{"id":823696,"date":"2025-05-12T08:44:14","date_gmt":"2025-05-12T06:44:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=823696"},"modified":"2025-05-12T08:46:04","modified_gmt":"2025-05-12T06:46:04","slug":"major-south-african-retailer-hits-525-stores-across-south-africa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/business\/823696\/major-south-african-retailer-hits-525-stores-across-south-africa\/","title":{"rendered":"Major South African retailer hits 525 stores across South Africa"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Pick n Pay’s discount retailer, Boxer, has 525 stores across South Africa and plans to add even more as its discount model proves a great success.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In its inaugural financial results as a separate listed entity, the group reported flat earnings for 53 weeks ended 2 March 2025, despite significant growth in turnover and trading profit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It saw a 13.2% jump in turnover for the period to R42.34 billion (FY24: R37.4 billion), with trading profit up 9.9% to R2.3 billion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Despite this strong growth, Boxer\u2019s headline earnings for FY25 remained flat at -0.1% (R1.4 billion for the year).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This reflected higher net finance costs associated with the new external debt introduced as part of the pre-IPO balance sheet restructuring.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It also accounted for an increase in the group’s effective tax rate, which offset the positive impact of the operational performance, it said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As a result, the group saw a decline in headline earnings per share of 11.8%, to 413.8 cents, down from 469.3 cents in FY24.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

All impairment losses and other capital items are excluded from the calculation of Headline earnings per
share.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, the year-on-year comparisons are not exact, due to the 2025 financial year reflecting a 53-week period.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Boxer reports on the retail calendar of trading weeks, by which each financial year is an exact 52-week period of trading weeks from Monday to Sunday. The result is the loss of a day per calendar year. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

These lost days are taken into account by reporting a 53-week financial year approximately every six years. In line with this methodology, FY25 is a 53-week year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In order to facilitate comparison with FY24 on a 52\/52-week basis, Boxer has provided pro forma sales and trading profit, which strips out the impact of the additional week.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Using these pro-forma figures, the group’s turnover growth is slightly lower\u2014up 10.4% to R41.3 billion\u2014and trading profit is also slightly lower\u2014up 7% to R2.3 billion\u2014when comparing 52 weeks year-on-year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Excluding the impact of the derecognition of the Pick n Pay guarantee, 52\/52w trading profit growth would have been 14%\u2014or 17% for the 53 weeks, it said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As part of the restructuring associated with the IPO, Boxer declared dividends totalling R9.3 billion to Pick n Pay before the IPO. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In line with the pre-listing statement, Boxer has not declared a FY25 final dividend, and maintains its intention to pay out 40% of headline earnings per share from FY26. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Boxer intends to declare an interim FY26 dividend at the time of the H1 FY26 result.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Surge in new stores<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/a>
Boxer CEO, Marek Masojada<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The group said its November 2024 public listing was a milestone for the retailer, which will drive its long-term growth strategy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This has already started to show through major expansion, with 48 news stores opening in the year, and its gross lettable area (GLA) increasing 9%.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Boxer now has a total of 525 stores, including 320 Boxer Superstores, 175 Boxer Liquor and 30 Boxer Build stores.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The new stores added include 24 net new Superstores and 25 new liquor stores.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A total of 15 Pick n Pay stores were converted to Boxer stores during the year, including 8 Superstores and 7 liquor stores. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The group said it experienced an uptick in business in these stores after being converted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Boxer said it aims to continue this growth trajectory by adding at least 25 Superstores and 35 liquor stores each year, while maintaining mid-single-digit like-for-like sales growth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While the group’s trading margin came in ahead of the 5.0% medium-term guidance, it did warn that it anticipates pressure from the annualisation of costs associated with now being listed and investments to drive competitiveness in the market.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It added that its weighted average number of ordinary shares will increase by around 34% to account for the full IPO share issue, which will drag on earnings and headline earnings per share in 2026.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Given the moderating global economic outlook and competitive pressure in the SA food retail market, Boxer currently anticipates low-teens FY26 sales growth,” it said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Regardless of the state of the economic cycle, Boxer is resolutely focused on execution to capture its substantial long-term structural growth opportunity, and this remains Boxer\u2019s primary focus.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Financial results (53\/52wks)<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
R million<\/th>FY2024
(52weeks)<\/th>		FY2025
(53weeks)<\/th>		% Change<\/th><\/tr><\/thead>
Turnover<\/td>37,419<\/td>42,344<\/td>+13.2%<\/td><\/tr>
Trading Profit<\/td>2,101<\/td>2,308<\/td>+9.9%<\/td><\/tr>
Profit Margin<\/td>5.6%<\/td>5.5%<\/td><\/td><\/tr>
Headline Earnings<\/td>1,408<\/td>1,407<\/td>-0.1%<\/td><\/tr>
HEPS<\/td>469.3<\/td>413.8<\/td>-11.8%<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Pro-forma results (52\/52wks)<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
R million<\/th>FY2024
(52weeks)<\/th>		FY2025
(52weeks)<\/th>		% Change<\/th><\/tr><\/thead>
Turnover<\/td>37,419<\/td>41,304<\/td>+10.4%<\/td><\/tr>
Trading Profit<\/td>2,101<\/td>2,248<\/td>+7.0%<\/td><\/tr>
Profit Margin<\/td>5.6%<\/td>5.4%<\/td><\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/div><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Pick n Pay’s discount retailer, Boxer, has 525 stores across South Africa and plans to add even more as its discount model proves a great success. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":823704,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9872],"tags":[6655,4067],"class_list":["post-823696","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business","tag-boxer","tag-pick-n-pay"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/823696","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=823696"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/823696\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":823710,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/823696\/revisions\/823710"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/823704"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=823696"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=823696"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=823696"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}