MPG - Metro Performance Glass

[BlackPeter]

One of these Private Equity Fund floats which came down since IPO like a bag of bricks. Too much debt, mediocre management, board firmly asleep - you name it, they used to have it.

Still - it appears the new CEO is not that bad as many thought, they got their Australian adventure under control and SP seems to have found some (though quite low) floor. They lost market share in NZ, but are still largest glass supplier for the NZ building industry. Hard to finish houses without putting glass into the windows, isn't it?

While it appears that not all of their customers like them - how bad can they do in the middle of a resource constrained building boom with some extra glass in the warehouse?

Their chair (Peter Griffiths) bought recently some more shares. I guess this must be a good sign, isn't it?

http://nzx-prod-s7fsd7f98s.s3-website-ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/attachments/MPG/395200/374505.pdf

[Shareguy]

Funny, I started looking at this when I saw the announcement from the chair this morning.

Always encouraging when you see insider buying.  I went back to the last annual report and thought initially directors and the ceo had bugger all shares. I guess they paid considerably more than they are now. But $17k is not a big endorsement.

I'm thinking a risky proposition with increased debt, some cash which is good.  A capital raise is just around the corner unless they sell the NZ or Aust operations.  Would have to be heavily discounted. I'm thinking It's "touch and go" if they even survive, all they need is a couple of bad quarters  and that cash is going to be used up.

The increased inventory might be legitimate but it might also be increased damaged stock. I mentioned some time ago on another site that we had used Metro glass for the rebuild of our house and over half of it had to be returned due to quality issues. Some of the panels had to be replaced three times. What concerned me was that these were obvious scratches and marks that weren't picked up in the factory, or picked up by quality control and weren't picked up by the installer placing it in the house.

So I'm a little sceptical but I can see the attraction when you see Peter Wells buying and the chair a small amount but is that enough. 

For me it's a no.

[winner (n)]

BP and shareguy sort of say the Chair buying is a good sign (maybe)

I often wonder if insiders buying really means much at all -- like that Liz over at Oceania is the best part of a quarter a million bucks down on her 'inside' purchases, even though she bought heaps at 79 cents and even some at 56 cents.

Like many of us maybe they buy and hope they'll make a profit .... one day

[Shareguy]

Take your point winner. To me it's a case of showing faith in the companys future prospects. What the market does is up to the market.  Certainly a lot more encouraging than if they were selling.

[BlackPeter]

BP and shareguy sort of say the Chair buying is a good sign (maybe)

I often wonder if insiders buying really means much at all -- like that Liz over at Oceania is the best part of a quarter a million bucks down on her 'inside' purchases, even though she bought heaps at 79 cents and even some at 56 cents.

Like many of us maybe they buy and hope they'll make a profit .... one day

I am sure that's what they do.

I guess the theory is that of all market participants they have access to the best and most recent insider information. This does not mean that they will always be right (remember - nobody can predict the future), but at least should their rate of success be better than that of an outsider ...

But hey - maybe some of them use the time in board meetings just to check stocktalk, some other internet forum or to prepare for the next unrelated board meeting and in that case they would not know more about their company than we do?

Who knows?

[teabag]

Sold out my holding over a month ago - having slowly accumulated over several years, at a bit below break even.  Have been disappointed that even in the midst of a building boom they couldn't perform that well. New leader may make a difference, but still seems to be a lot of the old guard left.

Still good potential for a strong upside, but have thought that for some time, with no results.

[Basil]

Sold out my holding over a month ago - having slowly accumulated over several years, at a bit below break even.  Have been disappointed that even in the midst of a building boom they couldn't perform that well. New leader may make a difference, but still seems to be a lot of the old guard left.

Still good potential for a strong upside, but have thought that for some time, with no results.

Good move.  This company has been a recidivist offender with lack of meaningful earnings in good times and consistently spending heaps on capex to modernize processing facilities to no real effect.  Despite having a huge share of the market they seem to have a systemic problem with being unable to perform for shareholders.    On the other hand staff, management and the directors seem to do okay for themselves.

A $17,000 purchase of shares is pathetic chump change...wake me up when an insider invests a minimum of $250,000 and not before.

[Cod]

MPG = serial underperformer, mainly due to the fact that they have to redo every second bit of glass.

[BlackPeter]

MPG = serial underperformer, mainly due to the fact that they have to redo every second bit of glass.

You are saying that they have a 50% failure rate? That's an amazing number for a quite established enterprise. Please provide some evidence.

I would be interested what they do with all this broken glass - and where they hide it in their books?

[Cod]

You are saying that they have a 50% failure rate? That's an amazing number for a quite established enterprise. Please provide some evidence.

I would be interested what they do with all this broken glass - and where they hide it in their books?

I was being factious, it isn't 50% - but it's high, my son used to work at an aluminum joinery company, he stated that they always had to send MPG stuff back. Either it was the wrong size, covered in silicone, etc.

[BlackPeter]

I was being factious, it isn't 50% - but it's high, my son used to work at an aluminum joinery company, he stated that they always had to send MPG stuff back. Either it was the wrong size, covered in silicone, etc.

OK - very funny.

Still - I guess I realize that there are always people moaning about companies with a large market share.

I used to work in development - and I've never seen engineers happy with the tools they were using ... the more they used them the more they complained. Good have been only the tools other organisations used, but better not talk with them to confirm that.

I guess the grass is as well always greener on the other side of the fence ... just ask any horse, sheep or cow ;

If you look at the economy - any large enough company has its chorus of habitual haters and moaners. Hardly anybody likes Microsoft (despite everybody using their products), nobody used to like Telecom NZ (despite their huge market share) ... I think there is even some sort of statistical law that anybody with a market share of above 50% must serve as well customers who are actively disliking the company and / or the product.

And yes, moaners have a reliable habit of exaggerating ... just ask any child complaining that all their friends get more pocket money than they do to list all these friends. Always works.

Given that MPG used to have something like 2/3rds of market share in NZ (and I think it is still well above 50% today) do I assume that the people buying from them are not all idiots, but buying because MPG provide the better and faster service or the only service in their location or the more reasonable price ...

Seriously - why would anybody go back to a company providing consistently lousy service, unless they are still better than their competitors? Maybe a worthwile discussion with your son ...

Just taking all this moaning with a huge amount of salt ... but hey, keep going - we need that to establish that MPG is still the market leader in NZ.

[Auto Rower]

I was being factious, it isn't 50% - but it's high, my son used to work at an aluminum joinery company, he stated that they always had to send MPG stuff back. Either it was the wrong size, covered in silicone, etc.

Cod I have spoken to people in the trade 18 months ago albeit & had the same response apart from the 50% bit ,but they have a bad rep from the past and need to reverse this.
Takes a while to do of course hopefully they are addressing this poor quality rep
I was quite shocked because at the start of the building boom ! over covid I was looking to buy in but luckily all the bad rep from people in the trade not Investors  warned me off 

[BlackPeter]

I was being factious, it isn't 50% - but it's high, my son used to work at an aluminum joinery company, he stated that they always had to send MPG stuff back. Either it was the wrong size, covered in silicone, etc.

Well, as indicated - it would be worthwhile to find out why the company your son works for is still ordering from MPG if they are so unhappy about the quality. Makes one wonder ...

But apart from that - here is the trendchart from MPG's Customer Satisfaction Surveys (source: 2022 annual report, page 7):

You cannot view this attachment.

Looking at that trend - the overwhelming majority of their customers are clearly happy (8.1 out of 10 is a quite good rating). But obviously - there is always a number of people who are always unhappy, normally no matter who provides them a service.

[Auto Rower]

I am glad they are taking heed and from the look of their mpg customer satisfaction survey things look to be Improving .
 I hope this translates into profits for the company & the eps becomes a plus & no reason it should not if the management  get their act together

[Sideshow Bob]

Could be that customers are more satisfied because getting cheaper than anywhere else. 

Our other companies are equally pies.