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This may be a daft question:
Could the after effects of the Tonga volcano have caused us any problems in Timor?
I mean, it reached Japan, and Timor is much closer, albeit around the top of Aus..
If this is daft, feel free to say so!
I've not read them - has anyone here?
Strikes me that, if these debentures are not subject to presidential sign off, then sign off must have already happened. And therefore perhaps we can forget about our french friends for the time being at least .
On another note, having read this board for almost 5 years, high time to say a huge thanks to the well informed posters on this BB. Certainly helps keeps the spirits up when ones average starts with a "3".
Thanks and all the best for '22..
@wyn, the other one...
EVE staying in the 3p range..
Good to see you here..
Like most of us here, I'm long time invested (2016) and can't wait for the next few weeks to unfold..
But..
SAVE need to look after these employees, not for the sake of getting the deal across the line, but in the interests of being decent human beings, and responsible stewards of their new environment.
(I might have coined that phrase from CH at ZPHR).
I'll vote by taking my pennies off the table (at first opportunity) if we don't see Chad employees getting properly remunerated.
Definitely uncomfortable taking profits at the expense of those less fortunate than ourselves..
AK - do the right thing.
Just my view of course but...
We're asking 'why aren't the BOD Buying' ?
With what?
They are a collective of salaried folk. Correct me if I'm wrong but no-one on the board has previously had major liquidity events from past exits. I'm not questioning capability, just their ability to buy, at any price.
Any idea why IG won't let me buy? Tried both Spread and Share accounts today..
D-G - I'm a long-time subscriber to Retail-Week as is my field - very occasionally there's some content that makes me think the subs are worth it..
The one-man team in France is presumably focused on partnerships / wholesale. If Eve are serious about a DTC business in France, they need local knowledge / local language. I like 'La Vie en Jaune' - but copy and paste of a UK site in FR will not deliver results. Our French friends need their buttons pressed in a very different way to your average British consumer.
CC is making all the right noises about a sleep / wellness brand but the actions are not following words here..
Search Google for eve sleep. the first result past the ads show:
Spring & Foam Mattresses | Free Delivery | eve sleep ...https://www.evesleep.co.uk
Shop five award winning, gorgeously comfortable mattresses at eve sleep....
and the second result for evesleep.ie:
Spring & Memory Foam Mattresses | Free ...https://evesleep.ie
Shop award winning, gorgeously comfortable spring and memory foam mattresses at eve sleep.
(PART 4 - FINAL)
Part of Eve Sleep’s issues in previous years were its overexposure to multiple markets. Both Sturrock and now Calverley have reined that in and focused on key markets in the UK, Ireland and France.
The retailer now has a 68-strong team of UK staff, down from 90 when Calverley joined the business in 2018, as well as a one-man team in France.
While the UK business still has some way to go until the rebuild strategy comes entirely to fruition, Calverley says Eve Sleep’s focus is now turning to France where the market is “much more immature” – both in terms of DTC and ecommerce.
For that reason, Eve Sleep’s strategy of forming retail partnerships with household names such as Olivier Desforges will help on its growth trajectory.
With her as the driving force behind the company, the sleep wellness element is bound to grow – soon Calverley will have us all asking “what stops you sleeping and how can Eve Sleep help?”
(PART 3)
Sleeping better
“What stops you from sleeping?” Calverley asks. “Is it your mattress, the room temperature or your own thoughts?”
Controversially for a business known for its mattresses, Calverley sees mattresses as the least important element when it comes to getting a good night’s sleep.
This is why Eve Sleep has now repositioned itself as a sleep wellness brand, offering a holistic range of products to help customers sleep better.
Eve Sleep has made the move into beds, bedding, accessories and wellness products, including CBD oil – a move that saw its share price jump back in February when it announced a partnership with CBD products distributor Sana Lifestyle.
Partnerships with Next and Habitat have also helped boost Eve Sleep’s reputation in the UK, setting it apart from competitors such as Emma and Simba.
Eve-Sleep-wellness-products
The company focuses on sleep quality and has branched out to offer a range of products to help consumers get more rest
The business has a bricks-and-mortar presence in 27 partner stores and concessions in the UK, while its wellness products are stocked across Boots stores.
Eve Sleep initially began as a pureplay business, but Calverley believes in being where the consumers want to shop – getting Eve Sleep products in front of customers in order to grow the brand awareness and equity.
By focusing on different routes to market, Calverley believes each of the DTC mattress brands that proliferated around 2015 have found themselves a niche in which they can exist alongside one another – with Eve Sleep firmly in the tech/sleep wellness space.
With a background in marketing, it’s also no wonder that Eve Sleep under Calverley’s leadership has turned around its marketing strategy – the dancing sloth has now emerged as the company’s mascot, where customers are encouraged to “wake up dancing”.
By focusing on how you feel when you’ve slept well, Eve Sleep turns the traditional mattress and bedding messaging on its head.
Similarly, in its French market, the adverts focus on “la vie en jaune”, or “life in yellow” – where life is happier with a better night’s sleep.
Calverley believes each of the DTC mattress brands have found themselves a niche in which they can exist alongside one another – with Eve Sleep firmly in the tech/sleep wellness space
Also in keeping with its mission to help the nation sleep better, Eve Sleep brought back “test card F” – a symbol that older consumers would recognise as it used to appear when television programming finished for the night.
With customers now engaging with content across multiple channels and devices, Eve Sleep runs adverts across terrestrial television with Channel 4, its streaming service All4 and on popular mobile games such as Candy Crush and Farm Heroes. The ads go live at 11pm to tell customers to switch off and go to bed.
(PART 2)
“I’m quite entrepreneurial and I prefer smaller, more nimble businesses – I’m not terribly corporate”
“I’m quite an extroverted thinker, I like to work with people and talk to people; that feeds me and I’m also quite a present leader. I like to stand up and give talks. That’s been quite hard and we’ve had to work hard as a business to maintain presence in people’s lives.”
With the world working from home for the past year, Calverley says she struggled to maintain Eve Sleep’s culture and worried her staff would feel they “could have been working for anyone”.
“You come to work for a business like Eve Sleep for the culture and development, and the opportunity to be with people you like being with to build something you want to build, rather than for the pay or the career path or more formal stuff,” she explains.
“When you take some of that away, it can feel a bit empty and pointless. I think that’s probably been the hardest thing for me, because it’s probably one of my strong suits – my natural ability to go ’right everyone, let’s go down to the pub’.”
Eve Sleep
Since taking the helm at Eve Sleep, Calverley has revamped the business’ marketing strategy
Start-ups like Eve Sleep thrive on being “unsettled”, Calverley says – and what is more unsettled than a global pandemic?
“The business is at its absolute best when everything changes,” she adds.
Going forward, Calverley is a huge advocate for improving mental health at work, shunning the nine-to-five paradigm in favour of a model where if everyone gets their work done by its deadline, they can do it whenever suits them best. Calverley, for one, often takes meetings while riding her horse.
She has also worked hard to create a company culture where mistakes are not only acceptable, but a necessary part of the business, especially when working remotely.
“One thing I’ve been working really hard with the team on, is the culture of being able to make mistakes and talking about them,” she says.
“Remotely, that’s even harder, because you make a mistake and you’ve got to just close your laptop and be left on your own thinking about what’s happened and how people might be judging you. We’ve been working on openness and honesty about dropping balls, because without the willingness to do that, the business can’t grow.”
While Eve Sleep has indeed made mistakes, its rebuilding strategy and the favourable home and DIY market has made it a Covid winner.
Here's the Interview: (PART 1)
How Eve Sleep boss Cheryl Calverley is sweetening investors’ dreams
Cheryl Calverley, CEO of Eve Sleep
After just over a year at the helm of the DTC brand, Eve Sleep chief executive Cheryl Calverley sits down with Retail Week to discuss how the business has turned things around
On a particularly wet day in June, Eve Sleep chief executive Cheryl Calverley arrives to breakfast by bicycle.
Despite her soaked trousers, Calverley’s positivity is undeniable as, over eggs royale and a flat white, she explains how she came to lead the only sleep wellness brand in the UK.
After completing a degree in psychology at Goldsmiths, Calverley began her career in marketing at FMCG giant Unilever, before moving to Birds Eye where she held various marketing roles for five years. It was then Calverley made the decision to move into direct to consumer.
“I realised if I didn’t get out of FMCG, I’d forever be fighting with Tesco and that wasn’t something I wanted,” she explains.
Calverley moved to the AA, but found that as marketing director she was “writing an awful lot of PowerPoints” and bringing little of value.
This is where Eve Sleep came in – a “young, nimble brand” that needed a new strategy after over-exposing itself geographically and making a string of losses.
Eve Sleep bedframe
“Being a psychologist, I like psycho/biological stuff – food, sleep, exercise, stuff where mind and body come together”
Cheryl Calverley, Eve Sleep
Calverley explains that her studies also helped her lead on Eve Sleep’s strategic pivot away from selling mattresses to selling a good night’s sleep.
“Being a psychologist, I like psycho/biological stuff – food, sleep, exercise, stuff where mind and body come together,” she says.
After two years as chief marketing officer, Calverley took the helm of Eve Sleep in May 2020, simultaneously guiding the business through the pandemic and its rebuilding strategy.
Eve Sleep is now set to exceed revenue expectations as the business benefited from the homewares boom and increased consumer interest in wellness during the pandemic, alongside Calverley’s moves to focus on core markets and quirky marketing schemes.
In its most recent update, Eve Sleep registered £25.2m in revenues for the full year ended December 31, while its EBITDA losses were cut by 81% to £2m.
For the coming year, Eve Sleep expects to return to profitable growth, while also investing in its core markets of the UK, France and Ireland.
Navigating the pandemic
“It’s very difficult because I’ve not taken the reins in any other environment, so I can’t tell you if it’s any more or less weird,” says Calverley when asked what it was like taking the top job during the pandemic.
Calverley replaced former chief executive James Sturrock last year as the company sought the next phase of its growth plan. While Calverley may have the senior title, she is not your typical retail leader.
Suspension is coming.
Having been here long before 7E and the previous suspension, I feat this rollercoaster will be coming off the tracks for a while.
A note to add my appreciation for all the insight and wisdom over the years from the majority of contributors here. I'm adding more £ here but am unable to contribute in any other way.
Looking forward to whatever the next few hours brings.
Good weekend all..
Yes, part of the remuneration.
Amounts to 20k over three years for CC - hardly a game changer. CC share purchase of < 5k also not inspiring huge confidence but better than zero.
On their options:
1. Would have liked to have seen a hurdle price of say 12p. Exercise price is at 0.01 so built in value from day one.
2. They are vesting 1/36 monthly. No commentary on conditions of exercise.
Agreed Genius.
2020 results are in the price already.
YTD should be high double digit % up on LY, as we are yet to anniversary C19 lockdown 1.
As for rest of year, I'm guessing we can expect 'hard to predict - cautious outlook'.
We need to hear about FR prospects.
And what impact raw material supply has had.
And new products. Eve needs plenty new products to become a sleep brand - it's not unreasonable to expect this by now from CC.
This CBD line is fine but let's not get excited - there's 100's of places to buy the end product - we're just another brand selling the same tinctures / gummies / tabs.
Not expecting fireworks tomorrow but I'm still optimistic long term, subject to getting product right.
Agreed Wyn, international is definitely a route to repeat current model but still believe we need to evolve into a sleep brand so we can put our hard-won customers to good use.
Looking forward to the update this month.
I've held Eve for a while now, mainly because they were, and remain, undervalued.
New management has turned this around - CEO & CFO have the right credentials and experience in this sector and may even get us to a profitable year before too long. And there appears to be enough cash on hand to get there.
BUT
Whilst Eve is a great brand and great product, we have to accept that we are a minnow in this space and we are a bit of a one-trip pony. We sell mattresses and have a few bolt-ons to up the ATV and maybe even get a Customer to shop more than once every 8 years.
And that's my fundamental problem here - a true ecommerce business grows at high double-digit rates through both Customer acquisition and retention and I don't see a business case for a Customer making multiple purchases per year.
Our CFO is ex LOAF - LOAF have their core product but they also cover multiple categories and adding more all the time. Not so here.
We really need to broaden out the product range beyond the tokens we have online today if we are to grow at a scale that is interesting. Being a real SLEEP brand as opposed a mattress brand with a few sideshows.
And then, what does acquiring a Customer cost us? Hoping someone here knows that answer? My guess is, whilst it is a lot less than it used to be, its still a big % number. It think we have a case of high CoA (Cost of Acquisition) with very low repeat Customer rates, making the business not particularly scalable and quite hard to eek out a profit.
But I'm still positive and long on EVE. Why?
Because whilst we remain undervalued, I believe we are a very attractive brand to a potential acquirer (and not a competitor). A plethora of ecom pure-play businesses out there who would be happy to bolt EVE on to their existing business (which is probably trading at a multiple of sales way beyond our own EV). Instant access to a good demographic of Customers; perfect cross sell opportunities, and an AIM listing should an acquirer be looking to make a back-door entrance on to AIM.
If neither of these two things happen in the relatively near term, EVE and me will have come to the end of our road, because I cant see the long term delivering results compared to what we can expect from other ecom brands.
Really interested to get other perspectives on this.