By Jessica Yun
If Christmas had an opposite, such an unholy season would, for companies listed on the Australian stock exchange, fall in the month of August. Far from being a festive period, this is the time when listed companies crunch the numbers from the financial year, open up their books, reveal how much money they made (or lost), and answer questions from investors, analysts and media about why. (For shareholders receiving a juicy dividend, it is like Christmas.)
While there’s plenty of room to fixate on finer details, earnings reporting season offers a chance to unpack company strategy from the chief executives that lead the businesses: what’s doing well, what worries them, and what their next big bets are.
From furniture and wine to milk powder and pies, here’s what the chief executives of Temple & Webster, Treasury Wine Estates, Universal Store, A2 Milk, Retail Food Group, and Ingham’s revealed about where growth in the business will – and won’t – come from.
Temple and Webster’s Modern Mosaic Escape bathroom idea.
Fast furniture
One of many retailers rewiring the way we shop, and proving how happy we are to do it online, is Temple & Webster. According to Mark Coulter, chief executive of the ecommerce furniture business, Australians are quite happy to shop for DIY home improvement materials – things such as bathroom vanities, taps, heating and fan lighting – without touching or seeing it first.
“With the right images, video, ratings and reviews, you can get a really good sense of what that bathroom vanity is going to look like,” he said. “You’re not going to be sitting in it. You’re not going to be sleeping on it. So the actual touch and feel is less about comfort – it’s more about trust.”
Experiencing the product becomes more important for products that will be used every day, such as mattresses and sofas, where comfort matters much more, he said.
Meanwhile, bedroom furniture and homewares are still selling strongly. “We’re selling more sofas and dining tables than we’ve ever sold before.”
Planning the next Penfolds
There are only a handful of names that can be considered luxury Australian brands. RM Williams is one, Aesop paved the way for high-end handwash, and Penfolds is another. The luxury wine makes up more than a third of parent company Treasury Wine Estates’ total revenue of nearly $3 billion.
Patrimony wine from Daou Vineyards: is this the next Penfolds?
Treasury has weathered Australia’s trade war with the lucrative China market, which has been fatal for many Australian wineries, without suffering brand damage. It lifted prices, and held them, at a time when many households were struggling with cost of living pressures.
While demand for luxury wine continues to grow steadily, cheaper wine has become unpopular. Treasury has been forced to keep its commercial wine brands after trying and failing to find a buyer for the right price.
There’s a lot riding on the success of Penfolds. Would it be prudent to have another brand in the works?
Industry watchers will know that was what Treasury’s $1.6 billion acquisition of Californian wine brand Daou Vineyards was about. “It’s interesting; if you’re in California, Daou needs no introduction and Penfolds probably does. Here in Australia, or in China obviously, it’s vice versa,” said Treasury chief Tim Ford.
How exactly do you build a brand that’s considered luxury? It’s all about experiences, said Ford, who said old, traditional advertising methods would not cut it any more.
“A brand that links to experiences, that then brings status to the consumer as they are consuming, buying, gifting that product, whatever the occasion may be, is how you build these brands,” he said.
“It’s a luxury brand playbook from around the world … We don’t think we’ve created it, we’ve copied them from other luxury brands, but we’ve done a pretty good job with Penfolds, and we plan to do a similar job at Daou.”
A2 Milking it
Former market darling A2 Milk is best known for its infant formula, but tucked away in this $5.8 billion dual-listed company is a tiny, fast-growing part of the business: milk powder for adults and seniors.
One of A2 Milk’s biggest challenges is the declining birth rate in China, a market that accounts for three-quarters of the business. Meanwhile, millions of people are getting older every year, and demand is increasing for fortified and functional milk powder.
A2 Milk chief David Bortolussi: The infant formula company’s fastest-growing part of the business isn’t infant formula.Credit: David Rowland
“The number of newborns has come down over the last 20 years from 30 million to less than 10 million,” said A2 Milk chief David Bortolussi. “Every year you’ve got almost like 25 to 30 million seniors falling into that [60 years and above] category … Not surprisingly, their nutritional needs are not too dissimilar to younger people.”
A2 Milk recently introduced three new products for bone strength, gut health, and heart health that are going well, Bortolussi said. Its fortified milk business grew 23 per cent during fiscal 2025. “I’d want [it] to be as big as it possibly can.”
Subway has a new challenger
You might not know Retail Food Group by name, but you’ve almost certainly heard of Gloria Jean’s and Donut King. The food franchisor’s portfolio also encompasses pizza chain Crust, Brumby’s Bakery, Beefy’s pies, Firehouse Subs, Michel’s patisserie, as well as CIBO Espresso and Pizza Capers.
ASX food chain franchisor Retail Food Group is positioning Firehouse Subs as a superior rival to Subway.
Running 1250 outlets across 30 countries is a lot to keep track of, which is why Retail Food Group has been phasing out low-performing brands (such as Michel’s and CIBO) and backing brands they see growth potential in.
“The best chance of accelerating growth in the next phase is around our Beefy’s and Firehouse [Subs] businesses,” said Retail Food Group chief Matthew Marshall.
Retail Food Group has aggressive store expansion plans for Beefy’s Pies (50 stores by 2028) and sandwich business Firehouse Subs, with a target to open 165 stores, which Marshall is hoping will eat some of Subway’s lunch.
“It’s a $1.7 billion category, it’s growing fast, and it’s really only got one big competitor in Subway,” he said. “We’ve got a really, really strong case here to shake up the category and have a real go at bringing something new.”
As part of efforts to focus on fewer, better brands, the group is putting Brumby’s Bakery up for sale. A review of the bakery chain’s value resulted in a $12.2 million write-down. “Our priorities have changed over the years,” the company stated.
Discounting is out of fashion
Two years ago, when Australians were counting their dollars more carefully after 13 interest rate rises, retail markdowns of 30 per cent to 40 per cent were common – but you won’t find smart retailers doing that. Youth fashion retailer Universal Store grew total sales by 15.5 per cent despite a pretty tough retail environment, which chief executive Alice Barbery said was down to “great range curation” and “really robust and beautiful” offers.
Universal Store chief executive Alice Barbery.Credit: Peter Wallis
“A lot of people might be growing with top-line sales, but they’re doing it at the cost of gross margin, so it’s through discounting. We’ve been able to do that without … participating in the rampant discounting,” she said.
Tight inventory control is also key. “We’ve trained our customer to pay full price. We also want to be sure that we don’t end up with over-stock issues, which devalues the product.”
Universal Store appears to be doing much better than its rival, General Pants Co, which has been quietly closing stores across the country and is battling its third attempt to be wound up by frustrated suppliers attempting to claw back thousands of dollars owed by the retailer.
Ingham’s hungry for fast food
Chicken has been a winner on the dinner tables of Australians for its relative affordability compared with red meat prices, which have risen by 25 per cent for lamb and 40 per cent for beef over the past five years.
Ingham’s needs to win new customers.Credit:
But major poultry supplier Ingham’s has had a tough year; a major supply contract with Woolworths ended after the nation’s grocery chain decided to diversify its pool of suppliers, leaving Ingham’s to fill the gap by selling more to Coles, Aldi and IGA.
In short, Ingham’s needs more customers for its chicken. It’ll focus on what it can control, but is hoping for a fast-food fix.
“There’s some good growth prospects as it relates to the emerging and medium-sized quick-service restaurants,” said new chief Edward Alexander.
Ingham’s supplies chicken to KFC, McDonald’s and Nandos. Cost of living pressures have led customers to make meals at home instead of eating out, to the detriment of Ingham’s food-service sales, but Alexander is hoping to see foot traffic return to eateries.
“[Quick-service restaurant] operators have really gotten back, not to a point of growth, but certainly seeing some green shoots as it relates to the sales and some of their foot traffic measures,” said Alexander.
“Our responsibility is just to make sure that we provide that exceptional customer service and ensure we’re cost competitive, and that’s the basis through which we’ll pick up market share and win new business.”
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