Landec Corporation

Good afternoon, and thank you for joining LANDAC's fiscal 2022 first quarter earnings call. During the presentation, all participants will be in a listen-only mode. Afterwards, we will conduct a question and answer session. At that time, I will provide instructions on how to ask a question. Now, I would like to turn the call over to Jeff Sonick, investor relations at ICR.

Good afternoon, and thank you for joining us.

today to discuss Landec Corporation's first quarter fiscal 2022 earnings results. On the call today from the company are Dr. Albert Bowles, President and Chief Executive Officer, John Moorburg, Chief Financial Officer, and Jim Hall, President of LifeCorps. By now, everyone should have access to the press release, which went out today just after 1 p.m. Pacific or 4 Eastern. If you've not received the release, it's available on the investor relations portion of Landec's website. Before we begin today, I'd like to remind everyone of the safe harbor statement. Certain statements made in the course of this conference call contain forward-looking statements. It's important to note that the company's actual results could differ materially from those projected in such forward-looking statements. Additional information concerning risk factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those in the forward-looking statements is contained from time to time in the company's filings with the SEC, including but not limited to the company's Form 10-K for fiscal year 2021. Copies of these filings may be obtained from the company's website. With that, I now turn the call over to Al.

Thanks, Jeff. Good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for joining us today. On today's call, I will provide highlights from our fiscal 2022 first quarter results. Jim Hall will then review recent developments at LifeCorps, I'll cover our operational progress at Curation Foods, and John Moorberg will discuss our financial results in Fiscal 2022 Outlook. We will then open the call for your questions. We had a strong start to Fiscal 2022 with our first quarter performance where we generated consolidated revenues of 129 million and consolidated adjusted EBITDA of 4.4 million. As we anticipated, the drivers were margin-related with a 7% increase in consolidated gross profit and a 42% increase in adjusted EBITDA, both of which were achieved despite a 5% decrease in our revenue which is explained by the planned contraction within our curation foods segment. Moreover, I'm pleased with our ability to drive adjusted EBITDA growth at both of our operating segments in our fiscal first quarter. LifeCorp grew revenue by a modest 1%, but drove adjusted EBITDA growth of 57% based on some mix-related benefits. And at curation foods, we were pleased to generate segment gross profit margin of 11% and grow adjusted EBITDA at 25%, despite the ongoing strategic contraction of revenue as we continue to rationalize SKUs and simplify that business. We are on plan through the first quarter and continue to feel good about our fiscal 2022 outlook. As a result, We are reiterating those objectives here today, which are called for a full year consolidated revenues of 545 to 554 million and consolidated adjusted EBITDA of 33.3 to 35.5 million. We have the benefit of a nimbler organization, which, as I hope you can see, is translating to improving margins. We have more work to do. but we are on the right track. We have a solid foundation at both our businesses that expect to drive more consistent results going forward as we work towards delivering enhanced shareholder value. With that, I'll turn the call over to Jim.

Thank you, Al. Building on our fiscal fourth quarter update, we continue to make headway with our operating initiatives including the $1.6 million investment in sales and marketing that are planned for fiscal 22 that we discussed last quarter. I'm pleased to report that we're on track with the build out of our development pipeline as we prepare for the future. In the fiscal first quarter, we signed development agreements with two additional companies and started work on one new project. This brings our development pipeline to 23 projects, which are spread across early phase clinical development with five customers, phase one and two clinical development with eight customers, and phase three clinical development and scale up commercial validation activity with 10 customers. We have also completed one development project which received FDA regulatory approval and have transitioned that product into commercial production. In addition, as we continue to build and prepare the organization to advance and expand our development pipeline, activity remains strong and we remain in active discussions with many potential new project candidates to continue to build on our pipeline moving forward. We operate in the amazing CDMO industry with strong fundamentals. and LifeCorps is perfectly positioned to take advantage of the growing CDMO opportunities to deliver attractive financial returns to all of our stakeholders. We are a beneficiary of the significant trends towards outsourcing of new drug development and our syringe and vial filling capabilities align perfectly with the powerful trends in new injectable drug applications that are utilizing those modalities. Limited injectable drug manufacturing capacity creates an opportunity for LifeCore to grow and also extend our reach through investments and new capabilities to meet the industry's ever-growing needs. Our expertise in viscous materials and our world-class quality system that supports drugs, biologics, medical devices, and combination products enables us to stand out as a specialized leader in the CDMO industry. We are preparing for the future through operational and capital investments with the $1.6 million investment in the P&L this fiscal year through sales and marketing and development resource expenses to expand our reach with new customers and to increase our development service capabilities, which ultimately allow us to continue to expand our development pipeline and open new sales channels that complement our existing capabilities. From an operational perspective, we are intensely focused on enhancing our organization to ensure that we remain prepared to meet our growth objectives. This really comes down to attracting and retaining great people with the pertinent technical capabilities to help LifeCorp grow. In response, we recently established LifeCorp University to educate and train our next generation of technical professionals in the critical operations of aseptic filling processes. In August, we graduated our first class, who will now use their knowledge to make an impact on our sales growth and lean culture. On the capital side of the house, we are focused on maximizing the revenue generating capacity within our current infrastructure and looking to the future to source and qualify the necessary equipment to keep up with growth and expected capacity needs. We continue to expect capital investment in fiscal year 22 of approximately $32 million towards expanding our filling capacity beyond our current 10 million units to reach approximately 37 million units over the next five years. This investment will support future capacity needs and nearly double LifeCore's revenue generating capacity of our aseptic fill finish business. Finally, a brief update on the channel inventory that we spoke about last quarter. As a reminder, in the fourth quarter of fiscal 21, we learned that many of our commercial customers carried larger inventories of finished products during COVID. due to the temporary deceleration and procedure volume. In the fiscal 22 first quarter, this dynamic explains a flattish year over year revenue growth, and we continue to expect a similar situation in fiscal second quarter. Expectations for inventory to rebalance remain focused on mid-fiscal year based on the latest communication with our customers, but could change based on market forces and procedure volumes. Now I would like to turn the call back to Al.

Thanks, Jim. Duration food started fiscal 22 strong, and perhaps most importantly, we are hitting the gross margin targets that we've been working towards as a result of Project SWIFT. We delivered on our steady state target of 11 to 14 percent in fiscal 21 fourth quarter which was a significant milestone for the business. And in fiscal 22 first quarter, we achieved 11%. We are standing by our commitment to deliver that same range of 11% to 14% for the full fiscal year, which speaks to the massive operational enhancements that we've made over the past two years to put this business on firm footing as we prepare and shift our energies toward growth. Our focus this year has evolved to drive efficiencies in our operational performance through maturing our operational excellence program, which we refer to as ZEST, zero waste, employee engagement, standardization, and training. This is an approach based on the lean principles that are well recognized for improving operational performance. Zest is only possible now that we have done the work to simplify the business through strategic moves to reduce organizational complexity, divest non-core assets, broaden leadership accountabilities, and flatten our management structure. Of course, inflation is having a significant impact across a variety of industries, and here at Creation Foods as well. While we'll continue to believe that we are in a relatively better position given all the operational enhancements we've made over the past two years at Project SWIFT. Categories such as packaging, freight, and supplier-related costs are things that we are dealing with daily. We have a focused program to drive continuous productivity through the supply chain with a concerted effort to offset cost increases. Where we are unable to offset cost increases, we are also working with our sales teams to implement price increases as we are committed to maintain gross margin in the 11 to 14% steady state range that I have previously discussed. Many supply chains remain dysfunctional post-COVID as well, and we are seeing issues with some suppliers of salad dressings, and other inputs that are complicating our operation and to a limited extent subduing our ability to meet demand. As expected our fresh packaged salads and vegetable business declined seven percent in the first quarter of fiscal 22 due to veggie trays being discontinued from club stores as a result of COVID and fewer people being able to congregate. We are now just starting to see retailer interest in bringing back trays, and we see an opportunity for the business to pick up as fiscal year 22 progresses. Our avocado products business was essentially flat in Q1 of fiscal 22, partly due to SKU rationalization with certain customers and a timing delay in our promotional activity as our guacamole now or squeeze product test was delayed from q1 into q2 we remain excited about our growth in the squeeze product we continue to pick up additional customers and we are now capable of bidding on private label guacamole opportunities as our hpp line is now in production on the commercial front our retailing merchandising efforts related to resets and new items are continuing to build as we hold additional top-level customer meetings. As planned, we are now seeing introductions of our new products starting to hit the shelves. These products have been delayed for as long as a year due to COVID and include our Buffalo Cauliflower, Spicy Sweet Kale Salad, and Ready-to-Walk Kits. We also introduced a unique packaging design, a saddlebag, into one of our large club store customers, and it is outperforming expectations. The saddle bag replaces a 28-ounce salad with two 14-ounce salads that are in separate bags but fused at the top. This allows consumers to open one salad at a time with a smaller portion size, retaining freshness on the unopened bag. We see the packaging format rolling out beyond the test and improving our overall sales in the sales category later in the year. So on the whole, I'm feeling like we are in a good spot. We have the innovations ready to go. We have distribution accelerating across North America, and we expect to see momentum with resets as we move through fiscal second quarter and into the second half of the year. Now, I will turn the call over to John.

Thank you, Al. I'm pleased to share with you our financial results for the first quarter of fiscal 22. I will begin with a summary review of each segment before concluding with a consolidated financial review. Starting with our life course segment, first quarter revenues ended at $22 million. a .7% increase over the same period of the prior year. CDMO revenues posted an increase of 8% to $17.8 million from the prior year, primarily due to the timing of aseptic commercial shipments. Fermentation revenues decreased 22% to $4.2 million, primarily due to the channel inventory rebalancing that Jim discussed as well as difficult growth comparison in the prior year where this revenue category was up 620%. Gross profit margin improved by approximately 330 basis points versus the prior year to 26.3%, largely due to improved product mix. Segment adjusted EBITDA totaled 2.3 million for the quarter a 57.2% increase over the prior year, and adjusted EBITDA margin was 10.4%, marking 375 basis points of improvement versus the prior year. Let's turn to our curation food segment results for the fiscal first quarter. Revenues totaled $106.8 million, a 6.2% decline from the prior year first quarter. Fresh packaged salads and vegetables declined 7%, which was primarily due to the planned reduction in the lower margin legacy vegetable and trade business. Avocado products revenues were approximately flat versus the prior year. Gross profit margin improved by 100 basis points versus the prior year to 11%, which is consistent with our expectations to achieve Steady state segment gross margins in the range of 11 to 14% for a full year fiscal 2022. Adjusted EBITDA for the quarter totaled 3 million with a corresponding margin of 2.8%. Briefly turning to our consolidated financial performance, fiscal first quarter revenues declined 5.1% to $128.8 million. Selling general administrative expenses decreased $2 million versus the prior year to $15.9 million in the first quarter. And consolidated adjusted EBITDA grew 42% to $4.4 million for the first quarter as compared to $3.1 million in the prior year period. Let's now turn to our cash flow performance. Cash provided by operations was $0.8 million for the first fiscal quarter ended August 29, 2021, compared to cash provided by operations of $17 million in the prior year period. Cash from investing activities improved by $38 million compared to the prior year, driven primarily by proceeds from the sale of the Windset investment of $45.1 million. At the end of the first quarter, our net debt was $155.8 million. We continue to work toward improving our financial position and create greater financial flexibility to ensure that we can execute our strategic plans as we similarly and strategically review each and every aspect of our businesses to ultimately enhance shareholder value. With that, I'll transition to our outlook for fiscal 22 which we are reiterating today across the board. We continue to estimate consolidated revenues in the range of 545 to 554 million, representing a range of flat to plus 2%. And consolidated adjusted EBITDA remains in the range of 33.3 million to 35.5 million, representing an increase of 6% to 13%. At the segment level, we are guiding LifeCorps revenues to a range of 105 million to 108 million, representing growth of approximately 7 to 10 percent, and an adjusted EBITDA in the range of 26 million to 27 million, representing an increase of approximately 6 percent to 10 percent. Creation Foods revenues are expected in the range of 440 million to 446 million. representing a slight year-over-year decrease of flat to down 1.4%, and adjusted EBITDA as expected in the range of $12 million to $13 million, representing an increase of approximately 9% to 18%. And as you think about this segment-level guidance and how it builds into our consolidated outlook, we think it is helpful to share some framework to inform your modeling and judgment of our future performance. First, starting with LifeCorp. As discussed last quarter, LifeCorp's top-line growth in fiscal 22 is hindered by approximately 500 basis points due to excess customer inventory as a result of a delay in elective procedures. The expectation is that this will rebalance at the end of our fiscal second quarter, which results in flash expectations for growth in the first half, then transitioning to substantial second half growth to meet the plan we are putting forth today for growth of 7% to 10%. Layering on the 500 basis points inventory headwind, we bridge back to LifeCorp's long-term expectations for compound annual revenue growth in the low to mid-teens. From an adjusted EBITDA perspective, we now expect the first half to approximate less than the 30% of the full-year guidance that we anticipated previously due to shifts in expected sales mix. For the fiscal second half, growth should recover in a very material fashion to meet our guidance for the fiscal year, which implies an increase of approximately 6% to 10%. From a gross margin perspective, for the First half of the fiscal year 22 as compared to the prior year first half, we anticipate a lower gross margin rate due to product mix. And as Jim discussed, please keep in mind that the business is investing in sales, marketing, and development activities to drive longer-term development revenues and to enhance some capabilities in anticipation of future growth. So adjusted EBITDA margin expansion on the higher revenues is temporarily muted, but expected to resume over the intermediate and long term. Shifting over to the curation food segment, we continue to expect a fairly consistent year of flat to modest quarterly revenue growth in the next three quarters. Gross margin has been an important KPI for curation since embarking on Project SWIFT And we expect to drive additional gains in fiscal year 22 as a result of those operational enhancement and simplification efforts that Al spoke to. We ended the fiscal first quarter with a segment gross margin of 11% and we believe that we will meet our steady state goals 11 to 14% on a full year basis for fiscal year 22. The inflationary pressures we are now seeing in our business, like so many other companies, will negatively impact our second quarter. However, we anticipate that these headwinds will be offset by future price increases and cost saving initiatives in the second half of fiscal 22. From an adjusted EBITDA perspective, we expect to realize a decrease in Q2 as a result of the near-term inflationary impacts. However, as we look out to the fiscal second half, adjusted EBITDA growth is expected to resume to achieve the full-year segment guidance we are reiterating today. And finally, from a CapEx perspective, in addition to the $32 million at LifeCorps, we plan to spend more modestly at Curation with up to $7 million on projects primarily related to maintenance CapEx and some minor automation enhancements. And with that, operator, please open the call for Q&A.

Thank you. We will now be conducting a question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question, please press star 1 on your telephone keypad. A confirmation tone will indicate that your line is in the question queue. You may press star 2 if you would like to remove your question from the queue. For participants using speaker equipment, it may be necessary to pick up your handset before pressing the star keys. One moment, please, while we poll for questions. Thank you. Our first question is from Mark Smith with Lake Street Capital Markets. Please proceed with your questions.

Hi, guys. First couple questions on curation. Just wanted to check. You guys talked last quarter a little bit about grocery store shelf reset. What are you seeing here? What are you seeing being pushed out and kind of your expectations as we move through the next couple months?

Yeah. Hi, Mark. How are you today?

I'm well, thanks.

Yeah, the resets are starting to happen. I think you noticed that we – our guacamole now test, uh, the reset, uh, was pushed out, uh, a couple months, which, uh, delayed our testing, but, but that's now happening. And we're getting our new products now into, uh, many customers. We're, we're excited about our Buffalo cauliflower product. That's off to a, to a great start, uh, ready to walk is off to a good start. And, uh, Our spicy sweet kale, the resets happened in Canada. We're now national in Canada with that product and have begun to ship to other customers here in the U.S. So it's really good, Mark, to see that the resets are happening. We're kind of getting back to normal here on the timing of those things. Okay.

And then similar questions, just as we look at food service, we're hearing a little bit more negative responses.

um kind of chatter coming out of food service here over the last maybe two months you know any update on kind of you know as you've got good fingers on the pulse of that business on what you're seeing within food service yeah we're actually doing a while in food service uh we uh we picked up some new distribution uh with our green beans uh some other salads so uh we're not seeing uh a slowdown in food service. It's nicely ramping for us. We also see the away from home, like the HelloFresh products. Our demand is very strong on that. And we're also off to a very good start in our e-commerce business with Amazon.

Okay, great. And then just turning to LifeCore a little bit, can you just walk through a little bit the gross margin there and some of that delta? Was this, you know,

product mix was this driven you know primarily by the inventory stocking you know walk us through any additional insight you can give us on on the gross margin there yeah sure we can do that uh john do you want to take mark through that yeah sure i mean it's primarily just product mix right so the combination of the products within the the cdmo side with the aseptic filling the manufacturing uh principally describing the uh the gross margin story there.

Okay. So not as much an impact from the inventory stocking, or does that have maybe some of the impact just as that then impacts the product mix?

Yeah, no, it's just really just on the sales side, on the aseptic filling side, just really strong demand there, really driving and assisting with the margins there. for the quarter itself. We're really pleased to see that strong performance of the gross margin for the quarter.

Great. Thank you.

Thank you. Our next question comes from Anthony Vendetti with Maxim Group. Please proceed with your question.

Thanks. I just wanted to check on the Logistics contract with Castellini, I think it is. Where is that? Because I know you're outsourcing that, but where is that in terms of being completely rolled out? Is it partially rolled out? And then when it is completely rolled out, what type of savings, either on a dollar amount or gross margin improvement or What can you tell us about that and the opportunity there? Because that seems like a good opportunity to take out some costs.

Yeah. Hi, Anthony. We just started to roll it out in Q1. So we are fully rolled out and, you know, beginning to ramp it up. We are seeing already with a couple customers, you know, one of the big reasons we wanted to do this was to get the town to be more efficient but more effective. We're shipping to several customers five, six days a week now, where before we were only doing three. So that's having a positive impact for us. And I am really pleased that we got that partnership done because I think you know the impact of freight costs these days. And, uh, I can't imagine where we would be if we would not have done, uh, that, that, uh, that project having a really strong partner with Castellini. Uh, I've been to Cincinnati twice, met with their CEO. Uh, we're getting our teams integrated. So, uh, we're rolling it out. Uh, and, uh, you know, we're really happy to see that, you know, we're expecting, uh, somewhere in the neighborhood of around a million dollars of improvement this year. And, uh,

That's where we are.

Okay, great. So overall, it should save you a million dollars, but it's not just the savings. It's the efficiency, the benefits to the customer, the on-time delivery. All that is critical, right, going forward?

Yeah, Anthony, you're absolutely right. That's the real reason why we did it. I mean, obviously, we want to save costs. Obviously, they're professionals at this. We were not. They're able to hedge their fuel. We never had to scale to do that. But the real opportunity is to get, you know, more fresh product on the shelf. It's to decrease our shrinkage on the shelf, which we're starting to see that happen. A couple customers where we are getting the five-, six-day delivery per week program in. And we are now just talking about white space, because I think as I've mentioned before, Anthony, if you drew a circle from Minnesota to Texas, there's a lot of white space that we were not able to get to before. And now with Castellini, we're able to start talking about with our sales force, how can we get after that white space, particularly on the eSmart side, and really begin to to get growth, and it's growth that I call, you know, news without skews. We don't have to invent anything new. It's just to get the customers that we couldn't get to before.

Okay. Lastly, on the cost side, are there any other costs that you're looking at or that you've identified that, you can take out of the system in general, not just logistics, to offset some of the inflationary prices that you're seeing?

We're taking a look at, on the procurement side, opportunities that we're looking at to partner stronger with our key growers to work closer with them on our grow contracts, that's an opportunity. We spend $150 million a year there, and we are beginning to work a whole lot closer with them. And I know John is doing some work in the space of our inventories. So, John, anything you want to add there?

Yeah, I mean, I think the other big thing is that we've spent so much of the year in integrating other facilities as well. And that just takes a lot of time and effort. And now that we've finished that, we can really concentrate on the four walls of our current facilities. And our teams are really focused on trying to sweat the assets that we have and trying to get more efficiencies. And with our Project Zest and the continuous improvement, we think there's just still great opportunities for us And we've got several business initiatives that we're tracking that are in place that are a big part of really trying to offset these inflationary pressures, you know, going forward. So we're really excited about those.

Yeah, Anthony, our Chinook facility in Mexico is operating extremely well. We got Zest really up and going in the second half of last year. You saw the impact in Q4. We have a really highly engaged workforce in Guadalupe, and we just, in the first quarter of this year, got it institutionalized in our Bowling Green facility, which is starting to pay dividends for us as well. It's exciting to see the engagement in the workforce inside our four walls. We're not having labor issues like you may hear from other companies. So it's exciting to see us being able to roll that out, get it moving, and get it institutionalized and really begin to sweat the assets.

Okay, excellent, guys. Thanks. I appreciate it. I'll hop back and meet you.

Thank you.

As a reminder, if you would like to ask a question, please press star 1 on your telephone keypad. A confirmation tone will indicate that your line is in the question queue. Thank you. Our next question is from Mitch Panera with Sturdivant and Company. Please proceed with your question.

Hey, good evening. So a couple things here. First, just through housekeeping for a second, in the press release, the restructuring charges and non-recurring, As part of the adjusted EBITDA was $3.3 million, and I realize there's some tax benefit, but in the footnote it says $4.9 million. What's the difference between those two? $4.9 of restructuring charges and the $3.357 that I'm seeing in the table.

Yeah, John, you want to take that? Hey, Mitch, you know what?

I probably need to look at that and get back to you on an answer to that.

Okay. That's fine. And then that's fine. As far as – I'm bouncing around here. Debt. So the debt ended at $155 million. You know, you're spending, obviously, some capital – Is it fair to assume that debt will be at $155 million or maybe slightly higher at fiscal year end 2022?

No. With CapEx and everything, we still see debt, you know, as we discussed last quarter in, somewhere around $180 million of net debt by the end of the year.

$180 million of net debt. Okay. Okay.

Yeah, and that would put us just under, well, that would put us just under, you know, five times leverage. That's considering we're doing, you know, around $32 million of CapEx for LifeCorp, up to $7 million for Curation. You know, it assumes some operating cash flow on the GAAP statement of probably $6 to $8 million, $15 million or so of free cash flow after the Winstead investment. Obviously, the one-set investment helps us by doing and allowing us to do that type of investment.

Okay. Excellent. And then you may have mentioned this. I might have missed. In the Yucatan business, whole guacamole business, how have margins – what were margins in that business like year over year?

Yeah. Well –

we don't actually give, we don't give margins out individually for those, the gross margins itself, but they've substantially improved for sure. I think what we said in previous, um, conversations and Al took that over that business over, you know, we were essentially didn't, didn't hardly have margins. And that was a big part of project Swift was really operating and fixing that facility. And, uh, And now we're having, you know, that's been a big part of fixing the whole curation story.

Is that still a high 20%, 30% kind of gross margin business? Well, we have, you know, we don't give guidance out.

It's not that high, you know, to that level. but we haven't given guidance out on gross profit at the segment level. Um, it's not that high though, but, um, it, but it's a, but it's a good margin.

Okay. I thought that's what it, I thought that's what the target margin was. Um, my memory may be a little off. Um, okay. And then, um, one for, um, for Jim, um, Any color on the Zimmerleaf rollout? I mean, has it gone smoothly? Any feedback from Heron on, you know, feedback they're getting? Any color would be helpful.

Yeah, from our perspective, things are going according to plan. Production's right in line with what we projected. I'll refer you to, you know, Heron's recent releases and Barry's comments. I think they're happy with the way things are going and getting good feedback, but I really can't provide much more than that. But from our perspective, it's right on track and nothing out of the ordinary for us.

And then I guess the last question, going back to curation, also you may have talked about this, but as you look at pricing and your cost savings combined that will help offset the inflationary pressures, what's like the mix there? Is it 50-50? Do you need more pricing than cost savings? Is it going to be more cost savings than pricing?

Well, for the fiscal year, I would say it's double on our productivity through our ZEST program and then over what we're going to take for pricing during this fiscal year.

I'm sorry. I didn't understand that.

So you asked for the mix. So our productivity would be 2X of savings versus what we were getting.

I didn't hear that. I got it. Okay.

Yeah. Yeah.

Got it. Okay. I didn't hear the X. And then I guess last question, is it – I guess we should finally see – I mean, it's been a long time, revenue growth in the third quarter. is that when things, is that when, you know, as a company, on a consolidated basis, the third quarter is, you know, we're back in the black on growth.

Is that a good assumption?

Yeah. I mean, we, you know, we have confidence in our guidance for the year. By the time we get, you know, our, our, our, productivity plans start to come to fruition, pricing taking hold. And then, as I said, we are very excited. We're off to a good start with our innovation. We're picking up new customers that we haven't had before in the Midwest, as well as some other channels. And we have a big focus on food service this year. And we expect those things to start to really pay off for us to see, you know, better profits and better top line growth in the second half of the year.

Yeah, Mitch, from an overall perspective, yeah, definitely. You know, there's definitely a meaningful growth with the life course side, too, from the top line, you know, to hit the overall 7% to 10%. So we'll definitely start seeing growth. overall consolidated revenue growth in the third quarter.

Okay. Yeah, that would be nice.

You need to get the revenue, you know, growing again. And it's been quite, you know, quite a year, year and a half. But, you know, it's sort of closer than it's ever been, I suppose. So thank you for your time.

Thank you.

Thank you. Our next question is from Mike Petoskey with Barrington Research. Please proceed with your question.

First one's for Jim. Did you all say that second quarter life core revenue should be roughly flat year over year? Did I hear that or no?

Yeah, this is John.

Yeah, it should be somewhat flattish. Really, the year over year, the first half is somewhat flattish, basically.

Okay, so if you then sort of proceed with the math, to get to the lower end of the yearly guide in top-line growth at LifeCorps, LifeCorps has to be clicking off sort of mid-teens growth in the second half. And I guess my question is, why should that occur?

Yeah, we're very comfortable with what's in the pipeline and what our –

customers are forecasting to have a very strong second half. As well as, remember, we're also investing in the P&L. And we're already starting to see with our investment in the sales and marketing side, including starting to add to the pipeline that we're seeing the opportunity there that will then translate into the top line sales.

Yeah, Mike, this is Jim. Basically, things are back to full speed ahead in the second half of the year. We're seeing inventories work through like we projected and project that to be done in the second half. That includes uptick in production in the second half, which is an uptick in HA. And we have a lot of activity in our pipeline on the development revenue front in the second half of the year. So you are right. The second half of the year growth is high, but it's as we projected. The first half of the year is playing out exactly like we had expected. Q1, we're happy with where that finished. Looking at what we see from our customers, barring any COVID surprises, things are back on track. So the second half of the year is going to be a big growth year, growth half for us that brings us indoor guidance.

So Al, the price increases that you're going to put through, I guess, on the food side, has any of that been done or is that to be done?

The majority of it is being done now. It takes a little time at the retail sector to get the prices in, so most of the dollars will be realized in the second half of the year. But we are taking some surcharges on freight to where we can. For instance, in the food service side, we – are taking those as we speak now. But the majority will hit in the January timeframe.

Okay. And when you guys sort of model out, hey, we've got to offset these inflationary pressures, and you talk about cost savings, and you talk about price increases, I heard the 2X on the cost savings versus pricing statement. But can you give us a sort of, and I may have missed it if you gave this, forgive me, but what is the dollar figure we're talking about in terms of your estimated inflationary pressures for, you know, for fiscal 22?

Well, yeah, John.

What we're saying, yeah, what we're saying, Mike, is, you know, we think it's a couple hundred basis points in the second quarter is really what we're saying here. And that we're, you know, basically trying to cover that. And we will cover it, you know, really through the, you know, the balance of the year with pricing and with some cost savings. And we really feel like the pricing itself on an annualized basis would cover all of the inflation.

Okay. So 200 basis points is what I should hear or what I should take away.

Yeah. In the second quarter. Yep.

All right, and then on Avocado, what's your current outlook for top-line growth in that business in this fiscal year?

Right now we think it's around the low single-digit growth. It's still growing.

Okay, so like 2% or 3% for the year? Yep.

We were saying it was probably mid-single digits, just a little bit of delay with the test here.

But we did mention, I don't know if you caught it, we've invested in the high-pressure line in Tanook, and that enables our sales force now to go after private label, which is the fastest-growing part of avocado products. So we are actively bidding private label business as well, most of which would not probably hit until later in the year just by how they do their bidding. But we're excited about the opportunity now that we can go after private label where we were blocked before because we did not have high pressure.

Just one other question, and forgive if I missed this. You guys give a lot of information. Expectation for gross margin in Q2, do you expect that to be better than gross margin Q2 a year ago, or do you expect that to be, you know, flattish or worse?

Yeah, no, we still think it's going to have some impact this year, but we still believe it's going to be better than last year in the curation side.

I'm talking about consolidated gross margin.

Yeah, I think it's going to be still a little bit better than last year, but we're a little bit, because of, on the creation side, we'll be a little bit better than last year and not quite as strong on the life course side, so... In summary or in total, it should still be a little bit better than last year. Okay.

Very good. Thanks, guys. I appreciate it.

Thank you.

Thank you. There are no further questions at this time. I would like to turn the floor back over to Dr. Bowles for any closing comments.

Thank you again for your interest in Landec Corporation and your participation on the call today. We look forward to talking to you once again. when we release our fiscal second quarter results. Thank you very much.

This concludes today's conference. You may disconnect your lines at this time. Thank you for your participation. Have a wonderful evening.