Balta Reports Q3 Growth Driven by Bentley's Commercial Success

Sint-Baafs-Vijve, Belgium, November 11, 2019-Balta, which owns Bentley, reported year over year (YOY) revenue growth of 3% for Q3. The company’s rugs division grew revenues 0.4%, its commercial  division, of which Bentley is a part, grew revenues 7.1%, and its residential business was flat. 

Organic revenue growth was 1.7%.

The company notes, “Following the strong growth realized by Rugs in H1 2019, primarily from regained US outdoor programs and the timing of European program roll-outs, Rugs achieved also slight top line growth in Q3. For 2020, we secured an overall stable share for next year’s U.S. outdoor programs. Rugs margin for the quarter was negatively impacted by the one-off adjustment in relation to higher than foreseen sales discounts at Balta USA on sales in previous quarters, as well as our investments in NEXT, in particular the start-up costs for the U.S. e-commerce business. Without these effects, Rugs had a solid underlying margin generation.

“Strong revenue evolution with further improved margins in Commercial, driven by the continued growth of our U.S. business. In Europe, volumes were down over Q3 2018, but in line with expectations at better prices and margins.

“In Residential, Q3 revenue was flat year-on-year. UK revenue was slightly up, benefiting from pre-Brexit stocking at some of our customers. Trading in our Continental European markets remained subdued in the third quarter, but margins benefited from the price increases introduced at the start of the year.”