Acco Brands Corporation

Hello, everyone. Thank you for joining us and welcome to ECHO Brands' second quarter 2026 earnings call. After today's prepared remarks, we will host a question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question, please press star one to raise your hand. To withdraw your question, press star one again. I will now hand the conference over to Chris McGinnis, Senior Director of Investor Relations. Chris, please go ahead.

Thank you. Good morning and welcome to the ACCO Brands conference call to review our second quarter results. Speaking on the call today is Tom Tedford, President, Chief Executive Officer of ACCO Brands, and Deb O'Connor, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. Slides that accompany this call have been posted to the investor relations section of accobrands.com. When speaking about our results, we may refer to adjusted results. Adjusted results exclude amortization and restructuring costs, non-cash goodwill and intangible asset impairment charges, bargain purchase gain, unusual tax items, and other non-recurring items, and include adjustments to reflect the estimated annual tax rate on quarterly earnings. Schedules of adjusted results and other non-GAAP financial measures and a reconciliation of these measures to the most directly comparable GAAP measures are in the earnings release and slides that accompany this call. Due to the inherent difficulty in forecasting and quantifying certain amounts, we do not reconcile our forward-looking non-GAAP financial measures. Four looking statements made during the call are based on the beliefs and assumptions of management based on the information we have at the time the statements are made. Our four looking statements are subject to risks and uncertainties and our actual results could differ materially. Please refer to our earnings release and SEC filings for an explanation of certain risk factors and assumptions. Our four looking statements are made as of today and we assume no obligation to update them going forward. Now I will turn the call over to Tom Tedford.

Thank you, Chris. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us today for ICO Brands second quarter earnings call. Last night, we reported second quarter results with sales and adjusted EPS exceeding our outlook. We are pleased with our first half performance, reflecting the results of our multi-year cost reduction program and our renewed focus on commercial excellence and strategic growth initiatives. including the recent acquisition of Epos. Our work integrating Epos is progressing as planned and we are pleased with the results in the quarter. Based on the first half performance, we are raising our full year outlook for both sales and adjusted EPS while maintaining a prudent view of the second half of the year. Our outlook reflects the seasonally adverse product and geographic mix in the back half of the year as well as an uncertain global operating environment. Deb will review the details of the drivers of our revised annual outlook. Second quarter consolidated sales grew 5%, ahead of our expectations, driven by strong performance in the Americas segment, solid contribution from the EPOS acquisition, and favorable foreign exchange. In the Americas segment, sales benefited from strong back to school placements in North America and solid growth in Mexico. This more than offset weak industry demand in technology peripherals, as well as soft demand in Brazil. North America back to school is an important season for ACCO Brands, and product sales and margins are recovering from the tariff disruption a year ago. Our focus on creative product solutions, strong supply chain support, and compelling value for our consumers has been well received by our channel partners. In Latin America, sales are mixed. were strong performance in Mexico, offset by weaker sales in Brazil due to a soft economy, which has created hesitancy in customer purchasing and an adverse product mix. Over the past several quarters, we've adjusted our product assortment, go-to-market strategies, sales incentive plans, and pricing where appropriate to better align with consumer needs. In the international segment, sales growth was driven by the EPOS acquisition and favorable foreign exchange. Demand in Australia and EMEA was weaker than expected due to geopolitical and economic conditions. EMEA sales were also negatively affected by a systems upgrade at our largest distribution center in Europe. That upgrade is now behind us with performance improving in June. Sales for technology peripherals were soft in the second quarter. The difficult demand environment for peripherals reflects cautious spending from end users due to elevated hardware costs, constrained memory chip availability, a soft console gaming market, and shifts in enterprise investments to AI. We expect these trends to continue in the second half of the year. In gaming accessories, second quarter comparisons were difficult due to last year's initial load-in of accessories for the Nintendo Switch 2 launch. We remain optimistic in our PowerA brand and believe we are well positioned to benefit when industry dynamics improve. We expect the fourth quarter release of Grand Theft Auto VI to drive positive sales momentum in gaming accessories categories. In computer accessories, industry trends worsened as global PC shipments declined. Our computer accessory categories were directly impacted by lower hardware demand. ePost integration remains on track. with second quarter sales ahead of our expectations. We continue to expect approximately 80 million in sales in 2026 and $15 million in cost synergies in 18 months from the closing date of the acquisition. While the near-term demand environment is challenging, the targeted technology peripheral categories in which we compete offer attractive long-term growth opportunities. We continue to execute our strategy to expand our global market shares and enhance our technology peripherals portfolio through organic and inorganic initiatives in these large and growing categories. Turning to cost optimization and productivity, we continue to manage costs well and expect to realize our targeted $100 million cost reductions this year. In summary, I am pleased with the second quarter results and the execution against our value enhancing initiatives. We are making meaningful progress on our strategy to transform ACCO Brands into a more focused, efficient, and growth-oriented company. I will return to answer your questions. Now let me turn the call over to Deb.