Crawshaw Share Discussion Threads

[knigel] 24/6/2013 19:03

Thanks. Last chance to buy tomorrow for the dividend!

[chrisis33] 24/6/2013 19:01

Thanks Playful - much appreciated. I'm guessing we have little insight yet into by just how much LFL sales have improved, as it would require an RNS?

I'd clean forgotten about the ability to buy back shares above 5p. Crawshaws could buy back 10% of the share issue for under 300K GBP. Great to have that option up the sleeve, and I guess it's a case of balancing the benefit of investing cashflows in buyback, or store openings, or increasing the dividend.

Very good position to be in.

[playful] 24/6/2013 18:53

Our AGM convened at noon today with 4 shareholders in attendance, myself, BrianGeeee, Philip Kanas (previous NED) and ottrott who had travelled up from Cambridge.

We went straight into the vote and I voted for all except resolution 3 (withheld) and 7 (against). BrianGeeee questioned 6 and was told it was only routine.

I opened the questioning by asking why the annual report was late for the second year running. The FD attempted to provide an explanation, but I was none the wiser.

Philip asked R.R to read today's trading statement and followed this by asking if dividends are now company policy going forward?

R.R said that in announcing a maiden dividend the implication is that it would be maintained as it would be seen as negative if it was discontinued. It is their way of delivering shareholder value back to shareholders and felt the time had come to repay shareholder loyalty.

Philip also asked if the company intended to actually make use of resolution 7 and buy back shares if the share price was above the 5p par value. R.R said it was there for flexibility and was a nice option to have.

I asked why the company had introduced a 5% substantial shareholder threshold this year for the first time in the company's history. L.S said a mistake had been made in reporting a holding under 3% in a previous year and that KPMG had told them they only need use a 5% threshold in future. I said this should have been made clear in all previous years and felt it very unusual that we are not adopting the accepted 3% which seems to me standard across all AIM companies.

BrianGeeee asked what plans we had to expand/grow the business.

R.R said they had made a conscious decision to only focus on the current portfolio until sufficient returns were made and then it would be a natural progression for the business to look at opening more shops.

I suggested the company might consider opening a small standalone hot food shop. A "Yorkshire style KFC" type offering in a location not too far from a current shop which could be used to supply and rotate staff. R.R said it is something they would consider as the hot food is a big part of the business.

BrianGeeee asked about the wholesale side of the business. R.R said it was very competitive and not really somewhere we could compete. I asked if we could get the award winning sausages into Booker, but R.R said we couldn't really compete on price and the reliance on one big customer is not ideal

I asked if we could adopt a staff bonus scheme similar to Greggs where 10% of profit each year is shared out amongst the staff. R.R said they do already have schemes that are more targeted.

Someone asked about staff morale and the CEO said it was the highest it's been for many years and went into detail on the new manager training scheme.

END

[chrisis33] 24/6/2013 18:52

Thanks for that snippet of insight, ottrott. I have a similar holding to you (around 2%) but unfortunately unable to make the meeting. Looking forward to a couple of grand in dividend next month, and feeling upbeat about the potential here.

Hoping we get a bit more detail back on the grapevine.

I decided to invest here having run a stock filter for low market cap companies with a large turnover and turning a profit. There are not many profitable (pretax and operating profit) shares out there with a turnover in excess of 18m GBP and a market cap below 3m. In fact, the filter I ran on iii returns just 4 companies. Battlebus also mentioned it ages ago on another thread so I decided it was worth a few hours of reading past reports etc.

What marks out companies with low caps like this is usually either continuous issuance of shares, loss-making, fear regarding market/competitive/technological change, large debt, pref shares or warrants, no dividend or prospect thereof.

What struck me was that Crawshaws has none of these deficits, and looks like a golden opportunity on a risk v reward basis. The share tanked on fears of the pasty tax, a poor set of 2011 figures and general apathy towards its prospects. Amongst companies of a similar market cap, it literally stood out like a sore thumb (in a good way) on the basis of its ability to generate cash, and the reduction in debt over past years from cashflow.

It's now dividend paying too, and appears to have turned a corner in trading performance.

ps. I'm feeling positive today.

[ottrott] 24/6/2013 18:20

~1.5%, so thought I should go along. Only a 2 hour drive after all.

[battlebus2] 24/6/2013 18:14

Good to hear that about staff morale and welcome to the board. Do you have any skin in the game?

[ottrott] 24/6/2013 18:06

According to K. Boyd and others present, staff morale at 3 year high.
Definetly good vibes about things going forward.
Just need to wait for margins to improve.

ottrott

[chrisis33] 24/6/2013 17:17

Capped at just £2,53m at the moment. CRAW have remained a cash-generation engine throughout the "downturn", with EBITDA coming in at £600K+ per annum. They're now net cash rather than net debt, still throwing off cash (and giving some back to shareholders).

I believe CRAW are very capable of generating £750K-£1m per annum in profits, which would 3-4 bag the share price IMO. Still trading around NAV, nothing in the share price for any of the growth etc.

I'm very positive here, and think it may run up pretty quickly.

The long term chart is extremely bombed-out, and the share price has broken out of a bullish wedge.

[investali] 24/6/2013 16:39

I hope so BB2 my other stock is falling of a cliff edge!

Ali.

[battlebus2] 24/6/2013 16:01

I reckon these could run guys with any amount of buying so hold em tight guys, and they could prove to be a safe haven in very bad markets ATM.

[battlebus2] 24/6/2013 15:56

Online quotes 4.1825 to sell 250k and no quote available to buy 50k :))

[chrisis33] 24/6/2013 15:54

Short supply is an understatement Ali, they're very tightly held indeed. Glad I'm in.

[investali] 24/6/2013 15:52

Shares in short supply and a tick up to match this mornings statement.

All is good,

Ali.

[battlebus2] 24/6/2013 13:30

Yep, looking forward to playful's report.

[chrisis33] 24/6/2013 13:09

All resolutions passed ... dividend confirmed then.

[battlebus2] 24/6/2013 11:55

Yes it seems they made them pay the dividend along with the price. Could be that 18k trade is a sell to match as for every sell there seems to be a buyer :))

[chrisis33] 24/6/2013 10:49

One reported trade thus far at 4.7p - well over offer.

[chrisis33] 24/6/2013 08:29

Agreed - 3.9p v 4.5p at present. Ex dividend Wednesday too.

[battlebus2] 24/6/2013 08:04

Yep, hopefully more figures from the AGM feedback.

[chrisis33] 24/6/2013 07:50

The thing is, on c. £19m revenue, it only takes a small % improvement to make a significant difference to the bottom line. That in turn makes a potentially huge difference to profit as a proportion of the lowly £2.3M Market cap.

[battlebus2] 24/6/2013 07:37

Yes sounds very positive chrisis33!! No detail but from a conservative Richard Rose this has to be fantastic news for the next set of numbers.

[chrisis33] 24/6/2013 07:13

Certainly sounds very positive indeed:

At this afternoon's AGM of Crawshaw Group PLC, the meat focussed retailer, the Chairman, Richard Rose, will make the following statement with regard to current trading.
 
 
"At the end of April this year I stated that I was encouraged by trading over the first 12 weeks of the current year. I'm delighted to report that since then our performance has strengthened further and that I'm particularly pleased with the progress being made for the current year thus far."

[chrisis33] 23/6/2013 16:21

That would be great if possible ... I appreciate that there's not an endless time window for Q&A, looking forward to any RNS statement and feedback.

[battlebus2] 22/6/2013 18:57

Something tells me you won't be anywhere near the AGM Sir Leo!! Some good questions there chrisis33, maybe playful can add some of them to his list. Looking forward to your report playful.

[sir leonardo] 22/6/2013 12:59

WELL WELL WELL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

FS KNOIGEL THEIR BETTER BE A FREE GLASS OR TWO OF WINE AT DE AGM !!!!!!!!!!!FFS

CRISIS33 IWILL ASK DE QUESTIONS YOU POSE FROM MR ROSE I SUPPPOSE !!!!!!FFS....

SIR IS HEADING OUT NOW FOR DE JUICE!!!!!!FFFS