Jarden Corporation's Outdoors Solutions division, which includes Pure Fishing, Coleman and the former K2, Inc. businesses, including Rawlings and Marmot, saw its first quarterly sales decline since the acquisition of K2 Sports and Pure Fishing as those business finally moved into the organic growth column.
For the quarter, the division recorded net sales of $494.0 million, a 13.4% decline from last year's sales of $570.2 million. The operating loss for the quarter improved from a loss of $21.5 million in 2007 to a loss of $0.4 million in 2008.
For the full fiscal year 2008, the Outdoor Solutions division reported sales of $2.48 billion, a 46.1% increase over $1.69 billion recorded for the previous year. Full year operating earnings amounted to $172.3 million, a 293% increase from the previous year's operating earnings of $43.8 million. That result was largely boosted by the company's acquisition of K2.
On a pro forma basis, full year Outdoor Solutions revenues declined 1.8%, with a 13% decline in the fourth quarter being driven primarily by weak retailer reorders, declines in business and unfavorable foreign exchange translations.
The company said that the Paintball business in the Outdoor Solutions segment was affected by a decision by a major retailer that “decided to really move out of the category in a major way.” Ian Ashken, Jarden Corp. CFO, said that they have taken the overhead out of the Paintball business. “We lost the volume but we are taking the overhead out of that business to run it as a smaller entity,” he said.
The Outdoor Solutions segment was also hit harder by foreign currency exchange rate changes than the other groups.
Jarden Corp. as a whole recorded a net loss of $170 million, or $2.28 a share, after a non-cash impairment charge against goodwill and intangible assets of $283 million resulting from the company's annual impairment testing. Sales decreased 8% to $1.35 billion from $1.47 billion a year ago. The net loss in the quarter compared to a net loss of $11.2 million, or 15 cents a share, in the year-ago period.
Full year net sales for the total Jarden Corp. increased 16% to $5.38 billion compared to $4.66 billion in the previous year, due to the acquisitions of K2 and Pure Fishing in 2007. JAH recorded a net loss of $58.9 million, or 78 cents per share, compared to net income of $28.1 million, or 38 cents per diluted share, last year. The results include a non-cash impairment charge against goodwill and intangible assets of $283.2 million resulting from annual impairment testing.
The bulk of the $60 million of Jardens reorganization and acquisition-related integration costs in 2008 were in the Outdoor Solutions segment. Management said work on integrating K2 and Pure Fishing is now over two-thirds complete.
There were $32.6 million reorganization and acquisition-related integration expenses in the Outdoor Solutions segment, with approximately half for employee terminations and the other half for terminated lease expenses, consultants, professional services, travel and other expenses relating to the integration of the businesses.
JAH said that 2009 will be the last year of reorganization expenses relating to prior acquisitions and that those expenses are limited to the Outdoor Solutions segment. JAH estimated the annual expenses to be less than $30 million.
