Habanos sales for 2011

[jedipastor]

I recently read in an article that Habanos sales for 2011 were quite poor, coming off a poor 2010. The same day I read in an HSA press release that they are "coming off a year of excellent sales."

So which is it? Is HSA generally doing well in terms of sales, or are they hurting?

I personally wouldn't mind if they were hurting ... I think the pressure might encourage them to take some more care with the product.

[Pilgrims]

Not really answering the question but I would imagine (IMHO) that the top end - LE's and the big name sticks (Cohiba etc) are still fine and even growing but the middle market (Monte 4's etc) must be a weakening...see no reason why it would be different from what I work in which is the fine wine and that's the pattern

[hdryder]

I thought there was a post on here awhile back about this stating sales where down but profit was up. Not sure how this happens except for maybe like Pilgrims said that they did well with thier top end sales.

[Ghabanos]

I thought there was a post on here awhile back about this stating sales where down but profit was up. Not sure how this happens except for maybe like Pilgrims said that they did well with thier top end sales.

This can happen, couldn't it?

Sales can refer to rev and turnover and profit means bottom line. Many things can happen in between. Even creative accounting

[CaptainQuintero]

I'd assume they are doing quite well down to the Asian/Russian growth.

[Bartolomeo]

Suckling mentioned on his blog that $150-200M of the $410M sales were from US consumers......i thought that was very interesting

Bart

[Lotusguy]

2011 was 9% above 2010 - not bad. IIRC, 2010 was 13% below 2009, though.

[Strada]

From Cuba Standard:

Apparently struck by the economic crisis in Europe, revenues of Habanos S.A. dropped 10.3 percent in 2011, despite a 4-percent rise in sales of Cuban luxury cigars outside the European Union last year, Imperial Tobacco Ltd. said in its 2011 annual report.

The company had reported a 2-percent rise of Cuban luxury cigar sales for the six months ended March 31, 2011.

Even so, the Corporación Habanos S.A. joint venture, of which UK-based Imperial Tobacco holds half, doubled its after-tax profits last year.

According to the annual report, the Habanos joint venture logged in a profit after taxes of 10 million British pounds (US$15.72 million), on revenues of 35 million British pounds in 2011 ($55 million). That compares to an after-tax profit of 5 million British pounds ($7.8 million), on revenues of 39 million British pounds ($61.3 million) in 2010.

Basically, they doubled their after taxes profits even if the total sales are down. They are making killer profits of their luxury cigars, like BHK, GRs ...