If you picture these different talented groups working together, but not really having an ability to work across those different lines, that’s limiting our ability to grow if we don’t figure out a way to really head the same direction aesthetically and really move in a more powerful way together.
Paul Huckfeldt: Becoming a marketing company.
Jeremy Hoff: Yes.
Anthony Lebiedzinski: Got it. All right. That makes a lot of sense. All right. Well, thank you very much. Best of luck. I’ll pass it on to others.
Jeremy Hoff: Thank you, Anthony.
Operator: Please stand by for our next question. Our next question comes from the line of Dave Storms with Stonegate. Your line is open.
Dave Storms: Good morning.
Jeremy Hoff: Good morning, Dave.
Dave Storms: Just hoping we could start. Great to see the inventory work you all have been able to do. How should we think about that going forward and any impact that might have on working capital? Assuming this market starts to rebound in the short to medium-term. Could we expect to see an inventory build at that point?
Paul Huckfeldt: Yes, we’ll need to fund growth, but I think it’s going to be pretty modest. Frankly, the whole COVID disruption caused inventory spikes. And we — since then, we’ve put processes in place to much better manage the inventories across the whole company. So, yes, I mean, obviously, if sales go up, we’ll need more inventory, but I think it’s going to be a pretty modest inventory build.
Jeremy Hoff: But also more specifically, we really didn’t have the inventory issues on the Hooker side of our business. we had the S&OP process, the controls that Paul just spoke of, those were already on the Hooker side of our business, and we simply expanded those controls over the HMI companies as well, which is why we believe we’re in a really good position from an inventory standpoint.
Paul Huckfeldt: And also getting out of the ACH business that was the only really inventory-intensive business in the Home Meridian segment. And so, we’re out of that business completely. So I would not expect significant fluctuations in inventory.
Dave Storms: Understood. That’s very helpful. And then just from a more supply chain view. What are you seeing in terms of shipping or you’ve seen any disruptions with some of the geopolitical stuff going on around the Red Sea. Any issues with sourcing or capacity just kind of an overall feeling of where that stands?
Paul Huckfeldt: From a shipping — from an ocean freight standpoint, I think we saw some delays when shipping lines went around the Horn of Africa instead of going through the canals, added a little bit of cost, I don’t think anything really appreciable. That seems to be pretty stable right now. Supply chains are, I think, in pretty good safe. This downturn, obviously, factories need work, too. So, I think we’ve actually seen an improvement in some delivery times.
Dave Storms: That’s perfect. Thank you. And then just one more. I know you laid out your capital allocation priorities. You do seem to have a lot of capacity should something beat your interest from an acquisition standpoint, do you have a sense of what any ideal acquisition targets would look like or are you just more focused on what you already have in-house?
Jeremy Hoff: So the key word for us right now is what you said, which is focus. We actually are going to treat several of our businesses like they are new acquisitions at this point with the whole strategy to pull them together into this whole home environment, which we believe will be like creating a new part of our company that will be — really position us, we feel like for growth.
Dave Storms: That’s all very helpful. I appreciate the color and wish you luck in this upcoming quarter.
Jeremy Hoff: Thank you.
Operator: [Operator Instructions] Our next question comes from the line of John Deysher with Pinnacle. Your line is open.
John Deysher: Okay. Good morning. Thanks for taking questions and congrats on a good solid year. Just a couple of quick questions. One, what was the orders for the fourth quarter? And what was the backlog at the end of the quarter again, please?
Paul Huckfeldt: Backlog at the end of the quarter was $72 million. Orders for the quarter were $94 million, up from $88 million in the prior year.
John Deysher: And regarding capital allocation, I think you bought back $25 million worth of stock, 1.4 million shares works out to about $18 a share. Stock price today is about $1 above that $18 a share. It’s currently, it looks like it’s going to open around ’19. I’m just curious if the Board has given any thoughts to implementing a new buyback program given where the current stock price is.
Paul Huckfeldt: Obviously, we’ll talk about it, but I think with the economic uncertainty that we’re facing right now, I think we’re going to be pretty cautious about a buyback. Stability is probably as much as share repurchase is an important part of our strategy. economic stability is probably more so.
John Deysher: And when you say economic stability, what exactly you’re referring to?
Jeremy Hoff: He’s just saying that in a downturn that we’re in currently, we’re watching our balance sheet, and we’re doing things that are necessary to feed our organic business and our growth.
John Deysher: Okay. So I got you. So growth and cash are taking priority at this point?
