Here is the article. Any current shareholder should be horrified...

Here is the article.

Any current shareholder should be horrified at the action Bapcor is taking. This reads like the beginning of a death spiral.

Where is failed Chair Margaret Haseltine? What a failure of corporate governance and simple business nous.

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Bapcor shuts big warehouses for two weeks to stop inventory blowout

Simon EvansSenior reporter
May 20, 2024 – 2.01pm


Autobarn and Burson owner Bapcor is temporarily shutting three large national distribution centres for two weeks in late June to prevent a blowout in inventory levels.
The company, which operates 1100 retail and trade outlets selling auto parts to retail customers and mechanics, has told dozens of parts suppliers it will not be accepting deliveries for the fortnight at the three big warehouses in Victoria, Queensland and Western Australia.
An email to suppliers seen by The Australian Financial Review from Bapcor’s executive general manager of supply chain, Abdul Jaafar, said that during the two weeks “all inbound orders to our distribution centres will be suspended”.

Burson’s parent company, Bapcor, is temporarily shutting three big distribution centres for two weeks in late June to prevent an inventory blowout. Arsineh Houspian
He refers to it as a “temporary closure” and outlines that the centres at Tullamarine in Melbourne, Redbank in Brisbane and Welshpool in Perth, will reopen on July 1, the start of the new financial year.
Asked why the large distribution centres would not be accepting deliveries for the last two weeks of the 2023-24 financial year, a spokeswoman for Bapcor said it was to keep stock levels under control.


“Bapcor is actively managing its inventory,” the spokeswoman said.
A similar two-week shutdown occurred in the last two weeks of June in 2023. Pallet-loads of parts then arrive at the distribution centres in the weeks after the supplier order bans end, but under accounting rules they are allocated to the 2024-25 financial year.

Bapcor is in turmoil after three profit downgrades in the past year and a no-show by chief executive-elect Paul Dumbrell, who decided he would not take the job two days before he was due to start on May 1.
The operator of Autobarn, Autopro, Burson, Opposite Lock and Midas stores, Bapcor announced a profit downgrade on May 2, which sent its shares tumbling 35 per cent in a day, wiping more than $500 million in sharemarket value.
The company, which had already downgraded profits twice in the past eight months, warned that soft conditions in its retail operations would drag net profit sharply lower in the June half. It said net profit for the full year would be $93 million to $97 million, having booked $54.2 million in the first half.
Mr Dumbrell’s no-show stunned the board, which had announced his appointment in early February. Bapcor has had four CEOs in the past two years.

Mark Bernhard, a director of Bapcor since 2022, was installed as interim CEO in early February when Noel Meehan left for personal reasons after two years. Mr Bernhard is now trying to steady the company in an extended stint as acting CEO while the board, led by Margie Haseltine, searches for a new boss.
Mr Meehan, a former chief financial officer of Penfolds owner Treasury Wine Estates, took the helm in February 2022 following internal upheaval over the ousting of long-serving CEO Darryl Abotomey, who had run the company for 10 years.

Mr Meehan brought in consulting firm McKinsey & Co, and their work was the basis for a Better Than Before program designed to deliver $100 million in extra profits by 2025.
But Bapcor has lost market share to rivals such as Repco, owned by New York-listed $22 billion giant Genuine Parts Company.