It was easy to see this one coming. Rule Breakers newsletter recommendation Steiner Leisure (NASDAQ:STNR) had topped its analyst targets for 10 straight quarters going into last night's fourth-quarter report. The cruise companies were reporting strong bookings. There were no pesky hurricanes blowing over onto the Florida shore. So with Wall Street expecting the floating spa operator to earn $0.47 a share, history and a favorable tailwind could have told you that all would end up well.
It did, of course. The company wound up earning $0.56 per diluted share. While the results included a one-time gain after cashing out of its minority interests in some resort spas in Asia, it was still a healthy showing as operating profits grew by 21%, outpacing the top-line growth of 17% for the period.
Over the past few weeks the company has been providing its investors with welcome contract renewals with the major cruise ship lines that serve as landlords to the company's onboard spas. This week alone saw Carnival (NYSE:CCL), Costa, and Holland America extending their pacts with Steiner.
The renewals weren't much of a surprise, especially after Princess went back to the bargaining table to hammer out a new deal with Steiner last month after its attempt at running the spas on two of its ships itself failed. It handed the ships back to Steiner -- as well as recommitting the rest of its fleet to Steiner's proven hands.
Operating the popular spas at ships run by Carnival, Royal Caribbean (NYSE:RCL), NCL, and Disney (NYSE:DIS) has served Steiner well. It now works out of 110 different cruises with just about every major line set on expanding its fleet over the next few years.
Steiner manages several dozen resort spas as well but the average sea spa generates more than twice the weekly revenue as the company's landlubber offering. It also runs spa training schools. The company has been able to parlay its popularity into selling related spa merchandise. In fact, products now make up nearly a third of the company's revenue base, growing faster than the company's hands-on business.
2004 will clearly be a year to remember for Steiner. Every quarter was a record-breaker. It wound up growing earnings of its continuing operations by 41% to hit $2.03 per share. While the bottom-line spurts will clearly not match 2004's heady growth, all the ingredients are in place for reasonable growth to continue. That leaves one to wonder why Steiner is priced at just 17 times last year's earnings. The cruise ships have all signed up for many more years. The ship travel industry is booming and reaching out to a new, younger audience that is more likely to want to be pampered while at sea.
While the stock has risen by 56% since being singled out as worthy in the November issue of Rule Breakers the upside remains. The ocean beckons. Steiner's willing to soothe.
Need some more reading while you lay out on the massage table?
- Read all about the reasons why Steiner won the heart of a Princess.
- Ten strong quarters was a good way to predict an eleventh.
- Check out some of the other Rule Breaker stock picks.
Longtime Fool contributor Rick Munarriz has been a Steiner customer on the Disney Wonder and while he does own shares in Disney, he does not own shares in any of the other companies mentioned in this story. The Fool has a disclosure policy. He is also part of the Rule Breakers newsletter research team, seeking out tomorrow's ultimate growth stocks a day early.
