Omaha, NE April 21, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The Basket Is Full, Inc. (TBIF) a Midwest leader in Natural Food Industry for the communities in the Midwest; today issued the following letter to shareholders:
To All Shareholders: The emerging coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak represents a challenge to our partners and all of our stakeholders. This letter provides a look at our situation as it pertains to our state of affairs of operations. We fully support the efforts of our healthcare professionals, each of the customers, and us to manage this pandemic. Our clients are focused on managing the emergency within their respected businesses and, therefore, have limited in-person contact and elective activities. We encourage everyone to follow the relevant local and national public health protocols and recommendations as provided. We have taken great steps to safeguard our employees by following the federal government's guidelines of social distancing. We have curtailed our business travels while maintaining supply chain activity as needed. The health and wellbeing of our employees, customers, and stockholders are our top priority. We will follow the guidance of public health officials as the situation develops and stay in good spirits during these challenging times. We expect this situation to delay direct sales activities, training, and service contacts, which will impact our sales in late Q2 and the coming quarters, lasting until the limits on activities for demo researchers are lifted. We are processing fewer sales that are currently in our pipeline; however, delivery will be limited until all conditions are deemed safe for our employees; demo researchers can return to their duties. We were blessed to have had the opportunity to strengthen our balance sheet during the last 12 months to ensure sufficient cash reserves for 2020 and are managing expenses carefully to maintain our runway into early 2021. We are confident that we are stable, and that we have taken all precautions to keep our employees and customers safe. We are committed to our long-term mission of providing healthy food choices to our local neighborhood grocery stores. Operating Reporting Practices For me, fair reporting means getting information to our "partners" simultaneously, or as close to that mark as possible. We, therefore, put our annual and quarterly financials number together following morning after the quarter closes. Once our accountant clears our quarterly number report, we share our operating results a week later; once we get the clearance. We do this so that our shareholders and interested investors have timely access to these essential releases and also have a reasonable amount of time to digest the information we supplied. One further thought while I'm on this subject: Our management team believes it is both deceptive and dangerous for me to predict our next twenty-four growth rates for the coming months. We should all resist, however, all too often, these predictions lead to trouble. It's okay for a CEO to have his own internal goals, and, in our view, it's even appropriate for a CEO to express some hopes about the future, if sensible caveats accompany these expectations. Yet coming out of Federal Regulated social distancing majority of corporations who will predict per-share earnings will grow over the long-term at, say, 15% annually is to court trouble. This is true because a tiny percentage of large businesses can only maintain a growth rate of that magnitude. Here's a test: Examine the record of, say, the 200 highest earning companies from 1960 - 2008 and tabulated how many have increased their per-share earnings by 15% annually after a deep stop in throughput operations. You will find that only a handful have. We would find that fewer than 10 of the 200 most profitable companies since 2000 will attain a 15% annual growth in earnings-per-share over the next 20 years. The problem arising from lofty predictions is not just that they spread unwarranted optimism. Even more disturbing is the fact that they destroy the CEO's behavior to manipulate the numbers in order of not being called a liar. Over the last couple of years, I have observed many instances in which public traded companies CEOs engaged in uneconomic operating maneuvers so that they could meet earnings targets they had announced. Worse still, after exhausting all that operating acrobatics, several companies started restated their earnings reports. Since we operate under cash accounting guidelines, we don't have to dance or twist the facts to our partners. Once a company moves earnings from one period to another, operating shortfalls maneuvers that must be even more "heroic." These can turn fudging into fraud. (More money has stolen from public stockholders with the point of officer’s pens, than at the noise of a gun in the last twelve months.) Lesson from Reading Public Trading Quarterly Reports Finally, be suspicious of public trading companies that trumpet earnings projections and growth expectations. Businesses seldom operate in a tranquil, no-surprise environment, and earnings don't advance smoothly (except, of course, in the offering books of investment bankers.) Randy and I do not know today what our business will earn next year. We do not know what TBIF will generate next quarter, and we are suspicious of all public traded CEOs who regularly claim they do know the future. We understand that the market has two opposing views playing out in the market each day, Bull and Bear Market. When CEOs consistently reach their declared targets month after month and promise to "make the numbers." At some point, managers will be tempted to make up the numbers, and Bears Market will reveal their dishonesty. We have capitalized on several CEO's failures to utilize this very constraint in Q1. Our management team will not be adopting this practice and will only focus on telling our "partners" how it is, despite how they might react to the numbers. We expect for you to accept nothing less from us. Continue to follow your Govenors mandates andkeep your distance and we will get through this season together. Sincerely, Jonathan Primo Fuego Galicia, CEO
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