Mission Produce, Inc.

Good afternoon, and welcome to the Mission Produced 4th Quarter 2024 Conference Call. All participants will be in a listen-only mode. After today's presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. Please also note today's event is being recorded. At this time, I'd like to turn the conference over to Jeff Sonick, Investor Relations at ICR. Thank you. You may begin.

Thank you, and good afternoon. Today's presentation will be hosted by Steve Barnard, Chief Executive Officer, and Brian Giles, Chief Financial Officer. The company's President and Chief Operating Officer, John Pawlowski, is also on today's call for participation during the Q&A session. The comments during today's call and the accompanying presentation contain forward-looking statements within the meaning of the safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. All statements other than statements of historical facts are considered forward-looking statements. These statements are based on management's current expectations and beliefs, as well as a number of assumptions concerning future events. Such forward-looking statements are subject to known and unknown risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from the results discussed in the forward-looking statements. Some of these risks and uncertainties are identified and discussed in the company's filings with the SEC, We'll also refer to certain non-GAAP financial measures today. Please refer to the tables included in the earnings release, which can be found on our investor relations website, investors.missionproduce.com, for reconciliations of non-GAAP financial measures to their most directly comparable GAAP measures. And with that, I'd now like to turn the call over to Steve Barnard, CEO. Steve?

Thank you for joining us today. Our strong execution in the fourth quarter rounded out an exceptional fiscal 2024, where we delivered $1.2 billion in revenue and generated $107.8 million in adjusted EBITDA, demonstrating the strength of our business model and industry-leading position. Throughout the year, we effectively leveraged Mission's differentiated global sourcing network to capitalize on favorable market conditions, which culminated in another quarter of solid financial performance. The strength of our integrated business was particularly evident this quarter through the collective efforts of our sales, sourcing, and operations teams. When others might have seen challenges, given the smaller production out of Peru this year, which resulted in supply constraints for the industry, we capitalized opportunities to leverage our unique capabilities and global sourcing network. Strong consumer demand and retail support of the category, coupled with a supply constraint environment, help support elevated pricing dynamics that extended into the fourth quarter. Our ability to seamlessly shift between growing regions and maintain consistent supply for our customers translated into robust per-unit margins that exceeded our targeted range. This performance underscores the breadth of our sourcing network, which we believe is the most comprehensive in the industry, enabling us to provide reliable supply to our customers even during periods of disruption to key industry supply sources, while at the same time maximizing our margin performance. We are particularly pleased with our cash flow generation for the full year fiscal 2024, in which we delivered a $64.2 million increase in operating cash flow versus 2023. Our strong operational performance throughout the year, combined with the planned tapering of our heavy CapEx cycle over the past several years, has resulted in strong free cash flow that has strengthened our capital structure through reduced leverage, further enhancing our flexibility. While some capital projects, including our packinghouse construction in Guatemala and certain blueberry investments, will shift into early fiscal 2025 due to timing of vendor payments and and blueberry plant development. Our overall trajectory of moderating capital spending remains intact as we complete these remaining projects and focus on optimizing returns from our existing asset base. While our marketing and distribution segment performance was the highlight of the quarter, our international farming segment faced a more challenging set of circumstances related to the El Nino weather cycle and its associated impact on our owned volume. We've taken proactive steps to ensure the long-term health and productivity of our orchards and are encouraged by early signs of improvement we are seeing. Combined with the cost optimization efforts we implemented, we expect to translate these into improved operational efficiencies as growing conditions normalize in fiscal 2025. Turning now to our blueberries segment, The harvest season ramped up during the fourth quarter, and we benefited from pricing that proved to be more resilient than we expected at the higher levels of volume. While pricing has since moderated, we remain committed to growing this segment of our business as we see significant opportunities ahead. The blueberry business continues to complement our existing offerings and aligns perfectly with the strategy of delivering high-quality, differentiated products across multiple growing regions. We look forward to advancing our planned projects in this category as we move through fiscal 2025 and beyond with the support of our strategic joint venture partner. While still in its infancy, I am also pleased to report that our strategic investment in Guatemala continues to progress. In November, the USDA approved Guatemalan avocado imports into the United States, a significant milestone that validates our expansion strategy in the region. Similar to our approach with other sourced regions, the goal of Guatemala is to fill voids in the calendar to reliably supply customers year-round. We look forward to the additional flexibility that the USDA approval affords us, which we expect to further strengthen our competitive position in the years to come. Further, on the topic of our facility work, we took actions in the fourth quarter to optimize our distribution footprint and enhance our efficiency. As part of this effort, we will be winding down our Toronto and Calgary facilities through the first quarter of fiscal 2025. We will be able to maintain the same high level of customer service while eliminating redundant costs in our system. This decision reflects the flexibility and efficiency that we've built into our North American distribution network over the years. In closing, I want to thank our team for their outstanding execution throughout fiscal 2024 Their hard work and dedication enabled us to successfully navigate dynamic market conditions while driving meaningful growth and operational improvements. As we look ahead to fiscal 2025, we're confident in our competitive positioning. Our global sourcing network continues to be a key differentiator, providing us with the flexibility to meet customer demand regardless of regional supply dynamics. Combined with our strong balance sheet and disciplined approach to capital allocation, we believe we're well positioned to continue creating value for our shareholders. With that, I'll pass the call over to our CFO, Brian Giles, for his financial commentary.