Johnson Outdoors - Earnings Call - Q1 2025

Executive Summary

• Q1 2025 was weak: net sales fell 22% to $107.6M and diluted EPS declined to -$1.49 as promotional pricing, unfavorable overhead absorption, and mix pressured margins; gross margin was 29.9% vs 38.1% YoY.
• Fishing (-25% revenue) drove the miss due to tough marine market/competitive dynamics and a tough comparison versus prior-year Minn Kota Quest load-in; Diving (-10%) and Camping & Watercraft (-12%) also declined.
• Management emphasized ongoing cost savings (factory efficiency, sourcing, product design) and inventory reduction; inventory fell to $201.6M from $267.3M YoY, and the balance sheet remains debt-free.
• Directionally cautious: management does not expect the market to bounce back in Q2; innovation ramp (Humminbird tech shipped in January) and a $14M vertical-integration acquisition in Diving were highlighted as medium-term positives.
• Dividend was maintained ($0.33 Class A/$0.30 Class B), offering income support amidst earnings softness.

What Went Well and What Went Wrong

What Went Well

• Innovation momentum: Humminbird launched new technology with positive retail reception; shipping began in January (not reflected in Q1 results).
• Cost actions gaining traction: factory efficiency and scrap reductions contributed, with expanded initiatives in sourcing and product design to lower product costs.
• Balance sheet strength and inventory progress: debt-free and continuing dividend; inventories down ~$66M YoY to $201.6M.

Quotes:

• “We are strengthening our innovation capability… Humminbird brand… positive reception… These products start shipping in January and are not reflected in our first quarter results”.
• “Our balance sheet remains debt-free… and we continue to pay a meaningful dividend”.
• “We’re expanding… looking at our product design and trying to just take cost physically out of the product”.

What Went Wrong

• Top-line and margin pressure: net sales -22% and gross margin down to 29.9% from 38.1% YoY due to promotions, unfavorable absorption, and mix.
• Segment weakness concentrated in Fishing: -25% revenue and swing to segment operating loss, reflecting tough end-market and competitive dynamics; Watercraft remains challenged.
• Directionally cautious demand outlook: cautious retail/trade environment and management does not expect a Q2 market bounce-back.

Transcript

Operator (participant)

Hello, everyone, and welcome to the Johnson Outdoors First Quarter 2025 Earnings Conference Call. Today's call will be led by Helen Johnson Leopold, Johnson Outdoors' Chairman and Chief Executive Officer. Also on the call is David Johnson, Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. Prior to the question and answer session, all participants will be placed in a listen only mode. After the prepared remarks, the question and answer session will begin.

I would now like to turn the call over to Pat Penman from Johnson Outdoors. Please go ahead, Ms. Penman.

Patricia Penman (CMO)

Thank you. Good morning, and thank you for joining us for our discussion of Johnson Outdoors' results for the 2025 fiscal Q1. If you need a copy of today's news release, it is available on our website at johnsonoutdoors.com under Investor Relations. I also need to remind you that this conference call may contain forward looking statements. These statements are made on the basis of our current views and assumptions and are not guarantees of future performance.

Actual events may differ materially from those statements due to a number of factors, many beyond Johnson Outdoors' control. These risks and uncertainties include those listed in our press release and filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. If you have additional questions following the call, please contact Dave Johnson or myself. It is now my pleasure to turn the call over to Helen Johnson Leopold.

Helen Johnson-Leipold (Chairman & CEO)

Thanks, Beth. Good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining us. I'll begin by sharing perspective on our Q1 performance as well as an update on the strategic priorities for our businesses. Dave will review the financial highlights and then we'll take your questions.

We continue to face ongoing marketplace challenges with a cautious retail and trade channel environment and competitive pressures. As we said during our last quarterly call, we are not seeing indicators these conditions are going away anytime soon and our Q1 results reflect that. We remain focused on aggressively leaning into our strategic priorities, innovation, operational efficiencies and e commerce and making the necessary changes for the future growth. We're making inroads on these key drivers and I'd like to share some of our progress on each of them. In this highly competitive outdoor recreation marketplace, we are strengthening our innovation capability as it is one of the most critical elements to driving growth.

For example, in our fishing business, we recently launched new technology in our Humminbird brand and we've seen positive reception from our retail partners so far with consumer enthusiasm beginning to build as well. These products start shipping in January and are not reflected in our Q1 results. We're excited about the momentum as we continue to work hard to give anglers the best fishing experiences possible. In diving, we recently purchased a company that has been a long time supplier for our ScubaPro brand and has been an integral part of a number of our past successful innovations in that business. In addition to being a catalyst for future SCOOPAPRO innovation, this acquisition is a vertical integration that allows us to accelerate our efforts in simplifying our diving business and enabling more efficient operational footprint.

Improving profitability and strengthening our business operations continue to be a strategic priority and we've been working hard to drive operational and product cost savings across all of our businesses. In addition, we are focused on managing our inventory levels. Dave will give more details on this. We also have heard the news around the new tariffs. As you know, we are an American company.

We pride ourselves on our U. S.-based manufacturing and operations, which we have been expanded which we have expanded in the past few years. For example, we have operations or manufacturing in multiple states, including Maine, Georgia, Alabama, California, Minnesota and Wisconsin. Regarding tariffs, we continue to discuss the implications and have already started on our mitigation plans. Leveraging our American footprint will be an important part of this plan.

Another key strategic priority is enhancing our ability to drive growth through e commerce. We are investing in digital commerce center in a digital commerce center of excellence, which adds expertise and capabilities that will allow us to accelerate sales and profitability. As we navigate this tough environment, we will continue to invest and execute on our strategic priorities. We are confident these are the right things to position us for future healthy profitable growth. Now, I'll turn the call over to Dave for more details on financials.

David Johnson (CFO)

Thank you, Helen. To start, I wanted to point out that the Q1 sales results also reflect a challenging comparison between quarters due to load in of the Minn Kota Quest trolling motor line in the previous Q1. Gross margin in the Q1 was negatively impacted by increased promotional pricing, unfavorable overhead absorption and unfavorable product mix. As Helen mentioned, we continue to expand our cost savings program with the addition of product cost savings initiatives that include investing in resources to drive down costs with improved product design. Operating expenses decreased $400,000 versus the prior year Q1 due primarily to lower sales volumes between quarters and decreased expense on the company's deferred compensation plan, nearly offset by increases in consulting expenses and warranty expenses.

We've been working hard to manage our higher than normal inventory levels. Our inventory balance as of December was $201,600,000 down about $66,000,000 from last year's Q1. I want to continue to highlight that in the midst of our challenging results, our balance sheet remains debt free, which is a strong competitive advantage in today's marketplace. And we continue to pay a meaningful dividend to shareholders with the Board approving our most recent dividend announced in December. We remain confident in our ability and plans to create long term value for shareholders.

Now I'll turn the call over to the operator for the Q and A session.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. Our first question comes from the line of Anthony Lebiedzinski from Sidoti and Company LLC.

Anthony Lebiedzinski (Senior Equity Research Analyst)

Good morning, everyone, and thank you for taking the questions. So first, as far as your revenue, it came in above our estimate, which is certainly good to see. So I guess just a broad kind of housekeeping question first. So in terms of the quarterly revenue, can you just give us a sense about pricing versus unit volumes? I know you have certainly engaged in more promotional pricing.

So again, just wanted to get a sense as to the pricing versus unit volume dynamics that happened in the quarter?

David Johnson (CFO)

Yes. I mean, we were affected by discounting obviously in the quarter. So I can't give you an exact breakdown of it. But certainly both units are down, but exacerbated by the discounting that we did in the Q1.

Anthony Lebiedzinski (Senior Equity Research Analyst)

Okay. Thanks, Dave. And then I heard there was a diving acquisition made. So can you give us some more details about this? When was this completed and purchase price or anything like that, that we can anything that you could add to what you said before would be very helpful?

Helen Johnson-Leipold (Chairman & CEO)

Well, I'll just start with how excited we are about making the acquisition. And it was a partner that we have had for a long time with ScubaPro and they've been making our product and contributing to our innovation and offered the opportunity for a lot more manufacturing efficiency and consolidation of some of our products that we source. So we're very excited and it the integration went very smoothly because we've worked with them before and know them. So in general, it was I think a very positive and added value. And Dave, you can go into details.

David Johnson (CFO)

Yes. The operation is located in South Africa and as Helen alluded, it will increase our efficiency for the diving operation, which we're very happy about. There's also some strong innovation that we'll be able to leverage out of that plant as well. The purchase price is around $14,000,000 All the details will be in the queue, but that's the approximate price.

Anthony Lebiedzinski (Senior Equity Research Analyst)

Okay. Well, thank you very much for that information. Yes, certainly very helpful and congrats on that. Certainly sounds like a value added acquisition here and accretive. So, I guess, as you enter the busy season now, I know you talked about innovation.

It looks like the Humminbird product is off to a good start. Can you give us any other sense as to the early indications for incoming orders for the rest of the business? And just broadly speaking, as far as inventory levels at the retail level, what is your sense of that?

Helen Johnson-Leipold (Chairman & CEO)

Well, let's talk inventory levels. It's really it's a mixed bag and depends on which partner and some are in a healthy position and some may have a little bit of too much inventory, but it depends on which business and what class of trade we're talking about. But there's cautious ordering and that's understandable given all the things that are going on, very hard to predict what things will be like. It is good that our new products are getting good reception by the trade. It's still in the selling time frame and we've got some in our watercraft business as well as some in jet oil, but they haven't hit our numbers yet.

But we don't expect the market to bounce back in Q2. We're just glad that the innovation and our new products are getting good reception, but it's still very unpredictable and very cautious environment as far as we can tell.

Anthony Lebiedzinski (Senior Equity Research Analyst)

Understood. Okay. And then, I know you also combined camping and watercraft recreation segments together now, but can you just parse out the 2 and give us some additional information about them? Just curious as to what you saw in the quarter.

David Johnson (CFO)

Yes. The camping business is doing better relative to the watercraft business for the quarter. The market and the paddling market is still really challenged. We're seeing a little bit of I hate to say growth in the camping business, but a little bit more positivity in that side of the business. So, kind of the first quarter is kind of a tale of 2 different markets really.

Anthony Lebiedzinski (Senior Equity Research Analyst)

Okay. All right. Thanks for that. And then as far as the your cost savings initiatives, can you talk about the impact of that? And then you also talked about expanding these cost savings measures.

So how should we think about the impact of what could come going forward here as you look to continue on that path?

David Johnson (CFO)

Yes. I mean, it's we're happy with the progress we've made in cost savings. I think we've talked before about we were really focused last year on factory efficiency, reducing scrap rates, just getting our act together on the factory floor, which has borne some fruit. We're expanding that. We're looking at sourcing initiatives.

And like we alluded to, looking at our product design and trying to just take cost physically out of the product. That's a little bit of a midterm to longer term type of payout, but that should bear fruit for us. The cost savings is definitely impacted the Q1, but it was just masked by the discounting we had to do.

Anthony Lebiedzinski (Senior Equity Research Analyst)

Okay, understood. Okay. All right. And then lastly, in terms of the tariffs, so I know you touched on this a little bit and even actually there was some new news actually just actually shortly before 11 a. M.

Looks like the Mexico tariffs are being paused for a month actually. It was just announced actually by half an hour ago. So but just overall, obviously, as an American company manufacturer in the U. S, you guys do use a lot of imported components. So I guess just maybe broadly maybe talk to us in terms of like what's your exposure is as far as China or any other sources as far as just broadly speaking about tariffs, so how should we think about that?

What are the mitigation strategies you're looking at here kind of going forward?

David Johnson (CFO)

Yes. I mean, as you alluded to, it's a dynamic situation. There's things change pretty quickly. We do business with China. We do business with Mexico.

We do business with Canada. Mexico and China, we have exposure to. I hesitate to give you a number on that because we are working on mitigation strategies right now. I mean, and we alluded to our American footprint and what we want to do in the U. S, I think there are things that we could do to help mitigate some of this stuff.

So I think more to come as we learn more and as we know where the dust is going to settle here, but just rest assured we're working on mitigation strategies.

Anthony Lebiedzinski (Senior Equity Research Analyst)

That sounds very good. Okay. Well, thank you very much and best of luck going forward.

Helen Johnson-Leipold (Chairman & CEO)

Thank you.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. At this time, I would now like to turn the conference back over to Helen Johnson Leopold for closing remarks.

Helen Johnson-Leipold (Chairman & CEO)

Thank you for joining us today and I hope everyone has a great day. Thank you.

Operator (participant)

This concludes today's conference call. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.