Fossil Group, Inc.

Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Fossil Group fourth quarter and full year 2025 earnings call. At this time, all parties are in listen-only mode. This conference call is being recorded and may not be reproduced in whole or in part without written permission from the company. Now I will turn the call over to Christine Graney of the Blue Shirt Group to begin.

Hello, everyone, and thank you for joining us. With me on the call today is Franco Fogliato, Chief Executive Officer, and Randy Grevin, Chief Financial Officer. Before we begin, I would like to remind you that information made available during this conference call contains forward-looking information and actual results could differ materially from those that will be discussed during this call. Fossil Group's policy on forward-looking statements and additional information concerning a number of factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from such statements, is readily available in the company's Form 8-K, 10-Q, and 10-K reports filed with the SEC. In addition, FOSSIL assumes no obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events, or otherwise, except as required by law. During today's call, we will refer to constant currency results as well as certain non-GAAP financial measures. Please note that you can find a reconciliation of actual results to constant currency results and other information regarding non-GAAP financial measures discussed on this call in Fossil's earnings release, which was filed today on Form 8K and is available in the Investors section on FossilGroup.com. With that, I'll now turn the call over to Franco to begin.

Hello, everyone, and thank you for joining us. 2025 was a transformative year for the company, defined by operational excellence and financial performance that exceeded our expectations. We took bold steps to advance our turnaround plan, delivering strong execution against the three pillars we laid out just one year ago. Those include refocusing on our core, right-sizing our cost structure, and strengthening our balance sheet. We built a brand-led, consumer-focused operating model, assembled an exceptional management team, and established a culture of accountability. We recently appointed a new chief people officer who will be a valuable part of our efforts to continue strengthening our organizational capabilities, culture, and customer-first mindset. I'm incredibly proud of our teams and wanted to thank everyone across the organization for their energy, passion, and hard work, and for upholding our commitment to keep the consumer at the center of everything we do. Our turnaround efforts gained traction quickly, enabling us to end the year ahead of our initial plan. We delivered full-year performance above the updated guidance we provided halfway through the year. Net sales totaled $1 billion. Gross margin expanded the 380 basis points to 55.9%, and we reduced SG&E by over $100 million. This drove a positive adjusted operating income of $11 million, a year-over-year improvement of 48 million. Now I will turn to the operating highlights and key accomplishments of 2025. First and foremost, we created a fossil brand platform for the future. We accomplished this by improving the customer journey and delivering a robust pipeline of product innovation, all supported by powerful heritage brand storytelling. At the same time, we successfully established a full-price selling model by radically transforming our promotional cadence across channels. This enabled us to return the business to a healthy gross margin profile in the mid-50s and improve profitability in both our wholesale and direct-to-consumer channels. Importantly, this has strengthened our wholesale-partner relationship creating a powerful flywheel effect that is delivering benefits across all channels. Next, we re-energize our core license brands, Microcourse, Emporio Armani, Armani Exchange, and Diesel. Most notably, strategic investment in point-of-sale and a renewed focus on specialty watch retail enable us to improve our in-store presentation and performance in the wholesale channels. We also drove a momentum in our traditional watch business by prioritizing our most scalable markets in the wholesale channel, including the US and India. This resulted in wholesale traditional watch growth in our core brands of 2% globally for the full year in 2025. At the same time, we took a clear action to right-size our cost structure and instituted a cultural strict cost control. Lastly, and as importantly, we transformed our balance sheet. We now have the runway and flexibility to support the next phase of our turnaround, build a sustainable, profitable business model, and deliver long-term value creation. We have entered 2026 well-positioned to leverage our foundational assets, including our 40-plus year heritage, iconic brand, innovative design, global reach, and talented teams. Also notable, the industry is experiencing strong momentum across markets and demographies. At the same time, our comeback is capturing increasing attention from consumer, partners, and the press. Just last month, I was at the Inorganta Watch and Jewelry Show in Munich, where many of our brands were center stage. In 2026, we will be making more bold moves on our journey to reinvent Fossil Group and lead the industry. It's an exciting time for the company as we continue to foster a collaborative, creative, and energetic culture with accountability and a strong commitment to win. We're turning the page to a new chapter and evolving our three strategic pillars as follows. Returning to profitable growth, optimizing our operating model, and building shareholder value. Over the next three years, this evolution of our turnaround is expected to generate a return to top-line growth, high single-digit adjusted operating margin, and positive free cash flow. More on our financial outlook shortly. But first, let's talk about the initiative we will be executing against to further advance our turnaround. Within our first pillar, Returning to Profitable Growth, our teams will be focusing on the fine initiative across the positive brand platform to fuel innovation, deepen consumer engagement, grow the traditional watch business, and reinvigorate our jewelry and leather categories. In 2026, we'll be fueling innovation through design, technology, and storytelling. This includes the reigning key icons continuing to delight our customers with culturally relevant collaboration, reviving one of Fossil's most sought-after Y2K innovations, and introducing a selected group of premium products. Let me take you through the roadmap. Starting with our watch icons, which make up a significant portion of our business, we will be innovating and expanding upon key collections, including our Everett, Arlo, machine, and Raquel platforms, and our watch rings. Additionally, we will be doubling down on our minis collection across all of our top women's platforms. Following the success of 2025 collaboration, such as Fantastic Four, Galactus, Minecraft, Shelby, and Superman, we will continue activating culturally relevant partnership with both new and returning properties in 2026. These collaborations deliver highly engaged audiences, customer acquisition at scale, and meaningful earned media. Importantly, as we anniversary successful 2025 partnership, we're focusing on converting collaboration shoppers into long-term foster customers, improving retention and lifetime value. One of our most significant interactions this year is the return of Fossil Big Tick, a bold animated movement that combines analog craft with digital innovation. Originally introduced in the late 90s, Big Tick is one of Fossil's most recognizable and emotionally resonant designs. The designs are geared towards millennial watch consumers, nostalgic for Y2K, Gen Z consumers crowding an analog forward accessory. and the male watch enthusiast looking for a big, bold watch to match his style. Earlier this month, we recently launched a nostalgic limited edition Y2K capsule, quickly followed by a reinvention of Big Tech machine. Initial response from consumer and acclaim from the press has been tremendous thus far. Our big tech marketing campaign reflects the evolution of our creative strategy, featuring a dynamic animated concept built around the idea that everything big tech touches becomes larger than life. It's bold storytelling, reinforced product distinctness, while driving modern relevance. We have a lot more exciting basic innovation coming and anticipate the momentum we will continue to build as we roll out additional collections throughout the year. Another significant innovation coming later this year is the introduction of Signature, Fossil's first premium platform in more than a decade. Rotated in craftsmanship and timeless design, the collection represents an important evolution for the brand and is designed to resonate with watch enthusiasts and collectors alike. Signature will also introduce a new level of technical sophistication and assembly that reflects hostile continued commitment to quality and innovation. We look forward to sharing more details in the coming quarters. While we're first and foremost a watchmaker, our jewelry and leather offerings expand our expression as a necessary brand Our strategy for this category focuses on staying true to our brand DNA of quality, value, and timelessness. We're repositioning the business with modern design, including jewelry introduction inspired by our most important watch collection and increased personalization through engravable offerings. We will be supporting all of this product innovation with a focused, high-impact marketing roadmap. In 2025, we concentrated our investments in priority markets, and the results validated that discipline, brand-led investment, drives stronger engagement and return. This year, we will continue scaling this approach, deploying our resources to opportunities where we can build further brand equity and accelerate growth. Our 2026 storytelling is designed to celebrate fossil heritage, reinforce our quality and design credential, and elevate cultural relevance. A great example of this is our exciting partnership with brand ambassador Nick Jonas. Nick has proven to be an authentic and highly engaged partner, currently anchoring campaign across Nick Jonas' collection, Machine, and Big Tick. Moving now to our omni-channel initiatives, which are designed to modernize our brand expression of wholesale, improve our e-commerce business, and optimize our fossil store portfolio. In the wholesale channel, we are focusing on our top customers in must-win markets, including the US, France, Germany, and India. For example, in the US, the strength of the fossil brand, our robust product pipeline, and engaging campaigns are driving growth with key partners. We're expanding distribution to specialty and energy retailers that can help to build the brand awareness and create excitement among a younger demographic. In the e-commerce channel, we have reshaped our business through two major actions over the past 18 months. First, we dramatically reduced our discount posture by more than 50%, establishing a full price-to-selling model. Next, We implemented a comprehensive redesign of the fossil site, featuring richer storytelling and a more seamless customer journey. The result is a smaller but more profitable sales channel with higher AUR across the entire marketplace. As we pursue long-term growth, we will continue to deliver consistent price and promotion while investing in personalization, inspiration, and more cohesive brand representation to drive customer engagement and strengthen brand perception. In the retail channel, we are optimizing our store portfolio and deploying our store of the future strategy in the US and EMEA. We're very pleased with the initial results from our store of the future concept, which blends lifestyle selling, data-led decision-making, and a purpose-driven strategy Importantly, it is shifting our selling culture to proactively planning and telling at outreach, personalized service, and community focus. This has a result in improvement across key performance indicators, including AUR and conversion. Turning to our co-licensed brands, we're focusing on initiatives to return the brand to sustained sales growth. We believe there is a significant opportunity to unlock potential in microcourse jewelry and men's watches. Our strategy for course jewelry is centered on modern wearable design while leaning into one of our strongest assets, the MK logo. We have recalibrated our pricing architecture to improve accessibility and enhance our competitive position. Men's watches, we are returning to proven microcourse design codes and investing behind hero platforms that have historically driven scale. We will do this by focusing on bold, confident styling, recognizable attributes, and strong perceived value within key price tiers. For the Emporio Armani brand, we're pushing opportunities in selected market outside of China, where there is a strong local demand for premium products and additional runway in the wholesale channel to broaden assortment and leverage longstanding partnerships. We're also continuing to drive their money exchange brand, which is experiencing strong momentum across major markets, including the U.S. and India. Key initiatives include elevating our retail presence, expanding distribution, building on the success of our icons, and delivering localized product offerings. Turning now to the final area of focus under our growth pillar. We see a significant opportunity in India, which has been the fastest growing large economy in the world for the past four years. This is an important strategic market where our brands have category leadership, strong momentum, and secular tailwind. I was in India last month with other members of our executive team as part of our focus on unlocking the full potential of this geography, where we are experiencing growth across all channels and brands. In 2026, we will be building further brand heat across our portfolio by broadening our assortment, entering premium price points, and introducing limited edition, all supported by dynamic storytelling. We will also be increasing our footprint to expand our distribution, opening additional wholesale doors with both new and existing partners, and opening new fossil retail stores. We have a highly seasoned team in India who is committed to driving continued growth and rapidly scaling the business. Moving now to our second turnaround pillar, optimizing our operating model. We made significant progress toward wide-sizing our expense structure in 2025. With this improved baseline and an emphasis on stricter cost control, we're well positioned to continue to drive optimization across the organization. We will be focused on initiatives to strengthen our omnichannel strategy and go-to-market execution while prioritizing operational investment and infrastructure improvement. Key areas of focus include sharpening our go-to-market execution to elevate point-of-sales engagement, reducing complexity and improving business agility, enhancing our digital and technology infrastructure, delivering best-in-class supply chain performance, and prioritizing high-impact projects and key performance indicators. I will now turn to our third and final pillar, building shareholder value. The rapid progress we made in year one of the turnaround, our accelerating profit profile, and our strengthening balance sheet give us the conviction that we're set up to create lasting value for all of our stakeholders. We expect to continue improving profitability affording us the optionality to strategically invest for growth and value creation. Building on the strong execution and financial performance we deliver in 2025, we're pleased to be raising the financial target we introduced one year ago. As a reminder, we previously communicated 2027 sales target of at least $800 million. We now expect to surpass that benchmark one year earlier than planned, In 2026, we expect sales in the range of 945 to 965 million, highlighted by a return to top-line growth in the fourth quarter. Additionally, we expect positive adjusted operating margin of 3% to 5% and breakeven free cash flow. Our commitment to operational excellence and returning the business to profitable growth is grounded in a focus on discipline, accountability, and performance. I'm grateful to our team's partners and shareholders for their continuing support of Fossil Group and look forward to reporting to you on our progress throughout the year. Before I turn the call to Randy, I would like to acknowledge the current geopolitical climate. As a global company, we are disheartened by the events occurring in the Middle East, and we're closely monitoring the safety and well-being of our employees and partners in the region. Now I will turn the call to Randy to discuss the financials. Thank you, Franco.

2025 was a year of tremendous progress on multiple fronts. I'm pleased that we gained strong traction on our turnaround initiatives, delivered financial results ahead of our expectations, and transformed our balance sheet. Our 2025 performance reflects the strength of our brand, strategies, and teams, and demonstrates that we have the right building blocks in place to drive long-term growth and profitability. Now I'll turn to the specifics of our fourth quarter and full year performance. Net sales for Q4 totaled $274 million, reflecting a decline of 20%, including four points of impact from store closures. For the full year in 2025, net sales were $1 billion, including 330 basis points of impact from store closures and 80 basis points of impact from the exit of connected watches. Fourth quarter gross margin came in at 57.4%. That's up 350 basis points from last year and reflects the ongoing strength of product margins as well as our focus on full price selling. which allowed us to drive structurally higher margins over the past 12 to 18 months. Indeed, full year gross margin for 2025 was 55.9%, representing 380 basis points of expansion versus 2024, even with the continued and compounded headwind of minimum royalty guarantee shortfalls, which as previously shared are expected to be materially abated in full year 2026. In 2025, we executed against several initiatives that drove a meaningful improvement in gross margin. Specifically, we substantially lowered our discount rate, strengthened our supply chain, negotiated better terms with key suppliers, retooled our open-to-buy processes, and implemented targeted price increases. I am pleased to note that all of these actions not only improved our underlying gross margin profile, but also enabled us to largely mitigate tariff headwinds throughout the year. The fact that we were able to absorb the impact of tariffs in 2025 while delivering a return to healthy gross margins demonstrates the agility of our supply chain and is a testament to our teams around the globe. Looking at 2026, we expect to continue to offset the current rate structure with our mitigation strategies and have not embedded material rate changes or any tariff refunds into our forward-looking guidance. Moving now to operating expenses, strict cost control enabled us to lower SG&A expenses by 16% versus prior year. The improvement is attributable to 49 fewer stores in operation versus a year ago, as well as lower compensation and administrative expenses. During Q4, we closed six additional stores ending the year with 199 locations globally. All 49 closures in 2025 occurred at natural lease expiration with minimal closing costs. Given the improving performance of our fleet, we expect to reduce our number of store closures down to approximately 15 locations this year. As we continue to focus on improving our cost structure, our teams are acting with financial discipline and rigor I'm pleased to note that on a full year basis, we slightly over delivered on our full year SG&A savings target of $100 million. Zooming out, the successful delivery of 2025 SG&A savings target was a key follow on to work that began in 2023. In total, the company's SG&A levels have been right sized by more than $250 million over the last 36 months. And while the lion's share of this work is behind us, we're never done. As Franco mentioned, in 2026, we expect to further optimize our operating model by capturing efficiencies throughout the organization. We will be directing resources toward go-to-market execution, operational investments, and infrastructure improvements. Looking now at our bottom-line performance in Q4, strong gross margins north of 57% and exceptional expense management translated to a profitable quarter with adjusted operating income totaling $11 million. We also achieved positive adjusted operating income for the full year, also at $11 million. This is notable after two consecutive years of losses on the bottom line and is another very tangible demonstration of our turnaround taking root. Turning to the balance sheet, We ended the year with $96 million in cash and cash equivalents, $67 million of availability under our asset-based revolver, and no utilization of our ATM program. Year-end inventory totaled $152 million, down 15% from last year, consistent with sales and in line with our expectations. It's worth noting that we have brought inventory levels down by more than $200 million over the last three years. The reduction in inventory, particularly in the last year, has not only seen us become more appropriately balanced in terms of weeks of supply and turns, but as importantly, it occurred as we rebalanced our overall inventory position to include far more full margin products. Strengthening the balance sheet was a key pillar under the first phase of our turnaround, and we delivered on that in spades. we are pleased to have entered 2026 in a healthy position with the right combination of liquidity and debt maturity horizon. Now let's take a look at our outlook for 2026 and beyond. We're incredibly proud of the work our teams are doing and believe we're poised for another year of strong execution as we embark on the next evolution of our turnaround plan that Franco just laid out. Provided there is no significant disruption in the macroeconomic environment, we expect our turnaround pillars to deliver the following outcomes for full year 2026. Worldwide net sales of $945 million to $965 million, including approximately $21 million of the impact related to retail store closures. That's down 4% to 6% and represents a significant improvement in the rate of decline versus last year. For added context, the impact of store closures and the extra week in 2025 is worth about 360 basis points. And it's worth reiterating the point that Franco made a few minutes ago. Based on the guidance we're providing today, we now see 2026 as the sales low point under our turnaround, one year earlier than previously planned and materially higher than the approximately $800 million in revenue we indicated for 2027 one year ago. As we look at the cadence of the year, we anticipate that 2026 will be second half weighted, with year-over-year declines slowing through the year and an expected return to top line growth in the fourth quarter. This is in line with seasonal trends, but more importantly, reflects the compounding benefits of our turnaround initiatives. This includes the lapping of last year's store closures and selected further closures this year, the sunsetting of some non-core small licensed brands, and our watchstations.com website, and the comping of last year's inventory reset as we shifted our focus to full price selling. Importantly, we anticipate that gross margins will remain healthy in the mid to upper 50s. Further, we expect that the intra-quarter volatility we've experienced, particularly in Q3 of previous years, should be largely abated with the benefit of our minimum guaranteed royalty relief. Additionally, expense control is expected to drive another year of meaningful SG&A reduction and enable us to achieve SG&A leverage. While we will be investing in marketing to support the robust pipeline of innovation that Franco spoke about, total marketing dollars are expected to be down slightly versus 2025. We are positioned to achieve improved profitability in 2026 and expect adjusted operating margins to be in the range of 3% to 5% on a full year basis. Additionally, our focus on improving cash conversion is expected to result in break-even free cash flow as we drive the business to be cash generating in 2027 and beyond. With innovative product offerings, favorable watch industry dynamics, and talented teams, we are looking forward to building upon the foundation and track record we established in year one of our turnaround. To that end, we are rolling forward our previously communicated three-year outlook by one year. In 2028, we expect our turnaround plan to be driving mid-single-digit sales growth, high single-digit adjusted operating margins, and positive free cash flow. Looking further ahead, we believe our brand-led, consumer-focused, and increasingly optimized operating model will deliver benefits well into the future. Now I'll ask the operator to open the call to Q&A.

We will now begin the question and answer session. And our first question comes from the line of Tom Forte with Maxim Group. Tom, please go ahead.

Great, thanks. Franco and Randy, congrats on a strong quarter and year. I have three questions. I'll go one at a time. I apologize to the extent that you may have commented on these during the prepared remarks. Question number one, what were the drivers of gross margin in the quarter, and what gives you confidence the improvements are sustainable?

Hi, Tom. First of all, this is Franco. Thank you. We're excited. Look, we made significant progress. I think you remember we always said that the quarter four last year was the beginning of the new strategy towards the end of the quarter four. We wanted to build a smaller company, more profitable. We wanted to change the model from very promotional into a full price to selling model. And we're continuing with this strategy. We're very excited. thankful to the work the teams have done globally to drive that strategy, and that strategy is paying very much, share all the value. Not only we've seen a better gross margin with our DTC, but we've seen incredible AUR increases across the marketplace as we become less promotional to the marketplace. We're excited. We're a product and marketing company. We built greater relationship with our partners And I've seen, I've just got back from the trade show, as I mentioned in my earlier remarks, and there is a great momentum. We've seen customers that we haven't done business for years, they're coming back to us now because we're leading by example. So very, very encouraged. Randy. Thank you, Franco. Thanks, Franco.

And Tom, wonderful to hear from you. The only thing that I'd add is, while Franco likes to say 2025 is in the past and we're now living in 2026, If you look at 2025, our gross margin performance was actually quite sustainable and consistent other than the dip that we took in the third quarter, which as we've spoken about was related to royalty shortfalls. As we've successfully renegotiated our minimum guarantees for 2026, that third quarter divot shouldn't be in place and you should see that continued sustained performance So really the past is a very positive indication, and we've already locked in the improvement that we were seeking for 26. All right, wonderful.

And I appreciate both of you answering all my questions. All right, so question number two. So it looks like you're guiding to an inflection point in sales and a return to growth in the fourth quarter of 26. What gives you confidence you'll be able to achieve that goal?

Yeah, look, the last 18 months have been a transformation of the company. We're in the middle of the journey. We see the light out of the tunnel, a smaller company returning to grow. And we're excited about the opportunities. I keep saying I'm excited about what we've done, but that's history. I'm excited about what we are delivering to the market now in terms of innovation. But I guarantee you we are more excited about what's coming next. The pipeline takes 18 months to get there. We're so excited about the opportunities. We think as we're driving a smaller BTC, we've seen a very good return from our wholesale channel beyond our expectation in 2025. Consumers are very resilient. They love our portfolio brands. Customers have a long-term relationship with the company. we are driving the company to get back into growth because the company has an incredible asset and incredible brand.

All right, excellent. All right, so third and final question for me. Seems like you've already made a number of adjustments to manage expenses. In the next evolution of your turnaround plan, you talk about further improving the cost structure. What more can you do that you've not already done?

Yeah, it's a great question. Let me take the lead and then Randy jumping in and he's driving that. As an organization, we are really driving this continuous improvement that we're really anchoring into the discipline of managing the company. We will constantly evaluate what we do and constantly finding a better way to do that. It's all about the innovation, the way we bring the product to market, the focusing to drive in the business. And we're so pleased because honestly, since we refinanced the business in November, this is a different company. Everything we do is about talking about how we grow and we become more efficient. We're very, very pleased. I think there are plenty of opportunities still there. We're looking to store performances, market performances, channels, performances, this is really part of what we want to drive that accountability and focus into driving shareholder value.

There's a few things that I'd like to add if I could. If you think about the work that we've done to manage expenses, it's been very broad and we're quite proud of the breadth and depth of where we've made adjustments to our business. One of the things that is important as we look into the future is the continued optimization for the business. And if you think about ways that that may play out, we have lots of opportunity as it relates to the simplification of our technology stack, places in which we can leverage automation or AI. And then as you move forward into the more medium-term horizon of our turnaround, that's when we start to play a little bit of offense as well, and we get the benefit of sales leverage as we return to growth.

Thank you for taking my questions.

Thank you so much. And your next question comes from the line of Owen Rickard with Northland Capital Markets. Owen, please go ahead.

Hey guys, congrats on a great quarter and Outlook is pretty solid here. I have about four questions for you. I guess firstly, deepening consumer engagement is cited as a key growth driver going forward. Can you guys just maybe elaborate on what that means tactically? Is that sounds like more marketing spend or first half of the year? And I guess, how are you measuring engagement improvement?

Yeah, great. Hi, Owen. Thanks again. Look, we're excited. We're a product marketing company. Part of this strategy and the turnaround plan was to refocus the company into the fundamentals. When, when, I joined the company when we assembled the world-class management team. We clearly said product takes time. And we saw some of that coming through fall 25. Really, spring 26 is very exciting. You've seen we launched Big Tick with Fossil, this incredible success. And we're just at the beginning. So we think of innovation, product, and the way we bring storytelling to the market will be the key differentiator. Think about the animation we just launched with the big tick. This is to us, it's just the beginning. When I think about our core license branch, which is really the second pillar of driving returning to globe, think about microcores, Armani, These are world-class brands that consumers are shopping every day. We see good momentum. We're investing in jewelry. We're investing in traditional watches. We see great momentum there. And the third pillar, we're really probably to some extent proud. is really our Indian market that has been over-performing the company. India is the fourth largest economy in the world and it's been one of the fastest growing in the last few years. is an industry that is growing. We are very well positioned there. We've seen strong growth, and we think that market will continue to grow for us. So very excited. It's early days. Look, we're here for the long run. We think of the opportunities as we get back the company into the fundamentals. We think of the opportunities there, and we're really focusing to driving these performances going forward.

Randy, the only thing that I would add is, Owen, you suggested in your question that we'd be spending more marketing. Our anticipation is actually that we'll be spending slightly less marketing in 2026. We'll certainly be spending the marketing dollars that we do spend better. We'll be more optimized in terms of the way we deploy our funds, smarter media mix modeling, smarter use of ambassadors. We've got a robust pipeline of initiatives that we've got that we expect to really drive efficiency as we work through this year and into the next.

Got it. Thanks, guys. Next for me, you know, you mentioned those three pillars of the next evolution, profitable growth, optimizing the operating model, and building that shareholder value. I guess, how do you think about sequencing those? Is profitable growth the prerequisite for everything else, or are these three pillars running in parallel?

Look, let me take this and then I'll let Randy to dig and give you more visibility. Look, we always said that returning the company to grow is a priority. We think the reason why we've done everything we've done so far is because we believe the company has an opportunity to return and to grow. We also see the industry coming back, which is very encouraging and very pleasing to see younger generation coming back into the traditional watches. All of this is very exciting. The first 18 months for me with the company have been simply fantastic. They've been exciting. And I look every day at all the opportunities, and I think we're doing the right work to focus on what matters, which is really profitable sales. And once we are really... driving this and we see our DTC stabilizing because we're less promotional and we continue to invest in our wholesale channel, there is no reason why the company shouldn't grow given the strong assets we have here.

Owen, I don't necessarily view them as sequential. There really should be a flywheel effect. If you think about the third pillar, building shareholder value, that should be born through an improvement in profitability, our ability to grow and then strategically invest for growth And, of course, to generate cash, all born through efficiencies in the operating model, growing of the top line. So much less about sequencing, more about getting all of these three to fuel each other.

Got it. Got it. Super helpful, guys. And then, you know, we're seeing strong, you know, some pretty nice tailwinds with, you know, consumer adoption. I guess, you know, as you think about the consumer you're trying to target, has your view changed? of that target consumer for, I guess, the fossil brand and licensed brands evolved through this transformation process or this turnaround process at all?

Oh, thanks for the question. This is probably the most impressive I ever seen in my career is the resilience of our consumer. Literally, we moved from a model that was highly dependent on promotional services to highly dependent food price model and you know we have seen no slowdown we've seen consumer coming back buying our products we've seen we lost some consumer in in our fossil brand and to be honest I'm not even sure we wanted that because they were looking for for deals and we got back some of the consumer we lost because we were And there's only one way of defining that is the resilience of our brand. So we're very pleased with this. Thanks for asking the question because every time we discuss internally, that is probably the biggest and best surprise we had. I would have thought we would have impacted more. But it didn't happen. The consumer went back and they were like, we love what you guys are doing for fossil. And the big tick response is just a phenomenon as we are capturing not only the nostalgic consumer that's seen the big tick from the 90s, but we're catching this new generation that wants a real brand. So very exciting. Thanks for asking.

Great, great. And then last for me, guys, when you talk to your wholesale partners today versus, let's say, a year ago, how has that conversation been evolving? Are they leaning in more, asking for more products, more marketing support? What's the qualitative feel of those relationships right now?

That's a great question. Look, we're on the phone with them, obviously, weekly. Some of them we have, you know, decades of relationship, they're impressed. They're impressed for the speed of change. We're driven with the company. They love the consistency. And I recall, I think I said that in the previous call, the first time I met with them in, I think it was October, November 24, they said, we love your story, but we heard the story before. When I met them Again, then in Q125, they said, well, you've been consistent. Keep going this way. And now they recognize we're walking the talk and they love it. And to be honest, the results are paying. So they're seeing more sales for our brand. They're seeing more margin because they're less promotional. And suddenly from being probably, I would say, not very inspiring, we went to lead by example. and we had a great relationship. I was in Munich, Germany, for the trade show, Julie, and watched the trade show, and literally a year ago, they were happy we were back, but this year was really surprising, the white coming, and we literally had a customer that hadn't done business with us for years, and they're back and wanted to deal with the fossil group. You know, this company has got a great reputation, And it was one of the reasons I thought this company had an opportunity to have a much stronger future. And I think the first indication from our partner are very encouraging.

Great. Thanks for taking my questions, guys.

Thank you, Rowan.

Thank you so much.

That concludes our question and answer session. I will now turn the call back over to Franco for any closing remarks. Franco?

Thank you, everyone, for listening to today's call. We're excited about where we're headed and look forward to talking with you after the Q&A.

That concludes today's conference call. You may now disconnect.