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Speaker 1: Rod Duke might have an answer to some of these questions. Actually,

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Speaker 1: he is the boss of Briscoes and they have announced

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Speaker 1: the company results today. Revenue largely flat, but profit down

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Speaker 1: because margins were squeezed. Of course, the state of the

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Speaker 1: economy partly to blame for this. Rod Duke is with me.

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Speaker 1: Good afternoon.

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Speaker 2: Hi, right, how you doing.

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Speaker 1: You're really good? Thank you, Given I mean it's been

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Speaker 1: well traversed how bad retail has been for you know,

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Speaker 1: the struggles over the past year. You must be pretty

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Speaker 1: reasonably happy with this.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, we're pretty toughed with the result. Got the sales

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Speaker 2: did cost a bit of margin, costs within one percent

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Speaker 2: of last year, infantries back about five million dollars, and

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Speaker 2: stock turns up. So a lot of the metrics that

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Speaker 2: we measure have come through and we're pretty pleased.

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Speaker 1: What is it that you do to make sure you know,

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Speaker 1: I mean, obviously profit was down, but it's still profit, right,

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Speaker 1: What are you doing to make sure of that and

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Speaker 1: keeping revenue flat?

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Speaker 2: Look, we're doing a lot of the basics that all

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Speaker 2: retailers know about. You're refreshing the rangers, You're improving the

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Speaker 2: quality of service in stores. The stores look better, the

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Speaker 2: online presence and presentation, and the platform is easy to maneuver,

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Speaker 2: just all the regular things that all retailers want to

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Speaker 2: do all the time.

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Speaker 1: Looking ahead, do you think, well, how long before you

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Speaker 1: think things get better? And are you worried about Trump

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Speaker 1: or you don't have much exposure to the tariffs and

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Speaker 1: the trade wars.

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Speaker 2: Look, I have to worry about in this country with

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Speaker 2: my business rather than worry about mainly ex elsewhere. But look,

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Speaker 2: at the end of the day, Look it is what

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Speaker 2: it is. We'll have some effect in this country. But basically,

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Speaker 2: all I've got to do is a customer that's been hurting,

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Speaker 2: and we think in the near term it will improve

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Speaker 2: a little and then towards the back into this year

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Speaker 2: or second half of this year, we should be able

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Speaker 2: to see some improvement. Given that we've got a government

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Speaker 2: that want to be re elected.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, we'll get to that in a second. Does that

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Speaker 1: mean for the first half of this year? Does that

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Speaker 1: mean more sales? Potentially?

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Speaker 2: Look, look at means doing a lot of other clever things,

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Speaker 2: you know, better rangers, as I said, better service, it's

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Speaker 2: all of those things. They're just doing things better than

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Speaker 2: my competitor set that's the criteria.

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Speaker 1: Now you've said today you want the government to get

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Speaker 1: their their arson to gear. What exactly do you mean

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Speaker 1: and what do you want them to do?

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Speaker 2: Well? I think it's about time something happened. I understand

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Speaker 2: they probably inherited something they didn't didn't anticipate, and getting

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Speaker 2: to understand how bad the situation and looking at solving

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Speaker 2: some of those problems. But it's just about time they started,

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Speaker 2: I think to put into place some really innovative and

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Speaker 2: some problem solving situation the solutions. That would be my assessment,

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Speaker 2: and I think time is probably about right now.

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Speaker 1: They would argue they have been doing exactly that, you know,

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Speaker 1: and there's only so much spend there you can cut

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Speaker 1: if you want to go out and do fancy you know,

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Speaker 1: corporate tax council whatever. Then you've got to balance the books.

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Speaker 1: I mean, they're in a tight spot, I think would

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Speaker 1: be their argument.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, and look, i'd agree with that too. I agree

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Speaker 2: it is a very very very difficult situation. But you know,

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Speaker 2: we need to see in the suburbs a bit of

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Speaker 2: imagination and a bit of forward thinking.

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Speaker 1: You haven't got any bright ideas for us rone.

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Speaker 2: I'm looking for bright ideas of improving my profit next year.

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Speaker 2: They've owned the comment.

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Speaker 1: We'll leave that to them. Hey, thanks very much for

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Speaker 1: coming on the show. I really appreciate it. Pleasure Roger

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Speaker 1: Managing director Briscoe's Group. For more from Hither Duplessy Allen Drive,

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Speaker 1: listen live to news talks.

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Speaker 2: It'd be from four pm weekdays, or follow the podcast

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Speaker 2: on iHeartRadio.