AutoZone, Inc. (AZO) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good morning, and thank you for joining us for AutoZone's 2022 Annual Meeting of Shareholders. I'm Bill Rhodes, Chairman, President and CEO, Customer Satisfaction, and I'll be your host today. Of course, it would not be an official AutoZone meeting if we didn't start with our cheer and pledge. Randy Horton, will you lead us?

Absolutely.

A-U-T-O-Z-O-N-E

Who's the best?

AutoZone.

Who's #1?

The customer. AutoZoners always put customers first. We know our parts and products. Our stores look great. We've got the best merchandise at the right price.

Awesome, Randy, thank you. Does anybody have an Extra Miler story to share this morning?

I do. The Extra Miler story comes from [ Mary-Lee Page ] in Windham, Connecticut. I would like to thank the employees of the Windham AutoZone for being so helpful and polite, specifically [ Forest ] and Kathy for giving sound advice and expertise. I appreciate the services being able to get your car's computer scanned and leave with a printed fixed finder report. After being grossly taken advantage of by another business, it's nice to know they are honest and reliable people working in the service industry. Thank you [ Forest ] and Kathy.

Awesome. Great story, Jeremy. Thank you for sharing that. Now I'll turn the meeting over to Kristen Wright, our Senior Vice President, General Counsel and Secretary.

Thanks Bill. Ms. Cassandra Shedd from Computershare is serving as our independent inspector of election. A complete list of the holders of record as of the company's common stock on October 17, 2022, which holders are entitled to vote at this meeting is available for...

Put your microphone on. Switch with it real quick to us. So everybody on the webcast can hear. Just to make sure anybody online can hear you.

Also I've received an affidavit of mailing from Computershare stating that notice of the meeting was duly given to stockholders of record as of the close of business on October 17, 2022. Finally, a tabulation of the proxies received from stockholders indicates that more than a majority of the outstanding shares entitled to vote are represented at this meeting and a quorum is present.

Awesome. Thanks, Kristen. I hereby call this meeting to order. As a reminder, it's not necessary for stockholders to vote at this meeting if they've already voted. If you've not voted or would like to change your vote, please raise your hand and a ballot will be provided to you. Before we proceed to the first order of business, I'd like to recognize our senior management team sitting over here to my left, the AutoZone Executive Committee, all of whom are here today. Thank you for your leadership in delivering another great year for our customers, our AutoZoners, the communities we live in and of course, for our shareholders. I'd also like to take a moment to recognize Mr. Doug Brooks, who is retiring after 9 terrific years of service on our Board of Directors. Thank you, Doug, for your guidance, encouragement and counsel over the years. Also with us today in front of me are our director nominees and Enderson Guimares is not present in the building, but he is on the webcast. Unfortunately, he was ill and couldn't join us today but he will be joining the Board and is part of this discussion today. And also, we have representatives from Ernst & Young LLP, our independent auditor. Finally, I'd like to take a moment to discuss a very important matter. Last year, our stockholders voted in favor of a shareholder proposal encouraging us to set short, medium and long-term greenhouse gas targets and routinely report on our progress. Over the last year, we have completed considerable work and have recently issued our latest ESG report and a supplemental disclosure that outlines our goals. We will be reporting on our progress in our annual ESG report that will be issued each April. With that, let's proceed to the 3 matters brought before the meeting today. These 3 items will be the only matters that we vote on. Our first order of business is the election of directors to serve until the next Annual Meeting of Shareholders in 2023. The following directors have been nominated for reelection to the Board, all of whom are current directors and all of whom are present except as I discussed with Enderson. Mike George, Linda Goodspeed, Butch Graves, Enderson Guimares, Brian Honish, Bryan Jordan, Gale King, George Mrkonic, Jill Soltau and myself, Bill Rhodes. The second order of business is the ratification of the appointment of Ernst & Young LLP as the company's independent registered public accounting firm for fiscal year 2023. The third order of business is a nonbinding advisory vote to approve the compensation of our named executive officers. The Board of Directors unanimously recommends that stockholders vote for each of the director nominees, for Ernst & Young and for the advisory vote on executive compensation. For those stockholders voting at the meeting, please complete your vote now, and we will collect your ballot. [Voting]

I now declare that the polls for the 2022 Annual Meeting of Shareholders are closed. Kristen, has the inspector of elections presented the results?

Yes. The inspector of elections has presented her preliminary report. There are present at this meeting in person or by proxy, 17.06 million shares of the company's common stock representing 89.9% of the approximate 18.98 million shares deemed to be outstanding as of October 17, 2022. Based upon this report, all 10 directors have been reelected. The appointment of Ernst & Young LLP for FY '23 has been ratified and the nonbinding advisory vote on executive compensation has been approved. The final vote results will be filed on a current report on Form 8-K.

Terrific. Thank you, Kristen. Since there's no further business, the official business of the meeting is hereby adjourned. At this time, I'd like to open up the floor for any questions. All right. Seeing none, I'd like to thank our shareholders for your continued confidence in our mission and I'd like to thank all AutoZoners across the globe for their commitment to providing Wow! Customer Service. Now, as our annual theme says, let's go accelerate together and deliver a great 2023 With that, I will close this out. Have a great day. Thank you for being here.