Walker Greenbank Share Discussion Threads

[netcurtains] 29/7/2020 06:54

debsdowner - its great to have a counter view. Thanks for sharing.
However I know there is a DIY boom and wallpaper doing well.
We have seen "massive" recovery from 35% to 15% down (that is a big bounce up).
Factories now going more or less full blast .
New important orders from USA
More news will follow from AGM and I guess therefore more buying (or selling) this afternoon
(or tomorrow) as this news filters through.
I think generally speaking the UPSIDE of working from home is middle class couples
doing lots of DIY...
The more middle class you are the more likely you will be working from home.
WGB will be tapping into this working from home market.
Big players like John Lewis will be upping their ON-LINE sales money - big time.

WGB have to make sure their products are for sale with companies that have a very
good ON-LINE presence . ON-LINE sales are where the future is.
WGB will be on the case I'm sure.

[debsdowner] 29/7/2020 06:53

Can you lot not read

"" We also reported that Brand product sales in the first five months of the current financial year were down 35% compared with the same time last year, and that in the four weeks prior to the results announcement sales were down some 31%. This recovery has continued such that Brand product sales in the first 25 weeks of the current financial year were down 32% and in the four weeks to 24 July 2020 were down 15% on the prior year.

The company sales are still down brand and little recovery.

This suggests Joe Public are doing no decorating of expensive wallpaper and said as much while the lockdown continued and I said luxury wallpaper needs a tradesman to put it on the wall.

While coronavirus is around and a second wave coming few people will have a tradesman in their homes and risk a virus infection.

Little wonder the share price been deteriorating again and fell just before the results.

Selfridges getting rid of 1 in 7 workers gave a hint of consumer confidence yesterday and so did John Lewis, the latter having to close stores.

It could take years for WGB to fully compensate for lost trade and as for the US the virus is spreading like a plague.

The company is unable to provide any visibility going forward its impossible at this stage.

[netcurtains] 29/7/2020 06:42

I was right about the factories! :-)
From update:

Our manufacturing sites, which are almost back to full operation as demand builds, are continuing to benefit from export-led new orders, particularly from the US.

There definitely has been a recent mini boom in DIY as a result of lockdown and wallpaper is back in vogue - you dont trample paint all round the house - which is important if have young family .

[our haven] 29/7/2020 06:35

Goliard, yes like the pace and the cash build. Market should like too after its very recent jitters.

[our haven] 29/7/2020 06:33

15 percent it is Solooiler! Relief that there are no nasty shocks there and the recovery continues at a good pace. Market should like.

[goliard] 29/7/2020 06:22

Looks like a good opportunity to take the company private. They would probably get support around 70p to 80p.

[goliard] 29/7/2020 06:17

Recovery continues. Good to see. Better sales and higher cash.

[solooiler] 28/7/2020 17:40

Every business is rebounding a lot so i hope walker are less than 15% down on sales in recent weeks. i hope so!!

[our haven] 28/7/2020 16:26

Kazoom, you have just about summed up my view so fingers crossed that is the position. I held by the way.

[kazoom] 28/7/2020 15:52

Too late now for that worry (although not when you posteed), it will be what it will be with tomorrow's RNS.

I am not overly phased by the 'drop' to be honest. The drop has been on pretty low volume and although some of the intraday prices have looked lowish (due to the spread) but in fact the price has scarecely moved in three days.

It blipped up (on virtually no volume) on the 17th and the gave back the majority of that over the next four days.

In general I agree - I do look out for share price falls immediately prior to a scheduled announcement, but I personally cannot see anything too concerning here.

Too late to act now anyway.

Certainly if they cannot report improvement from the statement a month ago, then there could be a pull back. However, unless there was anything really negative and unexpected, I would probably be a buyer on any pull-back as I think the response to the last update (excepting the blip up I mentioned) didn't really take in any of the postives.

We shall see!

[our haven] 28/7/2020 14:40

Bit of a worry the falling price prior to the AGM. Hopefully there's no nasty surprises for us. As far as I can see all looks well but that is an outsiders point of view.

[salver2] 28/7/2020 08:32

Having held colefax since 1998 they normally update right at the end of July ie this week.when I bought them there were 30 odd million shares in circulation but now there is less than ten due to persistent buybacks-
although I can’t imagine the results will be pretty they hold a lot of cash around 11 million so about 30 percent of market cap.The shares are very tightly held ( I’m not sure why they bother with a listing and should go private) and any great weakness in the share price would be supported by cash and more buybacks -The owner David Green is approaching 74 years old so he must be thinking of hanging up his boots but who knows. They have so few private shareholders ( I was once the largest - and although I’ve sold over half my shares since I bought them my roughly one percent holding probably still makes me the largest!

[netcurtains] 28/7/2020 06:47

elsa7878:
That cant be right - colefax have not said anything since march:

Its WGB that keep us all regularly updated with what is what.

Hopefully we'll get another update tomorrow. They certainly want
investors to ask them questions at the AGM so that is almost certainly going
to be a question - "How are we doing".

[elsa7878] 27/7/2020 21:13

Hey..?

30/6/2020 (4 weeks ago) "In the first five months of our financial year, product sales were approximately 35% below the same time last year. Online and international product sales channels have performed better than our UK average. Product sales in the past four weeks have been approximately 31% below the same time last year but ahead of management expectations. This reflects a steadily improving trend since the start of April."

[kazoom] 27/7/2020 20:10

Thanks salver, for giving us some insight into the relative movements of WGB & CFX (I haven't looked at Colefax for quite some while.)

To be perfectly honest I would be uncomfortable holding CFX at this time. Whereas WGB have been pretty forthcoming in keeping us up to date.

Meanwhile CFX issued a statement on lockdown day (23 March) binning the dividend and telling the market.

"Until there is greater clarity about the full impact of the pandemic, it is very difficult to give accurate guidance on the future sales impact but it is likely to be significant. The Group has a strong balance sheet and the Board's priority is to conserve cash and manage the Group through the crisis as prudently as possible."

Since then radio silence - that is absolutely outrageous disregard for shareholders.

You mentioned that the shares are tightly held and I vaguely remember that from when I last looked at them. Do this mean that most of the shares are held by the BoD and their mates?

It is an absolute disgrace IMHO that they have not updated the market on how things are going for over FOUR MONTHS.

[kazoom] 27/7/2020 20:02

In their results statement 30th June they said :

The Company will provide a further update on its trading performance at the Annual General Meeting which is expected to take place on 29 July 2020.

[our haven] 27/7/2020 19:57

Half year full trading update would normally come out early August. That said I am sure that we will hear some form of update on Wednesday. I would usually think that it would take the form of where we are in expectations.

[netcurtains] 27/7/2020 14:50

gfrae: I remember reading somewhere on this thread that there will be a trading update alongside AGM (I think I read it in a report too but cant find it at present). So I think its 29th July.

[gfrae] 27/7/2020 14:17

Are we expecting a trading update at the AGM ? Anyone know ? Te WGB website does not mention one.

[salver2] 27/7/2020 09:00

I’m probably looking maybe at myself hopeless in the diy department!

[netcurtains] 27/7/2020 08:46

salver2: Not sure that is true. I remember decorating one of our toilet rooms with timorous beasties gangsta wallpaper... I think DIY often depends on age and personality type more than how big your pocket is.

However I have no direct knowledge of the statistics of who does what. So just a guess.

[salver2] 27/7/2020 08:40

Well I suppose the difference is that the walker Greenbank and colefax wallpapers being higher end need a professional who wouldn’t have been going to peoples houses and the diy wallpaper would be put up by amateurs in their own homes

[netcurtains] 27/7/2020 06:36

Thanks salver2: I was looking into the factories of Walker Greenback and their websites state they do make wallpaper for third parties (not just internally). This being so, I was thinking about Kingfisher's results and B&Q have had a very good sales of wallpaper, is there any chance that some of that wallpaper was made by walker greenback or is B&Q too down market for Walker Greenback?

[salver2] 25/7/2020 23:38

I’ll try and answer your question as I hold both shares.About 30 percent of Colefax shares value are their cash holdings,they are slightly higher end - over 50 percent of their business is in the USA ( The pounds weak) they have no factories and manufacture nothing. Probably one of the main reasons is how tightly held the stock is - trying to buy and sell the stock in even small quantities is really tricky

[netcurtains] 25/7/2020 16:39

kazoom: I'm struck by how big the difference in share price falls between colefax and walkergreenback due to covid19


The difference between christmas price of colefax and now appears to be just 10% (440 and 400).

The difference between christmas price of walker greenback and now appears to be 65% ( 80 and 50).

Is there a good reason for the two ?