Good morning, everyone, and welcome to the Universal Store Holdings full year FY 2026 results call. My name is Sam Wells from NWR Communications, and joining me from the company today is outgoing Managing Director and Group Chief Executive Officer Alice Barbery, incoming Managing Director and Group Chief Executive Officer George Do, and Chief Financial Officer Ethan Orsini.

Following a summary of the results released to the market this morning, investors and research analysts will have an opportunity to ask questions. There will be the choice of two options: first, analysts and investors can raise your hand via Teams should you wish to ask a verbal question at any stage throughout the call, or you can also submit a written question via the Q&A function at the bottom of your screen.

We will endeavor to get to the majority of questions asked, in some cases combining questions on the same or similar topic. For analysts asking verbal questions, we kindly ask that you please limit yourself to no more than two live questions on today's call.

For anyone joining on their mobile device, you're best to send me any questions direct. Thank you.

Over to you, Alice.

Thank you very much, Sam, and thank you all for joining this year's results webinar. Ethan will follow my high-level results with some more detailed financials.

George will then walk us through the divisional results and the trading update. I know it's a busy day for everyone, we might just get stuck straight into the slides.

Thank you. Very pleasing group sales: $376.1 million, up 12.9% on the prior corresponding period; gross profit margin of 62.5%, up 140 basis points on last year.

We look at underlying EBIT: $64 million, up 17.2%, representing 17% of sales; and underlying NPAT of $40.5 million, up 16.3%. It's important to call out the $18.2 million statutory NPAT, down 21.6%, that includes the $23.8 million non-cash impairment of CTC intangible assets.

Earnings per share at 52.8 cents, up 16.3% on the prior corresponding period; and a strong net cash balance with nil borrowings outside of leases of $23.3 million, up 35.5%. I'm also very pleased to announce a fully franked dividend of 17 cents per share for the half, bringing the fully franked dividend to 43 cents for FY 2026, and that is up 11.7% on the prior period.

Looking at group trends, a couple to highlight: total sales of $376.1 million, as we said, up 12.9% on the prior corresponding period, bringing group five-year sales CAGR of up 12.3%, that's FY 2021 through to FY 2026, that five-year period; US six-year like-for-like sales growth of 7.88%; and we have 13 new stores opened in FY 2026, 5 Universal Stores, 7 Perfect Stranger, and 1 THRILLS store. As planned, 1 Universal Store temporarily closed in FY 2026 to reopen in half 1 FY 2027 for center refurbishment.

The group had 123 physical stores at June 30, excluding our web stores. The Perfect Stranger retail format continues to roll out nationally, with 26 stores trading at June 30.

Perfect Stranger contributed 9.4% of total group in FY 2026, and that is up 7.6% on the period. Underlying FY 2026 EBIT of $64 million, up 17.2%, translates to a five-year CAGR of a positive 7.3% from FY 2021 to FY 2026.

Just a little strategy update: committed to our core strategy to scale and grow our premium fashion apparel brands and retail formats. It's important that we continue to deliver a compelling customer service experience while we drive sustainable growth.

I'll just touch on each of the three banners. Starting with THRILLS, our primary strategy is our retail strategy progressing, with improvements in store function, product curation, and much faster-to-market mindset and processes.

Frequency of fashion drops is changing from November 2026, and as a reminder, when it was a primarily wholesale business, we had quarterly drops. We have now been able to move those to monthly drops, starting to be much more retail-focused.

THRILLS brand rejuvenation is definitely underway. Product design wants to celebrate the historic brand values while we continue to evolve with current trends that are exactly what our customers are voting for and getting excited about.

We focus on stabilizing the current wholesale channel through really important partnerships, and then the enduring retail relationships we have with those partners. That is not the part of the business we see expanding and growing; it is definitely a retail strategy.

Perfect Stranger is driving sustained brand awareness and customer acquisition through targeted brand activations that our customers are really embracing and engaging with. We are delivering elevated curated product ranges that meet diverse customer occasion needs, and staying close to customer and helping us know exactly what those occasions for wear are has helped really drive this business forward.

We continue to support growth within the brand with incremental, dedicated capability and resources. The national retail rollout is well underway, and we see this as a 60-plus retail banner.

Universal Store continues also to be customer-led based on our nimble and fast-to-market strategy. We identify and curate premium on-trend products that customers love; it's a slogan you hear repeated in our hallways.

We remain service-orientated, we remain close to customer, and we continue to invest in team and capability, and we still see this network with a potential of 100-plus stores. Underpinning and upholding this strategy is always our customer-led approach, guided not just by gut feeling, but data analytics, independent customer research, which we've undertaken for the first time across all three banners, and that helps drive our strategic priorities.

Very, very proud of our proactive team in sustainability. We are well positioned for the new mandatory climate reporting, which applies from FY 2027, to meet all of our governance requirements.

We have a new point of sale that is rolled out just as of last week, we've completely tidied that up and all stores are on the new POS system. Meanwhile, we are undertaking a new warehouse management system for implementation in FY 2027.

We continue to be a learning culture and investing in group technology in both depth and capabilities, controls and risk management. We are embracing emerging technology with gusto and governance; it's a very balanced approach within the organization.

I'm now going to hand over to Ethan, who is going to go through the financials with a bit more detail.

Great. Thanks, Alice, and good morning, everyone.

I'll start off by going through the group P&L. FY 2026 sales were $376.1 million, which is up 12.9% on prior period.

Pleasingly, all three retail banners are growing. Universal Store sales grew to $313 million, up 11.5%.

Perfect Stranger sales grew to $35.9 million, which is up 40.8%. The CTC retail format sales grew to $12.7 million, which is up 16.9%.

CTC wholesale sales were down 18.9% for the year due to reduced USA exports, the closure of a small number of key retail accounts, and lower intercompany sales to Universal Store. Gross profit grew 140 basis points to 62.5% for the year.

This growth was driven by strong product assortments, increased Perfect Stranger sales mix, and a lower warehouse channel mix. Good inventory management has supported our disciplined pricing strategy and good full-price sell-through.

Cost of doing business increased 100 basis points to 34.1% as we continue to invest in team and capability from a system perspective to support future growth. A higher LTI and bonus expense was recognized in the year in line with stronger trading results.

On a total basis, underlying EBIT was $64 million, which was up 17.2% on prior year and represents a robust 17% of sales. We'll now move on to the long-term sales trend.

The graph on this slide shows the six-year sales trend by retail banner. From this, we can see the steady growth of Universal Store, which has seen average like-for-like growth of 8.3% over the six-year period.

We can also see the benefit of Perfect Stranger going from an organic concept to a store network of 26. Perfect Stranger now represents 9.4% of the group total sales.

CTC sales were flat on prior period as increased retail sales offset the reduction in the wholesale channel. We'll now take a deeper look at gross profit.

The graph on the right shows the six-year trend of the group gross profit, and we can see that the group gross profit has increased to 62.5% this year, up 140 basis points from prior year. This increase was really driven by four factors: firstly, the continued growth of the Perfect Stranger and THRILLS retail formats has driven a favorable GP mix to the group; strong assortment ranging has supported disciplined pricing and full-price sell-through; we've also seen a reduced clearance sales mix due to that inventory management; and we also had a benefit in the year due to a stronger AUD/USD exchange rate, which contributed about 15 basis points to the gross profit result.

We'll now move on to cost of doing business. The graph on the left shows the cost of doing business movement from prior year, and from this, we see four main impacts: firstly, wage inflation and investment in team capability has added $6.3 million of cost; new roles were added to support our future growth and strategic projects; secondly, new stores and like-for-like growth resulted in an additional $9.2 million of expense relating to incremental store wages, rent, and other variable costs—however, from the bottom of this graph, we can see that like-for-like sales growth has fractionalized cost of doing business by 170 basis points; we also had an increased LTI and bonus expense in the period, which is consistent with the stronger trading results; and finally, the other cost of doing business of $800,000 primarily relates to costs relating to our new point of sale, which as Alice mentioned has been fully implemented, and costs relating to our new warehouse management system, which will be implemented in FY 2027.

We currently have eight leases in holdover, and on average, our cash rental costs have increased 5% on prior year. Moving on to the balance sheet.

As Alice mentioned, the group continues to have a strong net cash position of $23.3 million with nil external borrowings as at 30th June. It was pleasing to see inventory decrease to $32.6 million, which was down $700,000 from prior period, and this was due to improved CTC stock turns and reduction in the wholesale channel.

The final point I'll make on this slide is that the decrease in other current liabilities reflects timing of corporate income tax payments. Now we move on to the cash flow.

Really just two points to cover on this slide. Firstly, our cash flow from operations of $111 million represents a robust result and reflects a strong EBITDA conversion of 104%.

Our FY 2026 capex relates to the opening of 13 new stores, store refurbishments, some relocations, and technology hardware and system capability investments. I'll now hand over to George, who will provide our business and trading updates.

Thanks, Ethan. Good morning, everyone.

Now to our FY 2026 updates by banner. Universal Store delivered full year sales of $313.3 million, up 11.5% on PCP.

Like-for-like sales grew 8.1%, and we're pleased to see the team continue their track record of consistency and resilience by providing customers with an on-trend, differentiated product assortment. Gross profit percentage was up 150 basis points, driven by disciplined price management.

Private brand made up 51% of sales as the team continued to deliver an evolving customer-led mix of premium private and third-party brands in each category. Online sales grew to $39.6 million, up 9.4% on the prior year.

Five new stores opened during the year and that one temporary closure, bringing the total to 88 stores at 30 June. Nine new stores are confirmed to open throughout FY 2027, with seven in the first half.

There are also four to five refurbishments and three relocations planned for FY 2027. Universal Store has a target of 100-plus stores.

Now to Perfect Stranger. Perfect Stranger sales grew to $35.9 million in FY 2026; that's up 40.8% on the prior year and up 13% like-for-like.

The dedicated team executed the brand strategy, delivering elevated product ranges that meet diverse customer needs, increasing average unit price, and driving brand awareness and community engagement. Online sales grew 49.5% on the prior year to $4.9 million.

Seven new stores opened and one relocated in FY 2026; there were a total of 26 stores at 30 June. Six new stores are confirmed to open in FY 2027, with further opportunities being explored.

Perfect Stranger has a target of 60-plus stores. Now to CTC.

Our strategic focus, as Alice mentioned, is retail execution and speed-to-market product ranging to support store rollout. The retail strategy is progressing, with robust FY 2026 like-for-like sales growth in the retail stores of 17.8%.

Online sales were down 10.5% on PCP, reflecting lower promotional and clearance sales. FY 2026 gross margin grew 240 basis points to 45.3%, driven by a higher retail sales mix and improved price management.

Total CTC sales were $36.4 million in FY 2026, 9.2% below prior year due to wholesale. One new THRILLS store opened in FY 2026, taking the total number of stores to 9 at 30 June, and 1 new store is confirmed for half 1 FY 2027.

Now to our trading update for the first seven weeks of FY 2027. Group direct-to-consumer sales for FY 2027 to date were up 9.1% on PCP.

Universal Store total sales were up 5.5% and up 2.9% like-for-like, cycling 10.7%. Perfect Stranger total sales were up 45.8% and up 17.6% like-for-like, cycling plus 19.3%.

CTC direct-to-consumer sales were up 10.1% and up 3.8% like-for-like, cycling plus 4%. We intend to open 16 to 20 stores across the group in FY 2027: 9 to 10 new Universal Stores, 6 to 8 new Perfect Stranger stores, and 1 to 2 new THRILLS stores.

In addition, that one Universal Store will reopen after the completion of the center development. Our customer continues to value quality, on-trend product from brands they love, and we continue our customer-led approach to private and third-party brand mix.

Gross profit percentage continues to benefit from growth of Perfect Stranger and THRILLS direct-to-consumer, while higher freight and energy costs are expected to be offset by a favorable AUD/USD rate. As we expect an inflationary cost environment to persist, including award and junior rate increases, we remain focused on balancing wage optimization and customer experience.

We continue to invest in team capability and depth to deliver strategic priorities and support future growth. I'll now hand back to Alice to close.

I think we are ready to open for questions.

Great. Thank you, Alice.

Thank you, Ethan and George. As a reminder, you may ask questions via Teams through the Q&A function at the bottom of your screen.

For those asking verbal questions, would kindly ask that you keep it to no more than two questions, and we'll have some sufficient time to circle back if you have any follow-ups. We've just got a couple of questions on the CTC impairments.

Now that there is a write-off of brand names and not only goodwill, is this confirmation that the THRILLS brands are not as enduring as first outlined by management as per the presentation at acquisition date? Look,

I don't know that I agree with that impression. I think if to remind everyone, this was a wholesale business primarily, that we were excited about looking to find ways to grow the retail side of the business.

However, we didn't anticipate at the time that the wholesale landscape would change so dramatically, that their biggest partners would go under, that people would have complete strategy shifts due to their own balance sheets to go completely vertical, and we're continuing to see the retail partnership landscape erode. We've had to make a very big shift in the way that we've managed the team, we've had to get much more hands-on.

Clearly, we believe in the brand, we're still seeing a lot of customers still loving the brand, but it is moving now to a retail play while we manage through the wholesale partners that we have.

Anything you'd like to add? Thank you.

Maybe just two follow-ups there as well. Given the success of the company's private labels, does this alter the board's view for any future acquisitions of brands, and have there been any lessons learned from the THRILLS acquisition?

I'll start at the end of the sentence. Yes, there's been lots of lessons learned.

If I had my time over, of course I had no idea that the wholesale landscape was going to change so dramatically and it was a bit of a pain by a thousand cuts as opposed to overnight, it was a slow drip. However, what would I do differently?

Definitely take a more hands-on approach straight away. I think we would have gotten involved in the day-to-day machinations of how our retail business is run much more quickly.

That would definitely be something that we applied in a future acquisition. No, we're not afraid of future acquisitions.

There's so many ways to continue to grow this great business. Would I have done things differently?

Absolutely. We've learned some and embedded some good learnings as we always do from every experience we have.

Even our successes, big successes give us a lot of learnings to take away. We are a company that has always been pleased but never satisfied, no matter whether the result was a bit painful or whether it was what appears to everyone else to be a huge success.

Great. Thank you.

Next question comes from James Wilson at Macquarie. James, please unmute your line and go ahead.

Hello? No, looks like we've lost James.

We'll go to the next question. The next question's from Sam Teeger at Citi.

Sam, please unmute your line and go ahead.

Excellent. Hi, guys.

Can you hear me?

Hi, Sam.

Yeah.

Good morning,

Sam.

Great. Good morning.

Could we please flesh out the moderation in Universal comps to start '27? Just wondering how August compares to July.

Is it driven by transactions or basket size, and have you seen promotional intensity increase from the competitors plural? Thanks.

Yeah. I think we have seen transactions in the first part of this FY 2027 be quite strong, it is more basket.

I'm talking macro for the group now, but different by banner. I wouldn't say promotional intensity has really changed from what we saw in FY 2026.

Afterpay Day cycled the same time last year, I'd say the competitive intensity is quite consistent. I think just to add to the trading update there, obviously Universal Store, July/August, remember last year that was quite an elevated comp, 2.9% is lower than we're used to, and we've got to be comfortable in this environment given those elevated comps.

We know that our customer is discerning, that's something that we've traded through periods where customers are more or less discerning, and that's something that we're used to, and what we try to do in these environments is just grow market share. We're happy with how Afterpay traded.

We're not necessarily seeing anything in the transactions which suggests that customers are sort of really going for promotion more than full-price stuff that they value. It's still a customer that is voting for the best products at premium price points and other price points.

It's just that what they see is high perceived value.

Sure. Then second question just on CODB, of the 100 basis point increase, how much is one-off versus recurring?

I guess at what point will shareholders see margin expansion from the current spending? Thank you.

There's probably two parts to answer that question. Firstly, we made some investments, saying new point of sale, for instance.

FY 2026 had the implementation costs, but we'll have the maintenance fees or the license fees continuing on going forward. That won't necessarily taper off, but what it does do is it just gives us a better platform to sell to our customers than what we had previously.

Then obviously have the impact of things like rent, which is pretty consistent with prior years. Probably the second part to the question would be the capability we added in FY 2025 and '26 has really allowed us to grow Perfect Stranger as an example, so that business, as you can see, is doing tremendously well.

It's really that dedicated resource which has driven that outcome. As we've kind of consistently flagged, we continue to invest in that capability both in team and system to grow, you'll see that investment continue, but it'll taper off as a percent of sales.

In FY 2025 we grew 130 basis points, in FY 2026 was 100, I think you expect that to moderate, but we're still in that investment stage to set us up for the future aspirations for the group.

Right. Thank you.

Great. Thanks very much, Sam.

Next question comes from Ary Norozi?] at Jarden.

Ari, please unmute your line and go ahead.

Hey, guys, can you hear me?

Yeah.

Yeah.

Hi, Ari.

Oof, happy hour. First one, just on the gross margins.

Your gross margins in the first half of '26 was about 62% and it increased to 63.5% in the second half. This is for the Universal Store business.

That's despite your private label mix falling from 55% in the first half to 46%. Perfect Stranger mix obviously helps, but it's still a very strong result given that sort of drag on gross margins from private label.

Can you just run through what explained that increase half-on-half in addition to Perfect Stranger, and whether that second half '26 base of 63.5% is the sort of run rate moving forward, please?

Yeah. I might phone a friend with George in a moment, but look, currency was certainly stronger in the second half than the first half, so as we noted in the presentation, we had 15 basis point lift over the year.

That was slightly negative in the first half, so that definitely improved in the second half. Then as also called out in the presentation, I just think the range assortment and the mix of what we were selling was quite strong, coupled with good full-price sell-through and just inventory management.

I know I'm repeating what we said in the presentation, but it really is a combination of probably three or four factors, not just one thing. I might phone a friend first to see if you have anything to add to it.

Yeah. It's worth repeating because that's exactly right.

Despite I guess the stabilization of private brand mix at Universal Store, the team managed pricing very, very well across private brand and third-party brand. Even third-party brands was really led by delivering what customers want, like very loved, on-trend third-party brands.

Despite the promotional environment, making sure that the assortment is differentiated with those third-party brands actually meant there was a lesser rate of markdown. Same discipline.

Right, it sounds like it's within your control. That second half '26 run rate, assuming you continue to execute, it's not like it reverses or unwinds into '27, assuming you still execute well?

Assuming we don't— I think at a macro level, that's a fair statement, yeah.

Great. Then a second one just on the stores.

Obviously, you're rolling out a lot more Universal Store banners. Just for us in terms of understanding the contribution of those stores, is it fair to say that the sort of unit economics or box economics targeted are pretty similar to what you've historically done?

Just conscious of are you opening more stores, for example, in sub-regional shopping centers or further away from the sort of metro areas where it's good sort of payback periods, but lower contribution from a profitability perspective?

A bit of both. We are definitely opening a blend of geographic regions.

I think we're also opening a good spread of A great centers, regional centers, and maybe A-minus, B-plus centers. I think we really looked at the combination of return on investment and your EBITDA percent payback.

I think on an average basis, Ari, yet you'd say it probably averages out. I think we've just kind of widened our thinking on what kind of stores we would make sense to open

in. I agree just on the mix of stores that we're opening for F '27, there's a really good mix of stores in there and I think it speaks to how well the brand resonates in a wide range of areas, whether they're regional, suburban, or metro.

I'm sure a lot of you have been driving by the whopping Bondi Junction hoarding, there's stores like that in the mix as well, which is quite exciting.

Great. Thanks heaps, guys.

Thanks.

Great. Thanks, Ari.

Going back to James Wilson at Macquarie. James, please unmute your line and go ahead.

Hi, guys, hopefully you can hear me now. Sorry about getting cut off earlier.

Just firstly on Universal Store, guys. The trading update, it looked a little bit like momentum had maybe fallen away there in terms of the levels of growth you were doing relative to FY 2026 in the first few weeks of this year.

Can you just talk to me about sort of what you've been seeing in that brand particularly over the past couple of weeks?

Again, I think we've got to acknowledge that Universal Store is cycling very strong comps from last year through July and August. I think that's one thing to remember.

The team, I think we've got to be comfortable with that comp, but the team are definitely not satisfied, we're looking to improve that. I guess we're not necessarily seeing, there's commentary out in market that winter is doing badly, Outerwear has been consistently good.

It's sort of a mixed story between regions and categories, but I think the customer continues to vote for great product. When the team are executing well, which they are, that will deliver good freshness and customers will respond to that.

There is some good energy into sort of our two-for promotions, that you'll recall we do two-fors. That's not just on the base of a trade-down, because we still see premium price point tops from Perfect Stranger be the bestsellers in Universal Store.

There's actually some good trendability going into those promotions from Open Archive and LNDT, which are actually just exciting and value-driven.

All right, guys. Maybe just to expand then, George, on what you were just saying sort of around value proposition.

If we do start to see younger consumers maybe face greater headwinds this year, particularly in terms of say their cash flows, how do you think I guess your different brands are positioned to offer a more value product? Like is that primarily Universal Store, do you think Perfect Stranger has enough value product as well if that begins to occur?

I think this is actually a good question because I think it's relative positioning in market. If you look at the Perfect Stranger brand positioning, we've increased unit prices as you would've seen considerably in a year-on-year.

We've found ourselves in the white space we want to be in. Now that's more expensive than it was before and more expensive relative to a lot of the price points in Universal Store, but for that customer, it's actually quite accessible for what is effectively designer-led fashion.

We think that that is the value proposition rather than trying to go entry, because Perfect Stranger is not trying to compete at sort of the entry level of the market. In Universal Store, again we've traded through different macro conditions, making sure that there is good full-price offering.

What we know is our customer will vote for the premium product that they have to have, but then they'll also vote for a great price-pointed product as well. It's not about promotion and clearance, it's really about creating a great architecture in the price assortment.

In F '23, when we had rents rising as an example, we made sure that there was good energy going into our private offer, and then also there were good entry-level price points within each category.

I think what George said to me was his team trade, the team are excellent at trading and being close to the customer. Because we have that fast-to-market inventory procurement, we're not like other retailers who buy 3 to 6 months of stock at once and see how the card goes.

I think that that kind of operating model I think is really quite agile in this environment as well.

Provides the flexibility required to respond. I think we've done a really great job demonstrating how well this business performs in tougher macroeconomic environments and in softer macroeconomic environments.

We're not afraid of responding to the market as required, and we've got plenty of skills and tools and talent to do that.

That's clear. Thank you.

Great. Thanks, James.

Next question comes from Chami Ratnapala at Bell Potter. Chami, please unmute your line and go ahead.

Thank you. Thanks, Sam.

Hi, team. Hi, Alice, George, and Ethan.

Maybe two questions from me. Just with the first one, maybe as there has been a bit of consolidation in the streetwear market and a few others have come out and reported declines as well, how significant have your market share gains been to the extent you can speak to?

Is that a tough question, or—

I think they've been happening incrementally for a very long period of time as those brands have declined slowly. When they would undertake really heavy markdown activity, we didn't notice an impact because of the differentiation strategy, and close to market, and then the curation of the collection, and the customer service we provide.

It's kind of been an ongoing experience for us and I don't think we're going to see a big shift to particular consider.

I think we've incrementally and consistently chipped away market share. Universal Store is the leader in its category and a best-in-class retailer.

I think, as Alice said, it is more a long grind. I think the store opening rollout for F '27 does speak to consistent chip away, grow market share, the opportunities come.

That, I think, is in line with a more difficult trading environment for your competitors, they fall away and you capitalize on that market.

We've continued to learn a lot more about particularly the Perfect Stranger customer, now we have much clearer view on size of store, location, where we want to be, and we'll continue to learn from this rollout as well.

Perfect. Thanks for that.

Maybe as a second one just on the strong store number or store target for FY 2027 for Universal Store, where does that leave you with that 100 store target, and does that now become a different number? Probably if I can have two parts to that, Perfect Stranger retail stores you've been rolling out for five years now, a bit of a revisitation, and does that 60-plus number, what's the perspective on that as well?

Chami, I think we're being a bit cute on the plus. We are constantly learning.

As we know we've never been in Bondi, we are expanding our Chadstone store, not hugely, but we've taken a few more square meters there as we're in the middle of a refurb there. We are seeing those really well-proven metro stores either thriving or we've finally got a location and a rate in Bondi that we're comfortable with.

That's going to continue to grow. As we test and trial some regional areas that have actually performed exceptionally well, we've kind of owned regional Queensland for a very long time and we're testing and trialing more.

Let us get back to you when we've get these stores open, and we will potentially reform the number, but the plus is feeling good on both brands.

Perfect. Thanks for taking my questions.

All the best.

Thanks. Thanks, Chami.

Thanks, Chami.

Thanks, Chami. Next question comes from Sam Haddad at Petra.

Sam, please unmute your line and go ahead.

Can you hear me?

All good, Sam.

Okay. Congrats on a resilient, strong result.

Just on new stores, just on landlords, are they becoming more conducive in this difficult retail environment? Are you seeing sites become more available?

It's good that you opened up in Bondi Junction and you mentioned you got some good terms there. Just more broadly, what you're seeing with landlords and lease terms.

I'd say lease terms, no real change in terms of it's still robust discussions. As George mentioned before, I think with some of our competitors kind of closing down, there is more of an appreciation for what Universal Store and Perfect Stranger and THRILLS can bring to the center, I'd say there's probably more people calling us than there was previously.

From an economic lease contract point of view, it's really been no difference. We still have to have those robust discussions and make sure that we're comfortable the store will pay off and be profitable over the duration of the lease, not just year one and two.

I don't see that changing in the foreseeable future. We're not seeing a lot of new centers open, we're not seeing centers get larger.

Perhaps some big-box opportunities, as we've seen a few larger legacy department stores close down, we've picked up some locations as those locations have been carved up. We may see more of that movement, but we certainly aren't seeing extensions and new centers.

I think that occupancy was very, very, very, very high, we're coming off a very high base. As Ethan says, it's loosening up a little bit, maybe where we're getting more calls.

I think the other thing is just Perfect Stranger, the dream people now get. As we've got to 26 stores, the feedback continues to be refined, they can see sort of our engagement with customer and the experience that we offer.

That's been a much easier sell as we continue to establish the brand and grow awareness.

Thank you. Just back on the gross margin outlook, can you just sort of go in a bit more granular detail around what your FX hedge profile looks like?

What do you anticipate the FX tailwind would be, and will that be enough to compensate for the inflation costs that you might be seeing at the moment? Just around that, thanks.

At the moment, our hedge cover for FY 2027, to be to be precise, is 43% of what we think our spend will be, and that's at a 69 cents average hedge rate. If I knew what the currency would do, I'd be much richer than I am at the moment, but but basically if we see the rate stay around that kind of 71 mark spot level, that will kind of absorb a 20% lift in the fuel energy costs, fuel costs.

At the moment, then the fuel costs have been lower than that 20 or lower than that 20%, but the currency's been fluttering out a bit as well, at this point in time, we're still guiding towards it being an offset, Sam. Of course, if currency gets stronger than sort of 71, then that will be a tailwind, and if energy costs can stay kind of below the 20%, that would be a benefit as well.

The current FX spot is actually a bit of a tailwind, net tailwind on the current inflation backdrop that you're seeing?

You'd say as of this week, and then of course whatever happens in the Middle East or with currency, that could change next week, yeah.

Thank you.

Great. Thank you, Sam.

Next question comes from Forres Salekian?] at Barrenjoey.

Forres, please unmute your line and go ahead. Thank you.

Morning, guys. Can you hear me?

Yeah. Hi, Forres.

Faraz. Maybe just a question for George.

You've obviously contributed to a big part of Universal's success as head of product over the years. What have you done to ensure the team below you can continue to execute on product, and how much oversight do you currently have on product selection?

I guess how will this change as you step up into the CEO role?

Thank you for asking that question. Hey, I think one of the most exciting things about our business is the amount of autonomy and responsibility that we give our great team leaders.

There's excellent leadership across the whole business, not only in product, but across the business. One of the most exciting things for me in my role is seeing that next level of leadership coming in behind the most senior leaders.

As a reminder, the most senior product leaders in the business, I think the average tenure across the four of them is 11 years, and they run those departments very autonomously. It's me sort of supporting from a distance.

They're absolutely continuing on as they have for the last 30 months, it is in very, very good hands.

Just because I can, I'll reiterate that there's this really exciting next tier of leaders coming through the business as well. That's great.

Then maybe just one for Ethan. Obviously, there's a fair bit of wage inflation coming through this year with the Fair Work minimum wage changes.

Can you just talk to any initiatives that you're thinking about potentially rolling out to offset this, and how big that offset might be?

Yeah. Maybe I'll say also what we're not going to do.

We don't want to cut service to the customer, what we need to do is look at process efficiencies, the mix of team we use, casuals versus full-time, part-time. At the moment, as we've seen through the announcement, all hands are kind of let's get these stores up and running.

We definitely have things we're looking at from a CODB point of view, but the immediate priority is get these stores up and running and realize that benefit. To answer your kind of question, for us, it'll be things like how do we get process efficiencies for tasks that aren't customer-facing that we can look to save some cost in.

While the junior award change is going to be a cost across all businesses hiring young people, we're also the beneficiary of young people having more cash to spend. As we already know that we've placed ourselves as their prime favorite place to shop.

We have to just work with the costs as they come up. We have to be smart and the new POS system actually allows some efficiencies in how we get work done.

We will be definitely leveraging into what can we learn from AI, what kind of technology is going to support this. The last thing we're going to do is go down the pay-here route where you are self-served, because we can tell you that great team members in a change room with great leadership can double a basket where a customer on their own.

Where you might be thinking some retailers are saving costs, I can tell you they're not maximizing their potential.

Absolutely.

That's excellent. Thanks, guys.

Great. Thanks very much, Forres.

Next question comes from Emily Porter at Morgans. Emily, please unmute your line and go ahead.

Hey, guys, congrats on the results.

Hi, Emily.

Maybe just a question on Perfect Stranger. Obviously, very strong trading update.

I think, yeah, you spoke a bit to the increases in unit prices, but I'm just interested if there's any sort of particular call-outs in those first seven weeks, and I guess just how we should think about it for the balance of the half.

I I'll jump in on this one. I think the way to think about it is the Perfect Stranger team are really accelerating the way they're testing and learning with the product assortment and with the brand.

One of the most exciting things with that brand is they're trying different things with the way that they do community events, from the way they do marketing, the way they think about store, in-store VM and activations. Then when it comes to product, one of the key drivers they're not just the first seven weeks, but into sort of the second half of the year really was an expansion of category.

They still continue to strengthen in sort of occasion wear, like, more formal dresses, going out style items. They really grew outerwear and jeans, and private brand jeans as well, which was something that they identified as an opportunity from the prior year.

The way that the team is testing and learning even if you think about how they're approaching summer, I know it's it's it's still cold, and August is a time that you test new trend things for spring/summer, and they're getting some good hits on that based on how they're executing better compared with prior year.

Agree.

That's great. Thanks, George.

Maybe just, obviously, really strong balance sheet. I guess, just thinking around appetite potentially for new acquisitions or is there any new opportunities that are presenting themselves just given it's a tough market out there?

I'd say first and foremost there's some great organic opportunities to get US to that kind of 100-plus and PS continue to hum. Of course, THRILLS, we're excited by the retail strategies, but there's more work to be done there.

I think that's the immediate horizon of how we get growth. I'll defer to my senior colleagues in a second, but if a great opportunity comes up, we would of course consider it.

I think our plate feels not overfilled, completely manageable, but these store openings, you want to get those right and we will do that. We've got a long history of making that work.

Again, we just don't have a lot of fat in the business, where I think we've done a really good job. I know there's always questions on why are costs going up, and I always have to remind people that we started from a very, very low base and we still have no admin team, we have no EAs, we don't have a lot of traps and waste.

Very comfortable that from a governance perspective we're keeping up with everything we need to, particularly around sustainability, product compliance. You're seeing in the market a lot of retailers coming under fire for ACCC issues and we're not going to skimp on making sure that we're doing our audit testing, that we're going to make sure our product testing is in line.

Those are the things that I know personally as a shareholder that level of governance gives me comfort, and those are the things we're still going to make sure that we do. Absolutely.

Great. Thanks, guys.

Thanks, Emily.

Thanks, Emily. Final question comes from Wei-Weng Chen at RBC.

Wei-Weng, please unmute your line and go ahead. Thank you.

Sorry, took me a while to find the mute button. One of the key positives I'm hearing, I guess, from the market today is that accelerating rollout of the stores.

Just wondering, given the comments then about having little fat in the business, what do you think your capacity is in terms of rollouts? Are you guys constrained by sort of internal resourcing in terms of how many stores you can roll out in a year?

No, I think, as we've always said, it's been the opportunities that come up. I think this announcement kind of shows that, because the cadence has increased because, as George mentioned, there's just been more opportunities come to us that make economic sense.

I don't think that's a constraint on opening more new stores. I know the comment I made was more about how do you prioritize and what do you spend your time on, and in the near term I think the time's got to be on getting those stores up and running effectively and safely at the moment, so that's the intent of the response.

Internally our infrastructure in terms of team to be able to support and scale up, to say we want to be very prudent with the way that we select sites, but we've got a long runway with Perfect Stranger. If more opportunities become available, we can scale.

Really it is retail operations, the stock we can get, so that's very, very easy. Then retail operations, we now have great teams in all regions across both retail banners in Universal Store and Perfect Stranger.

If hypothetically not saying this is what's happening, but three great opportunities become available in WA, there is an area manager, there is the right infrastructure there to be able to scale as needed.

That's the muscle we're working to build in CTC at the moment.

Yeah.

Are you guys limited by the ability to recruit staff and team members or not really?

It's always a challenge, right? Because it's not just about getting bodies, it's getting the right people with the same customer service ethic, the same focus, the same grit and determination, wanting to achieve budgets, wanting to move ahead, and then how we capture those great people and give them a runway of growth.

With the business continuing to grow, there's more opportunity for people. We become more attractive than when you've got sort of two stores in WA, it's easier for us to attract the kind of talent that we become famous for.

Understood. Thanks, and congrats again on the result.

Thank you, Wei-Weng.

Thanks, Wei-Weng. Just one follow-up question from Sam Haddad at Petra.

Sam, please unmute your line and go ahead.

Thanks for taking my follow-up. Just an update on the work being done in the background around international online expansion.

There's a couple of problems to solve to realize that opportunity. One is how we present foreign currencies to our customers, so that's being worked on the back end.

Part of that will be how do we handle tariffs and what not. I think as those things get resolved, then we'll be able to do some test and learn to begin with, and then we can work out what markets might be more attractive both for us and for the customer.

Thank you.

Great. Thank you, Sam.

I think that concludes the Q&A session for today. Maybe with that, I'll just pass it back to you, Alice and team, if there's any closing comments.

Look, I personally would like to just jump in and say a huge thank you. This is my last results announcement.

I want to thank my amazing team who just do the greatest job and it's been the greatest privilege of my working life being involved with Universal Store. I want to acknowledge Ethan.

I don't care how good a CEO is, they're only as good as their CFO in my opinion, and I'm so fortunate to have had the best of the best. As a shareholder, I know how confident I am in George, but I also know how confident I am in him as a person, and I just want to welcome him to the role.

I just think our business is in great hands. I want to thank our board for their unwavering support, and I want to thank our shareholders.

I would thank you for giving us the privilege to manage your company, and yeah, it's just been an absolute joy. I hope to see many of you in Sydney, and this transition is going very well.

I expected some questions on that, but I think everyone's very confident that this is the right step for Universal Group, and I look forward to continuing to watch this business grow. Thank you very much.

Great. Thank you very much for joining today's Universal Store Holdings full year FY 2026 results call.

That concludes our session. Thank you, and goodbye.

Thank you.

Thank you.