harry belly fonti
19 Oct 2016
Re: A couple more things Can't help thinking Ashley should stick to the end of the clothing market he knows best. Pumping a load of money into Flannels is a recipe for disaster in my opinion. When the Flannels punters find out who's behind these shops they'll be off. £1000 coats mixing with his Karrimor brand, a brand he sells at Sports Direct, just don't mix.Time will tell.
Radaking
12 Oct 2016
Re: A couple more things Flannels in Manchester used to be the high end of fashion for men.Trendsetters often shop there and my mate said he saw the Gallagher brothers( oasis) in the Manchester branch just as they took off to pop stardom sometime back.I found some of the gear ok but its really expensive unlike the sp on SPD at the moment.The difference in price compared to JD Sports is unreal.Target price £7
BoyBlunder1
11 Oct 2016
Re: A couple more things JD own/co-own and compete with SD in this market online with some of the same brands.There is likely room for both.I still prefer buying direct from Hugo Boss.
TX2
11 Oct 2016
Re: A couple more things I have not visited any of the Flannel stores yet,so interesting thoughts.Sports Direct bought the Flannels name & some of the present stores which had been trading for quite a few years.However the new developments by SPD are on a different scale.Flannels is not in competition with JD,price & product entry level is far above JD's finish.We are talking top end luxury market.Sports Direct are spending serious money.£108m for the freehold of shortly to be opened Flannels Oxford St lead store,true it includes office space due to replace existing offices which have been sold for £50m;but with more money for fitting out & stock a mega investment.£18m for premises for a new store in Jersey.New stores opened this summer in Southport,Metro Centre Gateshead & Swindon.Is MA trying to make as big an impact on the luxury fashion end as he has on the lower/mid end of the sports fashion market.We could be talking several hundred million investment over this & next two years.Few existing competitors have this deep pockets.Will it work?No idea but interesting to see.
Andy46
10 Oct 2016
Re: A couple more things The only one i've seen is in Leeds. I wasn't impressed, I was the only customer in there and the store looked very sparse, wouldn't have worn anything in there tbh. On another note, I do think the Leeds Sports Direct store looked far better than other stores i've been in which looked more like jumble sales.
BoyBlunder1
10 Oct 2016
Re: A couple more things I will give some views.1. Some of the stores locations are so far off the major footfall. 2. I note he is discounting some of the hugo Boss products4. He is opening more new stores5. The web site looks good6. What revenue is flannels adding to the group7. Can he grow it fast enough to make it worth while and have an impact in the sector.JD are ready have impact on line with other shop front competiting in this segment,How will he compete, Price?Flanels have been around a while, I think....
TX2
10 Oct 2016
Re: A couple more things Anyone fashion savvy got an opinion on Flannels.com Sports Direct up market fashion chain on which a great deal of money is being spent?
Katonga
09 Oct 2016
Re: A couple more things In my opinion it is in Ashley's favour (in view of his very sizable holding) for the company to buy back shares at the lower price level
gamesinvestor
09 Oct 2016
Re: A couple more things "he does own and operate under several other web sites, that the consumer likely doesn't know are owned by Ashley & co."BoyB -- Good point - I wondered on this as well as I searched for the same items, but ultimately those other web links reverted back to the same listings that were obviously then Sports Direct, but I agree some will unwittingly see them as another company.It's all about web search catch as many as you can mechanisms and they have figured out a number of key names to get higher search engine rankings.The drop Friday of 10.66% at one point was a big one, and yet the share price is now down 64% on substantially the same amount of business being done for this year.Obviously the top number was so overpriced, but it's getting there now I think.Games - When is always the question. I shouldn't even be considering this as an investment, but as a cyclical punt maybe?
BoyBlunder1
08 Oct 2016
Re: A couple more things Interesting overview.I wuld suspect as they own shares in other companies (or did so at somepoint for the years you have evaulated) like John David Group, they will be earning dividends.Stores full of C Yes, but some people can only afford C and so it sells.As for his potentialy outdated return polices etc, there is no doubt that in most cases (Educated customes who shop aroaund for more than value) that he would see a an upside to operating in line with the consumer expectations, however, sometimes, you cant do everything, cheap prices, and then all the nice things as well. People(or a fair percentage are driven by price) Ashley's Marketing method appears to be about "entry price points" to drag customrs in store and on to his web site to buy.I would suggest growth under the current business model would be limited and he has nearly as big share as he is likely to get. (Unless some else goes out of business)However, if and when he rolls out his upmarket branded experience, in store, one would likely expect to see growth. We should also remember, that whilst people only look at Sports Direct, he does own and operate under several other web sites, that the consumer likely doesnt know are owned by Ashley & co. I havent studied the T&C Oon these sites.So far as Divdends are concerned, it wouldnt surprise me, if following his share buy back operation, and a balanced $/£ exchange rate and that all competitior retailers have then feed any or all prices increase on to the consumer, Ashley will increase his prices and a divident may well follow. One expects that prices at retail level may not increase for 6/12 months if they have hedged currency.So, the big question is when to buy? Will the sp fall further?Is there more bad news? How much hedging of currency did other retailers or suppliers do and when will market prices hit the consumer? Did Ashley hedge any currency in the last few weeks or has he now taken another hit with the further fall on the dollar rate?I might add here, that whilst he imports from the far east, some companies will and do business in £, that doesnt stop price increases, but my finding are they can be reduced with this method. I wont go in to the methods of some far east companies, but belive me when importing, they opportunties that are offered by suppliers to reduce prices.Risk Vs Reward? My view dont buy yet, but at some stage in the future this will be a buy and a potential double your money over a few years.The big questions like most is when?I dont think you can call it as of yet, it needs to be montiored, the only issue with SD is it tends to rise and fall very quickly, so I am waiting for all things to settle down before I take a position in SD. If you buy now and are prepared to wait, then I dont think there is too much risk, but I prefer to buy elsewhere in the short term.
gamesinvestor
08 Oct 2016
A couple more things The finances don't look too bad, despite all the shock horrors.If they could just get someone on to clean up the poor image !!Borrowings hit £330M last time, growing from £214M five years ago, but profits have grown in line with this. In fact the debt looks relatively low, although don't know what exposure he's got on the 465 shops in terms of lease obligations -- anyone know this without digging deeper?Company was cash flow positive last year and the gearing has come down from 123 five years ago to about 58 now, although this will probably rise again with the current poor performance.No dividend -- I wonder if Ashley is siphoning all the cash off through some unknown vehicle somewhere -- as the retained earnings last year were £1.48BN -- big chunk.Net cash flow from investing activities (I guess new shops, reorganising existing and buying new brands (have they done any of this recently?) has been stable at less than a £100M a year over the last 4 years, and the net cash flow for finance came in as a positive number last year.Operating margins are around 7.6% have fallen from 9 and even 10% a few years ago, I guess this reflects growing online competition and all the discounts they have to apply to shift some of the absolute crxp in the stores.The store I went in recently did seem to have some improvements, but it's still like a jungle trying to find anything.On balance it looks reasonably cheap -- could it get cheaper -- of course it could!!Games - If he declared a divi the tight wad, he'd see a boost to his share price, forget the buy backs.
gamesinvestor
08 Oct 2016
A couple of things Don't know if anybody actually shops with SD or are just on here to punt around with the share price.A couple of things I found a bid tedious when using their online and store system surprised me :-1. If you return an item they won't give you a refund. Just about every other retailer will.2. If you order something online, you have to pay £5 delivery charge, even on reasonably higher values (£50 usually wipes out delivery for most retailers now).3. Click and collect at the store still also charges £5 delivery, even though you have to drive to the store yourself -- no one else charges this.4. If you return an item that you ordered online to a store, because it doesn't fit for example, you only get a credit note -- you can get a refund if you send it back at your own expense. Other retailers don't do this.5. All the staff in the stores seem stressed and look distinctly unhappy. Nearly all are relatively light on the English language.6. All of the clothes are creased on display, giving the shop the appearance of a jumble sale.Maybe I'm over critical, but it's not a great experience.On share buy-backs? -- It doesn't change the value of the company one iota -- it's an artificial mechanism to try to boost the share price and longer term in 9 times out of 10 it ends badly.Games -- although to be fair I haven't analysed the accounts here at all yet.
casabanker
07 Oct 2016
Buying back shares Companies buying their own shares is supposed to be positive for the Company, management and shareholders. As a shareholder, it's not my preferred option of reward. Insofar as it is supporting the share price, the evidence of this is clearly missing in this case. We investors always like to look for a reason for a sudden price move and today is no exception. I think the general malaise with SPD has been the deserved bad publicity over treatment of staff. It was after this publicity and the sudden price fall to around 400 that I bought SPD. I thought that MA would change poor work practices quickly and resume with good turnover and profits as previously achieved. It now seems that there is more intrinsically wrong with the SPD model. Then there has been the Brexit decision which has weakened the gbp, making imports more expensive. Competition for retailers has been fierce this year and many are struggling to achieve profit margins made in years previous. Today's fall in price, I suspect, is probably due to the fact that the gbp has dropped unexpectedly again maybe due to the government announcement of Article 50 to be signed before the end of March next year. I am suspicious that the gbp will remain weak/fall further when Brexit starts to bite, particularly if we insist on limited immigration. In addition, the Bank of England wants to create inflation. The issue of QE and interest rate reductions has failed to do this so a falling pound will be encouraged.All of this will introduce serious headwinds against SPD making good progress in increasing sales and profit imo. Preferably, I want to see SPD achieve at least 300 before I make my decision to sell. Casa.
devonplay
23 Sep 2016
Re: Is this the start of something big... Or maybe just more confusion at Sports Direct, as soon as I saw the headline I remembered this quote;The billionaire tycoon told MPs the claims of mistreatment and poor working conditions that led to his delayed appearance in front of the Business Select Committee showed Sports Direct has "definitely outgrown me"."Sports Direct has "definitely outgrown me"."Will this really improve Corporate Governance? Not to my mind.DL
claude reins
23 Sep 2016
Is this the start of something big... Forsey goes and MA takes over the direct reins. Is this the start of SPD beginning to act like a corporate grown up (as distinct form a large company)? I hope so and look forward to the extra changes we may reasonably anticipate in the foreseeable future. This may well be close to the bottom for SPD. As always DYOR and assessment.
