Vishal Mega Mart Ltd (VMM) Q2FY27 Concall Transcript - Sep-2026 Qtr
Moderator: Ladies and gentlemen, good day, and welcome to the Vishal Mega Mart Limited Earnings Conference Call. As a reminder, all participant lines will remain in the listen-only mode, and there will be an opportunity for you to ask questions after the management's opening remarks. Should you need assistance during the conference call, please signal the operator by pressing star then zero on your touch-tone telephone. Please note that this conference is being recorded. I will now hand the conference over to Ms. Shikha Puri from Strategic Growth Advisors. Thank you, and over to you.
Shikha Puri (Strategic Growth Advisors): Thank you. Good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for joining us on Vishal Mega Mart Limited Q2 FY27 and H1 FY27 earnings conference call. We have with us Mr. Gunender Kapur, Founder, MD, and CEO; Mr. Amit Gupta, CFO. I hope everyone got an opportunity to go through our financial results and investor presentation uploaded on the company's website and the stock exchanges. We will begin the call with opening remarks from the management, following which we will have the forum open for question-and-answer session. Before we start, I would like to point out that some statements made in today's call may be forward-looking in nature, and the disclaimer to this effect has been included in the earnings presentation shared with you earlier. I would now like to invite Mr. Gunender Kapur, Founder, MD, and CEO, to give his opening remarks. Thank you, and over to you, sir.
Gunender Kapur (Vishal Mega Mart Ltd): Well, thank you very much, and a very good evening, ladies and gentlemen. A very warm welcome to this call. I will briefly take you through the quarter two '27 and first half '27 results and some of the highlights. And then we will open the call for questions.
Gunender Kapur (Vishal Mega Mart Ltd): with quarter two '27 highlights. We delivered another strong quarter with revenue from operations growing by 14% to 3,399 crores. Our same store sales growth stood at 5.4%. The festivals this year have shifted from quarter two to quarter three. This has had an impact of 3 to 4% on our same store sales growth. Adjusting for that, our same store sales growth in Q2 has been around 9%. Because of the shift in festivals, the first nine months period will provide a more meaningful comparison of festive performance vis-a-vis last year. I'm happy to report that we've had a strong start to the festivals. The festival season is now panning out in Q3. And this has reinforced our confidence in the demand momentum as we approach Diwali and the wedding season for this year. Operating EBITDA for Q2 '27 was rupees 262 crores, which was a growth of 3.7% over last year and a margin of 7.7% versus 8.5% in last year. Operating EBITDA growth was achieved despite lower fixed cost absorption during the quarter due to the shift in festive buy- buying to quarter three of '27. Profit after tax, adjusted for ESOP charges, was rupees 172 crores, which is a 6.4% growth over last year. And PAT margin of 5.1% versus 5.4% last year. Impacted again by operating deleverage due to the shift in festivals. Our performance was supported by the strength of our own brand offerings, our customer-first approach, and very disciplined execution. On the macro front, demand conditions remained steady despite renewed inflationary pressure across key raw material categories and a somewhat uneven monsoon. A differentiated merchandise, compelling price positioning and deep understanding of customer needs continues to resonate the shopper with our shoppers reinforcing the resilience of our business. I will quickly shift gears to first half results and highlights for this year. Revenue from operations grew by 16.4% to rupees 7,126 crores. Same-store sales growth stood at 7.7%. The shift in festival has had an impact of 1.5 to 2% on same-store sales growth. Adjusting for that, same-store sales growth for the first half will be about 9.5%. Operating EBITDA for the first half was 649 crores, which is a growth of 12.5% over last year and a margin of 9.1% versus 9.4% for last year. Again, the margin was impacted by operating deleverage arising from the shift in festive buying from first half to second half of the year. Profit after tax, adjusted for ESOP charges, grew by 15.8% to rupees 437 crores, a margin of 6.1% versus 6.4% for last year. This again was impacted by operating dev- deleverage arising from the shift in festivals. We continued to advance our store expansion strategy, adding 26 gross new stores during the quarter and 53 new stores during the first half of the year. This takes the total store count to 844 as of September '26 end. And we now have presence in 582 cities across the country. In quarter two, we launched the first pilot store of Belong & Co, our new apparel format catering to young, affluent, urban consumers with a very distinct brand proposition
Gunender Kapur (Vishal Mega Mart Ltd): cities in the country. And the registered users on Quick commerce crossed 1.5 crore people across the country. Looking ahead, we remain focused on capturing growth opportunities, while staying very agile in an evolving geopolitical and inflationary environment. By strengthening our merchandise offering, enhancing supply chain efficiency, and maintaining disciplined cost management, we aim to continue delivering compelling customer value and sustainable and profitable growth. With this, I would request the moderator to open the floor for questions. Thank you very much.
Moderator: Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, we will now begin the question-and-answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one on their touchtone telephone. If you wish to remove yourself from the question queue, you may press star and two. Participants are requested to use their handsets while asking a question. Ladies and gentlemen, we will wait for a moment while the question queue assembles. Participants, please note, please restrict yourself to two questions per participant, and rejoin the question queue for follow-up questions. We take the first question from the line of Percy from IIFL. Please go ahead.
Percy Panthaki (IIFL): Hi. Am I audible?
Gunender Kapur (Vishal Mega Mart Ltd): Yes, please.
Percy Panthaki (IIFL): Yeah. Sir, just one clarification. So when we say about 3%-4% impact of festive, does that mean that this gets transferred into 3Q? So basically this 14 15% kind of growth becomes like a 21, 22% because 3%-4% gets transferred from one quarter to the other? Is that the correct understanding?
Gunender Kapur (Vishal Mega Mart Ltd): No, I think, Percy, it means more like, you know, we had, we've had to report 5.5% approximately same-store sales growth. Now, this would look like 9% if we were to adjust for these festivals, because what's happened this year, unlike last year, is that three key festivals, which is Durga Puja, Dussehra, and Navratras, fell this year in October, whereas last year they were, for example, on 2nd of October, where the revenue was recorded in September month. So, they've just shifted from let's say September last year to October this year.
Percy Panthaki (IIFL): Okay, okay. So, my my second point BK that if in normal circumstances, if the season were not shifted, you would have done a 9% SSG. So, if you have done, let's say, 5.5% this quarter to achieve a 9% average for 2Q and 3Q, 3Q will have to be sort of 12-13% kind of a SSG to get to that 9% average?
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