The Middleby - Q4 2025

Transcript

Operator (participant)

Good day, and welcome to the Middleby Corporation's fourth quarter 2025 earnings conference call. All participants will be in a listen-only mode. On today's call are Tim FitzGerald, CEO, Mark Salman, President of Middleby Food Processing Group, Bryan Mittelman, CFO, James Pool, CTO and COO, and Steve Spittle, Chief Commercial Officer. After today's presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. To ask a question, please press star, then one. Please note, this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Tim FitzGerald. Please go ahead.

Tim FitzGerald (CEO)

Good morning, and thank you for joining today's call. Over the past year, we have executed decisive actions to unlock significant value for our shareholders through the strategic optimization of our portfolio of industry-leading businesses across Commercial Foodservice, Food Processing, and what was formerly our Residential Kitchen segment. Before we dive into our results for the quarter, let me start with our strategic accomplishments. In February, we announced the completion of the sale of a 51% stake in our Residential Kitchen business to 26North at an $885 million total enterprise valuation, delivering approximately $565 million in immediate cash proceeds, subject to future closing adjustments. This transaction represents a premium valuation while allowing us to retain meaningful upside through our 49% ownership stake.

Following the close of the transaction, Middleby operates two highly focused, industry-leading platforms, Commercial Foodservice and Food Processing. While we retain a 49% stake in the residential JV, we are treating this as a non-core part of our operations, which is why you'll see it in discontinued operations in the fourth quarter, and going forward, will be excluded from our adjusted results. In anticipation of the proceeds from the deal, we will immediately put this capital to work for our shareholders. Combined with our ongoing share repurchase program, we reduced our overall share count in 2025 by approximately 9% through $710 million in buybacks, one of the most aggressive capital return programs in our industry. This reflects our conviction that Middleby shares remain significantly undervalued relative to our earnings power and growth prospects.

In the second quarter, we plan to complete the separation of our Food Processing business, creating two independent, pure-play industry leaders. Each business will emerge with enhanced focus, optimized capital structures, and the resources to maximize growth in their respective markets. The financial impact is compelling. Following these transactions, Middleby will operate as a focused Commercial Foodservice leader with industry-leading 27% segment-level EBITDA margins, while Food Processing becomes an independent growth platform with segment-level EBITDA margins over 20% and significant expansion opportunities through both organic and acquisition growth initiatives. Turning to our fourth quarter results, our total revenue of approximately $866 million for our remaining two segments exceeded our expectations. This strong top-line performance drove adjusted EBITDA of approximately $197 million.

Through a combination of these operational results and the substantial share repurchases we made in 2025, this translated to adjusted EPS of $2.14 for the quarter and $8.39 for the full year. For today's discussion on segment-level results and trends, I will be discussing the Commercial Foodservice results and outlook. I have asked Mark Salman, the current President of our Food Processing segment, and as we announced today, the CEO of Food Processing SpinCo, upon completion of the spin-off, to discuss the Food Processing segment performance. Starting with Commercial Foodservice, we generated revenue approximately $602 million, which exceeded our expectations during the fourth quarter. The outperformance was driven primarily by the general market with our dealer partners, which had double-digit growth in the quarter.

We attribute the second half momentum to improved demand with independents and in the institutional market, along with continued growth with emerging chains. We are gaining share with our dealer partners as a result of investments to strategically align those relationships over the past several years. The broad-based strength we saw in the general market was offset by continued declines among our large QSRs and C-store customers, who faced lower traffic and cost pressures throughout 2025. While the QSR market conditions remain challenging, we are encouraged by actions taken by our larger chain customers to better position themselves heading into 2026. We have seen our customers address menu pricing, return to limited time offers, and launch new beverage programs to reposition against the challenging backdrop with a focus to drive customer traffic.

We are encouraged by the early traction we have with some of our largest customers with our new ice and beverage innovations. This is a targeted area of expansion for our Commercial Foodservice business. We are well-positioned with exciting new solutions. As we think about the year ahead for Commercial Foodservice, we remain focused on building our business for long-term success. We are optimistic that the chain restaurant environment will stabilize and improve as we move through the upcoming year. Bryan will provide additional color. Our guidance assumes a relatively consistent environment relative to what we are currently experiencing as we await larger chain customers to firm up their plans for the year, particularly in the second half.

More specifically, we have clear catalysts for accelerated growth, with restaurant industry fundamentals stabilizing, with early signs of traffic improvement, with our dealer partnerships generating strong momentum in the general market and institutional segments, and our ice and beverage platform representing a significant growth opportunity that we're uniquely positioned to capture. As we think longer term, the investments we have made position us with unmatched competitive advantages, both now and in the future, with the industry's broadest portfolio of leading brands, the strongest innovation pipeline, and leadership in automation and IoT capabilities that will drive market share gains for years to come. We still have work to do, but I'm excited for what the future holds for Middleby Commercial Foodservice. I would now like to turn the call over to Mark to discuss Food Processing.

Mark Salman (President of Middleby Food Processing Group)

Thanks, Tim. Before I discuss the segment results, I want to thank the board of directors for entrusting me with leading Food Processing SpinCo. Leading this company is the honor of a lifetime, I am excited for the opportunity ahead. I also want to thank you, Tim, for the partnership you've shown me over the past 10 years here at Middleby. I look forward to working with you even more closely through this process. Turning to the Food Processing segment, in the fourth quarter, we generated revenue of approximately $265 million, which outperformed our expectations. As I look at the business, I am proud of what we have accomplished in the fourth quarter, particularly our extreme strong order rate, more excited about the strong foundation it creates as we enter 2026.

2025 was challenged with disruption from tariffs and high food costs, which delayed our customers' purchasing and investment in solutions in the first half. The latter part of the year, we saw our customers moving ahead. We had a very strong orders in both the third and fourth quarters, with a record backlog as we finished the year. This was driven by continued success with our Total Line Solutions offering, along with strategic expansion in international markets. We have a strong sales pipeline and continuing strong order intake. This all gives me a great confidence in our position for not only next year, but the longer term. Taking a step, what sets Middleby Food Processing apart is our comprehensive approach to serve individual protein, bakery, and snack processors.

Rather than creating a portfolio of disconnected brands, we have created a portfolio designed to deliver complete end-to-end Total Line Solutions offerings that optimize our customers' entire production lines and are committed to delivering the lowest total cost of ownership. Our success reflects year of strategic investment in building these comprehensive customer solutions, and we are gaining momentum in the marketplace with a growing competitive advantage. Our decentralized culture promotes agility, innovation, and speed. We have state-of-the-art innovation centers, with the most recent one opened this fourth quarter outside Venice, Italy, where we can showcase our know-how in the most innovative and collaborative environment. This strategy is one of the key foundation that will drive our organic growth in the years to come. I am also very excited about the continued opportunities that exist as we expand the platform through targeted strategic acquisitions.

We have built the Food Processing business through additions of brands and products very specific to the food application that we have targeted and that complement our Total Line Solutions. This has proven to be a very successful acquisition strategy, providing significant revenue and operating synergies. We have a consistent and proven track record of executing on our acquisition strategy over many years with our strategic approach and financial discipline. Although we have been executing our strategy for some time, we are still in early innings, and it's the right time for the separation into an independent company. We now have the proper scale. We can accelerate what has proven to be our unique and successful business model. I am excited for what lies ahead. With that, I'll turn the call back over to Tim.

Tim FitzGerald (CEO)

Thanks, Mark. I am looking forward to what is ahead for Food Processing. As you've already heard, we have two well-positioned segments for growth in 2026 and beyond. On top of this, at a corporate level, our capital allocation strategy remains aggressive and focused. We'll continue our share repurchasing program, having allocated over $700 million in 2025, reducing our shares outstanding by approximately 9%. We continued this share buyback activity into the first quarter, expecting to repurchase approximately another $300 million in the first quarter of 2026. We plan to allocate the substantial portion of our free cash flow again to repurchases this year. Most importantly, we have a world-class team around the globe, whose commitment and execution continue to drive our success.

2026 represents a defining year for Middleby as we execute this strategic portfolio optimization and position both businesses for accelerated growth. We're planning an Investor Day on May 12th in New York City, ahead of the Food Processing spin, and look forward to providing greater level of information on profiles and growth strategies for each standalone company ahead of the separation in the second quarter. With that, now I'll turn it over to Bryan to discuss our financial performance in greater detail and guidance for the first quarter and 2026.

Bryan Mittelman (CFO)

Thanks, Tim. Our fourth quarter results showcase both the strength of our execution and the quality of our business model. Let me walk through the key financial highlights and our outlook. For Middleby Commercial Foodservice, positive impacts were seen from general market, institutional, and emerging chain customer segments. We delivered $602 million of revenue and a solid EBITDA margin of over 26%. This would have exceeded 27%, if not for tariff impacts. Customer engagement and interest in our leading technologies remain strong, especially in beverage dispense and ice products. At Middleby Food Processing, Q4 revenues were approximately $265 million, and our organic EBITDA margin was 23%. Organic revenue growth of 1.3% benefited from improvements in international markets. Margins were impacted by tariffs with higher costs and disruption in order timing impacting production efficiencies.

We are experiencing a strengthening order rate and growing backlog. Q4 orders reached $322 million, and backlog grew to $410 million, with growth across most of our served markets and in our Total Line Solutions. Turning to Residential Kitchen, our transaction to sell a 51% stake to 26North closed on February 2nd. Prior to the close of the sale, Residential Kitchen was treated as a discontinued operation. Following the close of the sale, our future balance sheets will include a minority interest investment, reflecting our 49% ownership stake and a note receivable. Our income statement will reflect the impact from our non-controlling interest on a quarter in arrears basis. Residential results are not included in our non-GAAP adjusted earnings and adjusted EPS calculations, as they are no longer part of core operations.

On a consolidated basis, total company adjusted EBITDA for Q4 was approximately $197 million, and adjusted EPS was $2.14. Regarding tariffs, the adverse net impact to EBITDA in Q4 was approximately $7 million. We expect benefits of pricing and operational actions implemented in 2025 to offset the cost of tariffs in 2026, although we will continue to have margin dilution in the first half of the year. Q4 operating cash flow was approximately $178 million, and free cash flow was approximately $165 million. Our leverage ratio per our credit agreement at year's end was 2.5x. Regarding capital allocation, last year, we communicated the decision to deploy the vast majority of our free cash flow to share repurchases.

For the full year 2025, we repurchased 4.9 million shares for $710 million, or an average purchase price of approximately $144.50 per share. In total, these repurchases reduced our share count by 9% during 2025. To start 2026, we have repurchased an additional 1.7 million shares for approximately $250 million at an average price of approximately $154 per share. I would like to provide some commentary on our capital structure overall. Our 1% convertible notes matured in Q3 of 2025, which now results in a higher interest expense of approximately $6 million a quarter. This is a $0.12 headwind to the fourth quarter earnings.

For full year 2026, the interest rate headwind from the higher cost of debt is approximately $0.34. The 2026 EPS guidance reflects the benefit of share buybacks from the proceeds of the sale of the 51% of the Residential Kitchen business. We retain future upside through our ownership of the 49% of the business and the $135 million senior note. Turning to the rest of our outlook for 2026.

For ease of communication, we provide this outlook on a current company basis, assuming that both Commercial Foodservice and Food Processing remain together for the full year. With that said, we still anticipate the separation of the two segments into separate public companies in the second quarter of the year, and we expect to provide updated guidance for the standalone companies at our Investor Day in advance of the separation of the divisions. For Q1, we expect to achieve the following: Total company revenue of $760 million-$788 million, which is comprised of Commercial Foodservice at $560 million-$578 million, and Food Processing at $200 million-$210 million.

Adjusted EBITDA is forecasted to be between $161 million and $173 million, which is comprised of Commercial Foodservice at $142 million-$152 million, and Food Processing at $37 million-$41 million. Adjusted EPS is projected to be in the range of $1.90-$2.02, assuming approximately 47.7 million weighted average shares outstanding. For the full year, we expect to achieve the following: Total revenues of $3.27 billion-$3.36 billion, which is comprised of Commercial Foodservice at $2.37 billion-$2.43 billion and Food Processing at $895 million-$925 million.

Adjusted EBITDA of $745 million-$780 million is comprised of Commercial Foodservice at $632 million-$658 million and Food Processing at $186 million-$208 million. Adjusted EPS will be in a range of $9.20-$9.36. Please refer to the presentation we have posted online at our investor relations website for full details. Please note this guidance does not include one-time costs associated with the completion of the spin transaction, nor does it include standalone public company costs for the Food Processing business. We will provide estimates and detail on standalone costs we expect to incur, along with additional materials in connection with the upcoming Baird Food Processing Symposium in New York on March 5th.

I also want to provide some additional color on the shape of the year for Food Processing revenue. As a reminder, we typically see Q1 as our weakest quarter and Q4 as our strongest, with Q2 and Q3 relatively equal in between. We expect 2026 to follow this general pattern. However, in 2026, we expect the sequential increase from Q1 to Q2 to be smaller than the $48 million step up we saw in 2025. This reflects our expectation that Q1 2026 will be stronger relative to the rest of the year than Q1 2025 was, essentially returning to more normal seasonal patterns after an unusually weak Q1 of 2025. Before we conclude our prepared remarks and begin Q&A, I want to provide an update on the Food Processing spinoff.

We remain confident in our ability to execute the necessary actions to have a successful transaction. Activities to ensure the spin company will be operating effectively, efficiently, and independently at inception remain on track. We continue to expect to complete the spinoff by the end of the second quarter. Ahead of the joint Investor Day on May 12th, we expect to file a publicly available registration statement, which will include annual audit financial statements in April. That concludes our prepared remarks. We are now ready to take your questions.

Operator (participant)

We will now begin the question and answer session. To ask a question, you may press star, then one on your touch-tone phone. If you are using a speakerphone, please pick up your handset before pressing the key. If at any time your question has been addressed and you would like to withdraw your question, please press star then two. We ask that you limit yourself to one question and one follow-up. At this time, we'll pause momentarily to assemble our roster. The first question today comes from Mircea Dobre with Baird. Please go ahead.

Mircea Dobre (Senior Research Analyst and Associate Director of Research)

Thank you. Good morning, everyone. I guess where I would like to start is with maybe a little more context on what you're seeing in the CFS segment. You know, you talked about the quarter being better than guided and anticipated that it clearly was. You mentioned improved activity from the general market and the dealers. I guess I'm sort of wondering here, how much of that was just a return to sort of the normal behavior that we typically see in the fourth quarter from the dealers in the general market? Going back to the prior call, we were talking about how your guidance at the time didn't seem to reflect kind of the more normal stocking dynamics. I'm wondering if that's really what surprised here.

As you think about your outlook for 2026, you know, how do you think about this general market specifically? Can it actually build some ongoing momentum? And all we're really waiting for here is for the larger QSR customers to sort of find bottom, or is there something else that you're contemplating here?

Tim FitzGerald (CEO)

Mircea, I think I'll kick it off, and then Steve will probably pick up. Yeah, I mean, I think we saw continued strength in the dealer market, as I mentioned in the initial comments. I think some of that's fundamentally us gaining market share there, I think to a certain extent, and then I would say kind of broad-based, we've seen improved replacement demand in the market. I think, you know, that exceeded expectations in the fourth quarter because it was very strong in the third. You know, we didn't want to kind of bake that into an expectation of that continuing. You know, I think we feel pretty good about the backdrop of that continuing into next year.

Really, kind of the inflection is what happens with the chains as we go through the year. We've seen improvement with the larger chains as we kind of went through the year. I think they've reset as they reacted to market dynamics, and we've seen traffic improve, and that kind of gives us, you know, some level of improving confidence in that category of the market as we go through next year. I think that's kind of the pivot point to move back into organic growth for the year.

Steve Spittle (Chief Commercial Officer)

Mircea, I would just add, this is Steve. Specific to the fourth quarter and dealer activity, we commented on prior calls that I don't believe this is the historical, "Hey, it's the fourth quarter. We're bringing in inventory, chase year-end incentives." That is not what I believe happened. One of the big areas we've spent a lot of time leaning in with our dealer partners, whether it's trainings at the MIK, online digital trainings, has really been to get them to think outside of core Middleby products. Right, all our dealers historically know the Pitcos, the Blodgetts, the Southbends. Where we're gaining market share, specifically the back half of last year, has been getting those dealer partners to start thinking of us for ice, right?

Pulling out Follett and Icetro, or pulling in, you know, Invoq Combi, pulling in TurboChef, pulling in coffee, and then starting to really package and wrap a full Middleby solution together. That's more where I think we saw the positive impact in the fourth quarter, not necessarily the historical norm of, you know, stocking up in the fourth quarter. We just don't see that, you know, bringing in inventory to chase a year-end or chase or beat a price increase. It's just not the way the dealer market is operating right now. We're very happy with, I think, the increased share we're taking in some of those new product categories for us.

Mircea Dobre (Senior Research Analyst and Associate Director of Research)

Okay, very helpful. Thank you for that. My follow-up is related to your tariff comment on slide 20 of your deck. If I understand this correctly, at least the way I read it looks like there's about $74 million at the midpoint of incremental tariff drag in 2026 relative to 2025. Hopefully, I have that correct. I am wondering how that splits between the two remaining segments. It appears that you're saying you're going to offset this with pricing, but there's a bit of a timing issue in terms of how that flows through. You know, I guess the question: how confident are you that you'll be able to offset this fully for the year?

Is this the primary factor that is accounting for the margin ramp implied in the full year guidance relative to Q1? Thank you.

Steve Spittle (Chief Commercial Officer)

Mircea, it's Steve again. The split on the tariff impact between the two remaining companies, in broad terms, is, I'll say 2/3 to 70% of the impact is coming from Commercial Foodservice, and obviously, the remaining impact from Food Processing. The main split difference there is, your Food Processing doesn't quite have as large of a supply chain base coming from markets like Asia as we do in commercial. That's the reason for a little bit of the difference. We have said that, you know, pricing that we took in the back half of last year, specifically on July 1st, and then, you know, we took another, you know, small to mid, single digit, increase to start the year on January 1 this year, that would cover the impact of the tariffs as we sit here today.

We still believe that to be true. There is some, it's just timing of, you know, when tariffs are hitting, when that pricing starts to or has been flowing through, and that's where you see a little bit of a drag in the first quarter, specifically in commercial, and obviously improving as that pricing comes through. Then you start to overlap, you have a tariff impact in the back half of last year, which is why you see, or one of the reasons you see margins improve throughout the year. We, we do feel confident. We've taken pricing. Again, the July pricing has been in place already, and now obviously putting forth another increase to start the year, and believe that will stick as the year, the year unfolds.

Operator (participant)

The next question comes from Jeff Hammond with KeyBank. Please go ahead. Yeah. Hi, good morning.

Tim FitzGerald (CEO)

Morning, Jeff.

Jeff Hammond (Managing Director and Equity Research Analyst)

Just wanted to, you know, come back on the QSR dynamic. One, I think you had some larger QSRs kind of, you know, take a CapEx strike in 4Q. Wondered if that played out, and what their, you know, was that kind of a one-quarter event, or does that linger? Two, what are they kind of telling you about store openings? It seems like the last couple of years, you know, there was optimism and then deferrals and what's kind of the update there? Just any, you know, as you see some of this, you know, value pricing, you know, better traffic, you know, some of the stimulus coming into the market, like, how's the dialogue changing or not changing around CapEx for your QSR customers?

Tim FitzGerald (CEO)

Sorry. Excuse me. I think one of the things that we've seen is increasing confidence in the operators as we've come into the year. I mean, I think that was there was a high level of uncertainty and certainly a lot of cost pressures, which, you know, caused them to hold up. I mean, I think one of the dynamics that we're seeing is it, you know, people have a lot more visibility. They're in a better situation in terms of where they're at with menu pricing, profitability, et cetera. I think that's a much better dynamic, and I think that's gonna start spurring the replacement cycle, which we saw some early signs of that, you know, in the fourth quarter. I think that's, you know, part of the dynamic.

We do still have chains that are on, I'll say, you know, CapEx strike, so to speak, as you said. As we kind of went through the fourth quarter, there were some that were still holding up plans, and I think that is still the case in the early part of the year. I think we have some good, you know, decent visibility that probably will pick up as we go through the year, and I think that's, you know, reflected in our, in our guidance. You know, and then, you know, with the new stores, Steve, maybe if you wanna touch on that.

Steve Spittle (Chief Commercial Officer)

Jeff, you're exactly right. I mean, as we saw as we went through last year, specifically, you know, the new store plans for the bigger, say, top 25 chains definitely pushed out for a number of different reasons. It was, you know, slow traffic. It was being thoughtful around, you know, costs. I think as we move into this year, Tim said it correctly, I still think there is some push-out that is happening on new builds. The positive side of that is I actually think it's causing them to go back and really look at their current operations, both from a replacement standpoint, but also I've talked about on prior calls, just making sure that they have a plan of attack to increase traffic through their current footprint, which comes back to increasing day parts.

Again, that's been a big theme that we've really seen with the QSRs, which I think will continue through this year, is, Hey, how do I get more traffic through my existing footprint? A big trend has been obviously beverage, and you've seen that with some predominant QSRs coming out with beverage programs that they're launching that we're a big part of. I think why we've been successful just in that aspect, Jeff, is just that they can come to us as a holistic solution, the full breadth of our beverage product, but also comes with the support globally to do installation, to do after-sale service and support. I think as those chains start to take action on those beverage programs, again, we're very well positioned.

To answer the question, new stores, I think there's still some push-out as this year goes. It's focusing more back on the replacement cycle, and that's also adding in those day parts, as the year progresses.

Jeff Hammond (Managing Director and Equity Research Analyst)

Okay, very helpful. The Food Processing, just wanna go to this kind of eye-popping 66% order growth and just kind of understand, how much is just people pausing and now kind of coming back in? Is there some good lumpiness in there? Just with, you know, the order strength against, you know, 4%-6% growth, like, why not? Why, why don't we see more of this, you know, order growth drop through to revenue? Thanks.

Mark Salman (President of Middleby Food Processing Group)

Hey, thanks for the question. This is Mark. A number of factors has affected positively our order intake. The first, our strategy around Total Line Solutions. Customers are going that route, and we see it in the order intake. Another is what you mentioned, some of the prior slowness of order intakes, especially in the first half of the year, balance itself with an increasing order intake in the second half of the year. The second part of your question is about the why don't we see that in the 2026 numbers? Was that the question?

Bryan Mittelman (CFO)

Yeah, Mark, I'll jump in there on the growth. Jeff, let me know. This is Bryan, you know, addressing your question. Obviously, we had a strong fourth quarter in orders, and as Mark noted, a lot of that is Total Line Solutions. Some of that has a little longer of a delivery, you know, tail on it. You know, we're excited that we're entering the year, you know, with a confident view on, you know, delivering growth after, you know, what's been a little bit of a slow period here. You know, based on the order trends, again, we're looking forward it, you know, to being a growth year for us.

Operator (participant)

The next question comes from Tami Zakaria with J.P. Morgan. Please go ahead.

Tami Zakaria (Executive Director and Equity Research Analyst)

Hi, good morning. Thank you so much. I wanted to ask about the backlog growth, which is quite impressive, I think up 36%, for Food Processing. Just curious, how much of that is deliverable this year?

Bryan Mittelman (CFO)

Yeah, Tami, this is Bryan. A significant majority of it is deliverable, you know, this year, but there certainly is, you know, a minority portion of it that rolls out, you know, into the beginning of 2027 as well.

Tami Zakaria (Executive Director and Equity Research Analyst)

Understood. Very helpful. If you could comment about your thoughts on broader capital allocation and M&A in particular for the core CFS segment, once the Food Processing split is done.

Tim FitzGerald (CEO)

Yeah. Hey, Tami, this is Tim. You know, reason for the split, obviously, as we said, is, there's quite a bit of M&A opportunity within Food Processing. Within Commercial Foodservice, I mean, I think the focus is going to continue to be on share repurchases, certainly, in the near term. We're really focused on organic growth. We've made significant initiatives or investments over the last several years on innovation, go-to-market strategies. A lot of that we're starting to see play out now, and we also expect it to take increasing traction as we go through next year. That's really going to continue to be the focus. There is opportunities there.

I mean, I think as you kind of look over the last few years, we've focused on beverage, and we've focused on technology, automation, IoT, and areas like that. There continues to be opportunities, so we'll, you know, be focused and kind of targeted in those areas, which we think will help us accelerate some of the organic growth. You know, largely the focus is gonna be on organic growth kind of immediately after the separation.

Operator (participant)

As a reminder, if you would like to ask a question, please press star, then one to join the question queue. The next question comes from Brian McNamara with Canaccord Genuity. Please go ahead.

Brian McNamara (Managing Director and Senior Analyst)

Hey, good morning, guys. Thanks for taking the questions. First, on Commercial Foodservice, great to see the segment guided positively for both the quarter and the full year, 2026 year. I was wondering if we could peel the onion back another layer a bit. To me, it sounds like this will be predominantly pricing driven, and if so, what's the expectation to kind of get volumes, moving in the right direction again? Thanks.

Tim FitzGerald (CEO)

Certainly, you know, we'll have pricing benefit going into the year. I don't, I don't necessarily think, you know, all of our expectation going forward is pricing driven. I mean, I think there are opportunities as the market stabilizes and recovers. I think we're very well positioned in our core cooking segment. I think as we think about ice and beverage, and as Steve commented, there's really significant market share opportunities. I mean, I think it'll, although it's a meaningful part of our platform today, you know, we really are a new player. There's a lot of new products that have been launched. There's a lot that's in the pipeline.

I mean, I think, you know, we're anticipating some, you know, organic growth even, you know, without, you know, big market turnup in the ice and beverage segment. I think it's gonna be a match of some pricing as well as some, organic growth opportunities with volume.

Steve Spittle (Chief Commercial Officer)

I mean, Brian, I would just add, as we think about the three or four big buckets of customers, to piggyback on Tim's comments, is, you know, we've commented already on the momentum we feel like in the U.S., you know, dealer, general market, institutional, and emerging chain business, which I think that continues through the year. The fast casual segment, which I think has outpaced and certainly done better than the QSR segment in the last year or two, which we're well positioned. We've talked a little bit more about international growth. I think, again, we're well positioned with a lot of the initiatives we've undertaken in Europe and the Middle East.

You know, Asia had a better finish to the year for us, but obviously still has some, I'll call, geopolitical, you know, headwinds as we do in Latin America. Still, I think we're well positioned in those markets. It really does come back to the QSR segment as to, you know, where the year potentially does inflect. I think our approach to the guidance for the year has been to keep a conservative nature based on where that market is today, but also knowing we're well positioned in QSR, especially when traffic picks up and things turn, both with our core business, and as we've talked about, with the additional, you know, products around beverage and ice.

Brian McNamara (Managing Director and Senior Analyst)

Great. Just to follow up on the QSR piece specifically, you had mentioned you're kind of waiting for some of the bigger players to firm up their plans, but they do have, you know. The big players that have reported so far obviously have CapEx plans, unit growth plans out there. I'm assuming there's some give and take, I guess, as it relates to the equipment spend. Is that how we should think about it? When do you expect clarity on that front?

Steve Spittle (Chief Commercial Officer)

What we're referencing there, Brian, are really, I think, of two things specifically, is how do new builds progress throughout the year? I think it is, yes, they all put out their projections that they're pretty open with us and obviously, what they share themselves. I think the concern there has just been the push outs we've seen. I think the firming up is when do we really see those, you know, stop being pushed out and actually turn into real builds? I think the bigger thing that we're waiting for is we have a number of, you know, exciting initiatives and projects with these big QSRs, again, around beverage, around, you know, new products, that, again, I think we need to see traffic improve. We need to...

I think trends to, you know, CapEx being freed up, which then I think greenlights a lot of the projects that we have in the works. When we talk about, hey, firming up plans back half of the year, it's really those two areas, new store builds and just some of these key projects getting the official green light to move forward. For us, it's not a matter of if they're moving forward and are we well positioned, but it's just a, it's a timing of when it actually starts to move forward.

Operator (participant)

Once again, if you would like to ask a question, please press star, then one to enter the question queue. The next question comes from Mircea Dobre with Baird. Please go ahead.

Mircea Dobre (Senior Research Analyst and Associate Director of Research)

Hey, thanks for taking the follow-up. Just very quickly here. The Investor Day on May 12th, can you maybe give us a general framework in terms of what we should be expecting? It sounds like you're gonna have both Food Processing and Commercial Foodservice present at this event. I am kind of curious for Commercial Foodservice, maybe more specifically. You know, strategically, are you contemplating any portfolio simplification, 80/20, those kinds of actions? I mean, over the years, you really acquired a lot of different brands, and I don't know if that you're reaching kind of the point of the stage, if you would, where simplification does make some sense. Is there something else from a structural growth standpoint that we should be prepared to be hearing about? Thank you.

Tim FitzGerald (CEO)

Yeah, thanks, Mircea. It's still a ways off, so I think we'll provide, you know, a little bit more lead into what to expect on May 12th as we get closer. Certainly, we'll do a deeper dive into kind of the strategic initiatives, our portfolio, some of the operational execution that we've got planned. Certainly there's a lot of exciting things going on in commercial. I mean, I think there's a great story to tell. As we get closer to May 12th and certainly at May 12th, we'll do a deeper dive into it.

Mircea Dobre (Senior Research Analyst and Associate Director of Research)

Okay. Thank you.

Tim FitzGerald (CEO)

Yeah. Yes, it'll be both Commercial and Food Processing, presenting kind of adjacent to each other.

Operator (participant)

The next question comes from Brian McNamara with Canaccord Genuity. Please go ahead.

Brian McNamara (Managing Director and Senior Analyst)

Hey, thanks for the follow-up. Just a quick one on Food Processing. Can you remind us how long it typically takes an order to convert to revenues and what the typical range is? It's great to see the quantification on both there. You mentioned most being converted in 2026. Thanks.

Tim FitzGerald (CEO)

Yeah, Brian, it depends on the type of equipment and the type of solution the customer is buying. By and large, I would say somewhere between six to 12 months.

Brian McNamara (Managing Director and Senior Analyst)

Awesome. Thank you very much.

Tim FitzGerald (CEO)

Sure.

Operator (participant)

This concludes our question and answer session. I would like to turn the conference back over to Tim FitzGerald for any closing remarks.

Tim FitzGerald (CEO)

No, thank you, everybody, for joining us today. We've got an exciting year ahead. Looking forward to speaking to everybody on the next call. Also, just mention, as we said on the call, we're gonna be at the Baird Food Processing Symposium next week, so looking forward to that. I'll let everybody know that we will be posting some materials publicly as well, in conjunction with that, to give a little bit more further information on our Food Processing segment. Thank you. Look forward to speaking to everybody next quarter.

Operator (participant)

The conference is now concluded. Thank you for attending today's presentation. You may now disconnect.