Leslie's, Inc. (LESL) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Okay. Why don't we get started? Good afternoon. Welcome to the Leslie's presentation. I'm Ryan Merkel from William Blair's research department. Before we begin, I need to remind you that a complete list of disclosures and conflicts of interest is available on our website. With us today is Steve Weddell, CFO. And for a bit of background, Leslie's is the largest retailer of swimming pool and spa care products in the U.S., operating over 930 stores and multiple digital platforms. One of the nice things about Leslie's business is it's tied to the aftermarket and has a very consistent revenue stream. So with that, let me turn it over to Steve.

Great. Thank you, Ryan, and thank you all for being here today. Mike is in Chicago. He wishes he could be here to share the story with us today but has a cold, non-COVID-related. He did not want to share his cold with the group. So he apologizes for not being here. As Ryan mentioned, we've got a host of slides here. The slides will be posted on our IR site, and we will be referencing specific slides as I present. It's only our second live conference since our IPO, and we're pleased to be able to share with you our story in person today. On Slide 4, if you're not familiar with Leslie's, here's a quick overview, dominant direct-to-consumer market share leader in the pool and spa industry. Our physical network of 969 locations is bigger than our 20 largest competitors combined. And our digital sales are 5x larger than our next largest digital competitor. After growing every year since we were founded, we went public in October of 2020. Our fiscal 2021, which ended October 2, 2021, was a record year for Leslie's with sales growth of 21% to $1.3 billion and adjusted EBITDA growth of 48% to $271 million. Fiscal 2021 represented our 58th consecutive year of sales growth. On Slide 5, there are 3 key pillars that make Leslie's unique and that we believe make it a very compelling public company. Number one, we operate in one of the most advantaged consumer products industries. It's large, nearly $14 billion. It has nondiscretionary recurring annuity like demand because once the pool is built, it has to be maintained. It is predictable growth. The installed base has grown every year for 52 years. Number two, we have built a consumer-centric integrated network of assets and capabilities that are unmatched in scale and reach, and that allow us to provide total pool and spa care solutions to all consumers, whatever they need and wherever, whenever and however they want to engage with us. None of our competitors have that capability. And number 3, despite being the largest direct-to-consumer brand in the industry, we have significant white space opportunities across all the consumer types we serve and all of the channels in which we operate. And we have the capabilities, talent and tangible growth initiatives to address these opportunities. On Slide 7, we're going to walk through the advantages of the pool and spa industry. You can see that the market we operate in is made up of 3 types of consumers: residential pool, residential hot tub, and pool professionals for the PRO market. Each of these markets are sizable. And in total, they add up to 14 million bodies of water and $14 billion of annual total aftermarket spend. And there's 2 points that I want to reinforce. The first is that Leslie's is the only company that addresses the needs of all 3 types of pool and spa consumers. And the second is that we have significant white space in all of these segments, including residential pool, which is our largest consumer base. On Slide 8, I'll change gears for a few minutes and walk through pool maintenance and requirements and growth of the installed base. Probably like most of you, I've had a lifetime exposure to pools and spas, but it wasn't until I got to know Leslie's that I began to appreciate the complexities of pool care. Let's start with the simple fact that pool care is more complex than most consumers expect, yet it's essential to get right. If you use a pool, you don't want any doubt that the water is safe. There are 6 critical components to proper pool maintenance. It's water balance and sanitation, it's water circulation and filtration and there's cleaning and water testing. It's an ongoing and iterative process that requires regular water tests in order to keep more than 10 different chemical ratios in equilibrium. And unless you use Leslie's water test prescriptions with specific actionable steps, achieving that water balance is trial and error. On Slide 9, you can see that once the pool is built, maintenance is not optional. Deferring maintenance, draining pools or filling them in are all more expensive than maintaining them on a regular basis. Lack of proper maintenance leads to poor water quality, which can create health problems or damaged equipment. If you drain your pool, the physical structure of the pool will be damaged or even rise above the ground. And if you fill it in, it's an expensive construction project, requiring punching holes in the vessel, demolishing the top layer of the pool. And on top of the out-of-pocket cost, it's going to reduce the value of your home. None of these are good alternatives to basic pool maintenance. And as a result, pools are long-lived assets. The installed base has grown more than 500% over the last 50 years since they started collecting data, and it's grown each and every year. On Slide 10, you can see the impact of regular maintenance over the lifespan of a pool, which conservatively is more than 30 years. On average, consumers spend $900 per year on their pool for maintenance. So the spend in the lifespan of a single new pool represents over $27,000 of aftermarket spend. The spend is highly defensible. Each pool effectively creates an annuity-like stream of nondiscretionary demand. When you factor in the 600,000 pools to be installed in 2021 to 2025, creates a $16 billion tailwind of maintenance spend. It's important to note that we are not dependent on new pool construction given the size of the installed base. We've demonstrated the ability to grow in all economic environments as we primarily focus on the installed base of 14 million bodies of water. That being said, we continue to be optimistic about the growth outlook for our industry. As we think about our industry setup for 2022, the first point we want to make is that there's a lot of data that tells us that macro trends driving consumer demand in the pool industry should continue through 2022 and for the next several years. Pool build and hot tub backlogs, the desire for a healthy outdoor lifestyle, ongoing investment in the home and backyard, the great migration to the Sunbelt and heightened sense of safety and standardization as well as the hybrid and the full-time work-from-home schedule, all support the forecast for underlying strength in our industry to continue. Against this favorable industry backdrop, we're confident that we can grow the Leslie's business faster than the industry across our consumer types and across our growth initiatives. So now let's talk about the integrated system of physical and digital assets that we have developed. We serve our 3 consumer groups with an integrated go-to-market model that consists of our physical network, our digital platforms, the omnichannel capabilities that combine them. Our physical network consists of 970 locations across 3 formats: residential, PRO and hot tub. We operate 850 residential locations that average about 3,500 square feet, and we operate 77 PRO locations that carry an enhanced assortment focused on the PRO consumer. The PRO format averages approximately 4,500 square feet and generates about twice the sales of our residential location. It's important to note that we leverage our residential locations to serve the professional consumer with PRO pricing in separate service counter and that our PRO format also serves residential consumers. Across these 2 formats, our real estate strategy is simple. We are where the pools are. 80% of all pools in the Continental U.S. are within 20 miles of a Leslie's location. We also operate 43 hot tub stores that each average about $3 million in sales. Since entering the space 4 years ago, we've grown to be the largest hot tub retailer in the country. Our digital platform of complementary, branded proprietary e-commerce sites and marketplace storefronts allow us to service the needs of all types of digital consumers. Our proprietary sites are the biggest sales and traffic sites in the industry. And we're also the biggest player in all 3 major marketplaces. For Amazon, we capture approximately 30% of their total pool and spa business. And taken together, our sites capture approximately 60% of all online pool and spa traffic. Our physical locations and digital platform are tied together by a full suite of omnichannel capabilities, buy online, pick up in stores; return in stores; ship from store; ship to stores, which allows our consumers to shop whenever, wherever and however they choose. None of our competitors have these capabilities. Now let's turn to Slide 14 and talk about product and service assortment. It's important to note that across our assortment of 30,000-plus SKUs, more than 80% of sales are from recurring nondiscretionary products, consistent with the nondiscretionary nature of pool maintenance. Remember, once you put a pool on the ground, you have to maintain it. 55% of our offering is also exclusive to us. For chemicals, that number is 85%. Exclusivity helps drive consumer loyalty and capture substantially higher margins. And there are 2 parts to our service business. First, all of our locations offer expert advice and consumer education, free water tests and treatment plans and even free repairs and extended warranties for products purchased from Leslie's. And second, we have the industry's largest in-field service team consisting of more than 200 certified technicians that provide essential on-site installation, troubleshooting and repair. Our in location and field services, including testing, analysis, advice, education, installation and repair are a critical component of the value equation we offer our consumers and are a significant differentiator to mass, home improvement, club and online competitors. Our competitors sell products, which are only part of the solution. We sell a total solution at Leslie's that results in a clean, safe and beautiful pool or hot tub. An important enabler of our total solution is AccuBlue, our proprietary water testing capability. AccuBlue represents -- or AccuBlue replaces difficult to use and inaccurate manual test strips with a digitized, gamified experience that delivers a pool score and step-by-step prescription for a clean, safe, beautiful pool. It's a game changer, and it's only available at Leslie's. So why doesn't everyone have it? Because no one else has 58 years of water test experience. No one else has performed over 40 million water tests. Coded 17 lines of proprietary software that takes the data and chemistry and converts it to a 10-point test that determines the condition of your water and exactly how to treat it with Leslie's products. On Slide 16, we get a number of questions with regard to how our business model has performed in different macroeconomic environments. As you can see summarized on Slide 16 in the deck, over the last 2 decades, Leslie's has been successful and profitably growing sales in periods of rising interest rates, inflation, housing industry slowdowns, GDP contraction, declines in consumer spending and reduced pool build rates. In fact, our business model has proven to be durable in all the macro environment conditions that have existed during our 58 consecutive years of growth. And then with the addition of Leslie's Connect, the focus on our 6 strategic growth initiatives and our investments in talent and capabilities, we believe we are better equipped today to grow profitably in challenging macroeconomic environments than at any time in our company's history. Before I discuss financials, I want to give an update on an important initiative for us, ESG. The pandemic and social unrest the world has experienced has brought into clear focus for our organization to need to elevate our ESG program across the entirety of our business. We have a lot of work to do, but we have made significant progress. In the last year, we've accomplished the following: we named our Chief Legal Officer as Executive Leader of our ESG initiatives and hired a Director of ESG. We formed a sustainability working group comprised of internal resources and external advisers to work on ESG priorities and projects at the direction of the Board and management. We published our inaugural ESG report. We elected James Ray, Jr. and Claire Spofford to our Board of Directors and appointed Mr. Ray as Lead Independent Director. Our 10-member Board now consists of 6 independent directors, 4 women, 3 ethnically diverse members. Finally, all of our Board committees are fully comprised of independent directors. We're committed to continuing our efforts to be an organization that makes a positive difference for our consumers, our associates, our shareholders and the communities in which we operate. So let's turn to Slide 18, talk about some financials. In fiscal 2021, it was our 50th consecutive year of growth. We produced all-time record sales, gross profit and adjusted EBITDA. Sales for the year grew 21% to a record $1.3 billion. We generated comps on a 2-year stack basis of 39%. During the year, we experienced broad-based strength across businesses and key product categories. Gross profit for the year grew 29% to a record $595 million and gross margin rate improved 290 basis points to 44.3%, primarily due to product margin improvements and occupancy leverage and was partially offset by business mix. Adjusted EBITDA increased by 48% to a record $271 million, and adjusted EBITDA as a percentage of sales increased 380 basis points to 28.2%. On Slide 19, we bridge our 2021 sales growth in 3 different ways. In the first bridge, we estimate the impact of total industry growth from new pool builds to be 2%. The mass of 117 new in-ground pools across a base of 5.5 million. Inflation for the year was approximately 8%. And the balance of the bridge, 11% is sales driven by our strategic growth initiatives. The second bridge illustrates the sales growth contributed by our residential pool, PRO pool and residential hot tub consumer groups. As you can see, we had good growth across all 3 groups, including our core residential pool consumer. In the third bridge, on the right-hand side, isolates the sales growth impact from each of our 6 growth initiatives. As you may recall from our past presentations, we guided that, over time, each of these initiatives should contribute 100 to 300 basis points of growth per year. Our marketing capabilities and advantaged inventory position resulted in an outsized impact in 2021 from growing our consumer file. The 18% growth in our active consumer base drove 11% of total company sales growth. Our PRO initiative also outperformed as we saw all 3 parts of our strategy: pro affiliates, additional PRO locations and our PRO website begin to scale. Our PRO business grew 44% for the year and contributed 5% of total company sales growth. Deepened relationships, M&A and residential white space all performed within the 100 to 300 basis point range we had projected. In AccuBlue Home, we had a successful pilot launch with version 1.0 and version 2.0 is in testing today. AccuBlue Home 2.0 is ready to go, but the microchip shortage has delayed a scaled launch until 2023. Taken together, our strategic growth initiatives drove total sales growth of 21%, and we're pleased with how the initiatives and our teams leading them performed in 2021. Before I turn to fiscal 2022 performance and outlook, I'd like to make a few comments on Slide 20 regarding our capital allocation priorities. Our first priority is capital structure. We finished the year 2021 in a solid position. We had net debt divided by adjusted EBITDA of 1.7 turns. We had $345 million of cash on hand. We had a $200 million revolving credit facility that was unused. Also our first maturity is our revolver in 2025. Our second priority is to invest in growth. This is 2 parts. The first is capital expenditures, and we expect to increase our level of investment in fiscal 2022. The second part is related to M&A, and we plan to continue to focus on acquiring high-quality, market-leading businesses to better serve consumers. Over the last 12 months, we've completed 5 transactions. We currently have 3 under LOI and more on the way. Our final priority is return of excess cash to shareholders. We're in a unique position. We have opportunities to invest in growth. We have strong cash flow generation and modest maintenance capital requirements. We did announce our first share repurchase program with a $300 million share repurchase authorization earlier this year. And in December, we completed a $152 million share repurchase that leaves $148 million available under the program. We will continue to take a balanced and disciplined approach to capital allocation current year and in future years. So turning to 2022, Slide 21. We generated strong results in the first half of the year. Sales increased 22% to a record $413 million with, again, broad-based strength across our 3 consumer groups. Residential Pool grew 15%. PRO pool grew 27% and residential hot tub grew 68%. Comparable sales increased 16% in the first half of the year and comparable sales growth on a 2-year stack basis increased 48%. Gross profit for the first half was a record $153 million and margin rate expanded 40 basis points to 37.0%. Adjusted EBITDA was positive $10 million for the first half, even as we continue to make investments to grow the business. With positive adjusted EBITDA performance in each of the first and second quarters of this year, we're on track to generate positive adjusted EBITDA in each quarter of a fiscal year for the first time in Leslie's recent history. On Slide 23, you can see that we are forecasting each of our 6 strategic growth initiatives with the exception of AccuBlue Home to drive 100 to 500 basis points of total sales growth in 2022, which is in line with our long-term view. It's important to note that we're taking specific actions across each initiative to achieve our growth objectives. We plan to continue to acquire new customers and grow our consumer file by increasing our marketing spend across our proven marketing tactics by more than 30%. To continue to deepen our consumer relationships and drive average revenue per customer, we'll continue to refine our Pool Perks loyalty experience with improved customer segmentation and targeting. Our PRO initiative will continue to be driven by all 3 of our PRO strategies. We plan to sign more than 3,000 PRO affiliate contracts. We have converted 29 residential locations to PRO locations. We've also built 5 new PRO locations this year, and we'll continue to scale our PRO website with targeted acquisition marketing. Next, we see a wealth of M&A opportunities in the pool and hot tub industry. We've staffed up to accelerate our ability to acquire and integrate businesses. For the year, we're now forecasting $45 million of sales growth from completed tuck-in acquisitions. And as mentioned earlier, we have 3 additional LOIs in place that are not factored into guidance. With regard to residential white space, we'll open at least 10 new locations in 2022, and we'll continue our digital commerce efforts in the 700 underserved markets we've identified. With regard to AccuBlue Home, and as we mentioned earlier, due to delays in the microchip deliveries, we have not planned for any meaningful growth for this initiative in 2022. On Slide 24, for fiscal 2022, we provided the following guidance on May 5. Sales growth of 17% to 20%, which compares favorably to our long-term growth algorithm of mid- to high single digits. And as we've discussed today, the industry fundamentals, expected product cost inflation and our growth initiatives support our sales guidance. Gross profit guidance implies a small improvement to gross margins, which compares to our long-term growth algorithm of flat to 25 basis points per year. And we continue to see opportunities to improve margins in each of our businesses as a result of our structural advantages. That's the relationships with leading industry suppliers, our proprietary brand strategies and vertical integration in both manufacturing and distribution. Adjusted EBITDA increased guidance of 16% to 22%, which compares favorably to our long-term growth algorithm of low double digits and adjusted net income growth of 20% to 27%, which compares favorably to our long-term growth algorithm of mid- to high teens. I know that top of mind for many of you is how is the business trending with Memorial Day now under our belts with our peak season underway. There are 2 things to note about the start of this year's pool season. Last year, when the chlorine shortage received pervasive national media coverage, it drove outsized performance in the third quarter. Chlorine sales doubled in our Q3 last year and drove all-time record May sales. And second, it's been a relatively slow start to the pool season in the Northeast due to cold and wet weather and California has also been colder than last year. Both of these factors are largely timing issues. As we've discussed before, demand at the beginning of the pool season might move by a few weeks, but it's still recurring in nature. What we'd like to point out is that historically, the third quarter has represented between 60% to 70% of total second half profitability. Last year's Q3 was at the higher end of that range. This year, given the factors just discussed, we would expect the third quarter to fall in the low to midpoint of that 60% to 70% range, more consistent with 2019 and 2020. To be clear, this does not change the full year outlook we provided on May 5. So we're going to end the presentation today where we started. 3 key pillars that make Leslie's unique that we believe make it a compelling investment. Number one, we operate in one of the most advantaged consumer products industries. It's large at $14 billion in size. It has annuity-like demand because once the pool is built, it has to be maintained. It has predictable growth and the installed base has grown every year for 52 years. Number two, we've built a consumer-centric integrated ecosystem of physical and digital assets that is unmatched in scale and reach, and that allows us to provide total pool and spa care solutions to all consumers, whatever their need and wherever, whenever and however they want to engage with us. None of our competitors have that capability. And number 3, despite being the largest direct-to-consumer brand in the industry, we have significant white space opportunities across all of the consumer types we serve and all channels in which we operate. The capabilities and talent to address these opportunities is in our business. We have multiple early-stage strategic growth initiatives, and we have a pipeline of disruptive innovation that only Leslie's can bring to the pool and spa consumer. In a unique and advantaged industry, Leslie's is uniquely positioned and advantaged to win. Thank you.

Great. Thanks for that, Steve. I want to start off and maybe pick up on the update that you gave on weather. So should we think about that shifting the sales from 3Q to 4Q if it is pushed?

That's exactly right. So as we think about the structure, if you go back and look at 2019 and 2020, a different mix from a profitability perspective and sales perspective in the third versus fourth quarter. We talked about in the third quarter of last year that we saw 100% increase in Trichlor, 60-40 price volume or volume price, sorry. And then in the fourth quarter, we saw a slowdown primarily due to availability of products. So we think we're in a better inventory position today going into the fourth quarter and as well as the current quarter. And that will cause a shift back towards what I'll call a little bit more of a normalization of results.

Got it. And then just comment on inflation. Is it still rising? Is it peaking? And then on supply chain, how is product flowing? Do you have all the inventory you need?

Great questions as well. So we have certainly seen an elevation or acceleration of inflation over the last few months. In our industry, we've seen inflation for the last 1.5 years, primarily product-driven. That's been no different in the last few months and the last couple of quarters as well. We do feel like in the current quarter, should see inflation at its peak. And again, as we manage through our business, so we've got an ability to pass on price increases. So as we talked earlier this year, we had a point of view that inflation was going to be around 5%. We have updated that in May that it was going to be closer to 10%, and you've seen pricing actions that we've taken to basically accompany some of those cost increases. From an industry supply perspective, it continues to be challenged. It's certainly tighter than we were pre-pandemic, certainly feels better than last year. Coming into the season, we feel like we're in a better inventory position, $70 million more at the end of the second quarter for us, which ended in March. It's about a 25% increase in overall inventories. I think at this point, we wish we had more. So we believe this year, we will still not have all the inventory that we need to meet all the demand that's out there, but certainly feel better about the inventory position today than in prior years.

And then for those that are new to the story and don't have a pool, what's the typical transaction at your store? And how many times a week or a month does a customer visit your store?

Yes. Good question as well. So typical customers are going to come in, they're going to bring a water sample. They're going to get a 10-point test and they get specific actional steps in that water test to balance their pool. If you've not owned a pool, pool care is, as I mentioned before, complex. You can identify what products you need, but to know how much you put in, whether you run your equipment, how much time to wait between you put in the next product, to have that total solution is difficult to attain without trial and error. When you think about kind of core pool maintenance, a lot of folks think of standardization, they think of chlorine, they think of saltwater pools, which again is chlorine-based standardization. But the balance is important. The water balance is important so that chlorine can be effective. We found over time that water is typically undersanitized, underbalanced. That can lead to discomfort from a swimming perspective, that can lead to corrosion of equipment. It could damage the vessel of the pool as well. And ultimately, it may not allow that chlorine to be most effective as it does its job in the pool. So a lot of times, from a consumer perspective, there's an education element, right? So they come and they talk to our general manager or a system manager or sales associate, these are trade experts. They're not folks just ringing someone up, checking them out. They know the customers market. In a lot of cases, they know the customer and the customer's pool, and they can help them find the perfect solution. And then there's also a need based. So for customers or consumers who don't necessarily sanitize their pool appropriately, weather can change quickly, a rain can come and alter the balance, and you can be dealing with bigger issues, can be dealing with algae. Dealing with algae in a pool or water imbalances can be a pretty involved process, a pretty stressful process. And our teams can take consumers step by step through the products they need, the processes they need to go through in order to get that pool back to kind of a safe, clean pool.

And then the follow-up I have, I often get asked why won't the Internet disrupt your business, right, with all the stores that you have? You kind of just answered it there a little bit, but talk about how you manage the digital assets that you have with the physical.

Yes. No, it's a great question as well, and we're the largest digital player. So there is absolutely a connectivity between the off-line brick-and-mortar and the online digital assets more than just proprietary. It's marketplace as well. We want to be where the consumers are. We want to be available for the consumer when they want to shop for the solution they need, irrespective of the channel in which they start their journey or where they finish their journey. So when you think about Internet growth from an e-comm perspective over the last 15 years, there has been a heavier focus towards equipment and parts. We've seen our manufacturing partners do a great job from a minimum advertised pricing perspective, really focusing on who the better retailers to consumers are, ensuring that there's some channel management. And they've done a great job as costs have gone up, minimum advertised prices have gone up as well. So it feels like there's a more rational market from a digital perspective relative to brick-and-mortar as well. But at the end of the day, we provide the total solution, irrespective of how a consumer wants to engage or transact with us.

Perfect. We're out of time. Thanks, everyone. Appreciate it. Move to the breakout.

Thank you.