MEDIROM Healthcare Technologies Inc. (NASDAQ:MRM) shares have had a horrible month, losing 27% after a relatively good period beforehand. The drop over the last 30 days has capped off a tough year for shareholders, with the share price down 47% in that time.

Following the heavy fall in price, given about half the companies operating in the United States' Consumer Services industry have price-to-sales ratios (or "P/S") above 1.4x, you may consider MEDIROM Healthcare Technologies as an attractive investment with its 0.3x P/S ratio. However, the P/S might be low for a reason and it requires further investigation to determine if it's justified.

Check out our latest analysis for MEDIROM Healthcare Technologies

How MEDIROM Healthcare Technologies Has Been Performing

The recent revenue growth at MEDIROM Healthcare Technologies would have to be considered satisfactory if not spectacular. It might be that many expect the respectable revenue performance to degrade, which has repressed the P/S. If you like the company, you'd be hoping this isn't the case so that you could potentially pick up some stock while it's out of favour.

Although there are no analyst estimates available for MEDIROM Healthcare Technologies, take a look at this free data-rich visualisation to see how the company stacks up on earnings, revenue and cash flow.

What Are Revenue Growth Metrics Telling Us About The Low P/S?

The only time you'd be truly comfortable seeing a P/S as low as MEDIROM Healthcare Technologies' is when the company's growth is on track to lag the industry.

If we review the last year of revenue growth, the company posted a worthy increase of 2.8%. This was backed up an excellent period prior to see revenue up by 74% in total over the last three years. So we can start by confirming that the company has done a great job of growing revenues over that time.

When compared to the industry's one-year growth forecast of 13%, the most recent medium-term revenue trajectory is noticeably more alluring

In light of this, it's peculiar that MEDIROM Healthcare Technologies' P/S sits below the majority of other companies. Apparently some shareholders believe the recent performance has exceeded its limits and have been accepting significantly lower selling prices.

The Key Takeaway

MEDIROM Healthcare Technologies' P/S has taken a dip along with its share price. While the price-to-sales ratio shouldn't be the defining factor in whether you buy a stock or not, it's quite a capable barometer of revenue expectations.

Our examination of MEDIROM Healthcare Technologies revealed its three-year revenue trends aren't boosting its P/S anywhere near as much as we would have predicted, given they look better than current industry expectations. When we see robust revenue growth that outpaces the industry, we presume that there are notable underlying risks to the company's future performance, which is exerting downward pressure on the P/S ratio. At least price risks look to be very low if recent medium-term revenue trends continue, but investors seem to think future revenue could see a lot of volatility.

We don't want to rain on the parade too much, but we did also find 3 warning signs for MEDIROM Healthcare Technologies (2 make us uncomfortable!) that you need to be mindful of.

Of course, profitable companies with a history of great earnings growth are generally safer bets. So you may wish to see this free collection of other companies that have reasonable P/E ratios and have grown earnings strongly.

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