3 Things Acuity Brands' Management Wants Investors to Know
In its fiscal second-quarter 2019 earnings, released this week, Acuity Brands (NYSE: AYI) demonstrated to investors that it's successfully navigating the impacts of import tariffs through a combination of strategic pricing and productivity initiatives. The commercial and industrial lighting and controls manufacturer also provided deeper insight into its profit margins and current product innovation. Below, let's review three comments made by CEO Vern Nagel during the company's earnings conference call that address and illuminate these topics.
1. Acuity is outpacing its revenue benchmark, and aims to do so over the long haul
The time period Nagel references here is the first half of fiscal 2019, when the company booked a year-over-year revenue advance of 6.7% (versus a 2.7% year-over-year revenue increase in the recently concluded second quarter).
Acuity believes that the first half of the fiscal year provides a more accurate sales gauge than the second quarter, as significant customers pulled orders forward in the first quarter to avoid impending price increases that Acuity instituted to offset rising costs from import tariffs.
In addition, while Acuity sells its lighting, controls, and Internet of Things (IoT) "smart building" platforms internationally, it benchmarks its progress against its largest geographical region, North America.
The company expects the North American lighting market to grow in the low single digits for the remainder of its fiscal year, and is poised to exceed this benchmark throughout the year.
Management intends to outpace the market's growth over the longer term in part through its investments in data capture and analytics. In its approach to lighting and controls, Acuity seeks to assist organizations in "transforming buildings and campuses from cost centers to strategic assets."
2. Reduced overhead expense will offset gross margin declines
Acuity's adjusted gross margin dipped by 100 basis points year over year to 39.2% in the second quarter, primarily because of the factor Nagel cites above: Certain customers in the company's retail channel shifted their service requirements, causing the company to reclassify income and expense amounts according to GAAP.
While this is a long-term, though not huge, headwind on gross margin, both Nagel and CFO Ricky Reece went on to explain that Acuity has an offset to this pressure in the form of lower selling, distribution, and administrative (SD&A) expense.
Specifically, the shift in retail channel service revenue resulted in lower freight and commission costs during the quarter, and this dynamic is expected to continue. In addition to productivity initiatives aimed at reducing overhead expenses, management advised investors to expect a shift in efficiency from gross margin to SD&A for the foreseeable future. In other words, the company intends to fully absorb a gross profit decline through leaner selling, distribution, and administrative operations.
3. Investments in technology-laden lighting will improve profitability in the long run
Increasingly, Acuity views itself as a technology company as much as a manufacturing concern. This is partly out of necessity: The organization has been compelled to invest in cutting-edge technology to preserve profitability as its products are challenged by a raft of cheaper lighting alternatives, many of them from Chinese companies that enjoy government subsidies.
Thus, Acuity is enhancing Atrius, its higher-margin, IoT platform for commercial and industrial buildings. The company has seen an increase in uptake of this smart-building line of products among major U.S. retailers. Nagel noted during the earnings call that Acuity was becoming an industry standard for retailers seeking IoT-based luminaire (complete electric lighting unit) systems.
Similarly, late last year, Acuity introduced its feature-rich wireless controls system, dubbed nLight AIR. The company reported strong customer demand for this commercial product in the second quarter.
While it may take several quarters, or even a few years, for the company's next-generation lighting and controls platforms to reach enough scale to significantly impact margins, they'll ultimately create much shareholder value if successful. More importantly, such investments will help remove Acuity further from the ever-present condition of having to compete primarily on price.
10 stocks we like better than Acuity BrandsWhen investing geniuses David and Tom Gardner have a stock tip, it can pay to listen. After all, the newsletter they have run for over a decade, Motley Fool Stock Advisor, has quadrupled the market.*
David and Tom just revealed what they believe are the ten best stocks for investors to buy right now... and Acuity Brands wasn't one of them! That's right -- they think these 10 stocks are even better buys.
*Stock Advisor returns as of March 1, 2019
Asit Sharma has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.