Briscoe (NZX:BGP): Is the Company’s strategic plan on track?

Highlights

• Briscoe Group produced a robust half-year result for the 6 months ended 1 August 2021.
• The Group plans to work on boosting the shopping experience, enhancing the supply chain and growing new revenue flows.
• Strategic advances attained by the Group boosted both the resilience and the range of options available to propel growth.

Briscoe Group Limited (NZX:BGP; ASX:BGP) has continued to deliver in the retail space despite the COVID-19 pandemic. Though the Group’s sales were negatively impacted in the last 2 weeks of August due to lockdown, Briscoe picked up as the rest of the country moved down on Alert levels in September. 

The Group produced a robust half-year result for the 6 months ended 1 August 2021. 

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Briscoe registered an increase of 35.2% in gross profit to $166.7 million and a rise of 69.93% in NPAT to $47.5 million for the half year ended 1 August 2021. Group sales also soared 22.58% to $358.4 million and 16.16% of the total sales were made online.  

The Group’s total sales rose 9.52% to $496.9 million in the third quarter ended 31 October 2021. The Group paid an interim dividend of 11.5cps.  

Strategic Plan 

Briscoe has plans to provide its customers powerful brand propositions and entertaining shopping experiences. In late 2019 and before COVID-19 hit the country, the Group had initiated many programmes to enhance its internal performance while driving new approaches for strength and sustainability. 

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Briscoe is focused on 3 key areas – boosting shopping experience, enhancing supply chain and growing new revenue flows.  

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Some of the major proposals taken to pursue these plans included the following- 

• Improving analysis and management abilities like better assessment and supervision of the promotional activity. 
• Driving supply chain improvements like the optimisation of imported products between North Island and South Island ports. 
• A broader workstream to optimise levels, accessibility and flow of inventory across its retail network. 

• Persisting in growing online sales platform, including improved search and by-store stock accessibility functionality. 
• Expanding platform to allow online shopping for new product lines transported direct from suppliers. 

Advantages of strategic programmes undertaken are on track to fulfil Group’s expectations for the full year. 

Outlook 

Strategic advances attained by the Group boosted both the resilience and range of options available to propel growth.  

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Briscoes’s stores remained shut for 50 days during the August-October 2021 lockdown. The impact was mitigated by the increased trend in shopping online and then by strong sales growth as stores reopened. 

Briscoe is well placed to fund strategic investment with a strong balance sheet and healthy inventory position. 

(NOTE: Currency is reported in NZ Dollar unless stated otherwise)