The Super Retail Group Ltd (ASX: SUL) share price will be on watch this morning after revealing continuing strong growth in FY21.
How is Super Retail doing in FY21?
The company is giving a presentation at an investor conference. Included in that is a trading update for the first 44 weeks of FY21.
Compared to the first 44 weeks of FY20, the like for like (LFL) sales growth is 28% across its four core brands.
But let’s look at the breakdown of the individual businesses.
Supercheap Auto LFL sales went up 21%. Rebel LFL sales grew by 20%. BCF LFL sales went up 59%. Macpac LFL sales rose by 17%.
Those numbers were particularly strong at BCF and Macpac. Super Retail provided investors a comparison of growth compared to the first 44 weeks of FY19 to enable comparison against non-COVID trading. Whilst Supercheap Auto and Rebel sales growth was roughly the same (22% and 19% respectively), BCF growth was 49% and Macpac sales growth was 3%. So those two been stronger compared to the COVID-affected FY20.
Management comments
Super Retail Anthony Heraghty said: “Given the continued strength of customer demand, the group has maintained relatively subdued levels of promotional activity in the second half. As a result, the gross margin improvement which the group delivered in the first half has been maintained in the second half.
“The group is in a well-stocked inventory position, which has benefitted from the arrival of orders made in the first half. Higher shipping costs in the second half have impacted inventory costs but these have been partly offset by favourable currency movements.
“As a previously advised, second half operating expenses will reflect catch-up on projects deferred during COVID-19 and increased re-investment in the business.”
Summary thoughts on the Super Retail share price
The Super Retail share price has performed strongly since the COVID-19 crash with good sales growth. It will be interesting to see how the investor community reacts to this update. It’s a solid update, but it depends how much growth people were expecting.
Either way, investors may be able to get a good dividend, as Super Retail is one of the more generous ASX dividend shares around.
