Kesko Oyj (KESKOB) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Highlights 2021, definitely, our great growth development as well as excellent development in profitability. I'm very impressed that all 3 business areas succeeded again to report all-time best numbers in sales as well as in profitability. Current year 2022 will be, again, interesting and definitely also in some respect, challenging. We can see around of us, a lot of challenges, question marks. Pandemic development is still open, as well as geo political situation looks again quite challenging. But we should remember that in Kesko Group, we have been also very successful in the middle of that kind of circumstances. And I believe and I trust that again, we will harvest a lot of benefits in current circumstances. Definitely, new technology offers a lot of opportunities. Digitalization is a great opportunity still for us despite the fact that we are definitely today among forerunners in digitalization in Grocery Trade, as well as in Building and Technical and Car Trade. For example, in Grocery Trade, we continue implementation of our well-functioning growth strategy. We continue strong development of our store networks. At the same time, we are accelerating development in e-com, as well as we are working very hard to further strengthen our leading position in food service business. This year, I believe strongly will be, again, a great success in Building and Technical Trade. We have well-functioning strategy. Our people in all 8 operating countries are implementing very successfully our growth strategy, and I believe strongly that we will continue this great development in each operating country also in 2022. In car trade, we have seen already amazing turnaround in Kesko car trade region, thanks to that successful turnaround. We succeeded already in challenging business environment to report all-time based profitability that is excellent foundation to further improve our commercial as well as operational performance in car trade. And I'm expecting also 2022, again, excellent numbers, and development on that side. When we discuss about sustainability, we should remember that also in this field, we have been already a long time here forerunner, and based on that, we are in excellent position to develop our sustainability approach in all businesses.