AUSTRIA – During the annual press conference on 25 July 2019 at its headquarters in St. Johann in Tirol, the EGGER Group reports on a successful, albeit challenging, 2018/19 financial year, that ended on April 30, 2019.

The key performance indicators showed a stable development: Group turnover increased by +5.6%, while adjusted EBITDA declined slightly by -4.7%. The record total investment of EUR 489.1 million had a strong impact on this result. Recently one of the Group’s flagship projects was completed as the 19th EGGER plant in Biskupiec, Poland, started operations at the end of June.

The Company’s management was satisfied with the sales of EUR 2,841.5 million achieved in the 2018/2019 financial year (+5.6% compared to the previous year) and the adjusted operating result (EBITDA) of EUR 425.0 million (-4.7% compared to the previous year). The adjusted EBITDA margin amounted to 15.0%, in line with the long-term average and the equity ratio remained at a high level of 36.8% (previous year: 40.8%). The quantity of raw boards (including timber) increased to 8.8 million m³ (+3.5%), which means the full utilization of all primary production capacities. Across the Group, EGGER employed an average of 9481 employees last year.

In the second half of 2018, global economic growth slowed, particularly in the Eurozone and the Company highlighted the slower than forecasted growth of the construction industry.

For EGGER, environments in the key markets in Europe and Russia were satisfactory in the past financial year and enabled stable development. The most important geographical market for the company is Western Europe, and above all Germany with the furniture industry strongly represented there. The Western European market with a turnover of EUR 1,672 million (+4.7%) also grew in the 2018/2019 financial year and thus generated 58.9% of the sales revenues. The Central & Eastern European and Russian markets also achieved a stable sales share of 29.5%, with declining sales of flooring products in Turkey and falling demand for OSB having a negative impact. However, this was offset by an increase in sales of flooring and interior design products in Russia and sales growth in other sales territories of the region.

Non-European countries are playing an important role for EGGER. In 2018/2019 they accounted for EUR 330 million (+10% compared to the previous year) or 11.6% of total sales. Sales at the new plant in Argentina fell short of expectations: “The Argentine market, which is new to us, was very challenging, as it was characterized by very high inflation and the currency decline of the Argentine peso and the associated economic recession,” explains Ulrich Bühler, EGGER Group Management Sales/Marketing.