2016, and I chair the Human Resources and Remuneration Committee. They're a very good team to work with, please be assured. Also seated at the table, Aston Moss, who's our Chief People Officer; Andrew Scott, our Chief Operating Officer; and Jess Schofield, our Chief Financial Officer and our Company Secretary. Other members of our Senior Management Team here today: Isabel Campbell, who's our GM Online and Digital; James Bailey, GM Merchandise; and Darren Portius, GM Supply. There are a number of other staff members here today, and I really do appreciate you joining us today for the AGM, and we all appreciate how much you do for us as an organization. Thank you for coming along today. Also here, representatives from PwC, Auditors, and of course Simpson & Greeson. Andrew, I'd like to thank Simpson & Greeson once again for hosting us here. Really do appreciate it. Now, the formal business is set out in the Notice of Meeting, which has been circulated to you all as shareholders, and I'll proceed on the basis that the Notice of Meeting be taken as read. Certainly satisfied that a quorum is present in accordance with the Constitution of the Company, and I now declare the meeting open. We've only received one apology, and that's from Stuart Johnston, one of our founding directors. Are there any other apologies that anyone would like to table? I've got one from Trace Collins. Oh, excellent, who was a previous member of our team. If there are no more, we can move on. Now, the agenda of the meeting is as follows: we'll begin shortly with the Chair's review, and then Rod will give the Group Managing Director's review. In the course of both of these addresses, we'll be hearing from three of our key executives: Andrew Scott, Aston Moss, and Jess Schofield. Then we'll proceed to the ordinary business, comprising the consideration of the financial statements, the re-election of directors, the remuneration of auditors, and this year the increase to the maximum number of directors from five to six, and finally any general business. Voting on all resolutions will, of course, be conducted by way of poll. Questions will be taken both from the floor and online through the virtual meeting website. I do encourage those online shareholders who have questions, please send them through as early as possible. There will be, of course, opportunity to ask relevant questions related to the Company's performance after Rod's review, and in the case of general business, nearer the end of the meeting. We do encourage you to ask questions; it's your way to become increasingly involved in what we're doing. Proxies have been appointed for the purposes of this meeting in respect of approximately 5,932,460 shares, being 2.66% of issued capital. As indicated on the proxy form, I intend to vote all undirected proxies I have received as Chairman in favor of the resolutions. I'm holding up to 72,050 undirected proxies for today's resolution. We have also been advised that the RA Duke Trust and interests associated with the RA Duke Trust have registered 171,566,383 votes in favor of all of today's resolutions. As you're probably aware, voting remains open for a short period after the meeting to enable the final compilation of voting both from here at the meeting and proxies received and for online voting. That means it might be up to 15 minutes after the meeting concludes for final voting outcomes to be made available. Of course, the proxies, as you have seen, are displayed on the screen. It is my pleasure now to present you from the Chair's position on behalf of the Board an overview of the Group's progress during the year. During my presentation, Jess Schofield will give us a summary of the year's financial performance, and Aston Moss will outline highlights in relation to the performance of our fantastic team and what we're achieving in so many areas. Following the conclusion of my review, I'll hand over to Rod for his operational perspective, which will include a presentation from Andrew Scott. As I've alluded already, this past year has been both exciting and demanding, and I'm pleased to report that our ongoing performance to drive a leading, innovative, and competitive retail operation continues to make significant progress. Regardless of the tough operating conditions, we continue to invest in our people, our products, and service offerings, and the backroom and support functions that power them to ensure that our customers' needs are always being met. As consumers, all of us, we know that our needs and demands are constantly evolving. Our expectations regarding delivery times, pricing, and range offerings, to name just a few, are radically more advanced than five years ago. To match these challenging demands, successful retailers can just never stand still. Our team are constantly reviewing the strategic retail landscape, taking account of global trends while ensuring there is a local lens and an understanding of Aotearoa New Zealand's customers. We continue to recognize that omnichannel capability is a must. The speed of technological change, social factors, and the evolving needs and preferences of consumers reinforce this. Some recent NZ Post data that Isabel shared with us, it was reported that the average share attributed to online in New Zealand is estimated to be around 11%, while in the U.S. it is 15%. Briscoe's online by comparison is currently at 19.7%. Customers who browse online and shop in store today can and do reverse their behavior for their next purchase because of the product choice or simply to mingle and be with others. Relatively few shoppers shop in store only or online exclusively, and this landscape continues to evolve, and of course there is more to come. The resulting growth and investment reflects the breadth of opportunity that we see. As we reported last year, the investment in our new distribution centre is both significant in quantum of investment and the wide range of benefits we believe it will unlock in relation to efficiency and flexibility. You will be very pleased to see these developments being reflected in Andrew's presentation later in our meeting. This, however, is only one of a number of strategic initiatives which you will hear more about from Rod. We've shared with you before that we believe our strategy program must be a source of advantage, particularly at the time when economic strains mean that many of our retail peers may be looking to refrain from or defer significant expenditure on strategic projects. This group is already benefiting from performance and profitability gains created by projects completed in their first phase. I really do encourage you to read more about a number of our strategic initiatives in our annual report if you haven't already done so. The core attributes of the business are enduring. Our market profile in homeware and sporting goods, our ability to offer customers a wide range of trusted international brands at great value, and a continuing focus on providing innovative and rewarding shopping experiences. Development of our store network continued during the last year, with the highlight being significant progress in the work to deliver new flagship store designs for both Briscoes Homeware and for Rebel Sport. Our online platform developed further with enhancement to the customer experience and progress on the work to deliver major upgrades on functionality and performance during the current year. I would also like particularly to draw your attention in the annual report to our work in sustainability built around the four pillars of governance, environmental, our people, and community. Whilst our environmental interest focus is largely on climate change and waste delimitation, there are also many exciting and challenging initiatives such as our commitment to an ethical supply chain and addressing modern slavery issues. Market conditions put the retail sector under extreme pressure. Our financial results were affected by what was ongoing decline in economic conditions and hence consumer confidence and demand, but significantly outperformed many of our peers. There is certainly nothing to indicate that the current year of 2025-2026 is going to be any less challenging. In fact, with such significant global political disruption, it is very difficult to predict. Andrew and James and their team have just returned from China, and I am sure they will be commenting on supply outlook, so that is certainly changing hour by hour, day by day. We are match-fit and excited by the current year. That seems like a great time to invite our Chief Financial Officer, Geoff Schofield, to take you through the Group's financials for the latest years. Over to you, Geoff. Thanks, Rosanne. Good morning, everyone. During 2024, the New Zealand economy continued to navigate a challenging landscape shaped by the lingering effects of the pandemic, fluctuating global markets, climatic events, and geopolitical conflicts. As such, important economic indicators proved to be somewhat variable in performance. This morning, I thought I'd visit some of those key indicators, look at their impact on our performance, and share why we're actually pretty excited about the path ahead. As I said, it was a really mixed bag of economic indicators for New Zealand during the year. Let's have a look at some of those. If the slide goes forward. That's it. GDP struggled to grow across the four quarters, and in fact, despite increasing by 0.7% for the final quarter. Next slide. Sorry. Despite increasing by 0.7% for the final December quarter, it contracted by 0.5% for the full year compared to the previous. This contraction was clearly influenced by factors closely related to ourselves, such as decreased retail sales volume, but also from lower activity in sectors such as construction, utilities, and transport. The New Zealand dollar remained relatively weak against the $U.S., so no relief there for retailers and businesses which import a significant portion of their product, as Briscoe Group does. Unemployment rates crept up steadily during the year from 4% recorded for the December 2023 quarter through to 5.1% a year later for the December 2024 quarter. Annual inflation, a persistent concern in recent years and clearly influencing the cost of living and impacting consumer spending patterns, was at last in gradual decline across the calendar quarters, closing the December quarter at 2.2%, the same as the September quarter, and significantly back within the Reserve Bank's target of 1-3%. Influenced by the reduced inflation rate, 2024 also saw a steady lowering of the official cash rate by the Reserve Bank. With it, the expectation of economic stimulus and support for an economic recovery. Commencing the year at 5.5%, the OCR closed at 4.25%, and as we know, was further reduced to 3.5% last month. Unfortunately for retailers, there appears to be no direct correlation yet between the OCR cuts and actual retail spending, as retail spend showed both growth and decline in different periods throughout 2024. The easing in cost of living pressures and the effective tax cut in July may actually have been more influential on short-term spending than the decline in the OCR. What did Briscoe Group see during the year? Sales for the year of NZD 791.5 million, agonizingly short, and by that I mean six hundredths of 1% short of the NZD 792 million record turnover produced by the Group in the previous year. In fact, the first decline in Group turnover for 16 years when the turnover declined by 4.7% on the back of the global financial crisis in 2009. The GFC was probably the last sustained period of significant economic downturn which severely impacted New Zealand and indeed global economic activity. In our view, the current economic downturn in New Zealand is deeper and more pronounced than the GFC and certainly has impacted households more harshly. We definitely saw a continued tightening across all of our own performance indicators as we progressed through the year, and certainly comparing the two halves, the second half proved significantly more challenging than the first. Quarterly sales is a great example of this, with 1.03% for the first quarter, 0.52% positive for the second quarter, and negative 3.15% for the third, with the final quarter positive at 0.96%. If we roll these up by halves, first half 0.77%, and the second half negative 0.79%. As we know, overall for the year, negative 0.06%. I think at last year's meeting, I referred to the continual challenge of driving for sales and optimising gross profit as the eternal balancing act for retailers. If that balancing act reflects as us on a tightrope, juggling flaming torches while riding a unicycle, you're probably halfway there. You can see here just how difficult riding that tightrope was for us. First half GP percentage declining from 43.73% to 42.9%, a 76 basis point reduction year on year to produce a +0.77% increase in sales. For the full year, GP percentage declining from 42.4%- 40.37%, a 203 basis point reduction to produce, as we know, a 0.06% decline in sales. Perhaps, more simply put, last year we needed to use an additional 200 basis points to achieve basically flat sales. Let's talk about costs. Cost control continues to be an integral part of managing the business, and the year closed with a total of store and overhead costs of only 1.1% higher than the previous year. A significant achievement considering the 6% wage increase we provided for our in-store, hourly-paid team in May 2024, as well as substantial increases absorbed throughout the business, including for the likes of power, occupancy, warehousing, and IT. Net profit after tax. With the backdrop of what we have just talked about, it is not surprising that, like most other lines in the income statement, profit was also under pressure. As we know, NZD 68 million was what the Group reported for the full year to January 2025. You will be aware that the actual reported net profit was NZD 60.6 million, but this included the one-off non-cash tax adjustment that the Group was required to book as a result of tax changes made to building depreciation announced by the government earlier that year. Yep, a bottom line down on the previous year, but still a significant profit which in the trading environment we faced and are still facing, we are proud of. I guess that's Briscoe Group's reality of the economic downturn. We all recognize that while the numbers are certainly under pressure, it is worth emphasizing that Briscoe Group's reality is still somewhat different to a number of other retail results published during the same period. Balance sheet. The Group's balance sheet remains strong. Cash and bank balances of NZD 142.4 million, as at January 2025, with approximately NZD 30 million of creditor payments included in the trade payables balance, which was subsequently paid before 31st January. As you know, and we'll hear more about this morning, the Group intends to make significant investment across the next two to three years in relation to a number of important strategic initiatives. By far the largest of these is the new distribution centre project now underway, and for which NZD 40 million of capital expenditure was made during the year end of January 2025. With the level of total future strategic investment expected combined with the seasonality of our operational cash flow, the Group is currently working to establish a funding facility for initial utilisation during the second half of this year, although we expect the facility will be more regularly and more fully used across the following three financial years. Inventories totaled NZD 99.7 million, NZD 5.2 million below the NZD 104 million reported for the previous year. Like all retailers, inventory management remains a key focus, especially in times of intense sales and margin pressure. We're happy with the inventory that we're currently holding, but realise continued inventory improvements are going to be critical. The introduction of the impact analytics planning software, for example, and further inventory optimization across categories should enable us to deliver those improvements. In closing, this is certainly one of, if not the toughest periods of economic downturn the Group has endured and continues to endure. From a national perspective, but also internationally, from, as we touched on earlier, the influence of global markets, the impacts of geopolitical differences, which really, I guess, largely are out of New Zealand's control. I guess going back to the tried and true adage of focus on what you can control, for us, that means at a time when other companies may very well be looking to refrain or defer significant strategic expenditure, as you'll hear this morning, we remain committed to investing in the Group's future through a number of both current and new initiatives. While the economics of the retail sector undeniably remain under significant pressure, we hope this morning you'll be able to share the confidence we have and the potential to be unlocked across the next few years with the initiatives in place. Maybe that tightrope walk we talked about becomes more of a confident stride down a well-paved road. Thanks. Thank you, Geoff. As I mentioned before, there will be the opportunity to ask questions of the team a little later in the presentation. I think listening to Geoff, it firmly supports that we believe our ability to perform in difficult times and through economic cycles is certainly key to this company's success. As I mentioned earlier, we continue to invest in our people and recognize the amazing work that they do individually and collectively in what is this very testing market. I would now like to invite our Chief People Officer, Aston Moss, to highlight some of the achievements and the important work undertaken by the team during the last year. Over to you, Aston. Thank you, Rosanne. I didn't know about the strip coming. I didn't bring the carrot. Good morning, everybody. We know that to continue to win in the marketplace, we've first got to win in the workplace. Just as we've had many exciting developments across product, property, platforms, the same can be said in relation to our people. We've been working on our capacity, our capabilities, and our culture for many years, and we continue to see the results, not just in our trading performance or our profit results, but through a wide variety of measures we use across the business. In terms of capacity, one of the simplest measures to consider is our labor turnover. That's simply the number of people who leave our business in a year as a proportion of our total headcount. Just as customers vote with their wallets, team members vote with their feet. I'm pleased to report that our employee turnover figures continue to trend down. With over four decades in retail, both here and in Australia, I can confidently say our numbers are looking very healthy. Now, that's a purely quantitative metric, but what do our team tell us? Our net promoter score and employee engagement surveys, so that's the voice of our team, it's increased, placing us in the top 25% of our peer group. Over the last two rounds, we've seen a shift with more promoters and fewer detractors. Participation itself remains strong at over 90%, indicating our team is eager to share their thoughts and feelings. As the saying goes, the way our employees feel is the way our customers will feel, and if our employees feel valued, so will our customers. We've also seen steady or increasing scores across a range of areas, including inclusiveness and diversity, as well as transformation and change, something which is incredibly important to us to monitor and manage as we implement the different initiatives within the business and navigate the wider macroeconomic and political changes in our environment. Our retail teams are doing a terrific job in continually building on each year's successes with customer satisfaction, and we appreciate that it's our team members that make the difference. One of the hallmarks of the Briscoe Group culture is to think commercially in our decision-making. As a leadership team, we always try to balance both shareholder and employee interests when we make our decisions that impact our people. This is particularly evident when I reflect on our financial performance over the last few years. If we consider pre-COVID sales and profits, we've achieved a 20% sales growth alongside an almost 9% improvement in profit. What isn't obvious or apparent, though, is the steady investment we've made through a 33% increase in wages over that same period. Alongside this, we've maintained stable employment with our team, earning both their understanding and their trust that we don't make promises of wage increases that are funded through wholesale reductions in headcount or contracted days and hours of work. That stability is incredibly important for our team. We work together to work smarter. Capability. Having run our management and leadership development programme for the last five years, we undertook a major review at the end of last year. Last year, 57 people progressed through the leadership series with participants from both support roles and retail leadership. This hybrid approach has broadened understanding and strengthened relationships across our business. Our management development series covered 11 topics with 197 participants, and we've tiered the series to accommodate different learning needs. This has extended our reach into our duty management pool, strengthening our succession planning. Alongside development of our new merchandise development programme, we've seen a number of appointments within our merchandise team, with a blend of both internal and external talent taking up new roles. We're seeing careers progress at the same time as injecting new skills and experience. Longevity of our team as part of our succession and progression planning not only contributes to lower labor turnover, but it protects and enhances both our institutional knowledge and our unique culture. Care. Now, shareholders will have heard about our innovative virtual reality training series. This training, first piloted in person in 2017, has been a long-term project. We like to call it our longest overnight success. With over 90 sites, including our distribution centre, we needed to find a way to make the training accessible seven days a week, 52 weeks a year, and to reduce the training load on our managers and our leaders. Partnering with Alison Richmond of Prevention, alongside our long-term partner Capability Group, we've harnessed VR to make training accessible and engaging. VR training complements our face-to-face, online, and on-demand training, demonstrating the impact of technology in workplace learning. Most importantly, it reduces the likelihood of injuries from manual handling, which is a significant issue in retail. In terms of technology, we've gone from this through to this. The research shows that VR as a learning tool is effective at helping to embed learning, provides immediate feedback, is cost-effective, and can be personalised to adjust to the learner's capabilities. We're seeing results demonstrating the impact this technology can have in terms of workplace learning, alongside delivering knowledge and skills that are transferable well beyond the workplace. Most importantly, we're excited about the reduction in the likelihood of injury through manual handling activities, something that has long been an issue across retail and many other industries. This is a great example of work that will build both our frontline and our bottom line. Alongside a range of other activities, the relentless focus on avoiding injury at work saw further reductions in our total recordable injury frequency rate, down to 61%, and our lost-time injury frequency rate, down to 68%. Although I'm not too sure that if Geoff has his way and we have people juggling on unicycles and juggling, that we'll be able to keep that up. Without turning everything into a nail, now that we've got a hammer, we're excited to build on the platform with other modules that are particularly well-suited to this technology, such as training and managing violent and abusive customer behavior, which remains an ongoing issue. It answers the question of how we train our team to deal with unsafe situations in an entirely safe way. The S in ESG. When we talk about the S in ESG, it's both sustainability and social. You'll know we've been a long-term partner of Cure Kids. This phenomenal organization invests in big research leading to big breakthroughs in child health. The Briscoe Group team has now raised over NZD 13 million in support of this worthy cause. That's NZD 13 million to make a real difference to children's health. We also have a significant commitment to funding scholarships through First Foundation to support Briscoe Group employees or their direct family members. Our partnership with this impressive organization has resulted in around 40 scholarships being awarded since 2013. Each of those individuals represents an opportunity to engage in tertiary education and take their steps towards a high-wage economy. If you watched 7 Sharp last night, you'll have seen George Gray, who's one of the scholars. He's not one of our scholars, but he's a great example of youth moving forward. You can see a combination of our new scholars and those completing the program on this slide. We're particularly delighted that the paths our scholars have chosen reflect a diverse set of future careers, including teaching and early childhood education, healthcare, architecture, law, science, design, sports, education, and agriculture. The four-year program sees Briscoe Group recipients gain work experience with the company during their scholarship alongside financial and mentoring support. It's particularly exciting to see an increasing number of our management and support team also volunteering their time and experience, providing one-on-one mentoring support to scholars, extending our reach far beyond Briscoe Group. Those providing mentoring support often refer to the learning and growth they experience, not just the satisfaction derived from helping someone else make their way in the world. Moving forward, we're working with our colleagues on a number of exciting developments, which will come to life in the business. A new service model to accompany our Rebel X concept store in Panmure, and the transition work, which will see our team commence operations in our new distribution center in Drury South. It's a long process to design and construct buildings and to undertake major developments and refits while also protecting trade. Similarly, the capabilities and capacity we'll need for both of these operations is a sizable step from where we are today, and we look forward to helping bring these to life for the benefit of our customers, our shareholders, and our wider Briscoe Group team. Thank you. Thank you. Right. Thank you, Aston. You can see why we take such pride in what has been done in this area, both with people within the organization and outside. It's fantastic initiatives. Dividend. As you know, the directors approved a final dividend of $0.10 per share, which, when added to the interim dividend of $0.125 per share, results in a total dividend for the year of $0.225 per share. The total dividend reflects the group's increased focus on a number of innovative strategic initiatives, our substantial investment program across the next two years, as well as the impact on profit from the economic headwinds. The company's dividend policy is to pay out at least 60% of NPAT when calculated on a full-year basis. Although lower in absolute terms than in recent years, this year's total dividend represents a payout ratio of 83% of reported NPAT and 74% when the one-off tax adjustment is excluded. The commitment and quality of our senior team's management is a key driver of the group's performance and thus value. There will be the opportunity, obviously, later to discuss that as an issue. Our senior executive long-term incentive plan is designated to allow participation by designated key executives in a long-term scheme designed to provide appropriate awards for past performance, just as importantly, incentivize future performance. Our long-term incentive scheme provides access to equity-based remuneration, crystallizing only on delivery of increased shareholder value. This is in the form of performance rights at vest after three years, subject to the company's achievement against growth targets for total shareholder return and earnings per share. There was one tranche of performance rights issued under the scheme during the year, and it's a board intention to issue another during this current year. As in every year, the annual report contains more information on this and other incentive plans, and do feel free to ask any questions you might later in the meeting. Our corporate governance. Briscoe Group remains committed to the highest standards of governance and management implemented through best structures and policy. We believe the cohesion and effectiveness of the board and the executive teams are key factors in our performance. Separately and together, we all remain aligned in our business objectives. You'll be aware from the notice of meeting that we're seeking to increase our ability to appoint six directors, and we'll be discussing that more later. Currently, the company's constitution caps the number of directors at five, and this has worked extremely well for the group since its listing in 2001. We believe there is merit in increasing this to six to allow for the transition of directors as we plan ahead. As announced last year, I will not be seeking re-election at the end of my current term, which is the annual meeting in May 2027. Andy Coupe has already indicated, signaled to the board his intention not to stand at the end of his current term, which is May 2026. Given this, and having the ability to appoint a sixth director to ensure seamless transition of directors when they occur is, we believe, essential before returning the board to five. Accordingly, you will see in the notice of meeting that we're seeking your support in raising the number of directors to six. Later in the meeting, we will, of course, come to the re-election of directors, the formal schedule of retirements, and this year, Rod will be offering himself for re-election. Rod's experience needs little additional explanation, but I know I speak for all of us when I emphasize Rod's energy and quite extraordinary knowledge of retail and his ongoing commitment to our company's growth and success is simply exemplary. As we outlined earlier, we've made significant progress in the Steps to a Better Tomorrow program, which reflects our determination to support the commitment of our customers and the broader community to protecting the environment. Thank you very much indeed, and it's now my pleasure to hand over to Rod for the Group Managing Director review. You can't get out. Do you need my crutch? No, I bought a very big bag of soap for some reason. Thanks, Rosanne, and thanks to everyone for coming along today, both here and online. It really was another tough year, and I certainly share Rosanne's view that the board, the management team, and all our people in the end produced a great result. Geoff has reported on our key financial metrics. Just briefly, I'll just briefly note the things that stand out from my perspective. It was a real feat to achieve 99.9%. If I'd known that a week before, it would not have been 99.9%. That's one I missed. Achieved 99.9% on last year's record sales against a retail environment that saw many operators struggle. Whilst our gross margin percentage came under some pressure, it's still important to note that it remains above pre-COVID levels. Our online business continues to perform well with our investment in both back office and customer-facing systems paying dividends. Online represents 19.7% of total sales, up from 18.7% last year. As Jess highlighted, costs were well controlled, and we're pretty happy with the $68 million net profit after tax. For the last decade, we have shown that our core business has been very strong and resilient. During that same period, there have been massive changes in the competitive dynamics, a pandemic that shut our bricks and mortar operations for several months, and more recently, a real slump in customer confidence and demand. The key factors in that performance have been the quality and the dedication of our team and the execution of strategic initiatives developed over recent years. I think it's fair to say that the latter is a manifestation of the former. The management team has broad and complementary skills suited to the modern retailing environment. There is a spread of skills starting with product sourcing through to merchandising, marketing, e-commerce, human resources, retail ops, and other disciplines, all, of course, with a strong focus and background in retail. Ladies and gentlemen, I'd like to now take you forward some two or three years and share with you some of our thoughts on what Briscoe Group might look like once we complete our largest single strategic investment in our North Island distribution centre, taking our total investment over the next three years to well over NZD 100 million. Additionally, there will, of course, be more stores, and they will look quite different from the stores that we have today. Our programme of relocation, resizing, and refurbishment will continue at pace. You will hear today of our flagship stores in both brands, where these stores will be larger than our regular-sized stores. They will contain a host of customer interactive elements, a large range of new products, and perhaps even brand new brands to us. These stores will also be experimental locations where we might test brand new brands to the market, to the New Zealand market. They will look and function quite differently from our regular stores, and for customers, there will be very exciting shopping environments. Andrew will shortly give you a detailed overview of our strategic path for the next three years, but first, let me take you through some of the obvious and early benefits of this new distribution centre project. For a substantial number of years, due to space limitations of our existing DC, we have pushed approximately 80% of our imported product that comes from the containers directly into the stores. That's because we only have capacity in our existing DC to hold 20% of those overseas deliveries. Now, that worked just fine for about 30 years, but now we think the stores would function significantly better with less stock. Those stores would receive daily top-up shipments from our DC. Just to repeat, the new distribution centre will, firstly, free up a lot of room in stores for new product, and it'll also return a lot of the back of house room. Typically, our stores are, say, 1,500, 1,600 metres with perhaps 500 or 600 square metres out the back. What we're saying is we don't need as much stock, and so those back of house walls will be reduced. We're probably going to have back of house of 200, not 500 or 600, so we're going to be able to return that to valuable selling space. We will also have the ability to introduce, as I previously said, global brands with premium housewares and sporting goods products that our customers are demanding and that other retailers at this point can't offer. There is no doubt in our mind that this initiative will deliver significant sales and margin gains. This is a very exciting time, and we can't wait to take possession of this new facility before the end of this year, complete the fit-out, and be operational by June the following year. Now would seem to be a great time to hand over to Andrew, who can take you through what we've got planned across the group for the next two or three years. Thanks, Rod, and good morning. Before I share some information on our exciting developments for the next few years, I'd just like to thank the team for their commitment and resilience over the past 12 months. To deliver the results that Geoff took us through earlier was not easy, and once again, our team delivered to the highest standard. It's really great to be here today. It's great not to be looking back, but to be looking forward. Toughest economic climate we've seen for a very long time, and we are looking forward to a period of record investment and hopefully record profitability. It's a unique situation that we're in. We have a business that continually performs but has so much potential left untapped. For us to be able to invest through this period is a testament to the financial stability of the business. As Rod said, three years in the planning, and our DC is taking shape. Darren and the team have done a fantastic job to keep this project on track and in budget. Geoff's particularly focused on the second one of those. Darren and the team continue to work hard to ensure that we unlock the value that this business has. Today, rather than take you through a detailed update from the DC, I'll take you through the deliverables that it will open up for us and the way in which we will change the face of this business. The new company-owned strategic asset will really deliver our next decade of growth. As we move to the current year, so FY2027, let's see if the clicker works. Oh, two clicks. Can we go back? There we go. It does work. This month, we'll implement our new AI-driven assortment planning tool. As Rod said, it will use rich analytical data to help us curate product ranges that are more compelling for our consumers and targeted to local community needs. The system is made up of several modules, all of which are planned to be implemented in 2025. Alongside the significant margin opportunities it provides, the tool will also free up a massive amount of time for the team to deliver new product ranges in the coming years. In September, Isabel and the team will deliver our new online stores for both Briscoes and Rebel. The new platform will provide increased flexibility, enable us to deliver customer enhancements faster than ever before, and make our online shopping faster and simpler for customers. The new web platform will also catapult our direct-to-consumer business to the next level and provide tens of thousands of new products available across Briscoes and across Rebel. By the end of the year, as Rosanne and Rod have touched on, we plan to open our new Rebel X flagship store at Panmure. This store will showcase the best store design and the best product ranges available in New Zealand. The new design will feature a fantastic new footwear zone and improved interactive zones for customers. The new concept really will deliver the best retail experience in New Zealand. To cap it all off, we should get an early Christmas present with the keys to the new DC in Drury. This will allow us to start building racking and fitting out the facility for a transition through early 2026. As you can see, this year is massive for us. Whilst the current year is predominantly about investing in the business, the benefits are not far behind. If we move to FY2027, by the end of Q1 FY2027, we plan to launch our new Briscoes concept again at Panmure, a bigger, brighter, inspiring new concept. This store will showcase the brands we have today and the brands of the future like never before. As we flow the Briscoes product through the DC, this will deliver a significant stock reduction for the amount of stock in store. The plan is to reduce the stock by around 20%. This will allow us to display the stores in a much more inspirational rather than functional manner. As the store stock levels reduce, it will free up significant space, as Rod mentioned. As of today, we have over 200,000 sq m of space in our 90 stores. If we could free up 20,000 of those 200,000, we've effectively got 10 new stores with no additional cost. With lower stock levels, we'll also be able to optimize the way in which we flow product to stores and free up labor and efficiencies in stores. We spend around NZD 70 million a year on store wages, so with 20% less stock in the stores, less double handling, a significant cost opportunity for us. Our current thinking is that we won't bank all of that saving. We'll actually reinvest it into the next level of service and really helping our consumers and our customers find that fantastic new product that we're making available. At the back end of 2027, we'll also launch the automation in the DC, and that stock reduction will then kick in for Varible. Those global brands of Adidas, Nike, and New Balance and all the others will flow through the DC, and that will allow us to feed the stores every day rather than once a quarter. With increased new sales from ranges that we've never seen before, increased margin from DC and store efficiencies, the profitability increase should be significant. In FY2027, the benefits that we're forecasting are up to NZD 5 million extra per year. We move further ahead out to FY2028 and beyond. Looking forward, the stores will look very different to what they do today, truly world-class and something I'm sure our customers will love. The new planning tool and new DC will be fully embedded, therefore another level of benefits released. As we meet full throughput, we'll see some fantastic new developments through the stores. Those stores will be optimized with significantly improved ranges, with new categories, new global brands, and complemented by a world-class service. With our new capabilities, we'll also have the potential to open smaller format stores. Encouragement to where today a large format store surely isn't commercially viable. Having mapped those locations across the country and also cross-checked to where our competitors are, we believe there's up to 15 new small format stores, and those stores clearly will deliver incremental sales. Hopefully, you can see from today that we are entering a phase of record investment that will unlock the group's potential. As Rod said earlier, in the next three to five years, with the projects that we're about to implement, I'm very confident we will get back to record profits. Thank you for your time today, and your continued support. I'll now hand you back to Rod. Thank you, mate. That was brilliant. We've really got certainly the projects we are now implementing, we're pretty excited about the potential business still to be unlocked, and that, of course, will enable us to get back to record profit numbers and much, much bigger dividends. Before closing, I just wanted to touch on this year and how we've started. Last week, I'm sure you would have seen the group's first quarter sales release. Yes, it's still tough. Recently, we've seen some encouraging signs in both sales and margin. Our goal this year is to protect last year's profitability. I know I've said that before, but we think the way the profit is produced will be quite different than it has been in recent COVID years in relation to the first half versus second half. We are targeting first half profit of around $30 million and expect the group to return to a more normalised profit shape for the full year, with the second half exceeding that achieved in the first half, but we'll keep you posted. In closing, and we've had occasion to say this a number of times in recent years, but it remains true, the group has the capacity to navigate successfully through very difficult times and achieve results that our shareholders, our management group, and the team members can feel very, very happy about. I'm confident we will achieve that again this year. Like Rosanne, I too would like to thank the entire team for their outstanding efforts and continued support. On that, I'll hand back to the chair. Thank you, Rod. We would be happy to take any questions now relating specifically to the items in the formal agenda, which should be held over. If you wanted to ask questions in respect of any of the presentations you have just heard, we would be delighted to do so. I can always rely on you, Coralie. Thank you. Thank you. Last year, it was mooted that an app would be required to read a barcode on products going forward. I am seeing how you are going to increase the flow from the distribution centre to the stores very quickly. I want assurance that I can still read a price in dollars and cents on the item or on the shelf below it that is accurate. Now, who's going to answer that one, given all the interesting work we've been doing in electronic pricing? Yeah, thanks for the question. I'm not sure if this is on or not yet. There we go. Yeah, currently we have the electronic shelf edge label, which gives you the price in 90% of Briscoes products and around 60% of Rebel. All of the products still have a price on the label. At this point, we don't have a plan to remove the prices that are on the stickers. As we learn more from the electronic price labels, there is clearly an opportunity long term, but at the moment, we use both just to make sure that the price is always very clear to customers. Thank you. Thank you, Coralie. Yes. Andrew, could you just give us a little bit more color around the proposal for the Metro stores? That sounds quite an interesting concept. What sort of place would you target? I know you mentioned you had about 15 in mind. Yeah, I mean, if you think of our current format, there are 2,000 meters roughly for Briscoes, 1,500 for Rebel and 700 at the back, so 4,200-ish. There's just some catchments where either we have a great location and around the fringes, there's an opportunity to put a store to take some more money out of the catchment. A great example of that would be Tauranga. We have one store in town. Most of our competitors have four. We have a fantastic location in the middle of town, but there's quite a lot of growth around the edges. That's a great example. Some of the other growth areas around the country, obviously, there's growth going north up towards Warkworth and those sorts of regions where a large format store really probably isn't commercially viable, but a small format could be. Would it be at places like Oboru, and would you put both of them together, or would it be either/or? We haven't got that far yet. Sounds like we ought to be calling you in when we get to this discussion. Yeah. I mean, ideally, they would be together, but there will be some catchments where a Briscoes is actually more needed than a Rebel and the other way around. Ideally, we always like to get them together. Is there a possibility that you'll start eating into your online sales because some of that at least will be coming from those smaller places? Yeah, potentially. Or people will use them as convenient click-and-collect locations. It could actually grow the total wallet because people have got a location now they can pick up more easily than getting in the car and driving half an hour. It is something we would be careful about, but we have a really tight network and it performs really well for us, but there are clearly some gaps. Thank you. Thank you. Good questions. Thank you. Any other comments or questions? Rosanne, we have received questions from online, but they're more related to general business and specific resolution questions. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. We'll come to them later. Thank you very much. Anything else you'd like to raise? There is still time at the end of the meeting, but I'm sure you agree with me. It's a pretty exciting-looking outlook that we have in front of us. Now, the formal resolutions. We can move to the formal business of the meeting and the matters requiring resolutions as outlined in the notice of meeting. As stated in the voting proxy forms, all voting at today's meeting will be by way of poll, and accordingly, in my capacity as Chair, I require that a poll be held for each of the resolutions. Shareholders on linked virtual meetings will be able to cast their vote using the electronic voting card, received when online registration is validated, and as I've said before, voting will be open until five minutes after the closing of the meeting. To vote, you will need to click "Get Voting Card" within the online meeting platform, and you'll be asked to enter your shareholder or proxy number to validate. Please then mark your voting card by the way you wish to vote, by for, against, or abstain on the voting card. Once you've made your selection, please click "Submit Vote" on the bottom of the card. You may ask questions on each of the matters being put forward to the shareholders. Questions raised by those in attendance here with us today will be answered first before moving to any questions submitted online. Each of the resolutions set out in the notice of meeting is to be considered as an ordinary resolution and as such must be approved by a simple majority of the votes cast by shareholders entitled to vote and voting on the resolution. Your board supports each of the resolutions and intends to vote undirected proxies in favor of all resolutions. First up is our review and consideration of the financial statements and auditor's report. With your concurrence, I'll take the annual report, including the financial statements and the auditor's report, as read. I'll now call for any discussion. I'm pleased to declare the financial statements open for discussion. Have we got any questions? Yes. Do you mind identifying yourself? Thank you, Robert. A little bit of commentary from the directors, please, around Briscoes' investment shareholding and KMD Brands. Just looking at the annual report, I see over the last two years, it's lost in value approximately NZD 30 million. Just really trying to get some clarity as to whether, in fact, this is considered to be a long-term strategic investment or whether, in fact, it does get to, I suppose, a basement level of a value on the NZX where the directors may decide that obviously it's time to offload the investment. Thank you. Rod, do you or Tony? Thank you, Tony. Thank you. Good question. We did have quite a discussion on this last year as well. I'm not sure if you were there last year, Robert, but it's a good question. From our point of view, it's very much a watching brief. We meet with the KMD Brands management team twice a year around results and hear directly from them what their initiatives are in their business. Unfortunately, over the last year, as you say, the share price has continued to go south, which has given rise to the additional unrealized loss, if you like, in our balance sheet. They've struggled with the same challenges in retail that all retailers have had, plus they've had some unique challenges to them around their US business. They've much been more affected by this whole tariff discussion than most New Zealand retailers. The last year has not, in terms of share price or their financial performance, there has not been positive progress. That is for the management team of KMD Brands and the board to focus on and work on. Obviously, that's what we would like to see. We're actually earning at just less than 7%. We don't have a board seat entitled to a board seat as such. It remains a watching brief. We keep in contact with them, and we're looking for them to return to the levels of profitability that they've had in the past. The investment balance moves from year to year based on the prevailing share price at the time the accounts are prepared. The markdown that you refer to reflects the fact that their share price has headed negatively in the last couple of years. Definitely a watching brief, Robert. Any other questions on the financial statements and orders? Okay. If not, we'll move ahead to the election of directors. In accordance with the NZX listing rule, we have one director standing for re-election this year. As per the notice of meeting, you'll be aware that that is Rod. Under NZX listing rule 2.7.1, a director must not hold office without re-election past the third annual meeting following that director's appointment or three years, whichever is the longer. Rod was re-elected at the annual meeting held on the 19th of May, 2022, and as such, retires by rotation and offers himself for re-election. The board unanimously supports the re-election of Rod. Rod, I'd like to call on you to say a few words, if you would. Thanks, Rosanne. Ladies and gentlemen, I'm here today to solicit your support for my re-election as the director of Briscoe Group. I've held the executive position as the Group Managing Director since the establishment of the Briscoe Group in 2001. During that time, the management team I lead have managed to advance sales, store numbers, gross margin, gross profit, shareholder dividends, and in fact, on every measure, and to quote a very well-regarded analyst who happens not to be here today, it's been a masterclass. Quite frankly, I'm very proud of it. To work within a team that has the capacity to produce high-value results year after year, to execute on strategically critical issues time and time again, and all the time being sensitive and aware that we want to be the very, very best family-style company in New Zealand. Culturally, we're not a large corporate, but we never set out to be. I guess that's why people stay in this business so long. This business is absolutely full on, but it's also very good fun. These days, I don't lead every charge, but I don't need to. We have an abundance of experienced leaders embedded within this company. Most importantly, I remain enthusiastic, committed, very healthy, and I've got skin in the game, so I'm very focused. Thank you so much. I'm glad you added that bit about your health because we had a very caring inquiry from a shareholder online, Stephen Maine from Australia, who was asking after your health. So I'm pleased you clarified that. Are there any other questions of Rod or comments? Just to add to that question that Stephen submitted, he also wanted to know, Rod, whether you're definitely going to serve a three-year term. Do you have relatives working in the business that represent Briscoe's interest when you're out of the business? Yes, I intend to. No, not known to me. Those are very good friends, but no going. Any further discussion? If not, I'll ask shareholders to vote on the resolution that Rod Duke be re-elected as a director of the company in accordance with that notice of meeting. Please now mark or select for, against, or abstain for resolution one on your physical or online voting card. We'll now move—sorry, have I given you enough time to complete that? Good. We'll now move on to the next item of business, the appointment and remuneration of auditors. The motion concerns the fixing of the auditor's remuneration and seeks shareholders' approval that the directors be authorized to fix PwC's remuneration. The remuneration paid to PwC in the year under review totaled NZD 220,000, of which NZD 165,000 was in respect of the company's year-end audit and NZD 55,000 for the half-year's review. I'll now call for any discussion on the reappointment of PwC as auditors of the company and fixing the auditor's remuneration to be the responsibility of the directors. Is there any questions that we'd like? Geoff, we have one that you might— We have one from Stephen Maine again. The question is, why do we have the resolution at all? I think that's in relation to the auditor resolution being under monitoring at the moment as to whether it's helping out auditors moving forward. That is under question. At the moment, our understanding certainly is that it is required to be authorized, and we continue to do that. Obviously, we'll look at that moving forward. If it's right or if it's something we lose, then we'll definitely look at that. I think I would personally always support that issues like this—and there is one that is going to come up shortly too—I like the fact that we bring these issues back to shareholders to commentate on. I think it is appropriate. I am not of the mode, and I know I speak to the rest of the board on this. We want our shareholders to be involved, and I think it is the most appropriate approach to take. Geoff, there was also a query that was raised by the Shareholders Association in respect of rotation of auditors. I would like to phrase that as well. Yeah, sure. The question—and I'm not sure whether the representative's here today. He said he was going to ask the question—but basically, they wanted to—they're coming to advise on their view on the requirement or NZSA's requirement that the external audit firm should be rotated every 10 years, just to where that obviously we've had the incumbent for much longer than that. Tony, would you like to speak on that because it is a matter of concern? Yeah. I think the first thing point to note is that we do rotate the partner, or at least PricewaterhouseCoopers rotates their partner on the audit every five years, which brings a fresh lens and fresh perspective on the audit. We think that's a really important protocol, and we're very supportive of that. We do from time to time, and I think most recently, in probably 18 months or so ago, we did also complete a benchmarking process of PricewaterhouseCoopers against our other credible options in the market. As a consequence of that review, we did take the decision very consciously to reappoint PricewaterhouseCoopers. We recognise the comment from New Zealand Shareholders Association. We have no concerns about the independence of PricewaterhouseCoopers and are comfortable with where we've ended up. Good. Thank you. It's a new difficult market out there in terms of trying to get new auditors or actuaries, let me assure you. Worth noticing there that in terms of the requirement to get the CRD, the climate-related disclosures, externally audited, we did not use PwC for that. We have used Miku and Miku Shaw. Just we are aware of the independence and the separation of different board of think tanks. Yes. Amanda led that initiative in finding independent auditors in respect of that piece of work, and it's been really fascinating. Very comprehensively done. Good to find areas that auditors are specializing, and it's been very—hasn't it, Amanda? Good. Thank you. Okay. With that, are there any—if not, could I ask that with no further discussion, our shareholders vote on the resolution that it be recorded that PricewaterhouseCoopers will continue in their office as the company's auditors and that the board of directors be authorized to fix the remuneration of PricewaterhouseCoopers for the ensuing years? Would you please mark for, against, or abstain for resolution two on your physical or online voting card? Good. The final resolution this morning is in relation to increasing the maximum number of directors stipulated in the company's constitution from five to six. As mentioned earlier, currently, the constitution caps the number of directors at five. The rationale for increasing the maximum number to six is to allow for an appropriate transition of directors. As announced last year and mentioned earlier, I'll not be seeking re-election at the end of my current term. Andy Coupe has also signaled to the board that his intention is not to stand at the end of his current term, being May 2026. Given this and having the ability to appoint a sixth director who ensures seamless transition of directors when they occur, we believe is essential before returning the board to five. I'd just like to call for any discussion on that. Again, we've had another question online. You might like to read it out, Geoff, from Stephen Maine. Sure. Yeah. So there's several questions. His view is best practice is to have no cap on the number of shareholders. If bothering to increase the cap from five to six, why take such a minimalist approach? Does the controlling shareholder recognize it's normal to have constitutional maximum that's higher than needed for flexibility? Will Briscoe Group agree to move to an uncapped model next time the constitution is revisited? It's an interesting question. Frankly, I am not in favor personally of uncapped. I think you'd see a few boards around the place where it would seem that it might be uncapped from the size of their boards. We do not believe in that. We think it is more efficient, and it builds a closer sense of team to have a smaller number. From a personal view, again, building on that thing of shareholder involvement, I would not like a company to have an uncapped. I would like always that we come back to shareholders to discuss the number of directors that is appropriate for a company at that point of time. We will certainly discuss it, but if I'm around for that discussion, I'll certainly be continuing to believe that numbers should be capped and that one should always be returning to shareholders to discuss increasing the number of directors. With that in mind, unless there are any other questions, I'd like to ask you to vote on increasing the maximum number again for, against, or abstain. Right. Geoff, there was one further question that we needed in respect that also came from Australia, and I think probably more accurately it flex. It was for whether Rosanne would lead consultation with shareholders and board on whether to put up a remuneration report resolution for advisory vote at the AGM, as is the legal requirement in Australia. I think if you were to mention, particularly following the inquiry in Australia into their financial services market, there was quite a lot of discussion about the levels of remuneration of chief executives and board remuneration, which I think led to the introduction of that. Interesting point. Maybe there will be a few companies in New Zealand that might want to consider that as well and a few financial institutions. However, I do not think we are in that area. It is an interesting point. It is not a requirement. More critically, it is not a requirement of the NZX. At this stage, I do not see there is any reason for us to be considering that. Geoff, any other questions unanswered? In terms of general business? Yes. Yeah. There is just one that missed the operational question time. It came in late online. There are two questions, really. One is looking for some comment around the increased wages, and I guess that was a reference to both Esther and my in terms of the 6.5% and where that falls in terms of the profitability and that sort of stuff as well in terms of that. That was one question. And I—yeah. I mean, I think it's a valid question, but I think we've always—I think it was well covered in your presentation, Aston, and you might like to add to that. You used a particular phrase that talked about employee satisfaction and how that matches customer satisfaction. We might be—were they suggesting the 6% was a little too generous or a little too modest? Just as increased wages. Increased wages. I can only suggest it's suggesting it's been a little too generous, but I think— Yeah. Maybe it's been some profitability. I think that was what they were— Right. I think—do you want to respond, Aston, or has it already been said? I guess the comment I'd make is our team are a significant point of difference in the market. They need to have confidence. We've shown stability. We need to ensure that they're remunerated appropriately. We have seen significant costs. A lot of our wage team bear those costs more directly than I suggest many in this room. We're certainly not out of step with our market. You can see labour turnover, team engagement. Our team feel valued, and they're able to provide that value back to our customers with our customer service scores. I think we've got everything working in balance there. I think it would be hard put to say that we are overpaying our team versus the wider retail market. Yeah. Good. Thank you. I would like to thank Stephen for forwarding those questions. They're most appreciated and good discussion points. There's one more question. One more. Right. On the back of that one, which actually wasn't from Stephen, how do you select new products to compete with Temu? Definitely one for you, Andrew. Or James is here in the front row also. As you know, both Briscoes and Rebel operate in best global brands at the best price. Temu is not a branded outlet. It's a discount outlet and very much entry product. We don't necessarily see them as a direct competitor. Clearly, they're disrupting the market. Again, just in terms of tariffs and things, I think that will slow down significantly over the next year or so. We focus on best brands, best price, best service, and that's not necessarily the Temu model. Thank you. Good. Right. Any other further questions under general business or we might have missed under operational? If not, I'll move that there being no further business to be brought to the meeting, I formally declare the meeting closed. Thank you for your attendance. I'd just like to wait while we collect the cards as they move around. I do thank you for joining us here today, and we look forward to seeing you all again next year. Thank you very much. We're around if there are any conversations that you wish to have. Thank you very much indeed.