Accent (ASX:AX1) primarily sells shoes. They are both a distributor and a retailer. They have 888 sales outlets, including 853 physical stores and 35 online sites. The store network includes both multi-brand retail formats and focused stores.
Source: Accent,1H FY24 Results presentation, 23/2/24
In addition to the retail stores they have a wholesale operation whereby they distribute a wide range of global footwear brands to other retailers. They also have some apparel brands that they sell at retail such as NudeLucy and brands that include footwear and apparel such as StyleRunner.
The retail store network includes both franchised stores and corporate owned stores although they are slowly moving towards a fully corporate owned structure. The main brand that is franchised is The Athlete’s Foot with 62 of 155 stores being franchises, but this has reduced from 134 stores six years ago as they have bought back the franchises.
Source: Accent,1H FY24 Results presentation, 23/2/24
Their top three store networks are Platypus with 210 stores, Skechers with 187 and then The Athlete’s Foot. The store network is growing rapidly with 72 new openings in the first half of the year and only 5 closures. This included 22 for Platypus and 18 across NudeLucy and StyleRunner. They have a particular focus on growing the later two brands. NudeLucy is a women's apparel brand and Stylerunner is about 60% footwear with the balance being apparel.
Source: Accent,1H FY24 Results presentation, 23/2/24
The store network has grown strongly over the past five years and they anticipate opening at least 20 more stores in the second half of FY24.
Accent has a high quality score of 95. This is supported by the Return on Equity of 16.3% along with the Return on Capital Employed of 13.5%. The operating margin of 8.66% is quite reasonable for a retailer and it ranks 14th out of the 44 companies in the segment.
The Health Trend is also very good at 7. The two areas where it falls down are a slight decline in return on assets from 6.1% to 6.0% and a small decline in the current ratio from 1.2 to 1.14.
The Bankruptcy Risk warrants a…
