CENTACentral Garden & Pet Company
Is the business good?
A genuinely good business: earnings fully cash-backed (2.1×) and margins widening.
Operating profit is fully backed by cash.
Operating margin has widened over the past few years, the business is getting more profitable per dollar of sales.
A balanced mix of margins, efficiency, and leverage. ROE 10% = margin × turnover × leverage.
Unless marked, from derived.
Where this answer is blind. The F-score rewards improvement, so an already-elite company can score mid-pack.
How good a business is CENTA?
Central Garden & Pet Company earns 10% on the capital it employs against a 9.0% cost of capital, so the business is worth more the bigger it gets.
Return on invested capital · cost of capital 9.0% · 1.2 points above what the capital costs: growth creates value
- Operating margin
- 8.1%
Operating margin · Packaged Foods median 7.6% · 12 months to Q3 2026
- Cash conversion
- 2.06×
Cash conversion · 2.09× a year ago · operating cash flow covers the operating profit after tax
- Share count, year on year
- −1.1%
Share count, year on year · bought back, each share owns more of the company
| Year | Operating margin |
|---|---|
| FY2020 | 7.3% |
| FY2021 | 7.7% |
| FY2022 | 7.8% |
| FY2023 | 6.4% |
| FY2024 | 5.8% |
| FY2025 | 8.0% |
Details›
- Gross margin12 months to Q3 2026
- 33%
- Operating margin12 months to Q3 2026
- 8.1%
- Net margin12 months to Q3 2026
- 5.4%
- Free cash flow margin
- 11%
- Revenue, trailing twelve months
- $3.08B
- Free cash flow, trailing twelve months
- $346M
- Net income, trailing twelve months
- $166M
- Return on invested capitaloperating profit after tax ÷ debt + equity − cash
- 10%
Margins, capital and share counts from the statements as filed with the SEC; cash conversion is operating cash flow over operating profit after tax.