Shoprite Holdings Ltd (SHP) Earnings Call Transcript

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to the 2026 full year results presentation. That's for the 52 weeks ending 28 June 2026. We will do our best to complete the presentation in an hour. We really value your time and thank you very much for you looking forward to most and then I will end off again with a little bit of operational review and a strategy update of where we are and what we're busy with. And then we'll take questions. So the year that was can probably summarized in one sentence. Shoprite is winning through customer focus and relentless execution. We had very good momentum. It continued 1.3 billion customer versus during the year, an additional 1.1 million customers per week. And of course, I know you understand it, that it has a whole ripple effect back into the supply chain to be able to serve an additional over 1 million customers in a week. But we're very happy. We're very pleased that Shoprite is still growing customers that people elect to come to us. The year was, again, the record market share achievement, additional ZAR 7.5 billion in market share gains in the supermarket RSA division. And the year didn't come with just increasing prices. We still have value retailer, even more so a price competitor in the Shoprite brand, so the year came out at a 0.8% inflation, a lot of categories in deflation, which I will unpack later on, where the impact is even more so on Shoprite. So we didn't have the luxury of just increasing prices. The market share growth came as a result of volume and customer growth. And then, of course, the trading margin improvement must be accompanied with very strong cost discipline, shrinkage and waste management. to offset this low inflation environment. There's a lot of migration happening in South Africa. So there's a lot of new areas still that's underserved. And therefore, we could open 262 net new stores during the year. Group sales were up 7.2% to ZAR 270 billion. That means we added ZAR 18.1 billion in sales. And like I said earlier, percentages can be very deceiving. And that's why -- we will, in a few examples also talk about the monetary value to give you this context because the percentage is not always from the same base. Trading profit is up 8.4% is now more than what the sales curve for us, also again amounting to ZAR 16.2 billion. Given the low inflation environment, Supermarkets RSA still achieved an excellent trading margin of 6.6%. Maybe I just pause there, 6.6% trading margin for a value retailer, I think, is an exceptional performance. The adjusted ROIC increased to 19.8% and with a WACC of 11.5%. There's a differential of 8.3%, which in my memory in the last decade, is the highest we have had such a differential. The headline -- diluted headline earnings per share up 12.2%, value up to ZAR 15.27. We have spoken in the past quite a bit about creating a smarter Shoprite and our investments in the last couple of years was exactly delivering on that for resilient growth. And there's a couple of examples. I will expand on it later also, but one would be like our price optimization tool in a low inflation environment, like what we had this year, that tool came in quite handy, planning promotions better, getting the pricing right. Therefore, we didn't have the luxury of just increasing prices. As a matter of fact, later on, I'll show you how massive some of the categories were in deflation. And thousands of items were cheaper than last year. Checkers are still leading the growth in the premium food market, especially on the fresh, which we are very pleased about. We continue to expand our delivery service to more locations and categories. Total platform sales were up 34.7% equal to ZAR 25.5 billion. Again, I'm referring to the monetary value because, as I say, percentages can be very deceiving. Adjacent business increased sales by 57.4% to ZAR 1.9 billion that's the patent outdoor and unique. And I do think we've made some good choices in these adjacent categories to give us a larger share of wallet. The supply chain and year, I cannot put it any other way to say, I think Shoprite has a superior supply chain. Very few retailers can claim to be now the second year in a row. Over 98% on shelf in stock. You've seen this before, our Shoprite purpose is to uplift lives every day, lots of businesses claim to be customer-centric or customer first. I believe and in Shoprite, we live that. I would be amiss if I don't just stop a moment to think new team Shoprite and say how proud I am of what you have delivered again. The consistency every team shop right delivers on excellence, very pleasing statistic is to report that we, again, have created new employment, almost 5,500 new jobs and consistently have done so year after year. What is also very pleasing is that our people also share with our shareholders in the success of Shoprite. Our employee trust have now paid out to our employees up to ZAR 1.3 billion in value, making them share in what they deliver on every day. On top of that, worth mentioning is that in terms of employment training and development. And last year, we spent over ZAR 1 billion on our people, bettering them, improving their skills to deliver better for our customers. And with that, it doesn't come as a surprise that Shoprite is the retail employer of choice in South Africa. So not only do we develop and create employment, we also support South Africa enterprise. By long mile, Shoprite is the #1 supporter of South African farmers just to put again a value to that 1.7 billion of fresh produce was sourced from local SMMEs. Very proud of that. We do a lot to develop small suppliers. We can also report that 88% of our private label products are locally produced and that our smaller SMMEs had a sales growth of 91% in the past year. And it is not that easy. It takes a lot of effort to take a small supplier into the larger retail and make them grow, and we are very proud of that and we will continue to support them. On top of just being a retailer is that we are also a force for good. It's now a decade since 2016 that we are selling a loaf of bread for ZAR 5 and no conditions, no extra rules, just ZAR 5 for a loaf of bread for 10 years, 0 inflation. On top of that, we have served 11.2 million meals during the year through our 148 early childhood development centers as well as our 35 sub trucks. We also care for the environment. So we have managed now to get up to 8% of our electricity that we use are sourced from renewables. And if we just look at our electricity generation that would be able to power 31,700 homes, just to put it in context. Recycling, of course, everything gets transported in plastic or cardboard and over 83,000 tonnes of cardboard and plastic that was recycled and reused. It's also good that we can report that almost 96% of our installed packaging is either recyclable, reusable or compostable. That was the quick overview of the year that was, we will unpack all of the numbers to make sure that you have -- are very clear on what transpired during the year. For the unpacking of the financial results and the numbers in detail, I want to hand you over to our very fine CFO, Anton de Bruyn.

Thank you, Pieter, for that introduction. Before turning to the detailed financial results for the year, I would like to highlight the restatement of our 2025 financial results. And this relates to the reclassification of the group's remaining assets in Nigeria as discontinued operations in accordance with IFRS 5. The reclassification reduced our DHEPS number in 2025 by ZAR 0.06, and that equates to around ZAR 41 million before tax, resulting in our DHEPS in the prior year, changing to ZAR 13.61. The financial performance presented today relates to our group's continued operations. I then turn to sales, our group reported sales growth of 7.2% to ZAR 270.8 billion. What was pleasing for the group and for management was that we achieved similar growth rates within H1 and H2. And I will unpack the performance per segment on the next slide. Cost control remained a priority for the group, and we ended our expense margin on 20.1%, pretty much in line with our performance of last year. and that gave rise to the fact that we could actually achieve our medium-term trading margin of 6%. From a trading profit point of view, we saw an increase of 8.4% to ZAR 16.2 billion and then strong performance in terms of EBITDA where we had an improvement of 7.7% to ZAR 25.8 billion. The diluted headline earnings per share for the year increased by 12.2% with adjusted diluted earnings per share increasing by 12.5%. As part of the appendices is a reconciliation where we show the variances between our diluted headline earnings per share as well as our adjusted DHEPS number. Adjusted ROIC was 19.8%. And above our weighted average cost of capital, which reduced to 11.5% during the year. Our final dividend increased by 14.1%, with a full year dividend increasing by 11.8% to [ ZAR 873 ] per share. You will see that there is a slight difference between the 11.8% increase that we had for the full year dividend versus the HEPS growth, and that was as a result of the restatement in the prior year. Just a reminder that our dividend policy is 1.75x the DHEPS from continued operations. Return on equity for the year was 27.4%, an improvement on the prior year of 26.7%. If we then turn into sales, the group saw an improvement of sales by 7.2% to ZAR 270.7 billion. From an RSA supermarkets point of view, we saw an improvement of 7.1% and to ZAR 228.7 billion on the back of the opening of 262 new stores as well as a 0.8% internal selling price inflation. If I then turn to the core brands, we saw an improvement in our shop rate user and liquor business of 4.3% to ZAR 121.6 billion, a ZAR 5 billion increase purely from that brand. And then we also saw a ZAR 9.5 billion increase in turnover within our Checkers & Checkers Hyper brand where we saw a 10% increase to ZAR 105.2 billion. From an adjacent business point of view, we saw an increase of 57.4%. And that was mainly driven by the expansion within our Petshop Science business, as well as our unique business. Supermarkets non-RSA, we saw an increase in sales of 11% to ZAR 22.8 billion. Like-for-like sales growth was 8.6%, with constant currency growth of 7.1%. Internal food inflation for the regions measured 2% for the period. But we again saw outpaced inflation with regards to higher inflation in Zambia of 6.5% as well as Angola, up 10% during the year. We opened a net new 8 stores in the rest of Africa segment. Sales growth in our other operating segments totaled 3%. The 0.6% growth in franchise sales was mainly driven by the net decrease of 42 stores during the last 12 months, following the termination of a single franchise agreement of 51 stores during our second half of the year. Our Medirite and transform business increased sales by 9.2%. The group continued to invest behind our store expansion program, especially in Supermarkets RSA where we added additional 262 stores for the year on the back of 255 stores in the prior year. Space growth again this year was around 6.1%. Within the Shoprite Usave and Shoprite Liquor business, we opened an additional 136 stores and likely also in the Checkers & Checkers Hyper business, we opened 72 stores. meaningful is our liquor business where we added 93 stores, and that was also driving the 12% sales growth that we achieved within those banners and store formats. Adjacent businesses, we added additional 54 stores, which 41 was new Petco science stores, bringing the total now to 185 stores for the full year. If I then again look forward in terms of new store openings, we already confirmed 211 new stores opening for the 2027 financial year which will drive again that space growth, which we estimate between 5.8% and 6%. Total income increased by 7.8% to ZAR 17.7 billion, which is also very good is to see that our income margins also improved from 26% to 26.1%. And that growth was mainly driven within the gross profit growth within the second half, where we saw a 9.2% growth. For the full year, gross profit increased by 8.1% to ZAR 66.5 billion and I will unpack that in my next slide. Old revenue saw an increase of 3.4%, that is 7.2%, excluding the impact of the reclassification of the revenue streams, our delivery recoveries as well as our subscription income that's linked to our 60-60 e-commerce business that we reclassified during the prior year as part of revenue and not as part of other income anymore. If I then turn to the main drivers in terms of the 7.2% growth, commission received increased by 9.6% to ZAR 1.4 billion. Despite the growing competition in the financial services market, especially relating to money transfer offerings and other value-added services, our money markets offer in our Checkers as well as in our Shoprite stores has seen an increase in activity, which drove that profitability and growth, especially also our contribution and the growth that we've seen within the payouts relating to government grants. Our marketing and media business, rainmaker, together with our business, Rex that looks after the customer insights revenues, we saw a very strong growth of 17.3% to ZAR 1.1 billion. Operating lease income remained muted with growth of 2.2% to ZAR 513 million, and we have spoken in the past around that we expect to see muted growth within our lease income from our own properties as we again sold some of our properties during the 2026 financial year. And we do foresee as well that we will sell additional properties within the group during the 2027 financial year. Franchise fees received reduced by 0.5% to ZAR 191 million, and I've referenced back to the elimination of that franchise agreement, and that was really driving the decline in our franchise income. Sundry revenue reduced by 5.9% due to advertising rebates recovered by the OK Franchise business being reclassified of cost of sales. and the ZAR 65 million that was impacted here, we will see giving us growth within our gross margin within our other segments. Interest revenue decreased by 16.1% and that decline was attributable to the decline in our investment in Angolan government bonds as well as our U.S. dollar-linked government bonds, where some of those bonds mature during the year, and as usual, we repatriate that money back to our operations in Mauritius, which obviously gave rise to lower interest. The decrease in the interest also negatively impacted the trading profit of the non-RSA segment. The majority of the share of profit of equity accounted investments are derived from our retail logistics fund, which is the owner of our key distribution centers across South Africa. Gross profit increased by 8.1% to ZAR 66.5 billion. And we also saw that improvement in our margin from 24.3% to 24.5%. From the graph below, it is clear that in a period of and following a deflation, we do see a margin increase and the opposite that happened during our 2024 financial year where we see a period of rapid inflation, our gross margins did reduce to 23.9%. But then just look for a segment from a Supermarkets RSA point of view, we saw that increase of 7.8% to close to ZAR 60 billion of gross margin. We also see improvement in our margins from 25.9% to 26.1%. What makes us much more meaningful is that this growth was against a backdrop of sales growth of 7.1%. If we look at some of the main drivers within that growth in gross margin, spoken about the impact of inflation and what that does within the various deflation and inflation periods. We also saw strong growth in the higher-margin Checkers banner, where we saw sales growth of more than 10%. And then as a result of the growth that we've seen in the Checkers banner and because it's growing ahead of our Shoprite banner, it's also now contributing more to the overall gross margin of the group, which also was driving that margin expansion. Lastly, I must mention the investment within our supply chain during 2024 and 2025. We did invest in additional capacity within our Cadence distribution center in Natal. And then in 2025, we also expanded into the River field DC in [indiscernible] and in the Wales state in the Eastern Cape, which is currently delivering us profitability ahead of our initial expectations. From a non-RSA point of view, we managed to increase our gross profit by 8.9% to ZAR 4.7 billion. We did, however, see a decrease in the gross margin from 20.9% to 20.5%. And that was mainly driven by the fact that there's a difference between our internal selling food inflation versus the official inflation within the country. Other operating segments saw an improvement, an increase of 11.3% to ZAR 2.2 billion. And that's where I mentioned the reclassification of the franchise advertising rebates not forming part of revenue anymore, but now as part of gross profit. And that was the main reason why we saw an improvement within that segment. We also saw a much more improved gross margin performance from our Medirite business as we roll out more of the stand-alone Medirite plus pharmacies. Total expenses increased by 7.6% to ZAR 54.5 billion, and what was pretty pleasing for us is that we could maintain our 20.1% expense to sales ratio. Cost growth in the first half was 6.6% that accelerated to 8.6% in the second half. The main drivers of the cost growth between H2 and H1 was mainly the additional cost in terms of electricity and water, as well as our support in sales where we saw an increase in advertising spend. Just a reminder that all delivery costs and all other related costs to 60-60 as part of cost of sales and not operating costs. Depreciation and amortization increased by 7.9% to ZAR 8.6 billion on the back of new store openings as well as 382 store leases during the financial year. Our target is still to get to a 3% depreciation to sales ratio, and we're currently sitting at around 3.2% depreciation on PPE increased by 8.4% to ZAR 3.9 billion, and then depreciation on our ROU asset increased by 13% to ZAR 5.3 billion. From an employee benefits point of view, we saw an increase of 7.3% to ZAR 21.7 billion, a much better performance this year versus the 10.8% growth in the prior year. Employee costs as a percentage to sales is currently still 8%, and it was also 8% in the base. Some of the reasons why we saw growth within our employee benefits is the new store openings that obviously drive the direct job creation within the business. We also spent ZAR 1.1 billion on trading for the period, which included ZAR 102 million spend relating to our support of the YES program, and then there was ZAR 319 million distribution during the financial year relating to the Shoprite employee trust. And we also had equivalent awards granted to our non-RSA beneficiaries. Other operating expenses increased by 7.7%. Some of the main drivers there is advertising, where we saw an increase of 7.2% to ZAR 4.4 billion, and electricity and water increased by 19.2% and on the back of a 12.7% national energy regulator of South Africa increases pleasingly was that we could reduce our reliance on diesel and we saw a reduction in diesel costs. The main driver behind the reduction in our diesel cost was our diesel expense in Zambia which obviously benefited that operation, and that also flows through in terms of the increase in our trading profit within the non-RSA segment. Security costs increased by 11.2%, and still a 1% cost to sales ratio, which we've maintained now for a few years. From a trading profit point of view, very pleasing to have achieved that 6% trading margin. and we saw an increase of 8.4% to ZAR 16 billion. On the back of that second half strong performance within the business, we saw a 6.3% trading margin during the second half compared to a 6.1% in the base year. From a trading margin improvement point of view, RSA supermarkets were leading with a growth of 7.9% to ZAR 15 billion. Trading margin also improved from 6.5% to 6.6% for the year. From a non-RSA point of view, also strong performance, trading margin increased from 2.9% to 3% with profit growth of 13.4%. I've spoken about the impact of the diesel expense that was lower this year than the previous year. That obviously helped the Zambia operations but performance remains challenging within our business in Mozambique, where we had the adverse conditions. We also saw that the reduction in interest revenue, our reliance on interest from our government bonds in Angola and that we estimate to be around ZAR 30 million for the year. Other operating segments decreased by 5.4% to ZAR 67 million, mainly driven by the impact in the franchise operations. From a net finance cost point of view, we saw an increase of 5%, a much better performance than our prior year where we saw a growth of 30.9%. And that was mainly due to a reduction in our finance cost, where we saw a 20.9% reduction during the year. That was on the back of a much stronger performance in terms of our cash generation within the business as well as cash flows within the business. We also saw an additional 100 basis points reduction in the borrowing rate from our various financiers, which gave rise to nearly ZAR 200 million saving year-on-year. From an IFRS 16-point of view, we saw increase of cost of 10.7%. That's also much lower than our base effects of where we saw growth in the prior year of 20.7%. I spoke about the normalization of our lease liability in the previous presentation and also base effects. And during 2026, we did see a reduction in lease renewals that also supported the lower growth. We will, however, see an increase in our planned renewals again for 2027, where we plan to renew around 508 leases but we do expect similar growth in terms of the finance costs that we've had in 2026. Very important to note is the comment that I made there around the impact of IFRS 16, if you really look at cash flows within where we normally pay our landlords vis-a-vis the total cost of IFRS 16 coming through our P&L, relates to the ROU asset as well as the finance cost bit, and that was ZAR 1.7 billion for the year. Now if we just purely look at that impact on our headline earnings per share, it's around 15% that our current headline earnings per share is lower than we would have reported in terms of the old standards. If I then turn to cash and capital allocation, there are several ways to assess liquidity in the business. Management applies more a risk-based approach where we try and balance the level of capital. We require to reinvest back into the business against possible volatility that's in the market. that could require additional liquidity. The Iran conflict did increase risk during the second half. And that, together with timing differences in the anticipated payments of the S/4 HANA project resulted in CapEx expenditure being lower than communicated in the H1 results presentation, which in turn then contributed to higher cash balances at the end of the year. This does, however, position the group well for local M&A opportunities. And the example is that we were presenting 2 of those opportunities today. And there are also other opportunities, obviously, within the market which bodes very well for us if we're in sitting in a strong cash position. From a core cash point of view, we generated ZAR 24.2 billion for the year. Some of the major items impacting then, obviously, our cash flow was debt and financing, of which ZAR 5.4 billion related to interest payments, ZAR 4.3 billion of the ZAR 11.3 billion was lease liability repayments, and then ZAR 1.6 billion was due to net settlement of Barings. In terms of shareholder returns, we did pay ZAR 4.4 billion in dividends during the year and there was around ZAR 300 million in share buybacks. We did purely relating to the staff share schemes that we classified as treasury shares. From a growth and maintenance CapEx point of view, we spent ZAR 6.8 billion and in working capital, we actually had a positive move of ZAR 1.6 billion, and that was mainly as a result of cutoff over year-end. Very important to note will change during the 2027 financial year as a result of the 53rd week that I will speak a bit later about. And I estimate the impact of that switch around cutoff to be around ZAR 6 billion. The net cash movement for the year was ZAR 3.6 billion, and that also then basically led that we can report cash and cash equivalents for the full year of ZAR 12.9 billion from a growth and maintaining CapEx point of view, our capital expenditure as a percentage of sales dropped from 3.2% to 2.5%. I did mention the timing differences that we had relating to the S/4 HANA project. And that was one of the main drivers of why we spent less CapEx than we initially communicated to the market during our H1 results. From a growth CapEx point of view, we spent the majority of our CapEx is in terms of our investment relating to our store expansion program as well as the upgrades especially within our Checkers footprint. There, we spend around ZAR 4.2 billion. And then we kept on investing in terms of improving our digital capabilities where we spent an additional ZAR 1.2 billion during the year. Our continued investment in key growth drivers is supporting our improvements in both our trading margin and our ROIC while the structure is in place to prioritize this capital proved to be very effective during the year. I think also important to mention is that the majority of our CapEx spend was within our RSA segment. Inventory increased by 6.6% to ZAR 31.7 billion for the year. Majority of that growth in inventory occurred within our Supermarkets RSA business. What is very pleasing is our inventory to sales ratio, where we saw improvement from 2025, where we were sitting at 11.8% to 11.7% in 2026. Also from the graph below, you can see that our inventory to sales has now really settled. I think what makes it very compelling is the fact that we've added additional distribution space especially in the 2025 financial year. And with that additional space, we could still maintain our inventory to sales ratios. From a supermarkets non-RSA point of view, our stock levels remained in line with the prior year. And then we also saw a slight improvement in terms of our other segments. In summary, before we look at our 2027 guidance, the group has a very clear vision on how we measure our affordability of capital that we invest back into the business and the returns we need to achieve. We've invested ZAR 34.8 billion over the last 5 years back into the business, strengthening our supply chain, our store footprint as well as the scale that the group can now operate in terms of our digital ecosystem. What makes it actually more compelling is that the investment was funded through cash generation by the business. with our borrowings to equity ratio being at a 7-year low of 19.8%. We estimate that the continued investment for us to continue growth within the business, as well as to maintain the required maintenance on our IT infrastructure and aging store portfolio will be less than 3% to 3% to revenue ratio. Adjusted ROIC of 19.8% is now also our best performance in the last decade where we also saw that gap widening to 8.3% compared to our WACC rate. We have, however, seen a reduction in our WACC rate. on the back of lower interest rates within the environment. We are proud that we could deliver ZAR 19.7 billion of cash returns back to our shareholders during the last 5 years. we've again looked at our dividend policy, and we are very happy with having a 1.75x diluted headline earnings per share policy, which drives a 57% payout ratio if we compare that to profit after tax. I think then lastly, if we really look at guidance in terms of the 2027 financial year, first, very importantly, is that we have a 53rd week that we will report on for the 2027 financial year. Now if I purely compare that to what we reported during our 2021 financial year, and that was the last time that we actually had a 53rd week. That last week added around ZAR 331 million of additional trading profit. So that's just a data or a reference point for you when you have to model that 53rd week. From a sales point of view, I've mentioned the confirmed new store openings. There's always new opportunities that come along during the year. So that 6% increase in space is definitely something that we will target. And then from a financial indicator point of view, if we can maintain our 6% trading margin, that is currently our target again for the 2027 financial year. And then cost growth will always remain top of mind. We will look again at how we do our store expansion, the continued investment within supply chain and then also now the introduction of the SAP S/4 HANA project that will kick start or kick off during the 2027 financial year. We have seen quite a big reduction in our effective tax rate during the last few years. And I think we are now getting much closer to -- if we look at the predominance of the profitability within the South African business, where we have -- and with in South Africa, where we have an effective tax rate. So we're getting now much closer in terms of how we think around our tax rate. And that's why I think we can again say that our effective tax rate for the year will be between 26% and 26.5%. Inventory levels, we will maintain that 11.7% is our target. And then from a capital allocation point of view, I spoke about the dividend cover. We also received a new mandate the Board in terms of how we think and how we look at share buybacks. And that again will be valid for the next 5 years. And then in closing, from a capital and CapEx spend point of view, we estimate to spend around ZAR 7.7 billion for the 2027 financial year, which is below the 3% CapEx to sales ratio. Pieter, that then concludes my part of the financial results presentation. And I will now hand over to you to take us through our strategy in terms of what we're working on for 2027. Thank you very much.

Thank you, Anton. I think that was a really good impact of the detail that's in the numbers. I'll take you now a little bit on to the operational review. I really think what we've been talking about, the smarter Shoprite that we have and consistently are trying to improve have allowed us to have a very resilient performance in this year despite the low price inflation. A standout definitely is the increase in the gross margin, 20 bps to 24.5%. And the group trading margin ended at 6%, which Anton also referred to is what we have guided, what we would like to achieve. So very pleased that we could achieve it this year. Our customer value leadership, the digital innovation that we're doing, it continues to set the standard in terms of customer-first retailing. Most critical probably of these numbers holistically is the volume growth of 5.6%. I almost say this, I think, every time is that we need to grow volume for our partners or our suppliers or I call them brand managers because in a low inflation environment, what else do they have to offset the increase in cost if there is no volume growth. So very pleased that Shoprite could grow volume by 5.6% and selling 9.3 billion items, that would be then more than one item for every person on earth what we have sold in the past year. Keep in mind that when you're in a deflation environment, the selling prices itself is also much lower. Therefore, you have to grow the volume in order to grow your total sales because the item pricing is now much lower. For a value retailer to report a 24.5% gross margin and the 6% trading margin is really a very good result. And as you can see on the right-hand side on those bargains, you will see that both gross profit and trading profits have grown higher than what the sales have grown and that plays to the efficiencies on the one hand. And on the other hand, the blending management of the gross margin. If we go to supermarkets RSA, South Africa, 7.1% sales growth continued to outgrow the peers, rest of market, as we also say, the additional customer visits, I just mentioned, the volume growth of 5.6%, plus customer growth of 5.3%. That is where the overall growth came from, not from price increases. And if I take you to the right-hand side on the bar graph, you will notice that the outperform of the Shoprite Group to rest of market actually increased over the last years, ending this year on growing 3.5x the rest of market. I think testimony of the excellence of execution, the previous investments we made, the tools we have to make better decisions. That is why we are continually outperforming rest of market. Checkers growth was really fueled by gains in fresh and growth in 60-60, which we spoke about at 34.5%. Liquor stores grew at 12.1%, our business of ZAR 21 billion, and we're now at the 1,000-store mark. Continue to open -- I know you can't open an office store with 1.5 stores a week, and we still see some good growth in there. The adjacent businesses we spoke about, good growth at 17%. I'm not going to repeat that. And just say again, I know it's a second time, but the RSA supermarket trading margin of an excellent 6.6%. on this one, if I go straight to the graph on the left, that tells the story of how we have managed this lower inflation. And as you can see, the internal inflation of Shoprite has consistently been lower then the official food inflation from [indiscernible] . The 0.8% is the average of all the brands. And you can see Checkers had a slight inflation of 2%. IFRS 1.2 and then we go into the negatives. Shoprite negative, you save negative minus 0.6%. Interesting, and if one quantifies what does it mean? 11,500 products prices was lower this year than last year. So it's not true that prices doesn't come down. They do. And it's also telling us a little bit of what is happening in the what I like to refer to as the price-sensitive section of the market. We have more visits, but people are actually finding it hard to buy more items. But yet this year, we've managed to get both of the three. I have mentioned earlier, I made reference to the frequency of customer visits, the loyalty and then the data that we give -- clearly gives us an advantage. And with the excellence of execution give us efficiency at scale. And here, one has to look at the fact that Shoprite is a corporate model. And therefore, the execution is much faster and consistent. Our supply chain, I have mentioned, we have made investments in there. We are servicing now inland as well. We've seen an increase of self-availability in there that supports customer loyalty because they get what they're looking for, better in-stock for promotions. And if you then look at the extra savings instant cash discount program. The discounts for the year amounts to ZAR 18.3 billion. You will remember, we added ZAR 18.1 billion in sales, so we basically have given more savings than what we added sales. But that's good for customers. And if one look at the participation of promotions now at the highest of 38.5%, up over 2%, it tells us a little bit about the state of the consumer and that people are much more promotion-driven South Africa is the country with the highest promotional contribution in food retail. But on that, as I mentioned right in the beginning, we didn't have the luxury of just increasing prices. So it was good for us that customers still voted us, our brands as the #1 in providing value. The achievement of a 26.1% gross profit margin in African supermarket business is really a great achievement. If I add July to the market share gains, then we're now at the end of 89 consecutive months of market share gain. I think a great result for continued performance at scale. If we talk about brand Shoprite, the supermarket brands, shop, shop it lower prices for customers, gained customers and therefore, sustain some sales growth, also ahead of market. So sales increased by 4.3% to ZAR 121 billion. And here again, I'm going to stop at that number, 121 billion food retailer means that Shoprite brand is now by far the largest retailer in South Africa, adding ZAR 5 billion despite the overall price deflation. Now here, I would like to take you down to the bottom of the screen and just look at those numbers, 30%, 25% deflation in those categories. What makes this significant is the fact that in those categories, amongst other that was in deflation, Shoprite over index, which means the effect on the sales line is exacerbated compared to rest of market and still Shoprite managed to grow and customer visits and in volume. I've mentioned the ZAR 5 bread in our responsibility, but it's not only that. It's 50 meals, it's 50 toiletries and we're sticking to our promise of low prices. If one takes those items that were in deflation, and you make a basic calculation in you just take the deflation part out that would have added another ZAR 1.7 billion to total sales. I know it's not scientific, but it just gives us one a feeling for what the effect was of all of these prices that were now lower than last year. So I did mention we continue to expand. And what is interesting is that -- there was a bit of a customer pattern change, sales pattern change and that we saw in quarter 4, increased visits to use, where people shop closer to home, saving transport costs just the illustration of that combined with the increase in promotional spend that people are turning their sense over and looking for good prices. At the end of June, Sixty60 was in 99 Shoprite stores. it's not going to grow the same speed as what it grew in checkers, but we clearly have been able to illustrate that there is a need for that service also in the price-conscious market. We will be expanding on it, and I am very pleased to report that it is profitable. So if we move from Shoprite to Checkers supermarket brand, this year, surpassed ZAR 100 billion in sales, as we say, to an extent, it's redefining convenience and innovation. Sales increased double digits by 10% to ZAR 105 billion, adding ZAR 9.5 billion in sales, very strong customer maintenance. It's really what the retailer is looking for. The customers vote with their wallet, adding 554,000 additional visits a week. Checkers, fastest-growing in the premium food outgrowing the rest of market 5x a really, really excellent performance from the Checkers brand. We have this ongoing relationship with Jamie Oliver, playing in with what we -- what I mentioned earlier about the growth in fresh food. And we know he is globally known for healthy eating and delivering everyday solutions for problems like what's for dinner. But we also have a partnership with our local [indiscernible] South Africa's Michelin chef and together with Simple Truth that actually promotes healthy living and healthy eating. Sixty60 is definitely assisting in creating or driving additional share of wallet. And in today's world really redefining and delivering on that convenience component that people are looking for. So if we talk about Sixty60, is now become Africa's largest digital commerce platform. The total 660 sales increased by 34.7% to ZAR 25.5 billion. That equates to 11.1% of Supermarkets RSA sales. It is definitely the #1 grocery delivery app in Africa, live now in 997 stores nationwide, added 303 in the past 12 months. Strong order volume, still good growth. It's the 34% I'm talking about. As I said earlier, percentage is going to be receiving. It looks like it's slowing down. But if you look at the monetary value, you'll see it added ZAR 6.6 billion in this year, although the percentage growth is less than the previous year because of the base that is so much larger. Very good to say, again, that we could -- through this platform, almost 20,000 job opportunities since the inception of it. Then what's very good to report is this scale growth has assisted us in improving the profitability by order. And I will unpack also the fact that we can do a combination of different deliveries and, therefore, further assess the profitability of their service. So supermarkets non-RSA improved performance this year, 11% sales growth, more stable environment in terms of exchange rate and hyperinflation. The biggest benefit of the year was in Zambia as they improve the electricity supply and reinstated debt and we saved on the diesel cost. I think where we are today, the base of countries that's in this segment is where we will stabilize. There is maybe a question around the affordability in Mozambique. But for the rest, there is the core countries that we are in and will remain, and the profit guidance as we've given you before. On the other segments, looks a little bit subdued. Mostly as a result of franchise where a fairly large franchisee for his own financial regions have left the brand and that had the impact so that they only grew 0.6%, and that resulted in a negative 5.4% trailing profit. Medirite, very good growth, especially if we look at the new Medirite Plus stores, although it's a small base, and yes, I'm going to call percentage, 67% sales growth, but what it shows to us is there is acceptance for it and there is a gap in the market for that Medirite Plus offering. Transform sales are by 7.8%. But one must look at that in relation to the single exit price increase that was only 1.47%. Most of that 7.8% growth comes from new customers, additional customers, we have moved to a state-of-the-art distribution center in [indiscernible] from Pretoria and the efficiency is much better than when we operate it out of different facilities. We have now a single facility, and that's really much more efficient. So just some update of the strategy and where we are. This slide you know very well. And very little on these 9 drivers have changed over the last decade. We set priorities for the long term. I have said before, we don't do knee-jerk. We stick to our strategy. And when we plan, it has to fit into this little trolley as we've got it here. If we just look at the Checkers brand, that was a very specific decision 10 years ago. to absolutely separate the Shoprite retail brand with the Checkers retail brand. It didn't come without a risk. I mean there were cost had to be duplicated, et cetera. But if one looks at the graph, the last 10 years, up to the ZAR 105 billion in sales, where we are now, that is just short of 12% compounded growth per year. Given all the things we've been through and COVID, and unrest in deflation and so in hindsight, I think we made the right decision. And now we're sitting with this natural hedge between the 2 brands. So better with the one, any other one covers and vice versa. We've upgraded now in the state, 194 of the stores into fresh X stores, which are determined by the areas where they are in mostly the areas where we've been underrepresented and they are delivering very good results for us. I've spoken about the market share gains in fresh, almost ZAR 1 billion, and we've added to our own private labels, premium food, 644 additional lines during the year. You will see the button there on the top of the screen is Checkers is the #1 brand in South Africa. Not retail brand, brand. I couldn't find another retail globally that a retail brand is the #1 brand. Maybe they are, but it's still, for us, an accolade of what was done over the last decade. One has to say something about AI for a smarter Shoprite. We definitely have embraced it. probably more so from the beginning of this calendar year, we on any day of about 12,000 users that uses this extensively but it's also embedded across the business. And if one had to just say in the workforce, people, how are they using it? One example would be the one Shoprite where the task at store are determined by exception, one then has a record that the job is done and all the time, as we know, AI get cleverer and clever. We don't want to do -- we don't want to fix what's not wrong, and that's where this helps us. In the middle there, the core retail, the large amount of customer data that we have it needs something strong to make sense of that in a category management, in a pricing decision, and that's the way we've deployed that and then the one that you would probably had some contact with Pixie on Sixty60, very clever and we'll just get more clever. Got a little video, just to quickly show how it works. [Presentation]

We like to think of ourselves as the everyday store. Because of the frequency that customers interact with us, we can see very quickly when there's a change in category buying, item substitution, and then we can react to that. And digital allows speed in doing so. So currently, there's over 50,000 products available on app convenience within 60 minutes. There's 1,000 stores. And I have said this before, at some point, we look at the real estate and if we call it all stores, roughly 4,000 stores and one thought at some point, can this become your Achilles heel, the opposite. It's become our advantage because we pick from store. And now where do we go next? That's where all the adjacent businesses also come into play is, we now -- and most of our adjacent business is very -- in close proximity to the supermarket where the grocery picking happens. So that we can give you multiple orders from different brands and product sets in one delivery and one payment. And I think there is a big advantage also with the fact that we are a corporate. And therefore, we're on a single platform and for us to add and improve on this is just so much easier if it weren't a single platform. It almost creates a flywheel effect. It drives engagement, the high frequency I spoke about -- so now we get the eyeballs, as I speak, in digital language more often. It gives us the opportunity to market product. People can see the pricing. That's why with our general merchandise, we've seen a huge uptake. I think people have forgotten what a fantastic offer the hypermarkets have and the pricing that they have, the brands that they have. And because of the frequency of interaction, we are able to show that to people. Another example of the single platform, the logistics and how we improve the unit economics because of the scale and the combination of all the businesses in a single order, as an example, would be few people know that you can start the transaction on the web and then complete it on the app later on. And all of these enhancements, we are able to develop, a release because we are on a single platform. So just to illustrate further what I was just explaining probably in a more graphic way. Shoprite, we've spoken about. You see the graph there of the increase in orders and the growth of it. Just supporting what I said that there is also a need for that service in that market. Pet has become a very big category estimated to be worth about in South Africa, ZAR 14 billion by 2030. By the end of the calendar year, we will have about 200 stores. They are really performing well. There's quite an increase of the number of people that own pets these days. Then we have the pharma, on the other hand, not only vitamins, but your script. And once again, standing back one step and say, okay, so I can do all of this in one and get one delivery, do one payment. And we've now added value-added services that's not like airtime bill payments will come and buying your complete ticket or your airline ticket, all of those, all again, in one platform where you frequent often. So the simplicity because you understand it is a familiar environment, you know exactly what to do. You've got AI helping you. You can now talk toit. You can now talk to it. You can take a picture of your shopping list and it will shop it for you. You can give it your grandmother's recipe and it will order you the ingredients. And then I mentioned general merchandise growth of 66%. People have really started to realize that we have a very good offering there. Outdoor is there amazing the product range that brand offers. And all of that, once again, you need something quickly. And an hour later, it's at your door. The supply chain needs a special mention. Again, we've expanded in the last 3 years. And in the last year, we have decided to also support our stores in land, and that is currently showing even accelerated market share gains because of that. when we went from direct to store to our own supply chain deliveries. And the fact that we are managing it ourselves, there are many levers to pull here to bring the cost of serving down. And that's why when the fuel price went all over, we could calculate it down to what the effect would be by item. And then we could make decisions around there. And there's just another illustration of how powerful the data is. We've shown you this before, but it's got a little bit more content around it now because of the developments that happened in digital, in particular. But just to remind you, this journey started, if we look at the core retail capabilities right at the bottom. That was now back in 1997 when we layered the platform, and then we had the ability to start building on that. And then it was the supply chain, we spoke about that just now. And then it was the real estate and how do we improve, use our real estate to get a bigger share of wallet. And then the adjacent businesses followed and now they are being added to the digital platform, making it more convenient. We're still the value proposition and then on top of that lies the integrated customer data layer that we gain mostly, not only, but mostly from the excess savings. And the repeat use there of gives us the most recent or current up-to-date data of what is trending with customers. And then on top of that, is now the digital layer the platform that covers the entire business. And the more we get that right, the better we get at it, the more profitable the digital will become. This is 100% replicable, but it takes money and it takes time. And currently, I believe Shoprite has taken advantage of time here, running fast from thinking back in the COVID days, when we really started to accelerate in here. And yes, this is where we are now in this journey, and we believe that there is a lot more that we can extract value that we can extract from this platform that has been both. So on that note, I really want to thank you for your time. We do appreciate it. We don't take it for granted. And then we will now go over to questions. So while you're getting your questions ready, we'll just give you an update of where we currently are with some transactions that we've concluded post the year-end. [Presentation]

Thank you. So I hope you have a quick leg stretch. Just to give you a bit of information. We'll always get asked about some M&A update or are we interested in looking at doing some acquisitions. So we have. We've done 2 small ones. It's about ZAR 1 billion. Vida e Caffe. The Russian offer is very simply is we currently have multiple coffee brands in our stable. We have a partnership with Starbucks. Our franchise division also has a coffee brand. And it just made sense for us to consolidate that. Vida is the largest chain coffee chain in South Africa. And we felt the time to consolidate plus secondly, give it -- give our franchisees an alternative to also grow their business. So Vida will reside in the franchise segment. Then the R&A Cellular it's more part of our intended growth in the financial services space, of which cell phones have become crucial, has become sync to being able to transact also financially. So we're looking forward to that. It's already established market. It's not that big, but there are a couple of thousand terminals out there. So also for us an opportunity to get into the, let's call it, less formal market where people can convert cash transactions onto a terminal and also sell value-added services. Okay. Then if we just quickly jump to the outlook I think the biggest question on everybody's mind is where is the inflation going to go. Now -- we last time said that we expected inflation to go up to around 5% with the increase in fuel and it didn't happen. We went the other way. And last week, you all have read that food inflation in South Africa is now the lowest in the last 16 years. So our expectation is that it will stay low, at least for this calendar year, end of December, with the strengthening of the rand on the other hand, I actually, obviously, for us, fuel because of our supply chain as a direct effect on costs. We managed to manage it very well in the previous financial year. We will do as best as we can obviously in this year coming Fortunately, we have the tools. I have mentioned that during the presentation also is that, of course, we have line item profitability because we have a real-time view on exactly where the stock is. There are also good things that happen. The shipping rates have come down quite a bit. One might have expected the opposite with the whole Hormuz and Iran story, but we actually got better pricing on the shipping costs. So there's -- it's going to be a balance for us to, again, manage that gross profit margin. It's a blended exercise. Some items are obviously more sensitive, price-sensitive, and some less. So it's a balancing act. We have the artificial intelligence embedded in our replenishment systems, et cetera. And yes, so all I can say Internet that we will do our best to manage it as well as we did in last year for sure.

I think we've mentioned the 53rd week as well

Yes, we must maybe just repeat the fact that remember that the 2020 financial year is 53 weeks. So yes, but impact -- but I get somewhat in teapot.

I think Pieter, yes, we've consolidated quite a few of the questions. I think if we start maybe with Sixty60. I think there's quite a few questions around what is driving the sales growth within Sixty60. And then I think maybe when you talk about the Sixty60 offering, obviously, you've had a slide around what the offering and the growth within the offering. Maybe just touch on the pharma as well and how you see that play out.

Okay. The growth for me speaks to the excellence of execution. If you want to have that, which is optimum convenience, do you have your goods delivered within 1 hour. But it's not no good if I ordered 10 items and you bring me 5. So I think the overall execution, the high level of big rate the consistency in the speed of delivery, that is driving the service. And I've tested it all for me, there's no question that Sixty60 is the base online platform. It's reliable. And yes, so that is just purely driving almost logically driving the behavior from customers because they have a great experience So then if you ask me that I did say something about it. It's the fact that we still have this opportunity to add all of the other parts of our business and combine that with your food delivery, which means it's a single checkout. It's a single delivery, but it's actually from 4 or 5 different businesses. And that for me is probably the top level of convenience that you can ask for. And that's what's driving it.

I think maybe also there were some questions around like-for-like. You always talk about, obviously, and that's why we also invest in our stores and the store footprint growth and additional space growth that we do every year. So maybe also touch on how we think around our like-for-like sales growth. I mean, there was quite a few questions around that as well.

Yes, for me, that has become -- because we move the Polycom -- because I think somebody asked about how do we manage the volume and the number of orders per store, that is what we then do. So the store may have, let's say, in area this year, but then we open a store closer by, and then we take some of those volume there. So immediately, there is no like-for-like calculation anymore. And I think people would just accept that, that is how we now look at this. The world has changed. We talk omnichannels, it's digital, it brings them more -- the one can't be without the other because we pick from store.

I think that also drives the whole notion around cannibalization and trading densities as well. And we always talk about sweating the asset a bit more.

Yes. I've said this before, maybe I must repeat it to say when we started out with the digital, we also had performance centers and then very quickly realize that this is not going to work, not in South Africa. Distances are too long, and/or too far. And what we thought may be our Achilles heel is our big store footprint became our strength. And when we then decided to start picking from store, all of a sudden, you were with this real estate, you were around about 90% of your addressable math within 5 kilometers. And that's -- I think that's where the success of it lies. So the footprint has actually provided that opportunity. Now I've heard that also some people say, oh, but we're cannibalizing on our sales. No, it's not so. Here and there, sometimes we do -- but that's for a reason. It's by design. But in general, our trading density has increased -- so that, for me, the 5 is that argument that we're cannibalizing negatively or affecting the return. And if you then refer back to you, you're right.

That argument for me doesn't hold and the trading margin within the RSA Supermarkets. I think those 2 are the data points here. But obviously, I mean, if we look at gross margin, I think there was comments around strengthening of gross margin percentage in the second half. You did unpack it in quite a lot of detail on, but maybe just to wrap it up.