The Lovesac Company

Greetings. Welcome to Lovesac's fourth quarter fiscal 2026 earnings conference call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. A question and answer session will follow the formal presentation. We ask that you please limit yourself to one question and one follow-up. If anyone should require operator assistance during the conference, please press star zero on your telephone keypad. As a reminder, this conference is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to your host, Caitlin Churchill, Investor Relations. Thank you. You may begin.

Thank you. Good morning, everyone. With me on the call is Shawn Nelson, Chief Executive Officer, Mary Fox, President, and Keith Signer, Chief Financial Officer. Before we get started, I would like to remind you that some of the information discussed will include forward-looking statements regarding future events and our future financial performance. These include statements about our future expectations, financial projections, and our plans and prospects. Actual results may differ materially from those set forth in such statements. For a discussion of these risks and uncertainties, you should review the company's filings with the SEC, which includes today's press release. You should not rely on our forward-looking statements as predictions of future events. All forward-looking statements that we make on this call are based on assumptions and beliefs as of today, and we undertake no obligation to update them except as required by applicable law. Our discussion today will include non-GAAP financial measures, including EBITDA and adjusted EBITDA. These non-GAAP measures should be considered in addition to and not as a substitute for or in isolation from our GAAP results. A reconciliation of the most directly comparable GAAP financial measure to such non-GAAP financial measure has been provided as supplemental financial information in our press release. Now, I would like to turn the call over to Sean Nelson, Chief Executive Officer of the Lovesac Company. Sean?

Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us. I'll start today by sharing a high-level overview of our fourth quarter and full-year fiscal 2026 results. provide an update on our design for life product platforms and strategic priorities for the year ahead before passing the discussion over to Mary Fox, our president. Mary will discuss our tailored customer acquisition engines and key growth enablers. Finally, Keith Signer, our CFO, will review our financial results and provide detail on our fiscal 2027 outlook. Before getting into the details, I wanted to capture the bigger picture strategic accomplishments from fiscal 2026 that could be easily overlooked. These accomplishments support our evolution from a product-driven company into a multi-platform, multi-room lifestyle brand. A brand that we believe can be the most loved home brand in America in short order. And in one day, the most loved brand in America, full stop. That's our ambition. We build our strategies to that end. These accomplishments recognize the economic landscape and competitive realities of the time, such as tariffs, with some reorganization of priorities to better optimize the opportunity to create value for stakeholders over the long term. First, we reinforced our already strong position in the living room with a focus on harvesting the strong brand equity we have earned over our now 27 years of history. We launched a new seeding platform called Snug, that will expand further in the coming months into a full sectional entry-level platform with new accessories, including the swivel armchair that we previewed at ICR. We re-engineered our sectionals platform and accelerated plans to onshore the manufacturing of the most core pieces beginning this summer. Mary will share more about this exciting initiative later. And we developed and consumer tested a new high-end sectional sofa platform that we plan to bring to market later this year. That will help round out Love Sacks offerings in the living room and provide more options for more customer preferences in style and in function, all done in a uniquely Love Sack way. Second, we set the stage for a planned calendar 2027 launch of a full suite of Design for Life products for an entirely new room in the home. Yep, that's right, a full suite of products and with a category-defining launch that we intend to support with a significant splash in the first half of next year. Third, we strengthened our leadership teams, particularly in marketing, e-commerce, and technology, and soft-launched essential services, including enhanced delivery options that our customers have pled for. We are in early innings for these growth enablers, but are already seeing the benefits as evidenced in our fourth quarter results. such as double-digit growth in our internet channel. That's a perfect segue. So let's run through those specifics on fourth quarter and the full fiscal year 2026. Uncertainty in economic conditions, intensity in promotions, and ever-changing tariffs tested our consumers and challenged our teams in fiscal 2026. But we adapted successfully, achieving market share gains, driving positive omnichannel comparable sales growth, full-year profitability, positive free cash flow, and a record year-end cash balance with no debt. Fourth quarter net sales grew nearly 3% with positive omnichannel comparable net sales and new showroom contributions outpacing the category, which declined 3.3%. Very encouragingly, internet sales grew 12.3% in the fourth quarter, showing how much upside there is from the upgrades new leadership has been implementing over the last six months. Tariffs and category promotional pressures on gross margins were in line with our most recent expectations, as was net income, which was down slightly year over year as a result. For the full year, net sales grew 2.4% with positive omnichannel comparable net sales and new showroom contributions outpacing the category, which declined 3.4%. Leverage of SG&A and marketing. as well as extraordinary efforts from our teams to mitigate tariff costs, had a meaningful beneficial impact on operating profits. But in aggregate, the gross margin pressures from tariffs and category promotions led to lower net income year over year. Finally, our balance sheet remained strong with a record net cash balance as of the end of the year and inventory levels down closer to optimal levels as we've committed to all year long. As a result, We've entered fiscal 2027 in a position of strength with substantial flexibility to enhance growth or optimize returns on capital. I'd like to spend a few more minutes summarizing the substantial developments of fiscal 2026 regarding our brand evolution analysis, the clarity that provided on go-forward product hierarchies, and the acceleration of our Made in America initiative. First, the goal was always clear. Lovesac would transition from being a product-focused company to developing as a true lifestyle brand. And to do so, we needed to sharpen and focus our positioning through a brand evolution refresh. That work, which we completed mid-fiscal 2026, laid a clear and reliable foundation, whereon we could build Lovesac into a multifaceted home brand with an organized and prioritized product hierarchy and merchandising strategy. It clarified what would allow us to confidently extend the brand further, but also deeper into the categories where we already have strength in order to compete even more vigorously for market share. It also led us to rethink everything from product naming to some new products themselves and the channels through which some of these new and even existing products can and should be offered. Next, we took the framework from the brand work and refined our strategic product priorities. The fastest and most effective path to profitable growth was to balance the current with the new, harvesting the brand we have built, shoring up our place as a leader in sectional sofas and in the living room, and aiming to take even more share in those places. All this would reinforce our brand equity and put Love Sack in an even better position to compete in the new rooms, the more radical growth initiatives coming. It's essential to understand what this means. We are not looking to add a large number of SKUs. We plan to intentionally launch products and platforms, as few as we can get away with, to achieve dynamism, high ROI, and love for this brand. Additionally, these carefully curated products have been intentionally designed to create daylight between each platform so they are distinct to customers and are creative to the brand. This is exactly the case with Snug. Sectionals and the new high-end sectional sofa of a different style coming out later this year. This will also be the case with the new room at launch from day one, built on this multi-platform knowledge that we now have. Simultaneously with our brand work, we accelerated our Made in America initiative. While long a goal for Love SAC, it became even more imperative with the tariff developments, which still remain fluid. Love SAC has a differentiated competitive advantage, high volumes of limited SKUs. This specialization in sameness and the resultant high volumes unlocks radical automation, which for us means better and less expensive domestic manufacturing. This initiative begins with factional seat inserts this summer, which we completely redesigned, not only to optimize for automation, but we've added brand new features and benefits verified through layers of consumer research. We gained the opportunity to refresh our portfolio of patent and IP protections to boot. Over time, we will apply the same thinking to more and more of our products. Of course, these new Made in America sectionals will be reverse compatible and can be used seamlessly with all sectionals ever sold. Furthermore, we expect Made in America products will help mitigate volatility in cost, risk of disruption for overseas shipping, and reduce weeks of stock required to provide the fast shipping that we are known for. Finally, under our new CMO's leadership, we are building a modern marketing engine. By accelerating our digital transformation and expanding our data and analytical tools, we aim to increase Lovesac brand consideration, lower customer acquisition costs, increase demand generation, and drive repeat business and customer LTV lifetime value. You saw phase one of this in the fourth quarter with much more to come over the coming quarters. Hopefully, it's clear just how much foundational work was completed during fiscal 2026, which we believe sets us up very well as we enter fiscal 2027. After four difficult years of category declines, we really hope this coming year would see category demand return to growth. But we don't strategize and plan based on hope. And you're all aware of the geopolitical and economic uncertainties in our world. Recent months have seen category declines easing, though still declining, and as such, we are planning based on the assumption that the category will once again decline in this fiscal 2027 by approximately low single digits. Keith will share the specifics later, but we believe we have the necessary ingredients to grow irrespective of the category in the near term, while maintaining clarity around long-term thinking and value creation. We are expanding our addressable markets in existing and new rooms by leveraging our core brand equities in quality and comfort by capitalizing on our installed base of superfans to drive LTV through repeat business. And that's all while adding ever more households to our family through more effective marketing strategies and lower cost of customer acquisition. Our commitment is not solely to grow the top line regardless of macro, which is true, but for revenue growth to drive enhanced flow through to the bottom line growth and resulting in higher margins. We expect that Lovesac will also absolutely benefit from an eventual category rebound, and we'll take that as icing on the cake whenever it arrives. Lovesac enters fiscal 2027 from a position of strength. highlighted by a clear strategic roadmap and a world-class team focused on generating profitable growth and tremendous long-term value creation for all stakeholders. In closing, a sincere thank you to our team, our hashtag lovesack family, for their ongoing dedication, commitment, and creativity as we work to become the most loved home brand in America. With that, I'll hand it over to Mary.

Thank you, Sean. Building on Sean's overview of our Design for Life platforms, I'll now focus on our customer acquisition engines, as well as our growth enablers that are fueling our momentum. Before diving into the specifics, I wanted to take a step back to reiterate how we think of the unique intersection of our product platforms and customer acquisition engines. We say platforms instead of products very deliberately. Substack competes in an industry in which customers choose a product Some for aesthetic, others for comfort, or maybe even just for its dimensions. But then they're largely married to that product for seven to 10 years. Our platform model is very different because nothing about a love sack purchase forces the customer to stop iterating on what's possible within the platform. 85% of our customers evolve, add onto, or compliment the sectional they initially purchased with further purchases. We know from our research that 7 in 10 customers rearrange their sectionals and more than 4 in 10 add seats or change fabrics. This is a fundamentally different paradigm, closer to Apple than traditional furniture, in that the platform only becomes more valuable over time and as it expands. As evidenced, nearly half of all LoveSac transactions are from existing customers because they recognize the inherent value in the ability to continue to personalize and evolve their sectional as life and their needs change. This is the heart of what we call our customer acquisition engine superpower. In essence, it's a compounding blend of brand and performance marketing, omnichannel retail presence, and customer relationship investments, which yields efficient awareness, customer conversion, and long-term brand loyalty. This model is why we fully recoup our customer acquisition costs on the first purchase. and why our lifetime value, as measured by gross profit, is 1.7 times the initial purchase by year five. The longer customers own LoveSac, the more they invest to make it their own. It's also why our retail stores have cash paybacks in one year, even as we are now nearly 300 stores strong. This platform model aspect underlying our customer acquisition engine superpower will only accelerate as we move into new categories and new rooms of the homes. which we believe will only drive lifetime value even higher, all of which make us feel incredibly bullish on the future for this brand and its economic potential. There's perhaps no better illustration of how this comes to life than our reclining seat, which has been an overwhelming success, surpassing even our lofty expectations. One out of every three new factional setups sold in fiscal 26 included a reclining seat. It clearly activated new customers, but also drove strong repeat sales behavior. In fact, repeat customers, those already in the sectional platform, made up nearly 40% of the sales. It just shows how meaningful innovation drives a powerful lifetime value customer acquisition cost ratio, strong initial purchase gross profit, and ever-expanding lifetime value from our installed base of brand enthusiasts that grows every year. To dive a bit deeper into our customer acquisition engines, let's start with brand and performance marketing. Building on the strategic evolution, we began in quarter three. Quarter four marked a clear pivot in the modernization of our marketing playbook that was just not driven by spending differently, but by operating differently as we build towards winning an AI-driven modern discovery. As we discussed back in December's earnings, in quarter four, we optimized our media mix towards a digital and social first approach, dramatically transitioning from a historically channel-led model, which included large TV spend. This means more integrated paid, owned, and earned strategies to improve overall return on ad spend and strengthen the economic model. This approach enabled us to build brand interest and awareness while balancing lower funnel tactics to improve efficacy, particularly during key promotional tentpoles. The result was that Black Friday delivered significant year-over-year growth and Cyber Monday more than doubled, making it the strongest Cyber Monday performance in our history. We launched our Here for It All holiday campaign, delivering a more emotive, social-first creative expression. This was complemented by Spread the Love activations with robust influencer and earned media activity, which made brand engagement very strong in total. Perhaps our most notable brand moment was the introduction of our post-holiday Couchmas campaign, which delivered earned attention, cultural relevance, and incremental traffic during a traditionally quieter period. Notably, these efforts did more than generate impressions. They were built to connect brand storytelling and our Design for Life product platform in order to generate full omnichannel conversion of impressions to sales. It worked. While we work to stabilize softness in more value-orientated sectional segments, which are transactions below $6,000, we simultaneously saw resilience and growth amongst higher average order value customers, driven by innovations such as the reclining seat, LoveSoft, and StealthTech. This reinforced our confidence in the brand and the inherent value of our product platforms. Second is our digital configurations and how we bring LoveSoft to life online. Our digital transformations, which started in quarter three with leadership changes and better aligned internal teams, is showing strong early signs of positive impact on LoveSucks online growth. In quarter four, we modernized our foundation to unlock easier customer navigation, a more intuitive customer experience, and AI discoverability. This effort was clearly evident in our results as quarter four web demand increased double digits year over year. driven by higher traffic and improved productivity. Demand outpaced traffic during key promotional periods, demonstrating stronger conversion efficiency. Black Friday delivered significant year-over-year growth, and Cyber Monday more than doubled. Additionally, web customer satisfaction reached the highest level on record, even during peak volume, reinforcing that our digital investments are enhancing the experience and supporting scaling demand. Overall, we're well positioned to fuel this momentum and continue our digital transformation efforts with the end goal to further improve site engagement and conversion this coming year. Core to our customer acquisition engines is the ability to flex up certain platforms in the appropriate channels. In other words, we start out by targeting market share potential, then flex elements of our acquisition engines to take that market share in the most efficient way possible. Our fiscal 26 and Snug launch illustrates this potential and highlights the power within our digital first platform. Snug's simplified value proposition and streamlined assortment resonated strongly in the digital channel and more than 50% of its year one sales came from the web. Snug's success on web gives us confidence that digital first platforms can deliver in parallel to our more complex platforms which skew towards showroom demonstrations. Third is our showroom experience, the physical brand amplifiers of our Design for Life products and the secret weapon of our omnichannel model. In fiscal 26, our fleet reached 278 stores, and I am pleased to share that the fiscal 26 cohort is on pace to deliver one-year cash paybacks with minimal cannibalization. In quarter four, we sharpened our focus on the Lovesac product experience, new selling framework, and further tied associate rewards to performance. Our focused selling framework has helped teams more effectively guide customers through the modularity, customization, and longevity of our products. It's improving conversion while supporting higher average order values. In parallel, in quarter four, we launched an enhanced field incentive program with targets tied 100% to the individual showroom sales performance, only with greater upside in compensation for locations exceeding their sales goal. This program helped drive associate productivity to increase by mid-teens percentage versus last year. And based on the success of this enhancement, we are expanding this program into fiscal 27. And finally, complementing our digital and showroom acquisition engines is our partnership strategy, with Costco being the primary example. Our online and pop-up shop model gives us access to Costco's 80 million plus members, while owning 100% of the customer data and relationship. We expanded our assortment with Costco this year, adding new fabrics, reclining seats, stealth tech, and pillow sack accent chair, just to name a few. We also refined pop-up shop locations to target key love sack demographics and segmentations, leveraging our unique ability to sell large premium products in just 100 square feet. When combined, these four elements of our customer acquisition engine create an unmatched customer experience that drives brand love and enables long-term customer relationships. During fiscal 26, we reinforced this further with customer-facing services. We've always delivered our customer orders fast and free within days, but in fiscal 26, we complemented this with room of choice delivery and pilot tested full white glove delivery and assembly, both for a reasonable fee. All has gone well, and we plan to roll out both nationally in fiscal 27. Fiscal 26 also marked the launch of Loved by Lovesac, our resale platform. And at year end, we had 29 states actively participating. Nearly 70% of our Loved by Lovesac customers are new users to our ecosystem. reinforcing that this is a powerful acquisition engine and lifetime value builder. Encouragingly, a meaningful and growing percentage of these customers then come back to us buying more from the resale inventory as well as from new inventory. Furthermore, our data shows that these programs reinforce the customer's appreciation for our commitment to design for life and circular operations principles and reinforce the long-term value of their investments. And quickly, on our growth enablers, our supply chain is a competitive advantage, a true strength, and a key to us sustaining profitable growth. Through fiscal 26, we transformed our sourcing model and supply chain to mitigate tariff disruption. We're pleased to share that we exited fiscal 26 with zero production coming from China, which is incredible progress given China represented nearly 50% just a few years ago. But that's only step one. Our diversification efforts ultimately aim to bring production closer to the customer. And as Sean shared, we are accelerating our Made in America initiative and are on track to begin domestic production of factional seat inserts this summer. Beyond the benefits that Sean shared earlier, I'm very excited to share that based on progress to date, we believe that we can do this with growth margins that are neutral to current levels, excluding tariffs. Our internal teams have really outdone themselves this year, and we thank them for such extraordinary efforts. Now, before I turn over to Keith, I wanted to briefly mention our fifth annual ESG report published in December. You may or may not know this, but our purpose as a company, central to our Design for Life principles and operational model, is to inspire humankind to buy better so you can buy less. This updated report expanded on that theme and showed continued progress towards our goals, including our commitment to zero waste and zero emissions by 2040. We're proud to have partnered with our US SAC manufacturer to scale our first zero landfill and net zero emissions production line. We're proud to be the largest repurposer of recycled plastic bottles in the home category, and so much more. We know that our actions today will shape the world of tomorrow, and we're leading by example. Together, we can create a future that's brighter, greener, and more comfortable for generations to come. And now over to Keith.

Thanks, Mary. Let's jump right into a quick review of the numbers on our outlook. Revenues were $697.1 million for the year, which were up from $680.6 million the prior year, owing to new showroom openings and an increase in omnichannel comparable net sales. Gross margin was 56.4%. a solid level, especially considering tariff impacts. Net income of $4.1 million was down from fiscal 25 owing to higher tariff, freight, and operating costs, but still supported positive free cash flow for the year and a healthy cash balance that I'll speak more about in a couple minutes. Moving on to the fourth quarter, please note that all performance metric references to the fourth quarter refer to fiscal 26 unless otherwise noted. Net sales increased $6.6 million or 2.7% to $248 million in the fourth quarter compared to the prior year, reflecting an increase of 0.6% in omnichannel comparable net sales. Showroom net sales increased $5.3 million or 3.5% to $159.8 million in the fourth quarter compared to the prior year period driven by the net addition of 21 new showrooms period over period. Internet net sales increased $8.7 million, or 12.3%, to $79.2 million in the fourth quarter compared to the prior year period. Other net sales, which include pop-up shop, shop-in-shop, open-box inventory transactions, and the Love by Lovesack program, decreased $7.5 million, or 45.4%, to $9.0 million in the fourth quarter compared to the prior year period. The largest contributor to the decrease was the closure of the company's Best Buy shop and shop locations as a result of the discontinuation of its partnership with Best Buy. By product category in the fourth quarter, our sectional net sales increased 1%, tax net sales decreased 18.2%, and our other net sales, which includes our new snug platform, decorative pillows, blankets, and accessories, increased 191.9% over the prior year. Gross margin decreased 230 basis points to 58.1% of net sales in the fourth quarter versus 60.4% in the prior year period, primarily driven by increases of 300 basis points in inbound transportation costs and tariffs and 90 basis points in outbound transportation and warehousing costs partially offset by an increase of 160 basis points in product margin, which is driven by price increases, cost reduction initiatives, and concessions from our vendors in response to changes in the tariff environment, partially offset by higher promotional discounting. SG&A expenses of percent of net sales remains relatively flat at 28.1% in the fourth quarter versus 28.0% in the prior year period. The $2.2 million increase in selling general and administrative expense dollars was primarily related to increases of $7.9 million in payroll related to higher incentive compensation, $0.8 million in new product innovation costs, and $2.0 million in other overhead costs, partially offset by decreases of $4.0 million in professional fees, $3.9 million in equity-based compensation, and $0.6 million in credit card fees. Rent increased by $0.1 million related to a $0.8 million increase in rent expense from the net addition of 21 showrooms, partially offset by $0.7 million reduction in percentage rent. Advertising and marketing expenses decreased $1.3 million or 4.7% to $25.5 million for the fourth quarter compared to the prior year period. Advertising and marketing expenses were 10.3% of net sales in the fourth quarter as compared to 11.1% of net sales in the prior year period. Operating income for the quarter was $44.9 million compared to $47.6 million in the fourth quarter of last year, driven by the factors we just discussed. Before we turn our attention to net income, net income per diluted share and adjusted EBITDA, Please refer to the terminology and reconciliation between each of our adjusted metrics and their most directly comparable gap measurements in our earnings release issued earlier this morning. Net income for the quarter was $32.1 million or $2.19 per diluted share compared to $35.3 million or $2.13 per diluted share in the prior year period. During the fourth quarter, we recorded an income tax provision of $13.5 million as compared to $13.0 million in the prior year period. The effective tax rate for the fourth quarter and fiscal year was 29.6 and 39.0% respectively. The increases versus the prior year were caused by a deferred tax asset shortfall owing to equity compensation previously expensed at higher levels and exacerbated by low pre-tax income. We do not anticipate these matters to recur and believe a tax rate closer to 30% for the full year is appropriate to use in your models for future years. Fully diluted weighted average shares outstanding were approximately 14.7 million shares for the full year. We've adjusted our calculation for diluted shares to better align with GAAP's treasury stock method. This change addresses the historical over-inclusion of certain RSUs and PSUs in our denominator which had previously resulted in a higher diluted share count. Adjusted EBITDA for the quarter was $49.6 million as compared to $53.9 million in the prior year period. Turning to our balance sheet, we ended the fourth quarter with a healthy balance sheet that provides substantial flexibility for Lovesac to invest in growth and enhance long-term value creation for shareholders. We reported $101.9 million in cash and cash equivalents, while retaining $36 million in committed availability and no borrowings on our amended credit facility. First, as we've discussed all year long, we intended to reduce the levels of excess inventory on the balance sheet at fiscal 26 year end versus the prior year level. We're pleased to share that this was the case, down 14% versus the prior year. We feel good about both the quality and quantity of our inventory, and our ability to maintain industry-leading in-stock positions and delivery times. We anticipate modest increases in inventory balance during fiscal 27 to account for product and platform expansion. Second, I'd like to spend a moment on our excess capital allocation strategy. Given significant uncertainty in macro backdrop owing to tariffs and consumer spending, we did not repurchase any of our common stock during the fourth quarter. For the full year, fiscal 26, we repurchased 6.0 million of our common stock outstanding, which left approximately 14.1 million remaining under our previous share repurchase authorization. We're pleased to announce that Lovesac's Board of Directors recently authorized the repurchase of up to 40 million of outstanding common stock, incremental to the previous authorization. bringing the total authorization available to approximately $54.1 million. Our approach toward allocation of capital is unchanged. We intend to be opportunistic, focusing on long-term stakeholder value and enhancing returns on capital. Please refer to our earnings press release for other details on our fourth quarter financial performance. So now for our outlook. As Sean mentioned, we're not assuming that macro conditions improved, and have therefore assumed for our planning purposes that the category continues its recent trend of low single-digit declines throughout the fiscal year. We're also facing uncertainty in many costs as a result of various geopolitical matters. In our outlook, we have factored in our latest understanding and expectation for tariffs, as well as some pressure from the recent rise in oil prices on shipping and certain costs of goods sold. On the other hand, we haven't included an assumption for benefit from a potential recovery of previously paid IEPA tariffs. We're monitoring all of these matters closely and will update you as soon as practicable. Specifically for the full year, we estimate net sales of $700 million to $750 million. We expect adjusted EBITDA between $33 million and $44 million. This includes gross margins of 56% to 57%, advertising and marketing of approximately 12% as a percent of net sales, and SG&A of approximately 40% to 41% as a percent of net sales. We estimate net income to be between $5 and $14 million. We estimate diluted income per common share in the range of $0.34 to $0.95, and approximately 14.7 million estimated diluted weighted average shares outstanding. We plan to open approximately eight net new showrooms, plus or minus a couple, and expect capital expenditures of approximately $20 million. For the first quarter, we estimate net sales of 133 to 139 million. We expect adjusted EBITDA loss between 12 and 16 million. This includes gross margins of 51.5 to 52.5%, advertising and marketing of approximately 13% as a percent of net sales, and SG&A of 51 to 53% as a percent of net sales. We estimate net loss to be between 14 and 18 million. We estimate diluted loss per common share to be between 95 cents and $1.22, with 14.7 million shares outstanding. In summary, we are balancing prudence and efficiency with our belief that it's essential to stay focused on the big picture. That's the massive long-term opportunity for tremendous value creation for all Lovesac stakeholders. We're building the Lovesac brand and investing in new innovation that spans style, function, and category to support a powerful multi-year secular growth outlook with macro upside exposure, a welcome accelerator whenever it finally comes. With that, back to you, operator.

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 your line is in the question queue. You may press star 2 if you would like to remove your question from the queue. And for participants using speaker equipment, it may be necessary to pick up your handset before pressing the star keys. As a reminder, we ask that you please limit yourself to one question and one follow-up question. Our first question is from Brian Nagel with Oppenheimer and Company. Please proceed.

Hey, good morning.

Good morning. Congrats on the ongoing progress here. Thank you. So the first question I want to ask,

Just with regard to the sales outlook for the current fiscal year that you provided today, clearly you're making clear that you don't expect the macro environment to turn into any type of tailwind. But I guess as you look at the range there from the bottom to the top, what are the key factors that will determine where sales ultimately fall within that?

Brian, thank you for the question, and good to hear from you.

As you called out, we don't see and haven't factored in any macro environment improvement. So, you know, we really are focused on what we can control. The first thing that we look at is we have a clear path to knowing around our product innovation launches that are yet to annualize the new ones to come and their respective timing. So we're very clear on that part. We're very clear in terms of our showroom expansion. as well as, as I touched on earlier, the next phase of the marketing and e-commerce transformation. The third is around our delivery services expansion and the expected incremental revenue as the kind of first time this year of rolling that out. So, you know, we've done some testing to that, but obviously there will be variability. We know that's been, you know, a high friction point for our customers to convert. where, you know, they wanted to have the assembly capabilities provided by us. So, you know, the great news is that we are going to be rolling that out. But the timing and then the take-up of that, you know, does have some variability, you know, for that. So, you know, we assume similar competitive environments as well. So it really is around that range of that very new revenue driver. that will shift the difference between what we anticipate in the range. And obviously our intent always is to continue to gain strong market share, as we demonstrated just last year, and accelerate it. So we're looking forward to the year. The team are pumped, actually, in terms of all the opportunities ahead for us.

Thanks, Mary. That's very helpful. And then my follow-up question, I guess on the gross margin, Again, lots of moving pieces here. We started talking, I think it was last quarter, about the reshoring, if we will, bringing manufacturing back to the United States. So the question is, we're looking at gross margins now and recognizing the ongoing tariff impacts. How should we think about, over any length of time, the trajectory from here? Will the reshoring effort, will that ultimately be a positive or gross margin? Do you expect to mitigate some of these tariff costs in other ways going forward?

Thanks Brian. It's a good question. I'll kick this off.

When we think about the gross margins, there's a couple of things to keep in mind with this whole, with the onshoring program, which is it will take us some time. Number one, to scale that production up and to flow it through our inventory. So when you think about things like tariffs, it's important to realize like when we pay those tariffs, what we do is we actually capitalize it and attach it to the inventory, which goes into our balance sheet. And then as we sell through, it flows through into our P&L. So we're really excited about what this potential is, and I'll get to that long-term opportunity in a second. But as you think about the course of this year, by the time we get that inventory really flowing through the P&L as the production ramps, et cetera, et cetera, we're not going to get to see much of that benefit for this year. So just to stick on this year for a second, what we're thinking about from a tariff perspective is all of the existing tariffs that are in place, We are no longer exposed to China-specific tariffs, which we're excited about, but we still have Section 122 and others. What we built in for now is upon expiration of the 122 tariffs, we've made the assumption that there will be something else that will come in its place and approximate those rates for the second half of the year. So, you know, and we still have an annualization of the impact because it didn't hit the entire year last year, right? So put all those factors together. Also some wiggle room around potential volatility in shipping rates. You know, we've built in some impact from that as well. So, you know, I think we're pretty comfortable at this point that there are some room, that there is some room for favorability. but there is also risk. We've built a number of these scenarios in place. Now, as we move beyond fiscal 27 and into fiscal 28, yes, this is where we get more excited about some of the potential upsides of gross margins that comes from a domestic manufacturing position and the flexibility it gives us to how do we think about things like overarching pricing, discount strategies, getting to the appropriate bottom line AOV for our customers to help us achieve the greatest market share gains with the greatest profitability. One of the other things that we'll be getting into at that time that will give you more details on at that time is the expansion into the new growth. So there's a lot of flexibility that we'll have because of this. There'll also be a lot less volatility in our cost structure because we'll have less exposure to to uncertainty owing to tariffs, to uncertainty owing to shipping rates, to less weeks of stock that will be required as we move more and more pieces into the domestic manufacturing realm. So we'll give you a lot more details on that as we get further through this year and start to get into next year. But, yes, it is exciting to us to be in a position to optimize as we move into 2018.

Our next question is from Thomas Forte with Maxim Group. Please proceed.

Great. So, Sean, Mary, and Keith, thanks for taking my questions. One question and one follow-up. So, can you talk about the relative gross margin and contribution margin for your e-commerce efforts, Love by Love SAC versus sales of new merchandise?

Yes. Hi, Tom. Thank you for the question. You know, as you know, with us,

I love that. We just started launching last year and rolling out on the resale side. And for us, you know, we're now, I think, with 29 states, we're actually opening Arizona up next week. So then, you know, to your question in terms of from a gross margin perspective, you know, compared to how we were managing open box inventory before, we have significant points upside. in the benefit of being able to turn that inventory background and be able to sell it at a higher rate of value than we were previously achieving. So, you know, still a lot to learn in terms of, you know, customers' velocity around kind of pricing, which obviously drives from a gross margin perspective, and then also scaling it up. So, you know, it's... It's not material today, but we do see that gross margin benefit, you know, over time. So, you know, excited. And then the second piece that we will be unlocking, which actually is really what we're excited about, and we're starting that pilot this year, is trade-in. Because we really see a huge amount of strength in terms of trading in the product and obviously being able to sell that product once it's cleaned and sanitized, you know, for a gross margin. But more importantly, then you give the customer a credit and then they trade up and buy even more from us. And that's just really the power of our platform. So whether they're buying, you know, an extra recliner chair, new covers, and all the things that, you know, Sean talked about that's to come, you know, just the acquisition cost and therefore the gross margin benefit that we're going to get through, you know, tapping into that opportunity is going to be very significant. But again, as we build this up, then we'll share more as this becomes more material.

Thanks, Mary. And then for my follow-up, how should we think about your free cash flow conversion on your adjusted EBITDA?

Sure. So for free cash flow conversion, I think there's going to be a little less volatility than maybe you've seen in the last couple of years. We've got the inventory in a really solid position. Our processes are already lined up really nicely and in place this year. I think what I mentioned earlier remains the case, which is a slight inventory build year over year, but I don't anticipate a whole lot of other drivers of variance between, let's call it our EBITDA and our free cash flow. You'll notice that on the balance sheet here at quarter end, we have substantially lower accrued expenses and accounts payable than we did last year. So just to remind everybody, we built that inventory in the Q4. A year ago, we paid for it in Q1. The cash flow for those bills came due in Q1. This year, we have lower inventory. We have substantially lower accrued expenses and accounts payable, so there will be less cash allocated to paying off those bills in Q1 of this year. But those are really the only nuances.

Everything else should be far less of drivers of variance.

Our next question is from Maria Rips with Canaccord Genuity. Please proceed.

Good morning, and thanks for taking my questions. First, I just wanted to ask about Snug. Now that the product has been in the market for more than six months, is there anything you can share in terms of sort of incrementality of Snug customers on the platform? Are this mostly new customers or existing transactional buyers? And are you seeing any differences in engagement with the broader Lovesac platform between the Snug and sectional customers?

Yeah, thanks, Maria. Great question. Snug is off and ripping. We're so excited to have it in the portfolio. It's part of a bigger strategy to take more of the living room and to win the living room. You're going to see us... unfurl a number of products that will continue to layer on to help us achieve those ends. As it pertains to Snug specifically, we're not ready to break it out as a business yet, but it is now more and more being, you're going to see it more and more be positioned to be our entry level platform. And in fact, as we've spoken about, it's going to be expanded on very, very soon here. to become a full sectional platform won't have the same flexibility that sectional does intentionally, but does offer some unique characteristics like a solid rail. It's not split up into individual seats like most sectional furniture is. It's a really unique platform. The landscape, unlike any other, unlike any other sectional platform has some really unique attributes. So it's helping us already capture back some of that, smaller ticket business that we spoke on earlier calls that we were struggling with in this current environment. And I think we believe once it's expanded into a more fulsome platform, it will help us mitigate those headwinds even more impactfully. On top of that, in terms of what you're asking about the customer, we're seeing success with snug, both with repeat and exist and new customers. Um, on the new customer side, you know, we're seeing, uh, upside in urban markets where spaces are tighter. Um, we're seeing upside with young families where, you know, not ready to make the commitment to sectionals. And, um, Again, we're not breaking out that incrementality, but it's definitely meaningful to us and is here to stay. On the repeat business side, Snug is so useful in other rooms of the home, even in context with sectionals, especially as an accent chair. We're really excited about the oncoming swivel. For that accent chair, we think that's going to be a huge unlock for that business. And that's all incremental because right now, you know, when a customer is buying even a large sectional, there's often that nice space for an accent chair facing back, facing a 45-degree angle, et cetera. And the swivel really helps unlock that business for us. So, We're really proud of the Snug platform. We're even more excited about its future as a couple of these key product introductions unfold this year. And we'll round it out with another platform introduction, remember, at the high end and even bigger footprint than sectionals. And we think that this at least three-tiered strategy will really help us compete for more business in the living room as we continue to layer on even a few accessory products to help us win there as well. So I appreciate the question and looking forward to more snug business very soon.

That's very helpful. Thank you, Sean. And maybe related to that, as your portfolio of products expands from core, sectional to now three products, right? Can you maybe just talk about how that's impacting your marketing message and just sort of how do you communicate with your customers about now these three different options that will be available in the platform in the middle of this year?

Yeah, thank you. I mean, you're witnessing Love Sack undergo a metamorphosis where we are brand-focused and we need to be brand-focused. You know, we've done very well with... focus message around but sectionals buy a bunch of seats buy besides build anything you want and that will continue to be a powerful marketing tactic for us but it's no longer the strategy you know as a tactic something like sectionals that plays well on tv amazing video has all these features and benefits will always be a powerful tool and you'll see us use this tactic as we expand into other categories and even rooms But our overall goal for this brand is to evolve into a lifestyle brand. And if we're going to do that, our advertising communications need to become more emotional, more brand focused overall, and built around a strategy to achieve those ends. And so as it pertains to Snug and these other platforms, we certainly will lower funnel where the focus is not establishing the brand and driving awareness for the brand. Mid and lower funnel, you will see snug ads, you will see new platform ads, and they will be product focused with the point being conversion. And the opportunity there for us that we see as real upside is at the moment, so much of our communications because we are spending a significant amount of money on marketing, right? We are not a retailing merchant with a tiny ad budget. We are a marketing-driven engine. And so much of our communication is around a discount. It's around a sale. And it's around one product, you know, just being frank. And so having this multi-tiered product strata now allows us, instead of offering, for instance, as you've witnessed, 30% off or it's up to 40% off, it now can be an up-to message. You're starting to see that fold in. It will allow us to offer discounts on certain products and not discount some products that we know the higher-end consumer is willing to pay full price for or closer to full price for on holidays. And so We've really lacked for dynamism in our marketing messaging because of our focused catalog. And while we, on principle, will never become unfocused, you know, you got to remember that we're still generating a sectional self of business, snug and sectionals combined, that eclipses most of our largest competitors' entire upholstery businesses. And so, you know, to get that from two and then maybe even three platforms is still pales in comparison to the, who knows, you know, 20, 30, 40, 50 sofa sectional designs that some of our competitors offer. So we'll stay focused overall, but we are diversifying, and it really will make the business more dynamic, we feel, going forward.

Our next question is from Eric DeLars with Craig Callum Capital Group. Please proceed.

Great. Thank you for taking my questions and congrats on the continued progress here. So overall, it seems like the reorganized marketing teams and e-commerce teams and then the enhanced field incentives in the showrooms that you touched on on the call, it seems like those are really having a material impact, helping you gain share, drive positive comps, because you just kind of help Arieh Iserles- frame you know where we're at with both of those in terms of you know how much further impact you expect from these initiatives are you sort of fully rolled out or do they have more room to scale thanks.

Arieh Iserles- yeah hi Eric Thank you yeah great questions and connecting them all together, so let me start actually kind of with the field incentive and then i'll come back to. you know, the reference around the marketing team overall, including e-com. So, you know, as I referenced earlier, we started testing in quarter four with a sharpened incentive program. Everything 100% is driven around the showroom performance. So it's a team effort in the showroom and we want to maintain that, but it is all about their performance. Prior to that, it was a lot more around total business performance with some blend of individual showrooms. So 100% around that. but with a much higher upside based on overperformance. So we saw a great performance in quarter four. That was the pilot to help us inform us for our strategy for this year. And actually we've risen up in terms of the overall cap in terms of their performance. And just talking to the field, they love it. They feel very motivated and they see a very linear path around how much more they can earn based, you know, directly related to their performance. So I think I would say that, you know, we're receiving some of that, you know, impact of that program, but you will see more to come as we kind of transition, I would say, over the next couple of quarters to really see the full momentum. And the second part that kind of dovetails into it is also just our ability to hire the best salespeople out there. in the market, and I think this is highly attractive to those that really do overperform, and we want them and welcome them all to Lovesac. So, coupled with some training programs, we see a lot of potential. And then I think back to your question on marketing, obviously, I think we announced before Heidi and the team had undergone a reorganization back in September last year. And that was really about bringing marketing all together under Heidi's leadership, including e-commerce, bringing all of media collectively under one leader as well. And, you know, we're really starting to see that total view around the customer acquisition optimization coming into force. But I would say, you know, anything such as this does take time. So, you know, we have baked in upside through this year. We're already seeing that through the marketing performances at the beginning of this year in Q1, and we continue to expect that to build out. So more to come, but really appreciate that team's leadership. The modernization of what they're doing is really good, but I think even just some of the brand storytelling connected to a tentpole moment and being very relevant to our customers you know, just really shows the sweet spot that Lovesat can play in. So, you know, we'll look forward to sharing more with you as we report next quarter. Thanks for the question, Eric.

Yeah, no, thank you for that answer. It's very helpful. And then just a kind of, you know, high-level setting question from a follow-up. On the showroom expansions, you know, you previously guided to 10 net new in fiscal 27, now 8. obviously, you know, materially down from previous quarters. How much of this is sort of a, you know, temporary strategy around macro headwinds that, you know, will reaccelerate in future years? And how much of this is just kind of reaching saturation or critical mass and, you know, in which case we should expect, you know, kind of a lower range to be the new normal going forward? Thanks. Yeah, great question.

So just to address the second part of the question first, It is not a saturation issue. It is really an offensive move to think about what the optimal showroom or store of the future might look like that best represents our ambitions in this metamorphosis. Sean talked about transitioning from a product company to a brand. You know, we finished the brand evolution work. We're now rolling it into all the other things that you've heard throughout this whole call. So we're taking a minute here to redesign a flexible suite of asset options that include various elements that can be pieced together in different ways, whether it includes heavier focus on, let's call it, sactionals or snug or sacks or the new room that's coming next year. We're already working on elements of that. And I think what we want to do is to let the data drive it. We're going to open some different kinds and different formats and different expressions, maybe some flagships, maybe some standalone and maybe some hybrids. And we're going to let the data tell us. But I think what I would kind of ground you in is this principle that Mary mentioned, which is we look at everything from a market share perspective. What market share do we think we can take? Then the second question is what's the most efficient way to take it? If the most efficient way to take it is through you know, a different type of expression, you know, than what you see right now, a blend of these asset options, great. If it becomes a lot of showrooms, substantially more, great, we'll do that. But we're going to let the data drive us. And I think, you know, again, we go through our customer acquisition engines are put in order on purpose, right? First things first, biggest, baddest store, 365 days a year, 24 hours a day, most of our customers go there, lovesac.com, that's got to be amazing. But we know some of our customers need to touch it, see it, feel it, just experience it. So we'll have these really amazing customer experience centers in our stores. And then we'll compound all of that through highly efficient partner channels as well. That's kind of the mindset we go through. So, you know, we think this is a great approach for now while we get all our ducks in a row as part of this transition. And then we're going to let the data drive what the optimal execution is to take that market share most efficiently.

Our final question is from Matt Carondo with Russ Capital Partners.

Please proceed.

Hey, guys. Good morning. I guess just wanted to fit the first quarter sales guide into the full year. So curious what you've seen maybe in February and March on traffic and conversion to date. And then presumably, I guess, the implication of the full year guide would be you get back to growth later in the year to hit the midpoint of the full year sales growth guidance. I guess, why are we confident in assuming... Improvement later this year, just talk about the drivers that give you confidence in the return to growth.

Yeah, just to start with the quarter sort of to date, just to give you some perspective, because I think sometimes we do vary a little bit differently from the category given the timing of our 10-pole promotions and things along those lines. Look, we had good, strong performance around President's Day. It outperformed our expectations. It was a great first month to our quarter. This was offset a little by a weaker second month. We had this valley sort of between the President's Day holiday of the first month and then Easter coming in the third. But we've got a really good, strong pipeline of quotes that we are going to activate against as we enter into the Easter selling season. So what we've done, good, strong first month, a little bit weaker valley in between the promotions, but a lot of confidence as to how we're approaching things. Look, I do want to highlight one quick thing that does make the Q1 look a little bit different maybe than it would appear at first glance. We're going to have a little bit of a one-time shift between demand and revenue in Q1 based on our rollout of these new delivery service options that Mary mentioned, the rule of choice and white glove. The reason is because we expect that some of our customers or even many of our customers they schedule the delivery further out than our normal fast and free, which is about a week. What this means is we're preparing for a little bit of an increase in our order backlog at first quarter end, but it's just timing, not demand. These are in the backlog and are expected to convert soon after the impact gets exaggerated a little bit in Q1, given it's our lowest quarter from a seasonality perspective. And look, we don't expect a material impact on the full year. So, you know, just to, Summarize that Q1 demand sales, if you think about it from our guidance, are projected to be flat to growing versus Q1 last year with revenues slightly lower than demand owing to this matter. So it may be exaggerates the quarterly cadence a little bit, but we do think net net and over the course of the long term and the year, it's a positive development.

Okay, that's helpful.

And then do you want to talk about later this year, just in terms of the assumptions, maybe new product launches and whatnot that factors into the return to growth?

Yeah, I think Mary talked about this earlier, and I think she covered it really well. It's the product innovation timing. It's the marketing and e-commerce transformation and the benefits we get from that. It's the ramp up of the delivery services and the whole related halo effect that that can drive. And then the quarterly cadence issue I just talked about with the shift between demand and revenues on this timing shift for the delivery service options. I mean, honestly, really, that's it. The only other wild card that comes into play here is a little bit of the promotional variance that can have an impact outside of core category growth. But I think those are really the items.

Yeah, and I'll just jump in and add a little qualitative piece. I think that as the year wraps up, Matt, if we could fast forward three quarters, four quarters, you will have seen this coming year as the most prolific year in Lovesac product launches in our history. And the reason for that is we're gearing up to propel ourselves into this new room that we've talked a lot about that's a multi multi-year investment. It has it, it, and we expect it to be, you know, quite consuming and a major leap forward for the business, you know, a year away as we, um, prepare for that. There are a number of moves that we feel necessary to really shore up our position in the living room, compete stronger. And, um, and really solidify that base before, you know, that, that new room takes so much of our focus and energy. And so it's really driving us to push a lot of things over the finish line that we're very proud of actually, and been thinking about for a long time. And it's just going to be a really exciting year, we think. So while no doubt we've been under pressure, as a stock for a long time, we've, we've, we've, uh, definitely been cooking in the back room for a long time, spending a lot of money on innovation and not, not just in the product realm, you know, in the services realm, all these things, you know, will really start to culminate toward the end of the year. And I think that, um, that gives us great confidence in this plan that it's, it's essentially, uh, you know, not a ton of growth, um, by love sack standards. But in this environment, you know, if we can pull that off, we'll feel like it's a good foundation to build on for all the even more exciting stuff to follow after that. So we appreciate your patience, and that's a great question.

We have reached the end of our question and answer session. I would like to turn the conference back over to management for closing remarks.

Yeah, thanks so much to all of our investors that continue to support this brand, keep us energized, challenge us. Thanks so much to the hashtag Love Sack family that is our lifeblood and so much energy and competence and expertise going into building our future together. Have a great day.

Thank you. This will conclude today's conference. You may disconnect at this time and thank you for your participation.