Footwear manufacturer Dr. Martens plc (DOCS.L), widely recognized as Doc Martens, announced underwhelming profits and revenue for its fiscal year 2024 on Thursday, attributing the results to sustained weak consumer demand in the USA.
The pre-tax profit for the year dropped 41.7 percent to £93.0 million, compared to £159.4 million last year. Basic earnings per share fell 45.7 percent to 7 pence from 12.9 pence in the previous year. Pre-tax profit before foreign exchange adjustments stood at £97.2 million, down from £170.1 million a year ago.
The company's annual revenue decreased by 12.3 percent to £877.1 million from £1 billion in the prior year, with a revenue decline of 9.8 percent at constant currency rates.
The 2 percent growth in Direct-to-Consumer (DTC) revenue was counteracted by a 28 percent drop in Wholesale revenue, largely due to a significant decline in the US wholesale market.
Additionally, the company announced its Board's proposal for a final dividend of 0.99 pence, bringing the total dividend to 2.55 pence. The Board aims to maintain a flat dividend for FY25 in absolute terms, with plans to resume a dividend payout aligned with policy from FY26 onwards.
Looking forward, Dr. Martens stated that current trading aligns with expectations and its FY25 planning assumptions remain unchanged since April. For the first half of FY25, the company forecasts a Group revenue decline of approximately 20 percent, driven by a roughly one-third reduction in wholesale revenues.
The company anticipates that overall results this year will be significantly skewed towards the second half, especially from a profit perspective.
