment, please, while we pull for further questions. Once again, the question and answer session is now open. Our next question is coming from George Melas from MKH Management. Your line is now live.
Good morning, guys.
George.
Good morning. Can you guys give us an update on the China JV? I don't recall whether you actually give information on the revenue of the JV, but maybe you can tell us. I think you have 25 FOS stores there, the rest are franchises. Help us remember how the JV is constituted and maybe also what cash the JV has.
Okay. I will start. Well, maybe I'll ask Piero . I know them by heart, but I want to be sure I quote it rightly to pull out the information on the FOS and the first store in China. You could discuss it before also revenue 2021. The JV, George , has been constituted as 49/51.
Yeah.
We don't consolidate line by line. We just get benefit of it historically in two ways. I'll mention a third way we are implementing this year. The two ways is the selling margin, so the JV sources product from us, and resells to any third party pays our industrial cost plus the margin. That's the first way we get benefit from it. The second way is dividend. Every year the JV distributes dividend, and 49% of that goes to Natuzzi. Those are the historical avenues that were used to distribute value to Natuzzi. We discussed and agreed with the board a third way, which is distributing some cash that is sitting in the JV, which is not needed for sustaining this business, in form of capital reduction.
That has been approved, is on the way in terms of execution. We are working to make it happen within this year. I will disclose the amount, as that gets, let's say finalized. That is something which has been agreed by the board of directors of the JV based on my proposal to do some capital reduction. Those are the more short term, let's say, ways. Mid term, as we discuss, I believe the JV is quite interesting in terms of growth and maybe Piero now can comment because he's been almost doubling the business every year. There might be some long term, let's say option to get full benefit of our participation.
I'm looking forward to be able to travel there, because I believe that those are easy to be discussed with our partner, KUKA, in person. We already mentioned potential option, including, separated IPO of the entity. There is no plan for that yet, so I think you should not take that into account as, something already happening. That's just to share my view. Piero, if you can share, the stores and remind me if we disclosed the revenues well in the past. If so, please do it again, now in this call, 2021 revenue.
Okay, Antonio. We generally disclose once a year within the 20-F.
Okay.
I mean, talking about the revenue of the JV, 'cause they are listed as well. As for the number of stores, as of June, we have in China 378 stores, of which 25 are directly operated by the JV itself, and 353 are FOS. Majority of the stores are in traditional stores versus
Yeah. Can you remind, otherwise I can pull it up. Can you remind how we closed 2021, in the 2021
Yes. In terms of revenue, the revenue from the JV was EUR 96.3 million in 2021. During the period revenue was EUR 62 million.
50% more. This year, as you know, China is the last big country still affected by COVID. We had until May, 15 stores that were closed. Now stores are open, but the COVID related procedures are not really encouraging for shopping in the sense that, from my latest information available, if a case of COVID was reported in a specific department store, all people entering this department store in the day would need to quarantine. That, of course, does not create a strong excitement to be in department store. That is something which is still affecting our traffic in the store. This year, we have opened, I believe, 48 stores in China, no, Piero?
Correct. 38 stores.
Vice versa. In the first six months, we opened 38 new stores. Even in these, let's say circumstances which are not really favorable, still, our retail progression in China is continuing.
Antonio, I'm here.
Hi, Pasquale. Welcome. We mentioned you were in a client call.
Oh, I'm sorry. I mean, for being late, but I had a call with the chairman of a big company where we are trying to do business with.
Fantastic. We were just commenting. We just shared the status of the art and now we're getting questions from our investors.
Okay.
Also maybe, Antonio, remind us how much cash there is in the JV and of course 49 of that really is yours.
Yeah. This is in the range of EUR 60 million. Again, Piero, if you can help me to be honest on the number.
Again, we cannot disclose how much cash.
No. For the one in 2021 because
Oh, sorry. Yes, I can. It was. Oh, okay. We had the JV had roughly EUR 62 million at the end of 2021 versus EUR 43 million at the end of 2020.
Going back to my initial point, George, and thank you for pointing to that. That's really, I believe one of the early investors pointed out that we are trading almost at parity with our cash, that without calculating what is the share, which is 49% of those EUR 60 million. As I mentioned, eventually, which I believe is a significant progress, we agreed in the board of directors of the JV to do this year first capital reduction. Because the nature of the business in China, which is based on retail, but mostly in the form of franchising, does not require significant direct investment. The cash sitting in the JV, even considering the volatile environment in China, is something we see the business need.
We mutually agreed with the board to do a capital reduction that we're targeting to achieve by this year.
Very good. Thank you.
Thank you, George.
Thank you. As a reminder, the question and answer session is open. Please use your raise hand function to ask a question. Our next question is a follow-up from David Kanen from Kanen Wealth Management. Your line is now open.
Yes. Can you give us an update on, excuse me, your High Point property? I believe it was up on the market for sale. Have you been able to consummate a sale lease back?
Thank you for the question, Dave. You are absolutely right. We are working to complete a potential transaction. We are entering in the final round of discussion with potential investors based, as you rightly mentioned, on assessing this cash stream. I'm not able at this time to disclose much more than that because discussion is ongoing as I speak. We're working and hope that in all of our quarter calls we can announce a positive outcome. That is part of our strategy to focus on the investment that make a difference from the long term, which are our restructuring plans, accelerating the Factory 4.0 and our retail development. The plan of doing disposal of non-strategic asset, the largest being High Point, continues.
There are other tactical assets that we might look at selling, including some, you know, production unit that we have in Italy, which are not strategic. Of course we are very careful to put those assets in the market in a moment where the market is clearly not in a buying mood.
Okay. Thank you. You know what? I've got another follow-up, I'm sorry. Just again, to me, the sort of the bright spot or silver lining here is the reduction in operating expenses as a % of revenue. Because if I model going forward, if you would've had a 35% gross margin, we would've made like $5 million for the quarter. Okay? My question is, aside from the transportation cost, which we know continues to come down, was there anything anomalous in OpEx that benefited the quarter that we would not expect going forward?
You mean just in OpEx? In OpEx, we have, like I said, three main items. One is the transportation we commented before, where the future seems to be starting a more positive trajectory. The second is material where we discussed here, the trend is not homogeneous on some material like wet blue, you see decreasing cost on some other material like fabric or motion, which production, some energy consumption, we don't see homogeneous trend. The third, let's say, element, is our transformation cost that I know you mentioned or not, but that is an important element we're working on. We're working on in two major ways. One is to have an optimal industrial production location. As you know, we have multiple sites, which include directly operated sites, Italy, Romania, China and Brazil.
In our sourcing, the largest one being Vietnam and, starting in Mexico, but also Portugal and India. The first strategic decision is reconfirming the location among those, industrial platform. That is based on multiple factor, which include the transformation cost, the tariff, and the production cost. The second big levers, which is more controllable, is the production cost. Transformation cost in our own factory. Here you are aware of the Factory 4.0 project that discussed before in Italy, which is delivering interesting results and is becoming the standard for all factories. We're also looking at way to accelerate, the transformation, especially for Italy, where we produce Natuzzi Italia and, Divani & Divani, the sub-brand of Natuzzi Editions for Italy.
Here we still employ 1,400 people, and we're carefully looking at ways to accelerate the restructuring, still being compliant with all the agreements that's been taken by the company, with trade unions and the public minister that are important stakeholders, in the local work environment. Long story to say, transformation is also an important part of that, and we're working to make better industrial strategic sourcing decisions and to continue lowering our transformation cost, especially in Italy.
Okay. Thank you guys.
And then maybe-
I'm sorry.
No, it's just right to summarize Dave's question, I think, you know, cost came down, operating costs came down about 400 basis points year-over-year. I think maybe in summary, his question is that the new baseline for our costs or was there kind of some one-time benefit that we can't count on on an ongoing basis?
Since you phrase it, you are very free to answer that question.
Well, honestly, at a global level, I'm not sure I have enough visibility to answer it, but that, you know, obviously it was great news for everyone to see those costs come down year-over-year like that.
As I said, Jason, sorry, Dave, it's a complex equation because there are conflicting forces. Transportation we discussed, you've seen pretty much taking a direction. It was clearly a speculative bubble. As demand is decreasing, that is decreasing, especially for shipping. For inland transportation where the fuel has higher relevance, the trend is less sharp. When it comes to materials, there are conflicting forces. I believe that's the answer to that. In the sense that in general, for the suppliers to serve durables like furniture or the car industry, the demand is less strong than 2021. It's providing, let's say, a benefit in terms of potential reduction in cost. At the same time, some of these producers, like fabric producers or motion producers, intensively use energy in their production process.
As you know, energy has hit a record high. The net effect, I've been reviewing the cost trend with our purchasing team this morning. There is diverging trends. Wet blue, where the energy consumption is lower, is reporting a decrease. In wet blue alone represent 25% of our cost structure. On fabric, the trend is opposite because fabric is more industrial process, so there is a moderate increase. I've been also exchanging view with some of my peers, CEO of industrial company, and they also are witnessing the same reality. There's no a single answer. The answer is it depends, which means it depends on the specific material, and it depends on where you source it, and it depends on the timing of your question.
Because out there is very much still a volatile market when it comes to energy cost and raw material cost.
Okay. Thank you, guys. Good luck in the back half of the year.
No, the thing is, we don't want to project any false reassurance on this because we are just taking what the market is delivering on the materials. What I can reassure you is that we are working to have a better control of the dynamics of those costs and how they impact our final unit cost. For instance, we just launched an internal project with our IT department as part of the broader digital transformation to immediately recalculate the unit cost of a specific product based on the latest information on the raw material dynamics. So that in the pricing or in the margin calculation, we don't use any more standard cost, which in a more stable world was somehow useful to take this kind of decision during the year.
We are trying to use functional information or real cost for individual product to take any pricing or margin decision.
Thank you. As a reminder, the question and answer session is open. Please use the Raise Your Hand function to be placed into the question queue. One moment, please, while we poll for questions. If you are not connected to the web and would like to verbally ask a question, you could also press star one. One moment, please, while we poll for questions. Once again, use the Raise Your Hand feature, or if you're dialed in over the phone, please press star one. One moment, please, while we poll for further questions. We do a follow-up from George Melas from MKH Management. Your line is now live.
Great. Thanks. Antonio Achille, I think that you unveiled a new store concept in Milan a few months ago. Can you tell us a little bit about it and maybe what's the reception that you've had? Also, you know, what would be the plan to propagate that store concept? Maybe sort of first of all, what you learned and how you think that's gonna impact other stores. How are you gonna roll out the lessons that you've learned?
Thank you, George. About the new store concept, for those who were not able to sit in Design Week in Milan, is a concept for Italia, our ambassador brand. Which is intended to be propagating the DNA of the brand. As you know, the brand that speaks about Italy, and especially speak about our reality of Apulia, which is a magic region, and we try to convey that magic in the product and the retail experience. The concept is about light colors, about, you know, resonance with our territory. That, George, is the standard for any new opening. In fact, in China, the stores we mentioned before, the stores for Natuzzi Italia have been opened with the new concept. The new store for Natuzzi Italia that would be open in U.S., would be open with new concept.
That is the image and the feeling that the customer globally will get from Natuzzi Italia, which is a global brand. This question allow me also to make a very transparent way, another element. As you know, Natuzzi has heavily invested to become a brand and a retailer. The two things goes hand in hand. We are still. Let's say we're still with a lot of improvement on both area, and we are realizing that retail experience is very important, is paramount importance.
Retail experience is of course made of the infrastructure, which is the store that I mentioned before, but is made of a lot of other details that we are learning across geography, and we are trying to standardize in a blueprint that can become the standard, not only for our U.S., but also for our franchising partner, which is still and will remain the predominant of our distribution. Here I'm talking about the way in which the product is shown, the merchandising, the visual merchandising, all the clienteling that's happening in the store. I've been working with company that take decades to learn the job. We aspire to go through a faster cycle, but we are very transparent that we still have a lot of hard work to do in that direction.
Great. Okay. Very helpful. Thank you.
Again, just to be factual, and again, we will talk a bit, if you don't ask me, I will do about the business trajectory. If I look, for instance, at U.S. retail, where U.S. has been, in this quarter, a market which suffer, especially on the wholesale side. If I look at the performance up to date, retail of Natuzzi Italia is up 60% versus 2018. I'm talking like for like, and is also up, you know, again, if I look at year to date, is also up versus 2021. There's a lot of work to be done, especially in Europe and also in U.S. Those figure confirm us that Natuzzi has the legitimacy to run retail.
Thank you. As a reminder, the Q&A session is open. Please use the Raise Your Hand function if you're on the webcast, or you could use star one if you're dialed in via telephone. One moment please while we poll for further questions. Once again, use your Raise Your Hand function to ask your question via the webcast or star one to verbally ask a question over the phone. One moment please while we poll for further questions. If there are no further questions at this time, I'd like to turn the floor back over for any further closing comments.
Gentlemen and ladies, thank you for your attention. In closing, I might remind you a bit what has been the theme of today. We are closing a quarter nicely in terms of growth. We are satisfied by seeing that this is the sixth consecutive quarter that we close with positive results, notwithstanding the issue we reported in China, which created some shortfall in production. We feel that our cash position of roughly EUR 60 million in the S.p.A. plus the one we own in China is a good platform to sustain the adverse headwinds of this day. At the same time, we're being transparent that Natuzzi as other player in the furniture has been reporting since I would say late April a softening in the demand.
This is for the reason that you know about the economy cooling down because of multiple factors. We, of course, are taking this very seriously and reacting at least with four major interventions. The first is about commercial focus. We are staying closer than ever to our clients. When I say we, it means the full organization, starting from the chairman down to the last regional manager. We are reviewing the organization where it makes sense. We are taking any single opportunity like the upcoming High Point market to show what are the latest innovations in our retail and product offering. Commercial focus is very important to us. We are also launching new growth opportunities, just to name one, trade. Trade is the business we do with the
Let's say in our store that we do with our architect and designer, is an important component in some stores, not so important in other. We just hired a senior manager to support creating a common methodology in accelerated part of the business. I can mention other initiative here to support the growth, like the JV in Vietnam. Two action, major action on growth and top line. Equally important to action on our cost structure. We keep a very high attention on margin. As I believe you capture from the discussion on the cost of material and transformation, margin is not something we can take for granted. It's a continued fight against external element like the cost of material and against internal element, which is our unit per minute production. We need to stay very focused on margin. That is the third point.
The fourth point is accelerating restructuring. We have several work stream to optimize our internal cost, and those are being always there, but we're looking at those element with an appetite to do more short-term. The last point which we somehow touch upon with FX and other dynamics, we keep monitoring very closely our financial and our cash position. We believe that this is turbulent time is very assuring for us as manager, and I believe as shareholder, to know that we are using the lens of cash to prioritize any decision we do in running the business. That was my final comment. I don't know if Pasquale, Jason, Piero, you have any final comment. Otherwise, I can thank the audience for their patience this morning.
You did a good job, Antonio. You did a good job. Thank you very much. Very clear.
Thank you so much, everyone.
Thank you so much, everyone. This concludes the conference call today, and please contact us for any requests that you might have. Thank you again for joining, and have a nice day.
You may now disconnect.
Thank you so much again. Bye-bye.