Fielmann Stock

Good day, ladies and gentlemen, and a warm welcome to today's analyst and investor call of the Fielmann Group AG, following the publication of the half year financial figures of the first half of 2026. And with this, I'm happy to hand over to Fielmann's CFO, Steffen Baetjer. Please, the stage is yours.

Thanks a lot. Thanks a lot, Ingmar, and welcome, everybody. Well, great, that was very, very fast. Thank you very much. We'll come to that later. You know the rules, 2 questions per head. Welcome to our half year results call. We obviously published interim results and preliminary results already on the 9th of July, so the numbers are more or less well known. So let's go through that at speed.

Before we start with the -- yes, we're not -- yes, before we start with the with the overall summary, and you can go to the summary, Nils. Thanks. Obviously, you all noticed last week that we issued an update to our guidance for the year, and it was obviously a downward correction. Well, let's address that before we start about those numbers. When Nils and I started taking over Investor Relations for Fielmann, we talked to a lot of you, and we said we stand for honesty and transparency and reliability.

And we feel that we already guided you based on our June numbers, we already guided you towards the lower end of our expectation. And when we saw July and August coming in, we felt necessary that we update our guidance because it became apparent that it might be the lower end, but it might be below the lower end. And therefore, we updated our guidance to you guys. It was a year, let me say, full of surprises. Who would have thought that we have an Iran war and a scarcity in crude oil and exploding prices all over again? Who would have thought that 8 months ago? We definitely didn't.

And we need to reflect that in the consumer sentiment, and we see that being reflected, and therefore, we adjusted our guidance. We specifically chose a slightly broader range. We chose a range, not just a 2% range, but the 3 percentage point range, 2 to 5 percentage points, percent growth. We also softened the language around the EBITDA margin going from around 23% to 22% to 23%.

The only reason is that it's -- quite honestly, it's not my favorite thing to give you a guidance update. And I'm good with doing one for the year. And therefore, we chose a slightly broader range. I think the important thing is to note that this is a temporary demand drip. It's not -- there's nothing fundamental going on in our cost structure. You see that our gross profit margins are super intact.

We see actually that July and August have already increased in terms of growth pace. So we're confident -- we're definitely confident that this is the last guidance update we've been giving you in this year and hopefully for the foreseeable future. But just to be on the safe side, once we do it, we said we want to give you a broader range so that whatever surprises all those people and presidents and whoever has out there for us in the making, we're basically covered.

It would be probably stupid of me to say, this is it, and 100%, but I can -- you can rest assured that all the internal models point in a direction that we're definitely within -- if the world continues as it does today, we're definitely very comfortably in the range that we have given you.

Now with that, let's move into the half year, #1, figures. We say that despite our challenging consumer sentiment, with everything that you know, the macro climate, the geopolitical uncertainties, the consumer sentiment, the uncertainty that people, especially in Europe, feel because of the new geopolitical environment, the uncertainty that our U.S. customers feel because of the uncertainty around the price development, we still deliver growth, and we continue to grow -- we grew at 2.3% at constant currency.

We see an acceleration in the growth rate in our international markets. It's the same pattern that we've seen over the last 2 years that the further away you are from Germany, the better your growth. Unfortunately, Germany is our home market and our biggest market, but we've seen that Germany has been struggling, and we come to that later. We've seen that Germany has been struggling.

But whilst we had a lot of weather and uncertainty impacts in our other European countries, we see that they have gone away. And for example, Spain is back to their usual 9%, almost 10% growth rate for the year. Our EBITDA margin is very stable at prior year levels, almost 24%. We continue, obviously, to do cost management. We invest into growth. We do that through increased hirings because the opticians we -- the more opticians we have in our stores, the more customers we can serve.

And yes, we still have an issue with not serving all the customers that we could serve. The more doctors we have in the United States, the more exam capacity we open up, and the more exam capacity we have, the more glasses we sell. So there is an investment going on into personnel expenses. But other than that, we're still very much on a cost-conscious travel. You see the European margin at 25.1% for the first half year.

The U.S. dropped by 2.5%. That's mainly due to personnel expenses and building up the capacity. Adjusted EBT margin is stable, and we expect improved growth dynamic for the second half year. I said, July and August, we already see that trend. We're pretty significantly above Q2 numbers, but there's also some seasonality always going on over the summer months when people are on vacation and all that.

But we're hopeful because fundamentally, we are accelerating our rate at which we open new stores. That's a tried and tested and overanalyzed way of growing for us. We do targeted hirings. As I said, we still send away customers who we can't serve. So if we hire an optician in those stores, then that will immediately increase our top line and productivity gains, mainly the AI-based refraction.

I talked to you about that many, many times. So half year 2 should be better than half year 1 in terms of growth and profitability is still intact. Those numbers we talked about, 2%, 2.3% growth, 1.7% organic. We did a small acquisition in Luxembourg. We disclosed it in our appendix. We added 10 stores. Adjusted EBITDA margin on same year level and adjusted EBT margin at the same level as well.

I mean that sounds like, whoa, these guys are only growing EUR 4 million in adjusted EBITDA. But please bear in mind that last year was a record profitability year for this company. So whilst with an updated guidance just a week ago, I should be careful, and Nils always says, "Be careful and tune it down." But I'd say it's less than we expected, but it's still pretty good that we're beating a record year at least on the half year.

Next page. Yes, total consolidated sales, we said that 1.8% versus prior year. You still see the U.S. dollar impact. You remember Liberation Day, early April last year, the dollar tanked, and we're translating about $300 million in revenue into euros. So if the dollar tanks, that's not good for us. The dollar has been stable since roughly June last year, so that effect will taper out. 2.3% in constant currency is our growth.

Swiss franc works on the opposite. Swiss franc appreciating against the euro, and those 2 level each other out. But 0.5% uptick from the dollar weakness that we have here. Well, the growth, which is great, is still across all our product categories. So we're not a one-trick pony. We're actually accelerating our growth in audiology. We're good on sunglasses. Well, there was a lot of sun, and therefore sunglasses are great.

Adjacent health care services grow. Prescription or Rx eyewear not growing as much as we wanted to, and that's the reason why we felt the need to communicate an updated guidance to you last week. Contact lens sales is down by 4%. Reason is very simple. I think we talked about the price development of branded contact lenses, competitive environment, which is going up quite significantly. The competitive environment in Europe where you don't need a prescription to buy contact lenses.

So our biggest competitors are Amazon, for example. You can just order them online, and that's a pricing game that we cannot win. And therefore, we're focusing more and more on our private label contact lenses, Atrea, which have a slightly higher margin or significantly higher margin. We see that actually a positive margin development. But obviously, we're selling a lot less because they're also cheaper. And therefore, we have a minus 4%, but that's part of our contact lens strategy and is totally as planned.

Countries are growing as well. You see Germany here at 1% for the half year, 0% in the second half year (sic) [ second quarter ]. So a reversal. The first quarter was weak because of weather and strikes. The second quarter was weak because of consumer sentiment. You see -- and that's what you see. You see the half year numbers, and you see the Q2 down there. So U.S., you see half year growth at constant currency, 3%. Second quarter was 5%, so an acceleration of growth.

The same for Spain, 7% overall, 9% in the second, in the second quarter. And then you have Switzerland and Austria, and the others, which are primarily driven by our acquisition, Luxembourg. The other countries are slightly down compared to prior year because we're adjusting our market approach to Italy. You know that it's been an ongoing story. First was, let's try and bring this back to profitability. Italy is now mid-teens EBITDA profitability.

So okay, not great, but okay, and very good compared to where they come from. But we're still working on the product market fit, and we're cleaning out our store network, and we have a new managing director for Italy. So the Spanish guy is also running Italy. And all that is going on, and that's why Italy is down half year about 3% compared to prior year, and that's the main driver here why the others are slightly -- if you rip out the acquisition, why the others are slightly lower.

Overall, we see, other than Germany, an improved growth dynamic. So it's great because it proves that diversifying into several countries, diversifying into the U.S. as the largest optical market is really something that pays off because we're not so dependent on Germany anymore.

Next slide. Yes, profitability talked about that profitability, EUR 4 million higher in absolute numbers and margin more or less where it was last year, which we think is a good achievement given that typically lower sales translate into the lower expected sales turn into a margin impact. But you see here that we keep it all relatively stable because our cost control is still ongoing.

Next slide. Yes, it's a half year, so we're going to talk about balance sheet as well. We have a quite significant cash position of EUR 265 million. After dividend, we still had about EUR 150 million in the bank. And yes, we do have plans what to do with it. The -- our leverage, including leases, is at 1.1; excluding lease liabilities, is at 0.1. So you might call this a somewhat underutilized balance sheet, and we're working on that. Equity ratio went up 2.5 percentage points almost to 42.8%.

So balance sheet is not our issue. Balance sheet is healthy. We're spending a lot of time in the Board thinking about how we can bring the money to use and expand further, and we come later to that. We're really accelerating our expansion in the markets because we feel that's a great way of growing the company. It's a very safe way of growing the company. And we calculated basically the IRRs for every store opening of the last 15 years. And I can tell you the IRRs are also very good. So it makes all the sense in the world to take the money and spend it on new stores, new openings and additions, smaller tuck-in acquisitions to actually increase our market share, as we did, for example, in Luxembourg, where we're now #1.

Looking at the cash flow statement. Cash flow from operating activities slightly lower. Cash conversion at EUR 188 million. Cash conversion was impacted by some temporary working capital impacts. We built some inventory. That's a seasonal thing, but it sometimes happens on this side end of the half year, sometimes it happens on the other side of the half year. We have a slight increase in our new stores and in our -- sorry, in our audiology sales. So there we have more outstandings to the people who actually get the money from the health insurance for us.

So this is all, more or less, a seasonal pattern that will normalize over the course of the year. Investing activities is impacted by accelerated store expansion and also by the acquisition that we undertook in Luxembourg at EUR 23 million and financing activities are slightly lower negative than last year. The biggest item is always leases. So the IFRS 16 rent payments, so to say, or part of that. We didn't take any new financial debt.

You remember that last year, at this point in time, we refinanced the short-term acquisition debt for the U.S. acquisition into long-term debt and paid down EUR 25 million. That was one big impact. And then we took over the remaining 30% of our Slovenian entity and paid out the owner at EUR 11 million. So that's ours now as well at 100%, and that gives us a lot more control and we can integrate much closer with them on a lot more also operational things like lenses, frames, et cetera, et cetera. So overall, cash flow statement, balance sheet, very happy with that. We're very cash generative. And that's not the first focus point. Obviously, how do we accelerate growth is the main focus point of this company at this current point in time.

Next slide. Yes. Capital market guidance. Well, we just issued it last week, so we don't have any changes, and obviously confirm it, 2% to 5%, EUR 2.5 billion to EUR 2.55 billion, adjusted EBITDA, EUR 560 million to EUR 580 million. Adjusted EBITDA margin probably around 23%, but giving you, because of the year of surprises, as we call it, a slightly broader range to make sure that we're not going to need to come back to you and communicate again. Now one is enough. As I said, one guidance update. Adjusted EBT margin should be around 12%. Our customer satisfaction definitely around 90%. We don't see any dip in any customer satisfaction. So really working on that. And as I said, July, August already with some favorable trends going forward.

Now this is the normal slide deck that we show you because you're probably interested in what's going to happen in the second half. We're going to accelerate our growth rate. Why is that? We do have accelerated expansion, and I have a slide on that. We're also going to increase productivity. Okay, let's talk about -- Nils said, "Let's talk about accelerated expansion." Okay, Nils, I do that. Why don't you go to the next slide, then? So this is the number of net new stores that we're adding to our footprint. As I said, we analyzed new stores of the last 15 years to death. We looked at the IRR. The IRR is extremely double-digit nice. So it makes a lot of sense.

We had a lot of discussions in the Board where basically I said, "Let's talk about it because the IRR is great. We have the money. We have the management teams. We have a great market position. We have great EBITDA. So let's do a little more." And our sales Board member also said, "I have the teams, and I have a very clear view of where our white spots are. So why don't we do it?" So we got together, and basically the teams opened a lot more new stores.

You see 2024, we opened 10. 2025, we added net 22 stores in the full year. We are now at 37 already in the first half year. That we added 11 of those acquired, and 26 opened. And we have in the pipeline another 33 stores for the second half year that we're going to open. That's excluding any acquisitions. So this is pure store openings across Europe and the U.S. So every country does something.

This is a push for expansion that's not just singular in terms of we only do it in Germany or GSA or the U.S., we do it across the company. Every store obviously adds immediately revenue. We typically have good brand recognition. If we open a store, they tend to be full. We have -- they turn then profitable depending on the country and the repurchase interval is between 1 and 3 years before they turn profitable, which also explains the slight margin dip from the expansion.

But once we build that and once they turn profitable, as I said, the return on the capital invested is quite significant positive, and that's why we do this because we're building a foundation that will carry us into the next decade. So 33 more stores, and then we have about 70 open this year, which would be a significant acceleration compared to 2025, and we're currently in budget discussions for 2027.

And well, sneak peek would be more. So let's see how many more we're going to do. Besides accelerating the expansion, we're also increasing our productivity. I talked a lot about AI-based refraction. That's now in many, many hundred stores in operation, and it's day to day -- it's a day-to-day thing. Basically, as I said, I did it. It cuts down refraction time by about, or eye test time from about 15 or 12 minutes by about 4 minutes, which opens up a lot of productivity for our opticians to then serve more customers.

And then we're going to expand eye exam availability, and that's mainly through hiring doctors, through hiring opticians so that we really have the capacity. In Europe, we're adding the capacity that's needed to serve customers that are coming anyway. In the U.S., and that's why you see the margin dip, we're adding capacity that customers get used to: "Hey, this is a different experience if I go to a Shopko and SVS in the U.S. than to another optician because we have the capacity."

But to offer that, we first need to build it, and then people need to realize it, and then it will pay off, but that might take a while. But that's the dip that you see in our margin from the expansion of that capacity. With that, I'm done with H1 and outlook H2. And with that, I think we go to Q&A. I think we already have a few people now. Need my glasses. I think we already have 2 people who asked their question.

[Operator Instructions] Mr. Abbott, Craig Abbott, he already raised his hands before the presentation really started, so we hand over to him. Mr. Abbott.

Craig, this is becoming a running joke.

Can you hear me now?

Yes, we can hear you.

I finally found the mute button. Yes, I will limit myself to 2 questions. The first one, just you very kindly gave us an indication a couple of times in your presentation that on trading trends in July, August, indeed, you are seeing improving trends, which is obviously very encouraging. I just wondered if you could indicate whether you are also seeing this acceleration in any kind of meaningful way in Germany? That's my first question.

And your second question?

Yes. My second question, I guess, would be to go over to the U.S. And I was wondering if you could give us an update on, say, the Fielmann-branded stores in the U.S., things like are you investing materially in marketing spend to establish the brand locally? Is this where most of your focus is right now with these doctor new hires? If you could just maybe just give us an update on how you feel about how those Fielmann-branded stores are developing.

Yes. Sure. So acceleration trend, yes, we see that also in Germany. Be mindful, summer vacations, et cetera, et cetera, but Germany looks a little better than it used to look in Q2 and Q1, so we see an acceleration there. But then again, it's 2 months, and it's been very difficult. I mean you live in Frankfurt, so you know how difficult the sentiment is in Germany at the moment. But yes, we see an acceleration there, and let's wait and see for the Q3 numbers in early November.

The U.S., well, we opened the first kind of Fielmann-branded stores around Northern Illinois and have been trying those. We've been seeing that the U.S. markets, basically, or the U.S. stores, the Fielmann stores in the U.S. are still lacking a little bit. They're not really -- from the whole setup, they're not really transporting what Fielmann stands for. So you know it, you're in Germany, you go into Fielmann store without knowing the logo, you know that you're in a Fielmann store. We don't have that experience in the U.S. that yet.

So we actually piloted one more store, which we opened about a month ago in Machesney Park in Rockford, Illinois, where we have one Fielmann store that's really done from the bottom up. It's really the first fully fledged Fielmann store with training, with a vision guide, software-based and tablet-based consulting, so that we can take the optical retail associates that are -- that we have in the U.S. rather than the opticians that we have in Germany, helping them to better consult our clients.

And first numbers are great, but first numbers are always great when you open a new store, and everybody from Hamburg is looking onto it. So we're monitoring this, and we're still adapting how we're going about, but that's where the focus is. At the moment, the focus is on the brand promise, the translation of the brand promise into store design, and definitely the translation of the brand promise into how we interact with our customers. And that's for us the biggest thing, and that's a training task that we have ahead of us.

But that's where the focus is. Other than last year, where we were really about, let's bring these 2 companies together and build one. We're now really building -- we're starting to open a few stores, also in the U.S., which we didn't do so much last year. So there, we are embarking more on the normal course of business, not yet on the accelerated growth path. So if you see the full year numbers, you're not going to see that jump into reaching the billion that we want to reach by 2030 is not going to be a straight line.

It's more going to be -- we need to find our way, and then we're going to very aggressively grow. So that's where we stand on the U.S. So building the capacity and making sure that we have the right footprint and then -- and trying it out, and very carefully looking at it and analyzing it, and then driving the growth.

Ingo, I think, had the next question: The U.S. has a considerably more demanding litigation and compliance environment than Germany. Given Fielmann's history of internal control issues, how confident are you that the company's current compliance framework is sufficiently robust for its expanding U.S. operation?

That's a great question that I don't really relate to because internal control issues, I'm not totally aware of that. We haven't had any product or treatment-related issues in our European footprint. So -- and obviously, we tightened up a little bit on the compliance and regulatory framework in the U.S. But as you all know, who follow us for quite a few time, SVS and Shopko both are in the U.S. -- active in the U.S. business for more than 50 years. We have a very good general counsel and a legal team there, so you can rest assured that we are not losing sleep over that.

Cedric: Steffen and Nils, here are my 2 questions, please. A, the midpoint of the revised adjusted EBITDA guidance implies a circa 5% decline in half year 2. Of the various pressures on profitability, notably retail expansion, unfavorable geo mix and lower operating leverage, which do you expect to be the largest drag on the margins? Rx glasses were up only 2% in half year 1? Correct. I presented that. Likely reflecting softer trends in Germany. Correct. Have you seen any signs of deferred purchases that could lead to pent-up demand in a few quarters? Thanks.

I'll take the first -- take the second question first because it's easier. Well, people are wearing their glasses longer than they used to. The repurchase interval has increased, basically in Germany, for example, by half a year. If you convert all that, somebody took 17% out of the market.

And when you look at ZVA numbers, so the German Association of Opticians, you're going to see that the German market is shrinking in absolute terms. And we're actually holding steady, and that's not too bad in a shrinking market, but it's obviously not what we want to do. So I don't think it's deferred purchases, like, "Damn, I need a new car. I don't want to do it this month. Why don't we do it next year?" Because that's not how purchasing glasses works. I think it's an overall feeling of, "I better be careful with bigger ticket items," and bigger ticket -- other than tourism, and bigger ticket items in -- is a pair of glasses. Because, yes, you can get very, very, very good glasses from us at EUR 19.

But if you are in a, if you want medium quality, progressive lenses, you're talking EUR 300, EUR 400, and that's a lot of money for a lot of people. And they say, well, why don't I wear them a little longer? So we're not going to expect, like this magic switch, that something happens and then everybody floods our stores. Unfortunately, we need to wait for overall consumer sentiment to come back, and that will only happen most likely next year because the GDP recovery that we see in Germany, as small as it is, is not consumer-driven, but it's defense and infrastructure-driven. So that translating into consumer spend is going to take a little longer.

And that's basically the big difference to Spain, where we see that, yes, first quarter was not so great because of weather and a lot of uncertainty. But there, the GDP growth is, a, higher; and b, it's driven also by consumer spend, and that's -- therefore, you have a more direct transition into our P&L. And therefore, we need to hold our horses a little in Germany and open stores and hire the right opticians and do what we do best, which is treat our customers in a nice and great way, and give them the right product at the right price. And then they will come to us as almost 60% of German customers do.

Second, the midpoint -- the second question is the first question. The midpoint of the revised guidance implies a 5% decline. We do have some phasing issues in spend, especially in the biggest portion here is marketing spend. We're probably going to spend, and that pattern, much to your delight, I can assume, but that spend pattern in marketing shifts year-by-year. It's not seasonally stable. But sometimes we say big campaign in the first half year, not so much in the second half year. And then you remember 2 years ago, we didn't do anything in the first half year, and then we did a big brand equity campaign, Your Glasses, in the second half.

This year, we're probably going to spend as much marketing in the last 5 months as we did in the first 7 -- and those effects, those -- some projects that are running and consulting spend and some marketing expenses, that's basically leading to a smaller or lower margin on an EBITDA level than in the first half year or in the first 7 months. First 7 months EBITDA margin is basically the same as in the first 6 months, though. That's great. That's stable, but that might happen, and that's the reason why we updated the guidance. I'd also said, the '22 and the '23, I wouldn't really necessarily look at the midpoint because the '22 take it more as a very, very cautious measure on our end because we just don't know what surprises this year holds for us.

See 2019 incident in Hamburg. Yes, I wasn't here in 2019. So maybe somebody can remind me of what the 2019 incident was. But yes, maybe we take that offline.

Thierry: Steffen and Nils, are the 2030 targets maintained on revenues and margin? And if maintained, is there a higher portion of M&A than before and a lower estimated growth rate organically? When do you expect to start M&A in the U.S.? As you told us, that a series of targets were already identified and it is part of your ramp-up to the EUR 4 billion sales.

Well, in football terms speaking, we're in the 19th minute. This is -- it's still 0-0, but we're not giving up on winning this game. So no, our 2030 targets are fully maintained. It's way too early to translate a temporary demand drip into -- or drop into a long-term doomsday scenario, and therefore, the growth is not going to happen. When do we start? We're planning to start with M&A. Well, probably next year, the year after, but it's going to be very small tuck-ins. If we do something bigger, if we could choose, it would be 2028, 2029. Unfortunately, with M&A, it's not only the buyer who can decide. Sometimes the seller also says, well, now I want to sell. And then we need to look at it and act on it. And that's what we're going to do. But so far, the 2030 target strategy is still intact, and we don't see a reason to change that. And if we do, then we'll let you know.

Thomas: Fielmann's lease payments declined by 11% to around EUR 49 million in the first half, while the store network increased. Can you please provide some information of the drivers of the decline?

The decline is from EUR 58 million to EUR 49 million. I think that's the investing cash flow, right? That's the financing cash flow. Nils sits opposite me. Sorry, when I look like that, I mean, Nils. That we need to take apart for you, and we can post that later on this -- we put an addendum page to the Q2 notifications and post it with the presentation on the website.

And could you please remind us how much total CapEx is being spent on Chomutov, and what the distribution looks like over the years?

Chomutov is about a EUR 75 million investment. And then we're spending about EUR 20 million on top for the operational backbone OVB, which is the full -- we're basically ripping out the full order and supply chain SAP R/3 that we still have and putting in a very modern, standardized S/4 that's going to run all the way to the year 2028, end of 2028. The biggest part in Chomutov is implementing a so-called shuttle, which is a fully automated or an extremely automated warehousing and distribution thing that costs about EUR 40 million. I've been in Chomutov last Thursday, Friday -- last Thursday, and it's actually there and it's standing there. So that part has been spent already. So EUR 40 million of the EUR 70 million has already been spent. The rest is now putting in some glazing. So putting together glasses, some glazing equipment and getting the operations up and running and connecting it to the IT networks and then the OVB as well. And we're going to go live with Chomutov for the -- for our e-commerce by mid next year. And then we are dealing with the brick-and-mortar business for another year, and then we take that live again. And that's basically the spend. So EUR 50 million has been spent in total already on Chomutov and the remaining EUR 40 million we're going to spend over the next 2 years.

Are you able to provide an update on market share dynamics and the competitive environment in the U.S.? Is this evolving in line with your expectation from a year ago or so?

Our growth is still lower than the growth of the Warbys and the Essilors of this world. As I said, at the moment, we are really working on finding the right approach to the market rather than growing aggressively in the U.S. That will take a little bit more time, as I said, the first fully fledged store is now open, including the training. We now have people from Europe on the ground in the U.S., so it's starting. But before we reach out and change things in 225 stores in the U.S., we want to make sure that we do the right thing. And until then, we're growing at 3%, 4% in the U.S., but hope to accelerate that, obviously, from mid -- probably mid-'27 onwards.

There are 6 notifications, but the question is -- these are the old questions.

There are -- there is one last participant with a raised hand. Michael Kuhn. So we still can't hear you.

Doesn't work. I think that sums up our first half year. Yes. Michael, do you want to just type it and then I read it, and then we take it? We can wait.

Growth. Same-store growth versus new opening versus Lux M&A.

As we said on page -- one of the earlier pages in the deck, 1.7% organic growth, 0.6% from Luxembourg. New openings, I don't have that number off the top of my head, but new openings, even 33 -- I mean we have 1,299 stores, adding 33 stores within the first half year, that are not all open on the 1st of January, but over the course of the month is that growth impact is relatively limited. And therefore, I'd say, chop off 0.1% and you're on the safe side.

Profitability impact this year from -- I like that, like bang, bang, bang, spare the niceties. Profitability impact this year from new store openings this year.

Again, so far, H1 numbers that we're talking about, very limited. Typically, as I said, the first year is negative, but we're not losing tons of money on a new store. So again, relatively limited 0.2 percentage point margin at max.

There's a follow up from Mr. Kuhn. Typing his last question. If that's the case, we'll wait a few seconds. And other than that...

All answered. Okay. Well, Ingmar, it's your turn, and then my turn. Sorry.

That was the last question, and that was the last answer by the way. We have no more questions on the line, so this concludes this call for today. Thanks to all the participants for your shown interest in the Fielmann Group. And with this, from my side, I wish you a lovely remaining week and say goodbye and hand over to Mr. Baetjer for some final remarks.

Well, thanks a lot. Hey, everybody, thanks very much for your continued interest in our company. As you know, we're doing whatever we can to grow this company and -- but grow it carefully and not do strange or difficult things. And well, summer is over, so I'm going to see a lot of you probably over the next 2 months in Paris, in Munich and -- or in Frankfurt on these conferences. So stay tuned. And again, thank you very much for your continued interest. Much appreciated, and thanks very much for your questions in this call today. Have a great Thursday.

Good day, ladies and gentlemen, and a warm welcome to today's analyst and investor call of the Fielmann Group AG, following the publication of the financial year figures of 2025 and the first quarter results of 2026.

And with this, I'm happy to hand over to Fielmann's CFO, Steffen Baetjer.

Sarah, thank you very much. Good afternoon, everybody. I'm Steffen. I'm Fielmann's CFO and joined about 3 years ago. I'm very happy to welcome you to our first quarterly results call where we deal with the 2025 results and Q1 '26. I'm super excited and happy to have Marc with me, our CEO and majority shareholder. And without further ado, I hand over to Marc for the intro.

Thanks very much, Steffen. So I think most of you guys know already the Fielmann Group. So I'll just give a very brief summary of our family business. We are the third largest vision care provider worldwide. We count around 30 million active customers who are served by 24,000 fantastic colleagues of ours across the globe. We're operating in our retail markets in Europe and in the U.S., and we also operate manufacturing logistics in Asia.

I think one thing that is particular about Fielmann is a very, very clear focus on customers and patients. We have a 90% customer satisfaction rate, so we do very regular surveys, and that's the number of customers that say that they are happy or very happy with us.

And last year, we reported EUR 2.44 billion in annual total sales. If you look at our market position globally, you can see in the middle, roughly the sales split by major countries.

As you can see, Germany is still by far our largest market with roughly a 60% share. Then the remaining 40% are split in sequence by the U.S., which is our second biggest market. Switzerland is big for us, 10%; Spain, 9%; Austria and then the other European markets account for the rest.

If you look to the right-hand side of this chart, you can see our market position. We are the clear and uncontested market leader in terms of unit sales, all across Central Europe. So we're speaking about countries like Germany, Switzerland, Austria, Slovenia. We're #2 in Eastern Europe, where we have a very strong presence and will achieve market leadership in the long term. And we are #2 in Spain, a market that we have just entered 5 years ago and have grown to become the #2 in 5 years. And we're actually pretty confident that we'll take over market leadership next year and grow a lot further there.

Looking on the left-hand side of this chart, you can see our market position in the United States, a market that we have entered roughly 3 years ago. As you can see, we are the market leader in terms of unit sales in the upper Midwest. So we're talking about states like Michigan and Wisconsin. We also have a strong position in Nebraska, the Dakotas and in Minnesota.

And we are very confident that in the medium term, we'll seize market leadership in additional states of the United States in an area that we call the Greater Midwest. Overall, we have a presence in 17 states.

Just a quick look at our manufacturing and logistics network. So as you might be aware, Fielmann is not only a vision care provider and audiology provider, but we are actually a vertically integrated business. That means we have our own design, product development and manufacturing capabilities. We generally manufacture the glasses and lenses in the markets that we are active in.

We have 2 large facilities in the United States. We have a big facility in Germany, one in Northern Spain, another one in Poland. We're just building up a huge logistics center in Chomutov in the Czech Republic, and we have a major joint venture in Danyang, Danyang being the city in the world that manufactures the most lenses in the world. That's where we run the joint venture.

Having this globally diversified and integrated supply chain obviously allows us to offer very, very, very competitive prices to our customers and patients globally and that being the value proposition that we give to our patients, so really competitive value is obviously one of our key USPs.

And with that, just after a quick introduction of the Fielmann Group, I would hand over to Steffen, who will provide a review of the financial year 2025.

Thank you, Marc. And it's an absolute pleasure for me to talk to you about the financial year 2025 because that was, for us, as a group, a record-breaking year in terms of numbers, so real pleasure to talk about that. Let's talk about top line. Our top line grew by 7.4%. One of the most reliable ways for us to grow our top line is by increasing our store network. We moved from 1,240 to 1,262, so plus 22 stores. That's a net number, so openings and closings.

We actually opened 37 stores across the world last year, 10 of those in Spain, which is a country where we grow a lot, 9 in the U.S., but we also closed quite a few in the U.S. because we are -- in terms of our integration work, we're looking at our store network there, and we cleaned up a bit, 7.4% growth. Top line is great, 3.5% -- of that 3.6% is organic growth, 3.8% is M&A.

The first half year full consolidation of Shopko Optical is the driver here. Looking at those numbers a bit more in detail, currency FX-related movements become a little more important for us as a group, that's why we're showing you in the middle growth numbers at constant currency, which for us is the operational view of the world, so to say.

And then in -- we obviously also show you the numbers in euros because that's our functional currency, and that's what actually ends up in the reported euro P&L numbers. So group grew at 7.8% at constant currency, 7.4% in euros. The 2 big movements were the appreciation of the Swiss franc against the euro and the significant devaluation of the dollar against the euro following Q2 last year.

Looking at those countries a bit more in detail, 4.1% growth in Europe, basically, the GSA region at 4% to 6% growth. Spain, as I said, we love it, 9% growth. All the others, 0.6%, 0.8% in constant currencies. And in euros, that's Italy, that's Czech Republic, that's Poland, et cetera, et cetera. Poland alone grew 11%. So that's another growth market for us. The U.S. grew at 46.7% in dollar terms, 41% in euro terms. That is obviously the first-time consolidation of Shopko of the first half year.

Organically, we grew around 3% in that year. In the U.S., you know that the focus in North America for us was something else than growing, it was more getting ready and building the platform. [ Great ] is also, if you look at the product categories, we not only grow across all countries, we also grow across all product categories. Contact lenses and medical service, the 2 things I want to point out here, very, very strong businesses in the U.S. medical services with all the optical doctors that work for us there, more than 300 of them, and they provide these services, but also the eye checkup in Germany that we -- or in Europe by now that we're providing is a fantastic -- gives us fantastic growth numbers.

Contact lenses, the 9% in the group versus the 3% in Europe is basically driven by the first-time consolidation of the U.S. numbers. If we look at profitability, well, we guided you towards 25% in Europe, 24% adjusted EBITDA in the group. And I think we delivered that at 23.8% and 24.8%. Really happy with the development of the U.S. margins.

The focus was on integrating and getting it to one company. So the U.S. margin growing from 9.9% to just over 16% is a great achievement. Also great is obviously that our adjusted EBITDA grows by 18% when sales only grow by 7.5%, so that's a great sign of operating leverage that this business exhibits, and that's part of our business model, obviously.

Also adjusted EBT and adjusted EBT margin and net results are great, growing at 30% or 33%. Net result at EUR 205 million is actually the highest that we ever recorded and further drives down our earnings per share ratio, so there might be an opportunity for you guys, looking at that. Adjusted EBT margin at 12.8%, also right at where we guided it.

Because this is a full year, we also take a quick look at balance sheet numbers, and we take a quick look at cash flow numbers. All these profitability numbers are exactly as we reported them when we reported preliminary numbers to you. So very happy with that, stable processes. Looking at the balance sheet, you see that our cash position improved quite significantly. That's basically a model of us selling a lot more glasses and hearing aids and medical services.

The important thing is not that we generate that much cash, the important thing is that gives us the financial flexibility. It supports growth. It supports dividends. We can do both. We're really in a very, very good position sitting on that cash and waiting for it to be deployed. Leverage went down from 1.7 to 1.2. That's a function of strong cash and EBITDA growth. This is actually including leases, not just the debt. So including leases at 1.2, we always guided to that we're looking at maximum of 2x. So we're well underway here. Equity ratio increased a bit from 39% to 40%.

That's basically if you have a record profit that goes into equity and drives the balance sheet strength. That also drives our stability and provides -- this capital structure really supports our growth because we have a lot of capital to deploy, and we can put debt on if we want to. So we're ready for what's coming under Vision 35 (sic) [ Vision 2035 ] in terms of growth if we wanted to.

Cash flow, on the other hand, operating cash flow up EUR 86 million, that's higher earnings. It's a continuously strong cash conversion from operating cash flow to EBITDA, almost 90%. We also pulled EUR 16 million positive out of working capital. That's mainly inventory that we drove down. So really getting more and more -- or leaner and leaner on that. But we're still working on 3, 4, 5 months inventory, so just to make sure.

Cash flow from investing activities is now at a normalized level, I'd say, for -- to provide us for capital growth for new stores, modernizations and infrastructure investments. Last year was significantly higher because of the M&A activities. And in the financing activities, you basically see the refinancing, short-term bank loan to finance the Shopko acquisition turned into a long-term Schuldschein, and the lease payments increased also because we grow our business, and therefore, we need to rent stores, and that happens in the financing activities.

So overall, super, super happy with all those numbers, very stable balance sheet, very good cash generation and ready and set and go for growth that's coming.

And with that, I hand back to Marc, who is talking to you about the Vision '25.

Yes. So 2025 was not only a great financial year for us with fantastic numbers that Steffen has just shown to you and elaborated a little bit on, but 2025 was obviously also the conclusion of our Vision 2025. So let's do a quick recap, 3 main strategic pillars.

We took what used to be a fairly traditional family business, and we transformed it into a modern family business. Now don't get me wrong, that traditional business model took us to market leadership in Germany. And so that was a great model for us, but the wishes and demands of our customers have evolved of our people working for and with us and obviously, also of the environment. So that needs a bit different family business culture, and I think we made great headways there.

Secondly, when we started with the Vision 2025, we were mainly a German brick-and-mortar business. I believe we've done a great job in digitalizing that business. Today, we have an omnichannel platform that has around 50 million active users, and we have quadrupled our e-commerce sales in that period, still with very healthy growth in e-commerce as well, just at a level of 4% that shows you how little the overall importance of e-commerce in our businesses.

And yet if you look more into categories like sunglasses or contact lens, it's highly relevant there, and we are very able to compete very, very well there in other categories, such as prescription eyewear. E-commerce stand-alone pure-play is not important, but omnichannel, of course, is very, very important. We see a lot of touch points with our customers even before they enter our stores or practices.

And last but not least, on the internationalization front, we took a German-speaking business, and we truly made it an international business for 4 years now. All of our senior management speaks English. We have diversified our footprint globally and continue to do so. Maybe just a quick look at the numbers as well, so not only on the strategic pillars, we succeeded, but we actually also reached all of our goals and in quite a few cases, even exceeded them.

We wanted to read the exceptionally high customer satisfaction number of 90% of happy or very happy customers did that. Fantastic, great, very proud and grateful to our teams across the globe. We aimed for a 5% CAGR over this period. We actually nearly doubled the growth pace. So instead of the EUR 2 billion in sales that we aim for, we got EUR 2.4 billion, so nearly EUR 1 billion increase over the Vision 2025 period.

And we said we're going to reach a 25% adjusted EBITDA margin. We did that in the original scope, meaning in Europe. Of course, we didn't fully take the U.S. into account that we only acquired 3 years ago. But I think also on a group level, a 24% EBITDA margin is a wonderful result. If you look at nominal operating profit, obviously, that by far exceeded what we originally planned.

And Steffen already mentioned our record net profit, highest in the history of our family business as well. So very, very happy to conclude the Vision 2025 at and above the goals that we set ourselves despite the coronavirus pandemic, despite the Ukraine war and ensuing crisis as a result of increased interest rates and very low consumer confidence. So I think a fantastic job of our people around the world.

Just a quick look at guidance. So Steffen showed you the numbers. Just a quick reminder, that's what we guided. We reached our guidance, so I think we've done that pretty consistently over the last few years. We said we accelerate the growth first. We accelerated the growth first. Then we said we're going to reach our margins. We're going to focus on efficiency. We did that, and that's how we got to the 25% margin. So a big call out to all of our teams across the globe. We're very proud of them. We're very grateful, and it's really them who deliver these numbers.

So it's really a big thank you to all of our loyal customers around the world and our great people over the globe that serve our patients and customers every day in our stores and practices.

And with that, we come to the Vision 2035. So this is the vision that many of you are probably aware of because we presented it at our AGM last summer. I'm just going to give a very fast recap. So our Vision 2035 for the next 10 years is as the most trusted partner for hearing and vision, we redefine comprehensive care globally. What does that mean? Well, first of all, if you look at the lower part of this chart, we have a very solid business in our existing markets in optometry in Europe, big potential there, especially in Eastern Europe and in Spain. So big opportunities.

Secondly, you see the optometry in the U.S. So our single biggest growth driver is optometry in the U.S., where we are growing healthily, but the potential is even significantly bigger. It's the biggest optometry market in the world, standing at around USD 70 billion. Third big growth pillar is the audiology in Europe. So that is obviously our fast-growing audiology business, on average growing 13% over the period of Vision 2025, and we want to accelerate that further to more than double the business in the next 5 years.

And then we have medical services, which is a very exciting field for us that is now firmly established in our group. So optometry and adjacent medical services are becoming more and more important for us. All of this leads to our 5-year goals. We have set ourselves the goals of reaching record high customer satisfaction of 90%, again, which is quite a big challenge, if you think that we acquired some businesses, especially in the U.S. with historically lower customer satisfaction rates.

So a big challenge there to bring those values up and to keep that consistently high level also in Europe. In terms of sales, we're aiming for about EUR 4 billion. We've given the range there. So that's really what we feel is an ambitious but realistic target for the next 5 years. And obviously, we want to keep our high profitability profile and reach around a 25% adjusted EBITDA margin.

And with that, I would hand over to Steffen for the Q1 numbers.

Thank you very much, Marc. Yes, let's talk about Q1. We just published those numbers this morning. Obviously, difficult environment in the first quarter. Iran war, contrary to common belief, not a big issue for us at the moment because, quite frankly, our supply chain is not touched by that. When we look at the Iran war, we're basically more concerned about secondary and tertiary effects, like increasing oil prices lead to inflation, lead to lower consumer sentiment. But at the moment, that is not helpful, don't get me wrong, but it's not -- it doesn't have a direct impact on us.

But weather was a big problem and strikes was a big problem. So if we look at the business performance across our -- the 3 main regions in which we operate, you see Germany, lots of strikes in the first 2 months. Winter was really, really harsh in Germany, really shutting down parts of the major cities for quite an extended period. So IMF forecast has been downgraded for Germany to 0.8% growth. So for us, on the short-term horizon, that's an unchanged red arrow downwards for the Germany economy.

So it was good that we actually embarked 5 years ago on internationalizing the business. Europe, slightly different, but also there, difficult weather. Spain saw torrential rain. Poland, really, really cold, really, really a lot of snow, but slightly higher growth dynamic. IMF forecast for Europe, 1.1%, for Spain, which is a more relevant country for us in Europe, 2.1%. So that gives us a kind of neutral yellow arrow to the side.

And then the U.S., and yes, it sounds like excuses, but really significant -- the Great West or the Midwest is really, really known for harsh winters, but this was, even by their standards, a very harsh winter. There were times when we couldn't open dozens of our stores just because we physically couldn't open the door.

So overall -- but even there, spring has arrived. So that's over -- overall, a more robust growth dynamic at 2.3% for this year forecasted. So that's a yellow arrow to the side. So overall, Iran war, not such a big issue, but weather and strikes was really difficult for us in January and February. March already looked a lot better.

Did we deliver? We opened -- since Q1 2025, we opened 43 stores in total. Alone this year, so since January '26, we opened 20 stores, 10 in Luxembourg through an acquisition and then 5 in the U.S. and then Spain, Poland, Germany, across the globe, we basically opened stores. And that's our increased growth dynamic that we're embarking on this year.

So we're adding a lot more to our network. Revenue grew at 2.3% at constant currency to a reported EUR 613 million. Let's look at the individual countries. Again, constant currency in the middle, reported figures on the right-hand side, you see the difference of 1 percentage point, and that's basically the U.S. dollar devaluation.

Numbers are a little smaller than what we saw last year, but still positive across the board. GSA in the 2, 3 percentage range. Austria really hit by bad weather, but also we took the downtime because, as you know, December is not -- is a low season month for us. We take those months to basically refurbish a few stores, and that reached into the January, February period as well, so 1% to 3% in GSA, Spain, torrential rain, still 5% growth; others, 9%, that's the Luxembourg acquisition.

And then in the U.S., 2.2% in dollar terms, minus 8.1% in euro terms, and that's the dollar devaluation against that started in Q2 last year. So not a lot we can do about that. On the contrary, profitability really, really intact. '24 -- we had a very good -- those who have been with us for much longer, we had a really, really good Q1 last year, and we're actually matching those numbers on a profitability level.

100 -- slight increase in total adjusted EBITDA margins basically on the same level as last year at 24.3% and 25.7%. U.S. at 13.8%, just a touch below Q1 2025 numbers. Obviously, we wanted to improve that profitability. But the lower demand or the inability of our customers to reach our stores because of snow, part with us really improving and increasing doctor coverage in most of our stores led to this effect that is basically setting us up for more growth in the month to come.

And as I said, March already looked a lot better, so let's hope this continues into the year. Adjusted EBT and net results also in line with last year's results. So given circumstances, very happy with the results. Total consolidated sales a little on the low side, profitability definitely where we want it to be.

And with that, we come to the outlook for 2026 and share with you our guidance for this year. But because Craig is such a good friend, and we put some one slide in there just to answer his question. He basically said, "Hey, if you only grow by 2%, but you want to guide us to 5% to 7%, how do you want to do that?" There are 3 levers to that. Number one, we're going to -- we are expanding exam availability, mainly in the U.S. So having ODs in the U.S. is the first gatekeeper.

If you can't get an eye exam, you're not going to buy a pair of glasses from us. Secondly, we increased productivity. We talked a lot about that over the last 15 months in terms of what we do on that. It's AI-based automated refraction. It's better store planning where we match the demand of our customers and our working schedules and then accelerate expansion. So we're aggressively going to move into opening more stores.

And as you saw, we already added 20 stores this year net, and that's about as many as we entered or added last year to our store network. So those are the 3 levers. And with better weather, we're going to be very, very sure that we see an improved growth dynamic across the board. So for this year, we're guiding you on customer satisfaction, we want to keep that number at the high level of around 90%. And that's, for us, the most important KPI because it speaks to the longevity of our business model.

Total consolidated sales shall grow at about 5% to 7% year-on-year. So that gives us -- lands us at about EUR 2.55 billion to EUR 2.60 billion. Adjusted EBITDA should be -- we will keep the margin around 23%. And as you all know, we're adding a lot more new stores. New stores are initially always loss-making because they don't address the full customer potential. Therefore, a slight decline in the EBITDA margin for this year as we announced last year at the Capital Market Day. So somewhere between EUR 590 million and EUR 610 million. Adjusted EBT margin should be in line broadly with last year, 12% to 13%.

That's our guidance. I know I read the comments, obviously, that some of you feel a little underwhelmed with that. But looking at the environment and looking at where we stand in the world and what we're doing, we have great plans. We're ready to grow. We have the capital, we have the knowledge, we have the footprint, and we're going to execute on that. So let's see how it turns out.

And with that, I open up to your questions, and thank you very much. Craig, we already did one of your questions. So if you all can limit yourself to 2 questions, we have 55 people on the call. So everybody, maximum of 2 questions, please.

[Operator Instructions] And then we will start with the questions from Mr. Rossi. So please go ahead.

So the first one is regarding the U.S. market. So a few weeks ago, you announced the creation of your U.S. Optometry Advisory Board. So I was -- could you provide more color on how this Board will help you to better serve your U.S. customers there? So I think it's going to be interesting to have your view on that. And my second question, so you alluded to the German consumer sentiment, but -- so no signs of a deterioration so far. But I was curious to have your view on how resilient the German consumer is now compared to 2022 during the last major inflationary phase. According to you, do you feel that the consumer is now better prepared to cope with a volatile macro environment?

Thank you very much for your questions. So first, the U.S. market. So as most of you guys are aware, the regulatory landscape and also the professional structure is a little bit different in most of Continental Europe compared to the U.S. So in Europe, we basically have opticians and master opticians taking care of everything but the medical part. And then you have the ophthalmologist that takes care of the medical part.

And we're using telemedicine to bridge that gap and work closer together in Europe. In the U.S., we actually have doctors on site. So we actually do provide medical services in store in our practices. And those optometrists have a very high degree of training. So they can not only issue prescriptions for eyewear or contact lenses, but they can also prescribe medication and do treatments there.

The main goal of the setup of this optometry board is to address the most important growth lever in the United States, which is the exam capacity and the availability of optometrists. So this has a twofold goal. The one goal is really to define a medical strategy and to define the medical scope that we provide. We are very clear that we will not be an aggressively full medical provider. But at the same time, we will also not just be an optical retailer in the U.S.

We actually will provide comprehensive medical care in the United States, pretty similar to Europe, where we're working with a hub-and-spoke model, meaning that we will not provide extensive medical care in every facility, but we're using our dense store network in Europe, practice network in the United States to refer patients that have additional medical needs, especially to those locations where we then also improve our scope of practice.

And that's really an exciting field in the United States, something that our doctors are very passionate about. So we really will bring and combine productivity and efficiency in the exam lane with an extended scope in the medical care.

So many people consider this a contradiction, we actually think it's very complementary. If we free up time for our optometrists, if we can be more productive in exams, for example, by adding skilled trained opticians that can do pretesting and that take up time, take out time, precious time, that our optometrists now spend on administrative work, then that's really time that we can use for additional exams and we can use for additional medical service, and that's something that our doctors really care about in the United States.

To your second question, the German consumer sentiment, so I think there have been publications there that actually say that the German consumer is more resilient. I'm not an economist or an expert of German consumer confidence. I've seen that the German consumer confidence has retreated slightly, translated to the German optical industry.

I can definitely report that there has been some hesitation when it comes to repurchase cycles. So I think an important part for our industry and for us specifically to make sure that we match -- or we manage the repurchase cycles. For us, of course, we benefit from consumers looking for value offerings.

So as the price leader, we obviously have a big opportunity at gaining additional market shares. That's something that we managed in the last 5 years. That's something that we managed last year. And as per our numbers, we feel that specifically also in Germany, we will be extending our market shares this year as well. So to our current information, we're significantly outperforming the German market with the numbers that we have right now. I hope that answered your questions.

Thank you so much. And then we will move on with the next question. So it's from Craig Abbott. He would like to know the sales guidance implies a clear acceleration in sales, the remainder of the year, 6% to 7%. Apparently, the investments you have been making are starting to pay off. Could you provide some color on what underlines your confidence in achieving this?

I think, Craig, we answered that question already with that slide saying we're basically adding more -- we grew in our core market, GSA 4% to 6% last year, and we're actually accelerating the growth pace by adding more stores. Number two, we're adding exam capacity, mainly in the U.S., which will help us. And after all the integration work, we're now ready to embark on a growth trend in the United States.

We're continuing to increase productivity of our opticians and of our optometrists. And thirdly, we're really embarking on opening more stores, and that should drive sales. As I said, this year alone, we added almost as many stores on a net level as we did for the full year last year, and that's going to continue.

In our meetings, I talked about that in Spain, for example, we're going to go from 10 stores to 25 to 30 stores this year alone. So that's the growth dynamic why we're confident around the 5% to 7% growth rate.

And maybe if I can add one thing, we are not only going to add exam capacity, we have already added exam capacity in the United States, and that was met with soft demand by very temporary weather effects, as we alluded to. So I mean, in Wisconsin, we had 3 feet of snow. That's why Steffen literally you couldn't get into the store, not even anywhere near to it. We are pretty confident that with that additional exam capacity and weather obviously having improved already from March onwards that obviously, the demand is there. U.S. consumers, U.S. patients on average wait 16 days for an eye exam. In rural areas, they wait months for an eye exam. So when you add exam capacity, that translates into demand. So that's why we are pretty confident that as now weather has normalized that we can also capture this additional growth, especially in the United States.

And then you will also see a normalization and improvement in the EBITDA margin because now what you saw in the EBITDA margin in the U.S. was soft demand on an already improved exam capacity that obviously drives up the cost base there because it was prepared for a higher demand that only temporarily didn't come, but is coming now.

Thank you so much. So the next question is from Harrison Woodin. So on the expectations for rebranding in the U.S., will new U.S. stores bear the Fielmann banner? What will be the branding transition look like?

Thanks very much for this very important question. We are actually now in the transformation phase. So as we have said in the past, '24, '25 with the integration phase, we have moved all of our banners into one Fielmann USA organization. So even now as we operate under SVS Vision and Shopko Optical, they all use the same systems. They all use the same core processes. In the next step, we are now transforming the business. We are actually piloting right now the Fielmann brand in a few stores. And with that, we are piloting our new offerings.

We will take the time that we need to make sure that we have a superior customer experience. I think we have alluded to that in the past that we'll feature readily available exam availability. So especially in regions where people wait for weeks or sometimes months for exams, that's a great USP to be able to say in 48 hours, you do get an exam guaranteed.

Secondly, we will have a huge selection of glasses fully covered by the vision insurances. Again, I think that's another really cool USP. And the third one will be really a transparent patient experience where people are -- can fully understand what they are paying for if they pay out of pocket. And those are the 3 big changes that we are piloting. We've introduced new products, new technology, new services into the practices that we're piloting in. We're iterating it.

And once we feel confident that the customer experience and patient experience is really superior, we will roll it out to further stores. That will take this year, I would suppose. And then the pace of transformation and introducing it to other practices will depend, obviously, on the success of the pilot that we're running right now.

Thank you so much. And his second question is, can you quantify the productivity improvements, especially in the U.S. so far? Can you break down the revenue drivers for price, volume mix? Is Fielmann brand outperforming other branded frames?

Well, don't really -- Harrison, don't really want to turn this into a modeling call. So your best source to go to is Nils. AOVs in the U.S. have been relatively stable and growth mainly comes from more sales basically and a slight increase in sellout structure, which is for us more important than the price increases, as you know. So improving the quality, selling more multifocal, that's basically the way we're going, and that's the same in the U.S. as it is in Europe.

And then we have a virtual hand from [ Diana Gomez ]. So you should be able to speak now.

Could I ask in terms of the guidance for the 5% to 7% revenue growth, would you be able to share with us what's your expectation in terms of the currency impact? And in terms of the U.S. margin improvement through the year, could you give us a little bit more color in terms of the shape of that trajectory and the implied sequential, say, deceleration in terms of the margin through the year? Should we think about it more due to the fact that you have the store openings coming through, or is there something else that we should keep in mind?

Sure. Diana, good to talk to you again. Hello. Why don't I take those 2 questions. The 5% to 7% growth and the FX impact, we're modeling on a constant -- well, constant U.S. dollar to euro exchange rate. It's now -- it stands at about 1.18. I think the last time I checked, which is about a few days ago, the forward for the end of the year was around that area. So we're implying, as we say in all our documents, read the fine print, we're saying the U.S. dollar euro exchange rate should be stable for the remainder of the year, which basically means it's also for Q2, Q3, Q4 in line with last year.

On the margins, that's a tricky question. The U.S. margins were a little softer than we wanted it to be because, as Marc said, we increased doctor capacity, which costs money, personnel expenses, and we had a little softer demand than anticipated. So that's not good for margin in our business, as you know. The really, really, really good news of this quarter is that our gross profit margins, so cost of goods sold is very stable and slightly improving over time. So we do see that we have a big resilience on the gross profit margin. Everything that happened to the margin is basically happening on the personnel expenses.

So as soon as demand picks up, we will be seeing an increase in the U.S. margins as well. And that should happen over the next -- over this quarter really because I spoke with Wisconsin yesterday. And yesterday, it was, yes, raining, but it was above 32 degrees Fahrenheit, which is good news for them.

And sorry, one last thing on that. Just a reminder, you all know that, but contrary to our European business, the U.S. business has the strongest sales in Q4 because everybody wakes up in December and thinks, oh, I still need to get my pair of glasses for this year. So the big margin improvement in the U.S. typically comes in Q4.

Which is because of the insurances, you get your insurance reimbursement. And if you don't use it in the last quarter, you obviously lose it for that year.

Thank you. So the next question comes from Mr. [indiscernible]. Congrats for the great margin lift up in all your major markets. But what needs to happen in order to lift Germany's and Austria's EBT margins back up to or close to 2018, 2019 levels? And what would be a realistic time frame?

Well, we don't anticipate. Our guidance says for this year as well -- for this year, we're guiding to 23%. In our target 2030, we say 25% for the group. Germany, Austria, Switzerland make up a big part of our business. So we're not targeting the 28%, 29%, 30% that we saw in the past. We are continuously investing where even in Germany, this year, we're going to open 15, 1-5 new stores. So that has a little drag on margins as well. So we don't have a plan to increase to 28%, 29% overall because our guidance for the group is 25%.

Thank you. And Mr. [indiscernible] would like to know, you mentioned an improvement environment in March compared to January and February. Can you give more details regarding the growth rates during this month? And has this trend continued into April?

Yes, we could, but we don't because, as you know, we are reporting quarterly numbers. We don't report monthly figures, just take my word. January, February were not good. March was a lot better. But we don't break it by month end drivers.

Next question, please, can you quantify the exit rate for the quarter or give us an understanding of the improvement seen in growth during March?

Same answer. We don't guide or give details on individual months. I think that would be over detailed. We're reporting quarters, and take my word, march was a lot better.

All right. And then we have a question. I think we already covered a bit. So the number of trainees has been declining gradually in the past 5 years. To what extent is this reflection of personnel [ infinity ] of your stores structurally declining as the various in-store tooks, like AI engaged refractory equipment reduced the average time per customer? Or is it simply a reflection of a shrinking talent pool? And if so, to what extent might this become a growth hindrage?

I think the major change in the last few years has been that the labor market slightly -- I want to say, slightly changed to our favor from a labor market that was really reflective of a lack of skilled labor. Now with economic weakening of Germany stagnation, rising unemployment, it is really a situation where the labor market is becoming a little bit more favorable for employers, like ourselves. As you already imply, we have enacted and continue to enact quite a lot of measures that drive productivity. The most recent one is the AI-based self-refraction. So this is not replacing the opticians core competency in refraction, but it is significantly accelerating the process at the same or better quality and the same or better customer satisfaction.

At the same time, another big driver was and remains our technology, also AI-based that we use to match capacity of labor in our stores in Europe with the customer footfall. So generally, the challenge is not that we have tons of stores where we don't get people, but the big challenge is always to have the people at the right place at the right time where there's the patient footfalls or scheduling and appointment systems help a lot there.

And another big lever on productivity has been a continued centralization of our glazing. So we're really centralizing and bringing the manufacturer of glasses into our own supply chain instead of making a lot of glasses in the individual stores. That's another big driver for productivity and also one that will continue quite a bit.

So little bit less labor needed. Still, I think, big perspectives and potentials for opticians in Germany, especially as we extend into the medical services, really adding a lot of new tasks and roles to our opticians, but the labor market developing a little bit more into our favor, and that is amplified by the productivity gains that we have seen and where we also still see potentials.

Thank you. And then Mr. [indiscernible] would like to know, could you talk to the competitive environment in the U.S. and also where you see a customer satisfaction level in the U.S. today relative to Europe? Is this improving?

Yes. So mid-single digits lower customer satisfaction rates in the companies that we took over that I would label as very solid companies in terms of the customer experience. We didn't acquire them solely because they were best-in-class in terms of their customer experience, but we acquired those companies specifically because of their dense store networks and their great positions with insurances.

So they really are also in a lot of positions where insurances are great partners that love to work with us. When you have one store in New York, one in Los Angeles and one in Florida, where a lot of other optometrists are, that doesn't make you very favorable with insurances. If you have a lot of practices in locations that are generally labeled health deserts or rural areas, you're much more favorable among insurances.

So having said that, we are in the right spot in the U.S. market. That's generally where there is a lower competitive environment, and that's also where we're going to continue to play, so specifically in the Greater Midwest. That's a very different competitive environment to, say, downtown New York City or L.A. or Miami. And that's where we feel very comfortable and where we will continue to expand and where we feel a lot of value can be added to the customer experience.

I've visited a lot of our practices there. And when you go to rural Minnesota or rural Nebraska or rural Wisconsin, there's not really a lot of people out there. So I think we're really doing a great job in improving the accessibility and affordability, not only of eyewear products, but also of the eye care there, and that's definitely something that we will continue to do.

Thank you. And then we have a follow-up question from Diana again.

Could you share with us the progress you have made in the progressive lenses space? I know it was one area where you were aiming to train the personnel in the store to be able to increase that product mix. And if I could squeeze one more in, in terms of smart or AI glasses, are you seeing any impact on the product mix from that as well?

Great questions, Diana. Thank you very much. So highly relevant question because the improving sales mix, especially in progressive lenses has actually been one of the biggest drivers of our EBITDA margin success story. So we said we're going to grow in Europe to 25% adjusted EBITDA margin. We did. And one of the most successful measures was really exactly what you mentioned. So really training our teams, making customers aware and then being able to see also the sell-through of progressive lenses.

So a far more complex product, product that takes more time, a product that really also requires more expertise, and we're super happy that we were able to deliver it. So yes, we set ourselves the goals to really improve this share, and we managed to improve that share, still upside, and that's also one of the drivers that we still see continuing in the coming years, especially in our mature markets.

With regards to smart glasses, so we've been following that topic, I would say, for nearly a decade. So you might remember Google Glass and so on. In my experience or my observation, smart glasses come and go in waves. So there's always these waves of excitement. We've seen multiple waves in the last decade of moving up and then it totally crashed and nobody bought smart glasses. I think now we see the first time a wave where smart glasses are here to stay. I believe that's the consensus in the industry.

So smart glasses have established themselves as a category. For now, in my personal view, smart glasses, I see them a little bit like sports sunglasses. So for me, right now, they are a category. We do offer smart glasses in around 150 stores and practices across our network. If they would be highly attractive, meaning if a lot of consumers would ask for them, we would have added them to all of our stores. So this speaks a little bit to the importance in the overall sales mix.

If I look at our store network specifically, you can see a very divergent demand pattern. So you can really see that different markets, such as the U.S. or different, let's say, regions, such as metropolitan regions, such as Detroit, where we operate a lot of stores in the Detroit metro area, this is really where you can see a lot of demand. In other markets, such as GSA, German-speaking regions, or also in other regions, let's say, if you go more to rural areas, I think customers still struggle with finding the use cases for it.

Maybe also interesting for you, I've just been to China last week to look at the landscape there. I visited the first smart glasses only store in Shenzhen metropolitan area. And I was speaking there with some optical retailers and asked them about the importance of smart glasses. So you really have a lot of technology companies betting on it.

Actually, China is a little bit further ahead, if you ask me in terms of the use cases that they provide. They have simultaneous translation. So you're basically having something like subtitles in your glasses. And those glasses, I think, will take another 1.5 to 2 years to come to the Western world because of the ecosystems. They currently only operate in the Chinese ecosystems, but it's only a question of time until those will come as well.

The optical retailers there that already have them, so that already have more advanced smart glasses, they are currently seeing a low single-digit share, and they expect it to rise maybe to 10%, and that's currently my perception as well. Our focus at Fielmann is to be ready, be it that they remain at a low single-digit share, they go to 10% or they go even to the high double -- or to the significant double digits as some others predict.

We are ready for that. We are offering smart glasses of all major brands in our store network, whatever works, we roll out. And obviously, a big field that we see is obviously the glazing, so providing the optical lenses and working with strategic partners because once you move from the camera glasses that you have today, meaning the lenses are completely normal, they are transparent into the display smart glasses or what they also call XR glasses, extended reality glasses, that gets very, very complex in terms of lenses.

It gets complex in terms of regulatory environment because those are medical products. And that's again something we feel very comfortable about, and we are working very closely together with some strategic partners to provide solutions there. So if you want to have screens in your glasses, that's, let's say, like a totally different level of complexity, but a very exciting future ahead.

So I think smart glasses is very exciting. Right now, they are a category. They are not a wearable yet. They might become a wearable, but it's a long way until they can replace smart glasses. All of this is possible. For now, they're a category, and I have yet to see the super convincing use cases that may make them a wearable. In metropolitan areas, some consumers in big U.S. metro areas and in some cities, like Barcelona and Southern Spain, we do sell them quite well, but generally not a mega trend yet for us.

Thank you. And then we have one question left from Mr. [indiscernible]. Could you please comment on the competitive landscape in Germany? You mentioned that you keep gaining market share, but has the pricing pressure increased? Last year, there was news on eyes + more is planning to expand aggressively in Germany. How has this impacted your business?

Well, I might be a little bit biased, but I would feel that Germany is the most competitive market for optometry and optical retail in the world. We are offering a free eye exam plus a full pair of glasses individually manufactured for EUR 18.90. I haven't found that, not even in China or other places in the world, at least not for the same and comparable product. So I think we are already the fiercest and most competitive market in the world.

As you mentioned, with 57% unit sales market share, I think we are managing quite well in that market, which is why we also love other markets that are a little bit less competitive and which is why we are very happy to grow there, but as we have shown in the last 5 years, as we have shown last year, and I feel also as we will show this year, we can not only survive, but also thrive in the most competitive market to us in the world.

And really last question from Mr. [indiscernible]. I would be interested to hear management thoughts on capital allocation, more specifically potential share repurchases, given your confidence in the long-term outlook, the strong cash position discussed earlier on the call and what appears to be a discounted valuation on the stock?

Well, no plans to do any share repurchases at the moment. And we're very happy to accumulate that cash. We're very happy to pay a great dividend to our great shareholders. And we're very happy that we are ready to act on M&A opportunities as they might arise. For us, no process running currently. But if they arise, we're very happy to be able to act on them very, very quickly and very convincingly. And I think that's part of my job description to provide our business with the opportunity to move and grow in all possible directions, and that's what we're doing.

Thank you. And this answer concludes our call for today. So thank you for your shared interest in the Fielmann Group. And with this, we wish you a lovely remaining week and say Goodbye.

Thank you. Goodbye.

Bye.

Good day, ladies and gentlemen, and a warm welcome to today's earnings call of the Fielmann Group AG following the publication of the Q3 financial figures of 2025. I'm happy to hand over to Fielmann's CFO, Steffen Baetjer.

Thank you very much, Ingmar, and also a warm welcome from me from very, very exceedingly sunny Hamburg, which is a rare occasion. So we really should be outside and not sitting in here and doing the call. But obviously, it's a pleasure for us to present to you our 9-month figures and our Q3 results in this call following, as Ingmar said, the presentation and the release of the publication this morning.

Well, here's the -- Tobias, we're not so fast yet. We can't do questions now, but we do the questions at the end. So disclaimer, very important, obviously, for you to take note of that, should you listen to the recording. But with that, let's go to our 9 months and Q3 numbers in a nutshell. You're going to hear from me a lot about expectations and within expectation because really what we do, and I think what we stand for in terms of the dialogue that we're having with you guys and on the investor and analyst side is that we walk the talk.

So we're not a stock that super overperforms. We try to be not a stock that super underperforms. And therefore, you're going to see a lot of -- it's within expectation. The focus, remember, for this year is that we're really focusing on profitability, and we really want to change the profile, the profitability profile of Fielmann Group for good so that we have a more flexible P&L structure, and we can actually reap the benefits of that going forward.

Coming to our group sales, they increased by plus 9%. 4% of that is organic, 5% from the U.S. acquisition. You remember that in July 2024, we, for the first time, consolidated Shopko. So this is the effect of the first half year. In Q3 alone, there is only organic growth because we didn't do any acquisitions, and that's why the growth rate is slowly coming down, and we always guided that we expect for the group an organic growth of 4%, 5%, 6%.

So 4% within the expectation, as I said, within the framework that we presented to you, obviously, not at the upper end, but more on the lower end of that, but still within that guidance that we provided to you. Q3 at constant currency grew by 4%, all of which organic, as I said, U.S. grew 4%, Europe grew 4%. Very proud about that, that the U.S. returned to growth path. We had a lot of discussions, a lot of questions from you, what's going on in the U.S. and why is the growth a little sluggish?

And I explained that, that we're in the middle of a business model transformation, which is still ongoing, but very happy about us having returned to growth pattern there, and we come to that a little later. Relentless focus on profitability. And when every word -- as you can imagine, every word in this presentation is very carefully chosen. Relentless is exactly what we mean, a relentless focus on profitability. This organization has been working for the last 2 years to bring our profitability back up to where we think it should be.

Adjusted EBITDA up 18%, adjusted EBT also up 20%. So that has been the primary focus of what we're doing. And what I'm especially proud of is we managed to flexibilize costs that were previously deemed to be fixed costs like personnel expenses. And therefore, we have become -- we have gotten a much better and sustainably better P&L structure.

Adjusted EBITDA margins are exactly where they should be. We always said group 24%; Europe, 25%; the U.S. at 14%, not quite where we expected it for this year, but we changed our outlook for the U.S. and said, look, it's going to be more around the mid- to high teens than the 19%. And I think that still holds true. Adjusted EBT margin also improving compared to prior year. So very happy about that.

As already said, U.S. platform regained growth momentum, 4% year-on-year in U.S. dollar terms. And all that while we're changing the business model, which is a lot of preparation, takes a lot of attention from a lot of people on running a business at the same time building up doctor capacity because that's really what's missing.

And then at the same time, thinking about what should be our presentation of SVS and Shopko, our Fielmann USA business in the future that takes a lot of thinking and it's very difficult to do it all at the same time, but we obviously have to. As I said, we didn't manage so well in the first half year. But in Q3, we actually went back to growth. So we manage a little better. Our outlook for 2025, we're confirming.

On revenue, it's very simple. We're going to -- we have the 25% rule. So really, Q4 is typically around 24%, 25% of our yearly revenue. So if we multiply that all out, we get to the nearly EUR 2.5 billion. We're looking at EUR 2.450 billion, [ EUR 2.4 low 60s billion ] maybe for year-end. So there, we are confident that we are within that framework of nearly EUR 2.5 billion. And sellout structure, we're improving. We've optimized our personnel expenses. We're pretty cost conscious on overheads and that will drive margin expansion also in Q4.

So given that we have about -- among those personnel expenses and consulting and marketing, we have like a EUR 30 million saving more or less for Q4 compared to prior year. So we expect that the margin trend that we've seen so far during this year will be stable for the remainder of the year, and that's why we are confirming our outlook for 2025.

Let's go to the next page. These numbers are basically very happy and still very happy looking at it. Organic growth, as I said, 4%, 9% reported numbers, including the first consolidation of Shopko for half a year. EBITDA growth is great. EBT growth is great. Margins are within what we said. And as I said, we have built a better, more flexible P&L structure, which is going to help us for the future.

Let's look at sales in a bit more detail. Sales at around EUR 1.842 billion for the year so far, as I said, 25% -- that's around 75% for the year. So we're going to hit our guidance, albeit at the lower end of it. The 9% growth, I already dwelled on. So why don't we move on and look in more detail. Again, we have a growth across all product categories. These are reported numbers, so not organic numbers, 7% in eyewear, 9% in audiology, which you know is for the future, a big growth topic for us.

We were looking at -- we built our own business unit for audiology and really driving that as a real business unit with P&L profitability responsibility and all that. Sunglasses, probably a low-margin business for us or a lower-margin business for us. So still at 5%.

Contact lenses. In Europe, not so interesting. In the U.S., a very interesting business, 13%, 3% of that is organic, just so that you know. And obviously, adjacent healthcare services, which are the Eye Health Checkup in Europe and the optometrist services that we provide to the communities in the United States. All that is obviously growing because of our Shopko Optical consolidation. So very happy. We're growing across our product categories. And we're also growing across our main markets. So Germany, a little lower. We come to that when we talk about Q3, but a little lower than we would have hoped for. The U.S., obviously doing great. That is a consolidation effect. We come to that as well. And then Spain, still growing strong.

I mean bigger and bigger and bigger and bigger business, and they just maintain this 8%, 9%, 10% growth pattern, which is really great and keep the margin stable, which is fantastic. Spain -- sorry, Switzerland and Austria also doing great. We've been active there for many, many years and that's our plan for our German business as well once the economy recovers.

Poland. Also Poland is something that we're looking at for the next growth horizon also doing great at 14%. And then we have all the others that are also growing, which is quite nice. We excluded here compared to the report our Belarus operations that we discontinued 1st of January this year.

Looking at profitability for the group. We increased our margins by 1.7 percentage points on the 9 months compared to the prior year, which we like. The drivers are exactly what we told you, and that's why I'm saying it's -- yes, it's -- we walk the talk, and we do what we talk about. And you see it all within expectation. We have a favorable sellout structure. Those who have been with us for more than one call know that we always talk about that so that increases the gross margin. We have optimized our personnel costs or the deployment of our personnel in the shops, matching more the customer flow with our available opticians that really has a big impact on our margin.

And then we have operating leverage in other operating expenses we're also saving. And then we have a few effects in other costs and booking of currency factors, et cetera, et cetera that have a detriment effect on our margin. But overall, 1.7 percentage points, so almost 2 percentage points growth. That's second year in a row where we're growing at that speed, which we really like.

Looking at the individual countries. You know that picture. European margin at 9 months '25 at 24.8%. So very, very, very close. So there at the 25%, 24.8% is very close to 25%. U.S. margin doubled compared to 9 months prior year, almost to 14%, but definitely not where we would have expected it and wanted it. But as I said so many times to you, it's all homemade and it's being addressed, and that's great that we can change this. Adjusted EBT also at -- growing at 20% and the margin increasing by 1.1 percentage points. So overall, within expectation, happy with the numbers, happy that we're able to deliver what we promised to you.

Now let's look at Q3 in a bit more detail because Nils and I figured that you're going to ask some questions about that. There was a lot going on in Q3. So we did a little buildup for you just to explain it to you. So if we look at it at constant currency, which is important because the U.S. is now our second largest market. And obviously, the U.S. dollar is all over the place and it's going more south than north.

And so if we look at it at constant currency, we see a 12% growth for the group. We see -- of that, we see a 4% growth in organically, and we do see in -- that's half year 1. And in Q3, we also see a 4% growth. So, so far, for half year 1 and for Q3 are totally in line within our corridor of 4%, 5%, 6% organic growth that we announced for this year, albeit, as I said, at the lower end of it.

Why is that so? Well, let's look at our 2 biggest markets, Germany and the United States. Germany growing in H1 still at 5% at Q3 at 2%. That's definitely not within our corridor of expectations. We mentioned some of the reasons. Weather in August was really an extreme. We had heat waves and heat warnings in major parts of Germany. If it's super hot, then people, especially older people who buy hearing aids and progressive lenses and all that do not leave the home and nobody goes into the city center to go for shopping.

We've seen that the consumer sentiment was not great in Q1, picked up in Q2 and then really started diving again in Q3. So the disappointment with the German economy, the disappointment, I think, with the German -- new German government that was established within Q2 really taken hold of the population. Everybody was hoping for change for the better after 3.5 years of that coalition that we had before that, that didn't prove to be -- to show yet hopefully.

And therefore, consumer sentiment went back to where it was in Q1. And so we're faced with this slowing and especially when consumer sentiment goes down, people become a little more careful than when it's actually down. And then we obviously also talk to all of our lenses providers. We are actually performing in line with the market. So it's not us, it's the market. So we see a general demand weakness in the German glasses and spectacles and lenses market in Q3. And as I said, especially in August. September was actually pretty good.

For the U.S., well, you see H1 that not taken into effect, obviously, the consolidation number. The growth -- the organic growth in the U.S. was very, very little, somewhere between 0 and 1-point-something percent. So we're very happy being back at 4% in Q3. Obviously, it's great to be back at 4%. Obviously, that's not what we're aiming for. We're aiming more for the 7% to 10% growth ranges in the United States, but we do it step-by-step and quarter-by-quarter because remember, we are changing the business model at the same time and preparing.

And for us, having spent all that money on those acquisitions is a lot more important to get the business model transformation right and be ready for growth in -- during next year than having a great Q3 in 2025. Now unfortunately, there's something that we can't really influence and that's the U.S. dollar. So if you look at that slide that I just presented to you in actually converted euro terms, which is our functional currency, you see that the left-hand side, so the 12% and the 4% is totally unchanged. The 4% that we showed you for Q3 as a group went down to 3%.

Germany is obviously unchanged because we're doing euros. And the U.S. dropped year-on-year growth in Q3 from plus 4% to minus 3% because the U.S. dollar in Q1 was $1.05. In Q2, it was $1.13. And in Q3, it was $1.17. So almost a 10% depreciation of the U.S. dollar against the euro. And that's something that we just have to take and that we can't really compensate for because we're not going to grow -- we're not going to outgrow a devaluation of that sort, but we hope that everything will settle and that the dollar will return to its former strength.

If we then look -- so that basically these 2 trends. So Germany, mainly the weather and the consumer sentiment, which dampened demand in Q3 across the optical industry, plus the U.S. dollar development for the U.S. that really explains why growth in Q3 was a little subdued to what we have seen in the first half quarter. If we look at the other countries, you see that overall, all markets together really accelerated the growth compared to H1.

So Spain, you can't see it here, but it's like a point-something acceleration of growth. Switzerland, very, very visible; Austria, very visible; and all the other countries also. And if you measure it all up, then you see it's Germany and the U.S. and the rest is developing as it should be, and we're very happy with an accelerated growth trend in those countries. That's really what I can tell you about Q3 revenue development or sales development.

If we look at EBITDA, you see that 24.2% is our profile for this -- for Q1; 23.2% in Q2; slightly higher in Q3, 23.4%. And we continue to be working on the sell-out structure. We continue to be working on our optimized personnel deployment. We're still working on cost-conscious overheads. All these are tried and tested measures that we're going to implement also in Q4 and that's why we confirm our outlook, as I said, on the sales and of around 24% EBITDA margin for the group by the end of the year. As I said in this call, probably at the lower end of the spectrum, but still within the guidance that we've given you.

Looking at opportunities and risks, it's a bit strange in November doing this. The opportunities are mainly midterm, increased organic growth. We see the acceleration in countries like Spain and Switzerland and Austria. To be honest, we're going to see a certain push from Black Weeks and people actually going out and shopping in Germany. There's no risk of a heat wave anymore.

So we're going to see some organic growth there that's going to be a little higher than in Q3. We're going to see great potential for expansion in the optical retail, but that's more for next year, the U.S. and continued in Spain and Eastern Europe. And in hearing aids, as I said, new business unit established first results showing we're now completing the organization. We're really implementing a European Head of Hearing Aids, which we never had.

And then primary eye care is definitely a promising market in the U.S. and Europe, but that's more a long-term part, and we presented that to you as part of the Vision 2035 strategy -- strategic goals 2030 presentation that we held during the Capital Markets Day and Marc and I and the recording that you can still download on our website. The risks, as we always said, consumer sentiment is the biggest risk.

And in Germany and unfortunately or fortunately however you want to look at it, Germany is our biggest market. But if it comes back, it's going to come back. Skilled labor shortage is still a risk, but it's really been easing, a, because of the productivity gains that we implemented, the flexibilization of our personnel cost structure really helps here.

Trade conflict and tariffs. We still have it on there, although currently, it's decreasing in importance, but it's always easier to put a risk on than take a risk off. But we're monitoring it and things have settled more or less. But you never know. And then we talked about that a delay in execution of our business model transformation. We're totally on it. We're working on it. But as I presented at the Capital Markets Day, not -- we probably underestimated the time it takes to merge a couple of companies in the U.S., define the new structure, define a new management team, decide where to put it, decide how we're going to address the needs that are obviously there in that very, very promising market.

All that takes a little longer than we thought. So please bear with us and give us a couple more quarters. And then obviously, the U.S. for reported numbers, not really business risk, but for reported numbers, the U.S. dollar development, the forward curve for next year sees another 10% depreciation. But that's really -- well, it's a risk that I can't manage and it's a risk -- it's a translational risk. We're not really shipping money back and forth between the U.S. and Germany. So there's no transactional risk. Most of the contracts that we have with outside providers are in euros -- in dollar terms. So it's more a translational than a transactional risk for our reported numbers.

And with that, I'm still looking positively into the future. I think so far, if we take a few steps back and look at what this group has achieved over the last 2 years in terms of internationalization, in terms of margin profile, in terms of P&L structure, I'm still a very proud CFO and very happy to be here and talking to you and being able and having the privilege to present those numbers to you.

Thank you all very much for being in the call and your continued interest in the development of our group. As I said, it's a pleasure of representing Fielmann Group to you guys. And we're not going to hear each other on a call like this until April, but we're publishing, obviously, which conferences we are attending, and we either see you in Paris, Lyon, Frankfurt or New York over the next half year or 4 months and then we speak again soon. I wish you all a Merry Christmas and a great weekend.