Australian print-on-demand marketplace company Articore Group has reported group-wide slips in sales, alongside a deepened net loss for FY25.
Articore is the parent company of Australian-born print-on-demand marketplace Redbubble and similar US-based sister business TeePublic.
Newly released figures from the company show Articore’s total revenue for FY25 was down 10 per cent to $379 million, with gross profit down 4.7 per cent to $173 million. Redbubble led the drop, offsetting growth in TeePublic.
Adding in all the extra costs, Articore reported a net loss of $11.29 million, a drop of 28 per cent from an $8.8 million loss in FY24.
However, Articore is reporting that the fourth quarter shows improvements on the full-year performance, claiming it is the best fourth quarter in five years.
For Q4, marketplace revenue was down 6 per cent, hitting $79.2 million, with gross profit up 2 per cent to $39.4 million. The group’s margin hit 49.7 per cent in the fourth quarter, up 430 basis points.
The group’s earnings before interest and tax (EBIT) was also up by 111 per cent to $600,000 from a negative $5.9 million.
“Our turnaround strategy is delivering results and building strong momentum,” Articore Group CEO and managing director Vivek Kumar said. “We have just delivered the best fourth quarter in five years, generating $2.5 million of underlying cash flow in a typically soft quarter.
“This positive trajectory is a result of the disciplined restructuring and execution, including combining our marketplace operations under one executive team.”
Kumar added that the group’s ‘one business’ execution is driving significant improvements, including greater supply chain efficiencies that led to a full-year gross profit margin of 45.6 per cent. This is despite the aforementioned gross profit drop in the full year.
Kumar also reported “impactful differences” in its paid marketing, which helped drive gross profit after paid acquisition (GPAPA) margin of 26.5 per cent. This is despite GPAPA dropping by 7 per cent to $100.6 million in FY25. However, GPAPA is up 8 per cent in the fourth quarter to $24.6 million.
“These strong foundations as we exit FY25 position us to drive a material improvement in EBIT and positive underlying cash flow in FY26,” Kumar concluded.
These results come as Redbubble co-founder Martin Hosking and former Redbubble chair Richard Cawsey strive to topple the Articore Group board and replace with new directors, with Cawsey planned for chair. An executive general meeting is set for next week for shareholders to vote.
According to the pair, the move is to redirect the business after its share price dropped from a high of $7 in 2021 to a recent low of $0.14 in May this year. Articore’s share price is now currently at $0.25.
Cawsey told this publication in July that his and Hosking’s proposal also involves pay realignment, with an all-independent director board, and with cash fees replaced with higher-strike options.
They also plan to stabilise leadership, including supporting the new CEO and now MD Kumar, and filling vacant CFO/CTO roles with non-interim people and embedding a “proper” succession process. Since the initial proposal, Articore promoted Curtis Davies to the role of interim chief financial officer, after being the group’s financial controller for the last few years.
Other strategies include investing in generative AI tooling to lift artist productivity and tighten content-safety screening, rebooting ROI-based marketing and entering under-penetrated markets via partnerships, merging Redbubble and TeePublic onto a common stack to unlock cost and data synergies, and cost discipline through zero-base overheads and redirecting cash to growth initiatives – including not engaging in buy-backs.
Articore continues to tell shareholders to vote against the proposal from Hosking and Cawsey in the EGM on August 22. The group recently consulted independent proxy advisers CGI Glass Lewis and Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS), who have backed up Articore’s stance in two separate reports.
Both CGI Glass Lewis and ISS found the requisitioning shareholders “had failed to present a significantly compelling case for change”, and strongly critiqued their rationale for seeking to spill the board. They concluded the board had already undergone significant refreshment, with ISS noting Articore's recent financial developments in reporting its strongest fourth-quarter performance in five years and suggesting further change could undermine reforms already implemented by the new Chair and Group CEO.
Cawsey responded to the latest news, saying he and Hosking requested meetings with both ISS and Glass Lewis to discuss their reasons for spilling the Articore Board, but they did not respond.
"Important decisions such as board composition should be made by those with a real stake in the company, deep connections with the people involved and understanding of the issues and the industry," Cawsey said. "We are fortunate that our shareholders have those skills and attributes and and we look forward to them making a decision based on their own experience."