02 June 2014

Soup Restaurant - Slurping with a Discount


Soup Restaurant can be found at quite a few shopping malls. My family like their Samsui chicken, soup and various other dishes. It is not particularly pricey. I discovered that they have a scheme where you can get a 15% discount card if you are a shareholder of at least 2,000 shares. They call it the "S Card". So, some years back, I bought a few thousand shares in order to apply for the discount card.

I figured that since I frequent the restaurant that often, buying the shares to get the discount was as good as paying a membership fee. Many restaurants offer membership schemes, but I have never encountered any that linked it to share ownership. Soup goes one step further by allowing you to own a part of the business to boot!

Turned out, it was an even greater blessing in disguise. Over time, I bought more shares, eventually averaging at a price of $0.123. Recently, the stock has run up to $0.23. Its historical P/E has gone through the roof - 152x! I figured, it's time to sell and promptly did so, keeping the minimum share holding only to maintain the Soup Restaurant Discount Card. Meantime, it remains a good dividend stock at 3.13%.


Ratios & Other data
ROA (%) 15.24 18.64 5.88 1.11 2.13
ROE (%) 18.21 22.64 10.00 1.66 2.82
DPS (SGD) 0.0035 0.0085 0.0018 0.0070 0.0075
EPS (SGD) 0.0098 0.0127 0.0055 0.0010 0.0016
[Source: POEMS]

It's rather hard to make the margin for such a labour intensive business. There just aren't enough workers to go around the service industry. It has started selling its special sauce as another line of business. Regardless, Soup does have a good brand and a decent product. I hope it continues to thrive - maintain the quality of its dishes, innovate new dishes, optimise its supply chain and maintain its cost structure.

You can pick up the Discount Card application form from the cashier counter at any Soup Restaurant outlet or at their Investor Relations website (Soup Restaurant - Investor Relations). Chomp! Chomp!

Related:
Soup Restaurant - Investor Relations [S Card application form downloadable at this link]

[Disclaimer: This is not a recommendation to buy or sell. It is only a reflection of my personal view and actions that I have taken. I continue to own shares in Soup.]

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