The Vita Coco Company, Inc.

Hello, and welcome to the Vita Cocoa Company's second quarter 2024 earnings conference call. My name is Corinne. I'll be coordinating your call today. Following prepared remarks, we will open the call to your questions with instructions to be given at that time. I'd now like to hand the call over to John Mills with ICR.

Thank you, and welcome to the Vita Cocoa Company second quarter 2024 earnings results conference call. Today's call is being recorded. With us are Mr. Mike Kerbin, Executive Chairman, Martin Roper, Chief Executive Officer, and Corey Baker, Chief Financial Officer. By now, everyone should have access to the company's second quarter earnings release issued earlier today. This information is available in the investor relations section of the Vitacoco Company's website at investors.thevitacococompany.com. Also on the website, there is an accompanying presentation of our commercial and financial performance results. Certain comments made on this call include forward-looking statements, which are subject to the safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These forward-looking statements are based on management's current expectations and beliefs concerning future events and are subject to several risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those described in these forward-looking statements. Please refer to today's press release and other filings with the SEC for a more detailed discussion of the risk factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied in any forward-looking statements made today. Also, during the call, we will use some non-GAAP financial measures as we describe the business performance. The SEC filings as well as the earnings press release and supplementary earnings presentation provide reconciliations of the non-GAAP financial measures to the most directly comparable GAAP measures and they're available on our website as well. And with that, it is my pleasure to now turn the call over to Mike Kerbin, our co-founder and executive chairman. Mike?

Thanks, John, and good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining us today to discuss our second quarter 2024 financial results and our performance expectations for the balance of 2024. I want to start by thanking all of our colleagues across the globe for our continued incredible performance. their commitment to the vitacoco company and to our mission of creating ethical sustainable better for you beverages that uplift our communities and do right by our planet our second quarter results reflect that our strategies are working and we believe that our customer relationships are as strong as ever our priorities of driving growth in the coconut water category and initiatives to grow our share of the category are visible in the healthy retail scans in our major markets where coconut water remains one of the fastest-growing categories in the beverage aisle, delivering double-digit volume growth. Year-to-date through end of June, according to Cercana, the Vita Coco brand grew 11% in the U.S. and grew 19% in the U.K. Importantly, the growth in U.S. scans accelerated in the second quarter, with Vita Coco brand growing at 14%. In addition to strong branded retail growth, we experienced strong growth in private label coconut water volume shipments. Our private label strategy allows us to benefit more fully from our category growth initiatives. Our second quarter branded net sales lagged the expectations we had at the beginning of the quarter, with shipments impacted by short-term delays in product supply due to challenges in the global ocean freight market, which Martin will comment on more fully. We believe our execution at retail was supported by inventory drawdowns at distributor and retail, explaining why scans are ahead of shipments. Our priorities for 2024 remain unchanged, adding households, expanding occasions, acceleration of our international businesses, and innovation. Our commercial initiatives around Vitacoco Multipacks, Vitacoco Farmers Organic, and Vitacoco Juice continue to perform very well, as seen in U.S. Sertana scans that we highlight in our investor deck, which was posted to our investor relations website today. Vitacoco juice continued to perform well in convenience stores, growing 27% year to date, and initial signs and major mass retailers are encouraging. Our new innovation, Vitacoco Treats, a delicious and refreshing coconut milk-based beverage, provided promising results in our initial retail tests. The launch has been limited to date, but the retailer and consumer acceptance has greatly exceeded our expectations. We're currently evaluating our plans for next year as it relates to treats and we'll provide an update when we talk about our 2025 plans. Our international business remains healthy with strong performance in Europe, led by the UK and Germany, offset by weaker shipments in Asia. Coconut water remains one of the fastest growing beverage categories, both in the US and the UK, and Vita Coco is the number one brand. During the first half of 2024, We became the number one branded coconut water in German retail scan data. We believe we are well positioned to lead and grow the category in these markets and to grow our share further through a combination of branded and private label growth. Additionally, I see very exciting opportunities in other large international markets, and we're working to establish better routes to market and brand strategies to capture these opportunities. I believe that we are in a stronger position than we've ever been to accelerate our growth, and with inventory improving in the back half of this year, we're setting ourselves up for what I believe will be a very strong 2025. And now, I'll turn the call over to our Chief Executive Officer, Martin Roper.