COVID-19 Cut Voxx Sales

COVID-19 cut Voxx sales in fiscal Q1 ended May 31, said CEO Pat Lavelle on an investor call Monday. The results came at 5:30 p.m. EDT Friday. Monday, the stock closed down 6.6% at $5.28. Revenue in the automotive segment declined $12.4 million from Q1 a year earlier, said Lavelle. Consumer electronics sales were down $9.1 million, he said. Voxx reported its net loss nearly tripled to $9.1 million. The closure of virtually all automotive OEM production idled Voxx factories in Orlando that make rear-seat entertainment systems, said Lavelle. The shutdown of most new car dealers doubly hurt, he said. “April was reported to be the worst month for car sales in over 30 years.” Retail lockdowns harmed the Voxx consumer business, and the shutdown of movie theaters halted sales of Klipsch commercial speakers targeted to “large venues,” said Lavelle. “The only bright spot was some of the large brick-and-mortar retailers that sold food and remained open” as essential businesses, he said. “We saw increases at retailers such as Walmart, Costco and others.” Voxx e-commerce sales activity “picked up as well,” he said. “But this was mostly offset by Amazon focusing on essentials for a large part of the quarter.” The pandemic’s economic impact is “far from over, but we remain cautiously optimistic” about the rest of calendar 2020, said Lavelle. In June, the first month of Voxx’s fiscal Q2, “we saw a rebound, with sales up 30%,” he said. The company bought Directed Electronics' automotive aftermarket business this month (see 2007060044).