Seeking Alpha • Sep 30
Kirkland's: I'm Bullish (Again) For The First Time Since October 2020
Summary
I originally wrote up Kirkland's and introduced the company to the investments world in May/June 2020. Shares were then trading under $2 and peaked at $34 in April 2021.
Despite selling all of my shares, for 'only' a six-bagger, in early Q4 2020, I have continued to closely follow the business and synthesize all of its conference calls.
For the first time in ages, I'm really bullish on Kirkland's, and I have a material long position, with a basis in the mid-$3s. I share why.
Today, I write to share that I'm really bullish, once again, on Kirkland's, Inc. (KIRK). In fact, I recently bought a decent-sized long position, in the stock, in the mid $3s. For perspective, I have been on the sidelines, on this stock, for a long time. Moreover, after a six-bagger, owning the stock from early June 2020 through early Q4 2020, I was 100% out of the stock. And by late November 2020, with the stock then trading in the mid to high teens, I was actually bearish on the company. My bearish comments are captured within the commentary thread of Cameron Smith's November 27, 2020 article. I expressed that I hated management's aggressive buyback program, and it was unclear to me how much of Kirkland's success was driven by the Housing Renaissance and three rounds of stimulus programs vs. great execution and a compelling turnaround by the management team.
Incidentally, and just to be clear, I've continued to closely follow this company. As readers might recall, I helped put this company on the map, at least to the small-cap investing world, as I interviewed its CEO, Steve 'Woody' Woodward, in late June 2020. Woody is a really smart guy, and he was the Chief Merchant at Crate and Barrel, so he is very capable and a really good merchant.
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And in case anyone is unaware of Kirkland's, from the time of publication, back in late June 2020 to late April 2021, KIRK shares 'ripped' from the low $2s to as high as almost $35. I was super long in the high $1s and added in the lows $2s, but was 100% out of the stock by the $11s. So, to be clear, I missed the last big leg up from the mid-$11s to the mid-$30s.
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Why I'm Long (Again), Bullish (Again), and 'Loved' Kirkland's Q2 FY 2022 Conference Call
Despite not really owning any KIRK shares, for quite some time, outside of a few quick and small trades, I have listened to all the conference calls and stayed current on the name. Prior to August 29, 2022, the past few conference calls were really bad and management sounded like deer in headlights. However, the Q2 FY 2022 conference call was markedly different, in a good way, and for the first time in ages, Woody sounded on point, reflective, and a step ahead as opposed to on his back foot. It was crystal clear to me that lots of adversity and some unforced errors have been and will continue to be course corrected. Moreover, the company presented tangible evidence of business re-acceleration and regained momentum.
And for perspective, it was well known and foreshadowed on its Q1 FY 2022 call that Kirkland's had too much inventory and they more or less hinted that they needed to take the short-term hit on margins, clear through the excess inventory, and shore up the balance sheet. Despite the short-term pain, management made a smart call and got out in front of this. Therefore, to anyone actually paying attention here, everyone should have expected a kitchen sink quarter, in Q2 FY 2022.
Lo and behold, this is exactly what we got, in Q2 FY 2022, a kitchen sink quarter. And this year, unlike last year, the company has its Harvest and Holiday inventory in place and isn't at risk, like last year, notably during Q4 FY 2021, of missing key portions of the holiday selling season.
Let me share a number of 'Green Shoots' and walk readers through my thought process and renewed bullishness.
Green Shoots
1) Managing the debt - The biggest threat to the business and equity is Kirkland's elevated debt levels. As of quarter end (Q2 FY 2022), KIRK has $55 million drawn on its revolver and only $10.3 million of cash. Think about it, with only 12.754 million shares outstanding, at $3.10 per share, we are talking about only a $40 million market capitalization. The reason for such a low market capitalization is because of the $45 million of net debt and fear associated with that level of debt in a context negative Adj. EBITDA and a very difficult macro backdrop.
To understand how KIRK got here, it was driven by a confluence of negative events, almost a perfect storm. These included an aggressive buyback program at very high prices (a big misallocation of capital), misreading some of its prior strength, trying to attract a new customer and spending aggressively to acquire that customer, a sharp increase in supply chain costs and timing delays leading to missing key portions of key selling seasons and carry too much inventory.
Moreover, the company burned a bunch of Adj. EBITDA (-$5.8 million during Q1 FY 2022 and -$16.4 million during Q2 FY 2022). That said, it's the really high inventory levels that were the major drain on working capital levels, and the biggest driver of having to tap its credit line.
On the call, management was laser focused and specifically said they have a realistic pathway to getting year-end inventory back down to $85 million (mid-point) and have goal of only having $10 million drawn on the revolver, at the end of fiscal year-end 2022. If this happens, and management sounded pretty upbeat, the debt is no longer an issue and the short thesis gets defused.
(Enclosed below are specific excerpts from its Q2 FY 2022 conference call.)
We quickly removed approximately $50 million in receipt from the back half of 2022 and began to ramp up promotions in Q2 to turn this excess inventory into cash. As we mentioned on the last call, we expected early Q3 to be our peak in those inventory and borrowing on our line of credit. And I'm pleased to share that we are where we expect it to be with inventory peaking up in August and a current balance on our revolver of $60 million, which we don't expect to go any higher. As we start to sell through harvest, we are already seeing our working capital improve and expect to start gradually paying down our revolver and outstanding payables in the third quarter with most of the progress beginning in November.
We expect to end the year with inventory in the $80 million to $90 million range and to have less than $10 million borrowed. We intend to manage our inventory tightly and keep it lean throughout fiscal 2023 to further improve our working capital position.
2) Nicely Improving Comps
Per the call:
Breaking down sales within the quarter we had a total comp decline of 12.7% in May, a comp decline of 7.4% in June, and a 5.8% decrease in July. E-commerce sales declined by 9.1% compared to the prior year quarter, and improved from down 15.5% in May to down to 1% in July, e-commerce was 28% of total sales in the quarter, which is similar to the prior year.
Moreover, although there were still a few days left in August 2022, at the time of the call, August comps were only trending down 3% and landed margins were 500 Bps better than Q2 FY 2022!
While it's difficult to predict we want to keep our expectations realistic. We are beginning to see encouraging results. Same-store sales during August continue to improve with only being down 3% on a year-over-year basis. And we've seen an approximately 500 basis point improvement on landed margin from our Q2 rate.
If you synthesize the call, the biggest driver of this improvement, despite a ridiculously difficult macro with interest rate/mortgage rates materially higher, record inflation, and super low consumer sentiment is Kirkland's furniture business is inflection and this enhanced by offering home delivery.
See exhibit A:
We still believe that inflationary pressures and a slowing housing market have continued to impact consumer demand for home furnishings as a majority of our categories were down on a year-over-year basis. However, our furniture category was a bright spot this quarter, with a 13% increase in sales compared to the prior year.
We successfully launched our in-home delivery service earlier this quarter through our partnership with Ryder, which we believe will play an integral role, expanding our customer base and delivering a positive customer experience when ordering larger items like furniture and outdoor.