IGLOO Inc. (DOM) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Hello, and welcome to the Dometic Call. [Operator Instructions] Today, I am pleased to present Juan Vargues, President and CEO; and Stefan Fristedt, CFO. Speakers, please begin.

Hi, good afternoon, everybody, and welcome to this call, where we are going to share an introduction about our latest acquisition, Igloo. So let's proceed to the first page without any delays. In our opinion, this is a transformational acquisition, which is really giving us a fantastic position in what we describe to be the vehicle-based outdoor business. Igloo is based out of Texas and is one of the world's leading companies in the market for passive cooling boxes and drinkware. This is an old company, was established 1947, has an iconic brand. For us, it will become a foundational base for our continued journey towards growth and higher profitability levels. It gives also a strong position in one of our main markets, namely the food and beverage market, a growth market, as I will come back later to. Igloo has been developing very nicely in the last couple of years. Just now, on 12 months rolling numbers, they are running at about $400 million or 24% up versus last year with an EBITDA margin of 10%. Talking about the price. The price for Igloo is going to be $677 million on a cash and debt-free basis and there is also an ear-out component that Stefan will describe later on. Next. If we describe Igloo a little bit closer. I mentioned previously, established in 1947, 1,100, with a very, very strong experience, a vast experience on the consumer business. They have a #1 market position, without any kind of doubts. In terms of hard coolers, they have a #1 position in terms of hard cooler brand in the U.S. They have a position as well, branding-wise, worldwide, even if the sales is very, very limited, has to do obviously with the history of the company and the iconic brand they have. Igloo gives us a fantastic opportunity, obviously, to establish the Dometic presence, or to accelerate, I would say, Dometic presence in the U.S. retail markets, having access now to 90,000 retail stores. Igloo has been growing on the B2C e-commerce channel very, very fast in the last couple of years, still very far away from the numbers that a competitor that you are very familiar with, namely Yeti, is running. While Igloo is running at 9%, 10% D2C e-commerce, Yeti is today at 54%. That brings, of course, opportunities for Igloo to grow in that channel. All manufacturing sites in Texas, out of Katy, Texas. That provides, obviously, closeness to the market, flexibility and short lead times. We get a fantastic and broad portfolio of coolers, but also drinkware. Drinkware represents approx 20% of revenues and offers also opportunities both as Igloo brand, where they have been showing very nice growth numbers also on the drinkware side, but also to accelerate our journey as Dometic brand. They have been working in the last couple of years as well to introduce renewable products, have been launching a number of so-called eco-friendly products that we are also very excited about, that we will be collaborating to introduce also as Dometic products using their own technology. The target with Igloo is really to keep the brand. This is, as I mentioned before, an iconic brand. And we see Dometic positioned as the premium brand, and we see Igloo positioned as the better and good brand from a cooler perspective. Next. We see the cooling box market as a very attractive growth market. This is part of what we call outdoor industry. And as we see, outdoor lifestyle has been growing for last 10, 12 years. We continue to see a growth path and the provisions is also strong for the years to come. This is a huge market. It's a USD 8 billion market, where it is including both cooling boxes and drinkware. It gives us also the opportunity to introduce even more innovative products. This is a design product area. Profitability-wise, we know that some of our competitors are running at 20% EBIT margins. We also know that our own coolers at Dometic are well above the company average, showing very strong margins, and we see opportunities, obviously, for bringing Igloo close to the margins that we are talking about in this case. Let's move on. This is a very strategic step for us, which is following to 100% strategy that we introduced to the market in May 2019, meaning expanding in the outdoor channel. We wanted to become much more B2C and get also into e-commerce. And of course, we were aware that in order to accelerate our repositioning as a company, we also need to look for acquisitions outside our traditional areas. And this is obviously a quantum leap in that direction. Next. This is really the journey that we have been running in the last couple of years. If you go back to the second quarter of 2018, just a few months after I joined the company, the OEM business stood for 61% of the total revenue of the company. Excluding Igloo, we are today down to 53%, even when considering the RV OEM market has been growing very, very strongly during the last 12 months. And then you can see on the right-hand side, the important impact that Igloo will have in our numbers moving forward. So again, we are walking the talk. We are developing the company according to the strategy that we introduced to the market. That would also lead, obviously, to lower cyclicality and higher margins over time. Next. And then with that stat from my side, I would like to hand it over to Stefan to give us some more insight on the transaction as such. Stefan, please.

Thank you, Juan. So transaction in overview. We acquire Igloo for an amount of USD 677 million on a cash and debt-free basis. And in addition, there is an earn-out element that can generate a maximum of USD 223 million in additional purchase price. The profitability level that the earn-out is based on is significantly above the current LTM level. If we look on the development of our net debt to leverage ratio, the acquisition of Igloo is going to add approximately 1.3x. And considering where we are starting from, we will be slightly above our target of around 2.5x. As Juan mentioned before, the net sales of Igloo for the last 12 months is USD 401 million, and they have seen a growth of 24% in this time period. And the EBITDA margin is -- for the last 12 months is 10.1%. Synergies from increased sales and cost improvements, we have identified, and it's approximately $50 million per annum. And they are expected to be fully achieved within 5 years. And the transaction is expected to be accretive to the Dometic EPS from 2022. And the closing is expected to happen in Q4 2021, subject to normal regulatory approvals. And from a reporting point of view, you're going to find Igloo in our segment Global going forward. Please, next. If we talk a little bit more about the synergies as such. As I mentioned, they -- we are -- they are approximately around USD 50 million on an annualized basis and will be fully achieved within 5 years. And they are basically coming from 3 different areas, starting with the first, it's the continued implementation of Igloo's stand-alone improvement activities. This is something we have seen during the process of getting to learn about this company, that Igloo and its leadership team have had a solid program, both on the commercial side and on the cost improvement side to improve the profitability of the company. And so far, they have shown a strong track record and good traction of delivering these EBITDA improvements. The second part of the synergies is coming from the commercial side. So we see approximately $150 million in increased net sales. And that's coming from utilizing the strong combined sales platform. As Juan mentioned, also to grow Igloo outside of U.S., they have 92% of their current sales in U.S., mainly targeting EMEA and APAC. And then utilize Igloo's strong presence in North America also for Dometic products. Then the third category of the synergies is related to cost synergies, which is a smaller portion. It's USD 5 million. It's coming from supply chain sourcing and distribution improvements, but then also the ability to utilize Igloo's high-efficient manufacturing plant in Texas for the products that Dometic is already having in its portfolio. So please move ahead. We would like -- I mean you know our financial targets, and we just would like to take the opportunity to reiterate that we are staying committed to the targets. And they mean that we should have a sales growth of totally 10%, which is a combination of organic growth but also M&A-driven growth. EBIT margin, 16% to 17% on an average over a business cycle. Net debt to EBITDA, we have, as you know, updated, and the target is now that it should be around 2.5x. Dividend policy means that we should distribute at least 40% of net profit. So with that, I hand back to you, Juan, to make a summary.

Thank you, Stefan. So we are obviously very pleased we've been able to share with you about the Igloo acquisition. This will help us -- will help Dometic to build up an even stronger and more stable end-user-orientated company. As you know, we have been describing that we see a Dometic that is much more consumer-driven, is much less exposed to cyclicality, is penetrating the major market in the world, both in terms of cooling boxes and drinkware but also on the more general outdoor business, which is North America. It is one more step in putting together a product portfolio that will be appealing for what we call vehicle-based outdoor industry, or in other terms, how to have consumers, how to have every single owner of a pickup truck, of a SUV and station wagon or a sedan to use our products, to be able to buy a rooftop tent this year but to buy a cooling box next year or to buy a barbecue the year after. And with that, obviously, taking down the cyclicality exposure that we have today. We want obviously to move from being perceived as a high-ticket discretionary spend company to a lower-ticket discretionary spend company. And we believe that we are getting access to a fantastic brand that has -- there is no American not familiar with the Igloo brand. And we believe that we have opportunities to use the strength in the marketplace to introduce even more Dometic products, but we also believe that Dometic is creating a fantastic platform for Igloo not just to stay in the American market, but to become really a global brand. And with that said, I would like to start with the Q&A session.

[Operator Instructions] Our first question comes from the line of Johan Eliason of Kepler Cheuvreux.

Juan and Stefan, congratulations to what looks like a very interesting acquisition. It though looks like you will have some work to do going forward. I have 2 questions I would like you to dwell a bit on. First of all, obviously, a very solid growth profile already of this company, 24%, you say, over the last 12 months. I noticed that here in the U.S., Yeti has grown 35% over the same period. Is there a significant reason for this? Is it that Yeti is moving more outside of the U.S.? Or how would you see that difference? And then secondly, on the margin side. I think you have already alluded to it a little bit, but 1 big plant in Texas wouldn't be so far to move sort of to your plant in Mexico, for example. But I got the feeling that it was also the distribution channel that's important for the margin in your presentation. What's the main activities to get this margin up to a more reasonable level?

So we start -- thank you, Johan. So we will start with the first one. It is clear that it's not a one-to-one to Yeti. Yeti is much more drinkware than Igloo is today. Yeti has become more international during the last few years. Yeti is much more e-commerce. With the e-commerce, you don't just get high margins, you also get higher revenues as such. So those are a number of the factors. If you look at market share-wise, we are growing just now our market share, faster in the American market than what Yeti is. So Yeti is just now focusing more on international expansion. So that was the answer to the first question. And the second question is a little bit of what I'm referring to. So you have one side, you have Yeti. But we know also Dometic has totally different kind of markets. So that's one. We know that it is possible. The second one is, as we said, we have drinkware. It's a very nice category to be growing in. So that's another one. We have e-commerce, that's another one, which is extremely important. When Yeti is running at 54% e-commerce, Igloo is at 9%. They just started 1 year ago. And they are showing, by now, fantastic numbers but of course, from a low base. Thirdly, you have also international markets. The U.S. is obviously the largest market in the world, but that's also where you have the most competitors. So having Dometic as a base abroad, overseas, we have a fantastic platform for Igloo to develop as well. So it's not a one single bullet, there are a number of different areas. Then from a manufacturing perspective, Igloo is an American brand. It's an iconic American brand. You look at these kind of products, meaning cooling boxes, drinkware, you would find them obviously all over the continents. But in reality, it's very much on the South. So to me, to move to Mexico, here and now, it doesn't make any sense. We have our customers in the U.S., and we have our customers more -- even more in Southern U.S. Then we have -- that's in terms of the hard coolers. Then you have soft coolers, so called soft coolers and you have drinkware. And very much of that is imported from Asia, and everybody else is importing from Asia as well. So I think we have a very, very good setup for distributing our products. And of course, in this case, and if you were looking at the synergies, we have synergies on the cost side, but that's not the reason for making this acquisition. The reason for the acquisition is to get access to distribution, to get a fantastic brand to help on one side Dometic; on the other side to offer this Igloo brand a global platform that they are lacking today.

Excellent. If I just may add, just to get the feeling for the pandemic impact as well. How would you see Igloo's sort of $400 million turnover versus vis-a-vis pre-pandemic 2019 levels? Just to get the feeling for that development as well.

They have been growing organically during the last 5, 6, 7 years. And if you look at both Igloo and Yeti, we're showing very nice numbers in 2020 despite pandemic. So that's also telling you the kind of exposure that these kind of products and markets do have in comparison to the more traditional where Dometic has been historically.

Our next question comes from the line of Agnieszka Vilela of Nordea.

Yes, I have a question on the underlying profitability of Igloo as a stand-alone business. Looking at the last 12 months, we can see that the EBITDA margin was 10% despite the growth of more than 20%. So what kind of progression did they made -- did they make in the recent time? I think Stefan you mentioned that they did improve the kind of level. And what's the kind of aspiration level that you see for that business?

Yes. There is -- I mean, one of the drivers of our interest around Igloo is that we have seen that the current management team of Igloo have implemented and are continuously implementing a number of activities that is going to drive profitability in Igloo. They've been able to show that improvement. The challenge that they have been seeing lately is pandemic-related and related to the raw material price development that has been very quickly, rapidly increasing. Not only by the pandemic, there has been other circumstances as well, which has more have to do with extreme weather situations that has even more fueled the situation. So if you look through that, you can absolutely see that they have been improving the margin with a couple of percentage points year-by-year since they came into place, which was approximately 3 years ago. So this is also reflected in the earn-out structure that we have with them, which is not an extremely long one. It's -- so that is reflected in that where we are expecting or yes, the sellers and we, as buyers, are expecting to see significantly underlying improvements coming through here when the raw material situation is normalizing. So this is an important part, which has been one of the driving forces for us to have the interest in Igloo. Absolutely.

Yes. But I just try to understand the gap nowadays or today between Igloo's profitability and your own profitability, as you mentioned, or even Yeti's is it -- I mean, are they more dependent on the raw materials? Or is it so that the kind of prominence of the brand is somewhat less? Or how should we understand it, the gap?

No, I think it probably has a lot to do with the positioning and with the pricing. We believe that a lot of it is sitting there, and they have started a very, what should we say, impressive journey in product segmentation per channel and where they are moving the positioning within each one of the channels and going in the direction of being a better positioned rather than a good positioned company. So then the raw material situation is more of caused by the pandemic and some other circumstances. So that is something that will normalize over time. So I don't know, Juan, if you want to add something to this.

But you have a couple of factors. I mean, you have on one side, e-commerce has a massive impact on the numbers. That's crystal clear. So that's one of the areas where we will obviously work together with the company in the same way as we are doing internally in Dometic to grow much faster. The other one, which is important in this case, like for many other companies, is product mix. We know that you have -- you don't need the same infrastructures when you are doing coolers than when you are doing drinkware. They are much more heavy on the drinkware than we are. So from our perspective, we have also clear targets to increase. So rest assured that our target is to get to the numbers that other and we have. I mean, we know how much we are making on cooling boxes. So now...

Yes. Perfect. And then my last question is probably again to Stefan. The leverage now is increasing above 2.5x after this acquisition. Do you think that it will limit your capacity for future acquisitions, especially also taking into the consideration the earnouts that might kick in?

Yes. But I think if you see it in the short term, of course, we have to keep this in mind. But as you know, the smaller acquisitions we are doing is not adding a lot of leverage. But then if we are looking ahead, I mean, we know that we have already before the acquisitions had a rather strong deleveraging profile. And that deleveraging profile has not getting -- has rather improved somewhat with the acquisitions that we have done during 2021. So I'm expecting the leverage to come down rather quickly over the coming 12 months here. So I think if you look on -- more on the -- on medium term and beyond, I mean, I don't see that there is any compromise on what we would like to do to execute on our strategy.

I think if I may comment, Agnieszka, we have been repeating this a number of times. We believe that we will see one of these transformational acquisitions once every 3 years, once every 4 years, of the simple reason that there are not many targets. On the contrary, there are many [ bolt-on ] and as Stefan mentioned, of course, both in terms of price stack or in terms of leverage is a different story. So I guess that the short summary is that Igloo is not stopping our journey. Same thing because we are going to see another transformational acquisition 3 months from now.

Our next question comes from the line of Fredrik Moregard of Pareto Securities.

Stefan and Juan, first off, just a question on the synergies of $150 million on sale that you're seeing, just to be very clear on how that is defined. I mean, should this be interpreted as being on top of the organic growth that you would expect from both Dometic and Igloo as a stand-alone company? So purely an effect of the combination of the 2 companies? Is that a correct way to interpret it?

That is a correct way of interpreting it, yes.

All right. Perfect. Then secondly, when it comes to B2C sales, you mentioned it was 19% (sic) [ 9% ] for Igloo. I'm guessing at least that, that is higher than it is for most of your other similar businesses in Dometic. At the same time, you bought Front Runner earlier this spring. And now you've got another D2C platform with Igloo. What is your strategic plan when it comes to growing direct to consumer businesses? Are you going to work with different platforms across different geographies? Or are you looking to integrate all of those to one common platform for you to drive growth?

We are integrating. We are already there. So we implemented a new platform in the U.S. in January, we implemented a new platform in the Pacific back in June. And we're implementing just now across EMEA. Then, of course, the first thing that we do is not to take Igloo and to take Front Runner into the new platform since they have just now implemented platforms. But of course, as you know, IT moves quickly. So sooner or later, we will need to upgrade platforms and then we will be based on the common platform. Then as I mentioned before, it is also important to remember that Igloo is Igloo, Dometic is Dometic from a branding perspective. So you will not go to the Dometic website and buy Igloo. You will go to the Igloo website. And the other way around it is value for Dometic. So Dometic is implementing clearly a global platform. We are building up a global organization. And we are rolling it out already now. Again, small numbers, but growing very, very fast. Front Runner is a fantastic addition. They are B2C-orientated. They are on 50% already today. BC, that proves again that it is possible, it's not just Yeti doing that. We are also doing that with some of our units where we can run a lot. And now we have Igloo being a fantastic complement, which is on the way up. They started with e-commerce just 18 months ago. So they are in the early phase of this, and that's why we believe firmly that we will see growth and we will see margin improvements over time.

All right. Yes, 19% (sic) [ 9% ] after 18 months, that sounds very promising.

Our next question comes from the line of Karri Rinta of Handelsbanken.

I will start with the -- just a clarification, is it 9% or 19%?

9. 9%.

9%. Okay. Yes. And then the 1,100 employees that they have, how many of them roughly work in manufacturing?

It's 600 to 700. Yes. Yes. Okay.

600, 700. All right. Yes. And then finally, more strategic, these cross-selling synergies, given that in active cooling, you are a high-end player, whereas Igloo is more mid-market to low-end. So in the physical channel, in stores, so where do you see those opportunities that you can add? Let's say, in EMEA, you can add Igloo to the channels where you're selling Dometic. And in the U.S., where do you see the same kind of opportunities in adding Dometic products to retailers that are selling Igloos or any names, any specific [indiscernible] would be helpful.

Yes, I mean you have the sport and goods channel is a great channel. They are there. We are starting. As we have been commenting, Dometic is today on every eye. We are on -- in the goods, Dick's Sporting Goods, we are. But of course, that we are taking step by step. And customers, when you are new to the market, as we are as Dometic, they are cautious, they need to approve us and all that kind of stuff. If you look at Igloo, they are already in every eye since many, many years. They are in all these channels. So of course, that if you have been working for Walmart, as these guys have, you have the credibility. They have relationships with Walmart for the last 40 years, with Target. But they have relationships with Cabela's, with every eye with all these companies of course we see those opportunities in the U.S. Then we have the other opportunities where we are talking about overseas. Overseas, they don't have people. We have people. It wouldn't be the same for Igloo, obviously, to establish their own organization in France or in Germany from scratch and to have an organization of 5, 6 people the first day that you're opening the door than to have 1 person which is Igloo dedicated hosted by the Dometic organization. So we see -- and what is fun is that even if the sales is minimal outside the U.S., we are talking about 8% outside the Americas, rather than the U.S., so they still have a brand. And that's very positive. What they are lacking today, is the presence. They are lacking the distribution. Of course, we have distribution in Europe. We have our main warehouse in Germany, in the middle of Germany, reaching the rest of Europe in hours. So of course, that will be a fantastic complement to what they are doing.

Okay. And then a quick follow-up on that because I think the U.S. market is well understood and we have talked about some of the strong names there. But the European market for passive cooling, which would be our competitors that they would be facing?

I think that it is today limited competition. But what is really positive here is that now we have an American company that has made a fantastic journey and that is established in Europe all over the place, which is Yeti. You can find today Yeti. You can find Yeti for street and you can find Yeti in any of the main capital cities, of course. That is creating a market as well. And that's what we see with our own passive coolers as well. We were not selling passive coolers in Europe 3, 4 years ago. We are selling passive coolers today. All of a sudden, we have 2 players in Dometic and Yeti developing that market.

And pricing-wise, pricing strategy in Europe because the -- given the brand is not that known in a sort of a non [indiscernible] you could probably price it at a premium to the level that they sell in the U.S. as all of the ties in Amazon, so you can't really deviate from price.

Correct. Correct. That's the target. So the position of Igloo -- from a starting point, Igloo has been historically good and better. Our job is obviously to help Igloo to become better and good. That's the American market. If you look at the European market, it's wide open. So there, we -- I believe that we have a different opportunity to become much more better from day 1 being an American product with a strong brand name, even again, if a brand name is not known in Europe, it is -- Yeti is not known in Europe until now. So we are working together at the same level, so to say, to develop the product across Europe. And then the other one is that I truly believe that there is a market for active cooling. When looking at the global numbers, it is clear as well, that passive coolers is the major market in the world. And even when you take a Dometic premium active cooler and compare it with a Yeti premium active cooler, it is a significant price difference. So we will attract new customer categories where we are not today.

Another follow-up, if I may, sorry about this. But would you say that this cross-selling synergies, there is actually more potential from Europe than there is in the U.S. in the short term?

I think it's both. I think that it is the same for -- I do believe that Igloo will give Dometic a lot of credibility among the major retailers in the U.S. And we are talking about obviously sporting goods. We are talking about the outdoor, the more outdoor-based retailers in the U.S. Just the fact that they have been there for so many years is just impressive. I mean I have been working with Walmart before, right? I know how demanding they are. I have been working with Target before, I know how demanding they are. You cannot simply miss deliveries. You have to get it 100% right. That gives us credibility. Even if we have 2 different brands, even if we have 2 different teams, there is no American retailer that is not going to know today that Dometic owns Igloo. And we will obviously share platforms in terms of logistics and all that kind of stuff. Perhaps this was interesting to mention, I see a market as well on the better and good for active coolers that I don't want to get into with the Dometic brand. But I have an Igloo brand. So no, that we have Dometic being super premium in the U.S. today, even if we are small. If you look at premium products on coolers, you will find Yeti being a giant and Dometic the second one, even if obviously site-wise, we are miniscule today in coolers. But still, we have a very strong brand. Then you have Igloo, which is, as I said, good and better. Giving Yeti technology coming from Dometic, we will help also Yeti to start looking at their own positioning to become much better, but also obviously, with that, you follow the prices -- the pricing. And you create a new category, which is not in those retailers. So we believe that we can put together a very, very attractive portfolio.

Our next question comes from the line of William Macaulay of Morgan Stanley.

I have [indiscernible] as well. My first question is on the phasing of the synergies. You said that you expect to achieve them within 5 years. But could we get a little bit more color about the actual time frame of these? How they're going to phase there in the next couple of years? And kind of an extension of that, if you achieve the synergy target, how much of the earnout would you have to pay?

Yes. If we achieve the full synergy target, then that would mean that we would pay the majority, yes, clearly so. And then the phasing in, I mean it's going to be -- you have to follow the already initiated stand-alone improvements that has been driven by the current leadership team and the leadership team that is going to continue to run Igloo. And there, we are -- there, both we and the sellers are expecting to see results, as I did indicate, that you would have to see a significant improvement of -- versus the current LTM EBITDA for it to materialize, the earnout to materialize. So there is, of course, going to be, how should I say, a step change related to that. And then I think the commercial synergies is obviously going to take a little bit longer time to realize. So they will probably come in more gradually during this -- the 5-year period.

Okay. Perfect. And my second question is, well, on this slide you mentioned how this acquisition helps you move away from high-value, more cyclical discretionary spend towards lower-value, less cyclical discretionary spend. So I guess my question is, why not also divest some of these more cyclical businesses to really focus on this lower discretionary spend market?

You never know how cooler would look like tomorrow. Of course, we are revising our portfolio and we will continue to revise our portfolio. I mean you can see on the charts that we were showing that things are happening. And we might be in a situation soon or later where we simply decide to be in these areas. I have always been talking a lot about which kind of products are driving aftermarket and which kind of products do drive very little aftermarket. Of course, we will evaluate on a continuous basis when it is time. Where that, first, if we should, second, when is the right timing for doing that. So you are totally right. We have no intention of growing everywhere. We have no intention of being doing everything for everybody. We are focusing a lot, we are dissecting businesses, we are organizing ourselves better [indiscernible]. And I believe that we are becoming much more segmented as a company. We want to be world-class in the things that we are doing.

Thank you. We have no further audio questions, I will hand back to the speakers for any final remarks.

Well, Juan Vargues here again. Thank you very much for your attention. This is a very important step for us. This is opening a new -- a new area for us. We have SeaStar a few years ago, where that became a growth platform for us within the marine market. And we see Igloo as another growth platform that will help us to penetrate the outdoor market. We are becoming more and more of an outdoor [ life size ] company for every day. So thank you very much for your attention and talk to you soon. Goodbye.

Thank you. Goodbye.

Bye.