AKRON, Ohio – Myers Industries announced results for the fourth quarter and full year ended Dec. 31, 2014.
Net sales increased 9.4 percent in the fourth quarter of 2014 and 6.7 percent for the full year of 2014, due mainly to the acquisition of Scepter Products. Income per diluted share from continuing operations as adjusted was 13 cents in the fourth quarter of 2014 and 60 cents for fiscal 2014, versus 15 cents and 75 cents for the comparable 2013 periods
The company completed a strategic initiative to focus the business through the sale of WEK Industries in June 2014, the sale of its Lawn and Garden business in February 2015 and the acquisition of Scepter Products in July 2014. Myers also returned $70.6 million of cash to shareholders through dividends and repurchases of common stock in 2014.
President and CEO John Orr commented, “As we anticipated, sales in the fourth quarter improved over the previous year’s fourth quarter. However, weakened demand for our Material Handling Segment’s agricultural and food processing products, together with a challenging Brazilian economy, led to lower profitability versus last year. We continued to streamline our business portfolio in 2014 to realize our strategic goal to strengthen our leadership position in the Material Handling Segment, while preserving a strong market position in our Distribution Segment. To accomplish this, we sold WEK Industries and acquired Scepter Products. The Scepter acquisition continued our strategic growth and profitability improvement plan for the Material Handling Segment. Scepter provides an expansion of product assortment, added global reach and has already expanded our customer base through cross-selling opportunities. In February of this year, we completed the previously announced sale of the Lawn and Garden business for $110 million. In 2014, we continued our balanced approach to capital allocation. We generated $28 million of free cash flow and returned $70.6 million of cash to shareholders through dividends and repurchases of common stock. The result of all of these transactions is a streamlined, more focused Myers Industries with strong cash generating business segments that we believe will continue to generate sustainable returns for shareholders.”
