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Operator
Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by and welcome to the ASAC Company Q1 2021 Earnings Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. After the speaker's presentation, there will be a question and answer session. To ask a question during the session, you will need to press star 1 on your telephone. If you require any further assistance, please press star 0. I would now like to hand the conference over to your speaker today, John Skelly, SVP of Strategy and Execution. Thank you. Please go ahead. John Skelly, SVP of Strategy and Execution Thank you.
John Skelly
Good morning, everyone. We issued our earnings press release this morning to the investor relations portion of our website at investors.azetco.com, as well as via 8K on the SEC's website. I'm joined today by Jesse Singh, our Chief Executive Officer, Ralph Nicoletti, our Chief Financial Officer, Greg Jorgensen, our Chief Accounting Officer, and Amanda Samaglia, our Vice President of ESG. Before we begin, I would like to remind everyone that during this call, ASIC management may make certain statements that constitute forward-looking statements within the meeting of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These include remarks about future expectations, anticipation, beliefs, estimates, forecasts, plans, and prospects. Such statements are subject to a variety of risks, uncertainties, and other factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those indicated or implied by such statements. Such risks and other factors are set forth in the company's earnings release posted on the website and will be provided in our Form 10-Q for our first quarter of fiscal 2021 as filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The company does not undertake any duty to update such forward-looking statements. Additionally, during today's call, the company will discuss non-GAAP measures, which we believe can be useful in evaluating our performance. The presentation of this additional information should not be considered in isolation or as a substitute for results prepared in accordance with GAAP. Reconciliations of adjusted EBITDA to net income calculated in our GAAP and adjusted gross profit to gross profit calculated in our GAAP, as well as reconciliations for other non-GAAP measures discussed on this call, can be found in our earnings release, which is posted to our website and will be included in our Farm 10-Q for our first fiscal quarter of fiscal year 2021. I would now like to turn the call over to Jesse Singh.
Jesse Singh
Good morning. I'd like to welcome everyone who has joined today's call. we are off to a strong start to our fiscal 2021, building off the momentum we saw both pre-pandemic and as we exited 2020. Our results this quarter were driven by robust end market demand for our products and our residential segment, operational execution on our capacity expansion and recycling plans, and downstream sales investments. Given the last few months, we continue to remain confident about the future, the strength of our business model, and our ability to drive value in various market environments. We also remain committed to making a positive contribution to society and expanding our recycling capabilities to further divert waste from landfills. Consistent with that commitment, we are announcing today a goal of utilizing 1 billion pounds of recycled scrap and waste annually in the manufacturing of our products by the end of 2026. This is an ambitious target that builds upon the 400 million pounds of scrap waste that ASAC diverted from landfills in fiscal 2020 and highlights our ongoing commitment to ESG and sustainability. Achieving 1 billion pounds of recycled consumption will be a guidepost for us and drive our future behaviors. including the ongoing reengineering of our current product portfolio and the launching of new products that use an increased amount of recycled material content. In many cases, these steps have the added benefit of reducing our cost position. We believe that we can revolutionize outdoor living by building a more sustainable future. We continue to make progress executing our strategy and key initiatives. We have been investing in our core strengths of brand, manufacturing, R&D, and customer connection, and we remain focused on our key initiatives to achieve our long-term performance objectives. Growth through innovation, margin expansion through recycle and continuous improvement, and positively impacting the world through our commitments to ESG stewardship. We have multiple levers to drive above-market growth and accelerate material conversion, including investing in new products and leveraging downstream-focused sales and marketing teams. We are making meaningful progress on these levers and see continued growth in our internal leading indicators. As part of our innovation pipeline, we recently announced the launch of our exciting new TimberTech AZAC landmark collection. which is the latest extension of our premium cap polymer decking and leverages advanced technology to create the most natural-looking, in-demand look of rustic, reclaimed wood. We also announced new railing products to complement our high-performance decking, including new top rail options for TimberTech Impression Rail Express and new aluminum baluster options for TimberTech Radiance Rail Express. Second, as part of our... focus on sustainability and margin expansion. We had made great progress with our recycling initiatives. During the quarter, we brought our third polyethylene recycling line into production in Wilmington. Our AZEC full circle PVC collection and recycling program, which launched in November 2020, continues to gain in momentum and we are honored to have been recently recognized for the program as a 2021 Green Innovation of the Year award winner by Green Builder Media. Third, we continue to make significant progress in improving our social and environmental impact and corporate governance. Our core value of always do the right thing serves as the guiding principle of our culture and commitments to environmental, social, and governance excellence. It's part of our corporate DNA. We are building the AJAC company in a way that drives long-term value creation for all stakeholders. And as such, our business and sustainability objectives are highly complimentary. We are excited to have recently brought on Amanda Simaglia as Vice President of ESG. With this newly created role, our goal is to formalize and further accelerate the implementation of ESG programs throughout the organization and across key stakeholders. We will soon be releasing our inaugural ESG report, which will contain more details on our performance and targets. In many ways, we view this just as the start of our journey. Put simply, we not only look at the full circle, we bring things full circle, and we believe we are uniquely positioned to pursue sustainability initiatives that positively impact our products, our people, and our planet. Finally, we continue to invest in our core brand, manufacturing, R&D, and customer connection strengths. We have made significant progress against our capacity expansion, which will be detailed later in the call. These strengths serve as the foundation of our differentiated business model, and we continue to see opportunity arising from our ongoing investments. As we continue to operate through the pandemic and the early innings as a public company, our recent success and track record serves as evidence of the attractive market opportunity and our ability to enhance our growth drivers through conversion, and product innovation, along with operational excellence and margin execution. Turning to our first quarter results, we delivered strong sales and adjusted EBITDA growth. Our residential business grew 37% compared to the first quarter a year ago, while our commercial segment declined approximately 12%. Adjusted EBITDA grew 43% year-over-year, and adjusted EBITDA margin expanded 240 basis points over the same period. As a reminder, our fiscal Q1 is a seasonally smaller net sales quarter, where we traditionally build internal inventory in our residential business to service future quarters. The strong trends that we saw in the second half of fiscal 2020 included continued throughout the first quarter as consumers remained focused on improving and investing in their homes, and channel demand remained robust, driven by strong end demand and lower than normal inventory levels. Our adjusted EBITDA margins benefited in the quarter from the higher rate of sales, operational excellence, and carryover from 2020 pricing, partially offset by startup costs related to our capacity expansions. Within our residential business, we experienced strong demand through the first quarter. Repair and remodel and new construction benefited from favorable tailwinds, and both the pro and retail channels saw significant growth this quarter. Sales within our exteriors business grew over 20% year over year, and our deck rail and accessories business grew over 40% year over year. We saw strong sell-through and demand was broad-based across our residential product portfolio, including our 2020 product launches like TimberTech Pro Reserve and Edge Prime Plus. Inventory days in the channel improved exiting the quarter but remained below typical levels. While inventory in the channel is not where we would like it to be based on historical benchmarks, we are doing a better job at servicing our customers and getting them the right inventory. We continue to improve internal and channel inventory levels ahead of the prime deck building season that typically starts in the spring. And we are working with our channel partners to ensure we have the right inventory at the right time in the right geographies. Our investments in digital branding and improving the overall customer experience continue to drive strong returns. Key demand metrics we track, such as website sessions and sample orders, all saw strong growth in Q1 relative to the same period last year. Our commercial business declined for the quarter on a year-over-year basis, but continues to perform relatively well in a difficult market. While we are starting to see improvement in certain end markets, like marine, we expect commercial to remain challenged, especially for trade shows and retail through at least the first half of calendar year 2021. As a reminder, this business tends to track more closely to GDP and the broader economy. Our commercial business product portfolio includes high privacy bathroom partitions and barrier products with important antimicrobial and antiviral features that could become increasingly necessary, as well as innovative OEM solutions that are utilized in faster growing outdoor living applications. Our team is doing a great job navigating the difficult macro backdrop. And while we still see some near-term challenges on this front, we continue to expect to see some stabilization in the back half of fiscal 2021. Though, as you can imagine, certain end markets won't fully recover until the economy has fully reopened. Operationally, our team once again worked tirelessly to respond to customer demand while continuing to execute against key operational initiatives. These initiatives are on track and include the expansion of manufacturing capacity, the increased use of recycled raw materials, and the execution of our continuous improvement programs. On the capacity front, we are encouraged by our early success with our capacity expansion program. Favorable operational execution led to the first phase of our capacity expansion plan coming online faster than planned during the quarter. Despite the sustained level of demand we saw during the quarter, we are improving our ability to more fully meet total market demand and made progress on service levels during the quarter. We expect gradual continued improvement as new phase two capacity is on track to come online by the end of the third quarter of fiscal 2021. And we continue to evaluate opportunities to accelerate the third phase of our capacity expansion program. As a reminder, the strategic capacity expansion plan includes an incremental decking production capacity of approximately 70% relative to the end of fiscal 2019 and a new manufacturing facility in the western part of the U.S. over the next 12 to 18 months. This is a multi-phase investment that is modular and flexible and, importantly, will allow us to position ourselves for ongoing growth and market penetration. The growth from these investments coupled with our recycle and continuous improvement initiatives give us long-term confidence that we will continue to expand our adjusted EBITDA margins. As you recall from our last update, during the fourth quarter of fiscal 2020, we announced a low single-digit price increase across the majority of our product portfolio within our residential segment, as well as across our commercial product portfolio that went into effect at the beginning of the calendar year. During our fiscal second quarter, we have continued to experience incremental inflationary pressure in raw material pricing, particularly on the resin side, as well as inflationary pressures on the labor front. As such, we recently took action and implemented an additional price increase in the low single-digit range that will begin flowing through in late fiscal Q3 to offset this increased inflationary pressure. Now, turning to our outlook, we are raising our net sales and adjusted EBITDA growth guidance for fiscal year 2021. As previously discussed, our outlook is fundamentally driven by a number of internal and external variables. We continue to see positive signs in our internal digital and website metrics, sample order activity, as well as dealer and contractor survey checks. The macroeconomic indicators that most highly correlate to our business, such as repair and remodel activity and new housing construction activity, also continue to show positive signs. This is balanced against the continued uncertainty in the overall economic environment. As we look ahead to the remainder of our fiscal 2021, we are increasingly confident in our outlook as steady demand continues across our residential segment. We have improved visibility on channel inventory levels, our pricing action, and downstream demand from our pre-season or early buy program. Taken together, this data and our more near-term visibility are the drivers behind our increased outlook for the fiscal year. In summary, we are well positioned as a company to continue to perform strongly and remain optimistic about the opportunity that lies ahead. We play in growing markets, operate leading brands with category leadership, and have multiple levers to drive growth and margin expansion combined with a strong balance sheet. We are in the early innings of our multi-year value creation strategy. With that, I'd like to turn the call over to Ralph, who will discuss our financial results and outlook in greater detail.
Green Builder Media
Thank you, Jesse. As I discuss our results, all comparisons made will be on a year-over-year basis compared to the same period ending December 31st, 2019. For the first fiscal quarter of 2021, net sales increased by $46.2 million or 28% to $212.3 million. The increase was primarily driven by sales growth in our residential segment aided by favorable operational execution as the first phase of our capacity expansion plan came online faster than planned during the quarter. For the first quarter, net sales for our residential segment increased by 37% year-over-year, driven by deck, rail, and accessories growth of over 40% and exteriors growth of over 20%. Within deck, rail, and accessories, we estimate consumer and contractor demand drove approximately three-quarters of the growth with the bounce being attributable to rebuilding inventory in the distribution and dealer channels. Residential segment growth was partially offset by a decrease in our commercial segment of 12% year-over-year. Gross profit for the first quarter of fiscal 2021 increased by $21.7 million, or 42.3%, to $73 million. Adjusted gross profit for the first quarter of fiscal 2021 increased by $22.3 million, or 34%, at $88.8 million. Adjusted gross profit margin was 41.8%, an increase of approximately 180 basis points compared to the prior year period. The increase in adjusted gross profit was driven by higher residential segment sales, carryover pricing from 2020 and manufacturing productivity, partially offset by startup costs related to our capacity expansion program. In the first quarter, we experienced a modest cost inflation impact and expect higher raw material prices will flow through our P&L in subsequent quarters. Raw material prices have continued to increase further during our fiscal second quarter, and as Jesse noted, we have taken additional actions to offset the impact, including the recently announced incremental price increase. Selling general and administrative expenses increased by $9.6 million to $53 million, or 25% of net sales, for the first quarter of fiscal 2021. The increase was primarily driven by higher stock-based compensation expense, ongoing public company expenses, and personnel costs. Net income in the first quarter increased by $20 million to a net income of $10.2 million compared to a net loss of $9.8 million for the three months ended at December 31st of 2019, primarily due to higher net sales and lower interest expense. Adjusted net income was $23 million or 15 cents a share for the first quarter of fiscal 2021 compared to adjusted net income of $3.6 million or $0.03 a share a year ago. Adjusted EBITDA for the first quarter of fiscal 2021 increased by $14.6 million, or 43%, to $48.5 million. Adjusted EBITDA margin expanded 240 basis points to 22.8% from 20.4% a year ago. Now turning to more detail on our segment results, Residential segment net sales for the first quarter of fiscal 2021 increased by $50 million, or 37%, to $185.6 million. Residential segment adjusted EBITDA for the first quarter increased by $19.9 million, or 51%, to $58.8 million. The increase was mainly driven by higher sales and gross profit margin, partially offset by higher selling and general administrative expenses. Commercial segment net sales for the first quarter of fiscal 2021 decreased by $3.7 million, or 12%, to $26.6 million. The decrease was primarily attributable to declining sales in our Scranton products and Vicon businesses as the effects of COVID-19 continued to impact certain end markets. Commercial segment adjusted EBITDA for the first quarter was $3.3 million. The $300,000 increase year over year was primarily driven by lower manufacturing and selling general administrative expenses offset by declining sales. The steps the team took in the second half of last year to lower operating costs given the revenue challenges are starting to benefit the segment margin profile. Looking at our balance sheet and cash flow, As of December 31st of 2020, we had cash and cash equivalents of $210 million and approximately $143.3 million available for future borrowings under our revolving credit facility. Total debt as of December 31st of 2020 was $463.3 million. And we have not drawn on a revolving credit facility. Our net leverage ratio stood at 1.1 times at the end of fiscal Q1 And notably, in early February, we refinanced the entire balance of our term loan and were able to realize over 100 basis points of interest rate savings. Net cash provided by operating activities was $20.1 million for the three months ended December 31st of 2020. Turning to our outlook, our outlook is based on continued solid demand within our residential segment. We remain encouraged by our strong demand trends, including internal signals like web traffic, digital engagement and sample orders growth, as well as external demand signals, such as housing starts and repair and remodeling activities. To set some context, our second fiscal quarter is historically one where inventory is manufactured and positioned in the channel ahead of the building season. However, we expect this staging to extend more into the third fiscal quarter, given demand and production dynamics this fiscal year. For the fiscal second quarter, we expect total company net sales growth to be in the range of 13 to 15% year over year with the residential segment growing in the high teens range and adjusted EBITDA growth in the 18 to 22% range. For the full year fiscal 2021, we expect total company net sales to increase 14 to 18% year over year and adjusted EBITDA growth in the 19 to 23% range year over year. This results in continued adjusted EBITDA margin improvement as additional costs, including startup from our capacity expansion, incremental raw material and labor inflation, a normalization of marketing and SG&A expenses, and costs of being a public company are more than offset with pricing and manufacturing cost savings from recycle initiatives. From a segment perspective, based on our leading indicators, we expect full-year residential segment net sales growth in the range of 17 to 21% year over year. This outlook reflects the visibility we have for the next three to six months and recognizes continued macro uncertainty and the strong performance we saw in the first fiscal quarter of 2021 and in the second half of fiscal 2020. This outlook also assumes some channel inventory refilling for the full year. In the commercial segment, we are assuming there will be economic stability with some improvement in the second half of the fiscal year, leading to our projection of net sales declining at a mid-single-digit rate year over year, consistent with our prior outlook. We continue to expect total capital expenditures to be in the $125 to $135 million range as we work through our capacity program, primarily in decking. And we continue to evaluate opportunities to accelerate the third phase of our capacity expansion program. To assist in modeling, we expect approximately $21 to $22 million of interest expense for the full year of 2021. And our tax rate for 2021 is now estimated to be approximately 25%. And our full year weighted average diluted share count is estimated to be approximately 157 million shares. I'll now turn the call back to Jesse for some closing remarks.
Jesse Singh
Thank you, Ralph. I'd like to recognize our team, including Ralph and John, for their continued leadership in our response to the pandemic and its impact. Consistent with our core value of always do the right thing, our first priority has been and will continue to be the safety of our employees, our customers, and our communities. Thank you to the entire ASAC team and our channel partners for your commitment and dedication. With that, operator, please open the line for questions.
Operator
At this time, if you would like to ask a question, press star, then the number one on your telephone keypad. In the interest of time, we ask that you limit your questions to one and one follow-up. You may press star one again to rejoin the queue for additional questions. Our first question comes from Susan McCleary with Goldman Sachs. Your line is now open. Thank you. Good morning.
Susan McCleary
My first question is around just thinking about, you know, you've now announced two price increases over the last couple of quarters in there. Are you seeing any pull forward of demand in the pre-buy? And could that perhaps have any implications as we think about the seasonality as we move through the rest of this year?
Green Builder Media
Hi, Susan. Good morning to you. Yeah, just, you know, as it relates to the, you know, the price increase, you know, we plan that and set the timing of orders and effective dates, you know, so that there isn't any pull forward, you know, that's, you know, any material way influencing the results. So I think, you know, as you look at our guidance and, you know, you know, what we saw in the first quarter to no real effect from, you know, no real effect from pricing. And of course, you know, as we've said before, you know, we're, you know, the capacity, you know, the capacity relative to demand situation, you know, is tight. So, you know, we had to take all that into consideration when we set the dates.
Jesse Singh
Yeah, our demand right now, and as you look at the the demand pattern that we have is really driven by optimizing service at this point and making sure that we have the right inventory position with the right players at the right time. And as such, the pricing And really any other factors are less prevalent this year than they might be as we consider past years.
Susan McCleary
Okay, that's helpful. And then my next question is, you know, you talked to the fact that your capacity, some of your capacity came online a little sooner than you had expected in the quarter. As we think about, you know, you're continuing to add some lines in there, how should we think about that flowing through as we move through the next couple quarters? And is there the potential that we could see that coming online a little faster as well? And how does that kind of influence the revenue guide that you've put out there for this year?
Jesse Singh
Yeah, you know, relative to the capacity ads, as we highlighted, we're, you know, we were very pleased with what the team did in the first quarter. As we add capacity, there's a normal ramp-up that occurs, there's staging that occurs, and there's expectations around that of when that capacity will become productive. You know, as we highlighted in Q1, that capacity became more productive faster as we look at the later stages, you know, we have what we believe is a realistic plan for how that capacity comes online. And as such, our guidance is really based on that. And the way to think of our guidance throughout the entire year is we certainly have at least enough capacity to meet that guidance. And as you would expect from From any good management team, you know, there's always opportunity to exceed that from a production capability standpoint. But in aggregate for the year, we think our guidance is very appropriate given, you know, the timing of the production that we see coming online.
Susan McCleary
Okay, that's helpful. Thank you and good luck.
Jesse Singh
Thank you, Susan.
Operator
Our next question comes from Mike Dahl with RBC Capital Markets.
Green Builder Media
your line is now open hi thanks for taking my questions my my first question is is sort of a follow-up around cadence and i was hoping you could elaborate more on some of the timing when you talk about kind of demand and production influencing the timing between fiscal 2q and 3q because it sounds like end demand is still quite strong and channel inventories are are low so is it is it a behavioral decision on the part of the customers, or is it truly more your production constraints that are pushing the seasonal timing more towards 3Q this year?
Jesse Singh
Yeah, so, Ralph, I'll start, and please chime in afterwards. So, as you look at our demand pattern, the underlying demand in the market that we have seen has continued and we expect to continue at a nice pace. So that's the underlying demand consumers find from contractors. As you take a look at the channel itself, as you can see from our Q1 results, you know, the channel has demand needs and is running at lower inventory levels. As we mentioned in the call, We took a step against that, a modest step in our deck rail and accessories to get a little bit healthier in the channel. But the vast majority of what we sold in Q1 was against underlying demand. And so as you play that out into Q2 and Q3, you're dealing with a situation where there is strong demand for And also a need to position inventory for the selling season. And so the way to think of it is, you know, what we're highlighting for Q2 into Q3 is us managing our production, managing what we sell to our customers against that demand to make sure that inventory is well positioned such that we can meet end market demand. And when you do that, you time the load in a more efficient way, not efficient necessarily, but in a more structured way against end demand. And so if you roll all that up, what you see then is a flattening of that inventory build to progress during Q2 into Q3, that allows us to meet both end demand, but also give our channel partners what they need to service demand and season.
Green Builder Media
Got it. Okay. Thanks, Jesse. And then my second question just relates to kind of timing of price costs. It's good to hear that you're getting out in front of the inflationary environment, second price increase. Just remind us that the way that the resins and other components inflation flows through your P&L from a timing standpoint relative to when price takes effect. Does your guidance for the year incorporate pressure from price costs, or do you think you've managed the timing in a way such that it's going to be, yeah, at least price-cost neutral still for the year? Mike, you know, great question and point because clearly, you know, resin prices have been pretty dynamic here over the last, you know, several months for sure. So, you know, first to start with the endpoint is we've, you know, looked at costs in, you know, both inflation on the base labor plus the movements in resin. You know, we've covered the costs in our outlook. So, you know, based on the price increase that we announced early into the fiscal year, coupled with the incremental price increase that we just announced, you know, we've covered the expected costs, you know, within our guidance. Having said that, a couple of points relative to how it flows through the P&L, you know, this is important to understand. You know, first, coming into the first quarter, if you recall, late in Q4 of 2020, you know, we said there would be, you know, at least a quarter lag on how those costs go through. And in Q4 of 2020, actually, there was a temporary decline in resin prices that in our first fiscal quarter, you know, we got the benefit of. So there was very modest, only a modest impact from inflation in our first quarter. And, you know, while we benefited from some carryover pricing from the prior year in the first quarter. Now, you know, as we moved into the early part of the second quarter here, resin stepped up quite a bit. You know, big double-digit increases. And, you know, we have levers to pull here. And, you know, we executed another price increase. And so the resin impact that started to really spike up in the beginning of the second quarter, that's going to impact Q3 and Q4 more pronounced. And we took pricing. And on the year, we're covering the costs. But as you think about the quarterly flow, our pricing is not going to take effect in full until the latter part of Q3. So there's some uncertainty. imbalance between price and cost in the third quarter, but we fully recovered that in the fourth quarter and on the full year. So that's an important consideration when you just think about the flow of the quarters, but on the full year, we've got it covered. Okay. Thanks, Ralph. That's really helpful. Thanks, Ralph. Thanks, Jesse.
Jesse Singh
Yeah, and, Mike, the only thing I would add is, you know, just to reiterate what Ralph said, you know, the benefit of how we're doing things and the benefit of the opportunity that we have is we have multiple levers by which we manage our margin and the profitability of the company. And so we've talked a fair amount about recycling. We've talked about our ability, if needed, to offset inflation with price. And I think as you see the actions we're taking, and the inflation is also on the labor side. So I think at a macro level, as you see our performance, you're going to continue to see the ability that we have for the entirety of the year to appropriately manage both growth and margins. Okay. Got it. Good point. Thanks.
Operator
Our next question comes from Sil Ng with Jefferies. Your line is now open.
Sil Ng
Hey, guys. Congrats on a very, very strong quarter. You know, a few of the R&R levered building practice companies have actually reported results and have called out, you know, flat to down sales growth for the back half of calendar 2021. Obviously, you guys are dealing with a different dynamic with some of the secular men you're seeing. But it would be helpful to kind of give us a little perspective how your channel partners are echoing to you and how they're thinking about the shape of the year. It seems like they're looking to build inventory, so that's pretty encouraging. But any color on how you're expecting sell-through demand throughout the calendar year?
Jesse Singh
Yeah, thanks for the question, Phil. As, you know, we do surveys on a monthly basis, and our survey base is against 1,000 dealers and 1,000 contractors. And, you know, in general, what you see from their specific perspective is, you know, they continue to be very positive on their year-over-year expected growth, specifically around each of our deck builders expecting, you know, in aggregate, you know, close to double-digit growth at least, you know, as they look out. Our channel partners are even a bit more bullish, and obviously there's more you know, there's more folks focused on outdoor living. And so, you know, we continue to see data points that point to solid underlying growth trends. And our long-term indicators that we've talked about, which, you know, relate to web visits, you know, housing starts, all of those continue to uh to point to ongoing growth uh in the underlying market and as such you know we continue to see in our market segments and expect uh ongoing growth uh as we move forward that's really helpful and given the growth you're seeing and not just in decking you're seeing it in your exterior business as well
Sil Ng
You know, Ralph, it would be helpful to help us think, do you need to add more capacity? And when we think about CapEx in the out years to sustain this level of growth, what's a good way to think about it? And then just given some of the movement you're seeing on inflation front this year, any color on how we should think about working capital as well? Thanks a lot, guys. Great. Thanks.
Green Builder Media
Sure. Phil, I guess on the two points, you know, first on capital, On capital, our program for adding capacity is adding 70%, 70% capacity over the three phases that we've discussed. And so that's a significant amount of capacity that will carry us going forward here into 22, and frankly, the third phase of capacity, which we said we're putting in in the in the first two fiscal quarters of 2022, you know, is that ramps up, you know, that's really going to help us in season for 22 and then set up 23. Uh, having, having said all that, you know, we're always looking, you know, at, you know, our outlook and, and, and the pace of demand. And, you know, we've, we've said in our remarks, you know, we'll, we'll, you know, we're thinking through, you know, maybe, you know, some options to perhaps, you know, uh, accelerate some of the capacity availability in the third phase, uh, you know, beyond, beyond what we have now. And from a total capex standpoint, you know, you know, guided to the 125 to $135 million, uh, if we, if we need to add more because we see more growth opportunity, uh, beyond, you know, the timing of what we're looking at, then, you know, we'll add it. We can add capital modularly. Uh, and in fact, um, the, uh, the existing capacity plan, you know, does provide, you know, some more space in both our Wilmington and our, you know, to be named West facility to add more incrementally without a lot of extra infrastructure. So, you know, it will be added, you know, very efficiently there. Then, you know, as it relates to working capital, you know, the movement up in, you know, in resin prices. You know, one, you know, it tends to be cyclical. So, you know, what we're seeing now in resin prices is largely due to demand and nearing demand really in the export side and some capacity on the PVC side coming off of force maturation. So, you know, There's some expectation over time that, you know, that could moderate. Even if it didn't moderate, you know, we also have payables on the other side. And, you know, and it's a fairly short, you know, it's a fairly short cycle there. So I don't think we'd have a meaningful impact on our, you know, return on assets or working capital overall, you know, as we manage through it.
Sil Ng
Is there a need for capacity on the exterior side? I know you're well served on the decking side. You're adding a fair amount of capacity. But what about on the exterior side?
Green Builder Media
Yeah, we don't talk about it a lot, but we are adding some capacity. The dollars are not that significant, you know, but we are adding some capacity on the exterior side and a little bit on rail as well because we have really good growth in those categories as well.
Sil Ng
Okay, super. Thanks a lot. Appreciate it.
Operator
Our next question comes from Matthew with Barclays. Your line is now open.
Matthew
Morning, everyone. Hope everyone's well. Thanks for taking the questions. So my question is, I guess, to the extent, obviously, a few of your competitors are ramping capacity as we speak. And, you know, channel inventories are still light, you know, following the early buy season. Is there any risk of some business you know, changing hands or to that end, you know, maybe opportunities from your own perspective as you ramp your capacity successfully, or is the customer dynamic relatively firm here?
Jesse Singh
Yeah, we just, thanks for the question, Matt. We just went through the early buy process, which is, you know, typically an alignment in negotiation with The dealer base and, you know, we had a lot of really good discussions. I think people are appreciative of both the capacity that we have and the capacity we have coming online. And so in aggregate, we feel really good about our position with the dealer base that's out there. And we continue to invest in and service them effectively. So if you just step back, you know, from our vantage point, our focus is on making sure we're the best that we can be at servicing our customers. And, you know, relative to the rest of the industry, we feel pretty good about where we are today. you know, specific competitive dynamics, you know, in aggregate, you know, when we make it through the year, you can see growth rates on a relative basis based on underlying demand. We believe that, you know, we're doing as good, if not better, in servicing our underlying demand than the other competitors that are out there.
Matthew
Got it. Okay. Thanks for that, Jesse. Second one, The Western capacity ad, you know, you guys talk about sort of finalizing the site selection. My question is, what are the characteristics that determine that? Is it distributor footprint? And what, I guess, markets out West, you know, do you see kind of the greatest conversion opportunity? Thank you.
Jesse Singh
Yeah, we have a nice and growing business in the western part of the U.S. And in aggregate, that part of the country, like other parts of the country, are certainly benefiting from a greater focus on agriculture. on rural or suburban housing and vacation homes and, you know, that type of activity. And so we already have a really strong position there. And we do view the western part of the U.S. as having really nice wood conversion opportunity, both in our exteriors business and also in our outdoor living business. So we're well set up right now to service it. The addition of a facility in that part of the U.S., of course, will be beneficial in terms of adding capacity and incrementally beneficial in terms of shortening supply chains out there. In terms of characteristics, exactly what you would expect, you know, a good location, the ability to have expansion beyond this next phase, I think one of the critical elements for us as we're looking at a facility, as Ralph has pointed out, we're adding 40%. But any facility we add needs to have significantly larger capability than that and a larger footprint to allow us to continue to expand. And then, you know, a nice high-quality labor footprint. And, you know, we feel really good that we found that. And, you know, hopefully in the next – In the next few weeks, we can share that with you.
Matthew
Perfect. Thanks for the call, Jesse.
Jesse
Yeah, appreciate it. Thanks, Matt.
Operator
Our next question comes from Tim Moodries with Baird. Your line is now open.
Tim Moodries
Hey, everybody. Nice job on the quarter and the outlook. Jesse, on recycling, just the billion-pound target of recycled materials that you put out there, I think – Relative to where you ended last year, that's something like a 15% or kind of 16% CAGR on your usage of recycled materials over time. So I guess two questions I have associated with that. A, how much of that is kind of incremental, you know, kind of recycling that's going into your products versus just end market demand expansion? And then second, you know, how do you think about sourcing, you know, that amount of material over time?
Jesse Singh
Yeah, first, you know, the intent of the Billion Bounds for us is to really put a target out there for our teams to align around in terms of how we can make a difference in the world. Recycled plastics versus virgin plastics, depending on the material itself, has something in the neighborhood of 70%, 80% less carbon footprint. So there's an intentionality to put a target out there to give our teams an opportunity to really align around that. And as you point out, part of that is ongoing growth of the business, and part of that will be expanding the use of recycle in our core products, and then part of that will be reengineering new products and new offerings across our entire portfolio. to increase the use of recycle. Specific to what components or what, we're not going to disclose that right now. The intent really is to put a relatively big target out there that's one that we can align our teams around to make a difference in the world. Relative to sourcing, we continue to build out our sourcing organization. We have As you know, there is a lot of plastic generated in our types of materials, over 50 billion pounds, according to the numbers we see. And so there is a tremendous opportunity to access a lot of materials that are going into the waste stream. We acquired return polymers, obviously. We are investing and expanding their footprint and investing and expanding their their capability in addition to um investing in the expansion of our own capability uh to access uh more and more sources of uh you know lower value landfilled uh types of uh of plastic so obviously we'll you know we'll continue to share our progress there but that but our plan our current plan and our future plans uh continue to involve uh making investments against that target okay
Tim Moodries
Okay, great. And then maybe just on SG&A investments, could you just kind of run through how you're thinking about SG&A, you know, this year from an investment standpoint, maybe what happened in the first quarter, and then how you think about, you know, incremental kind of demand creation investments for the rest of 21?
Green Builder Media
Hey, Tim. Yeah, good morning. On the SG&A side, I think, you know, first, you know, to your point about, you know, the first quarter and the full year. As we think about the full year and the guidance outlook that we provided, you saw in the first quarter, and that will flow through all quarters, the increase from public company costs, and that's consistent with what we've said in the past. We did also in the first quarter, you just have some higher personnel and related and some marketing costs that bled in the quarter. As you look at the full year, and let me take it a level up for a second. Our EBITDA margins, if you just look at the outlook that we provided, we're expecting our EBITDA margins to continue to grow. We grew about 110 basis points in 2020. And if you look at our outlook, we're expecting continued EBITDA margin performance. As it relates to SG&A, I think importantly, I just want to kind of go back to last year. Last year in the second half, and particularly in our third quarter, you know, we pulled back on SG&A, particularly marketing and T&E, you know, as the COVID situation, you know, was onset. And we normalized a little bit more in Q4. So in our guidance, you know, we're assuming that we're returning to a more normalized level of SG&A in marketing in particular in Q3. So, you know, our Q3, the DOM margins were, you know, or SG&A was abnormally low last year. So that's going to affect the flow on the full year, though. You know, we're making, you know, we're making investments in SG&A largely in the public company side. As we've said in the past, you know, we'll continue to add SG&A selectively. But, you know, the big step function increases significantly. you know, are largely behind us that we made in sales, marketing, and R&D. But we'll selectively add, you know, to build our, you know, our demand capabilities in the market. But just wanted to highlight importantly that the flow of the SG&A in the back half does reflect a more normalized level of spend versus what we had in prior year, particularly in the third quarter.
Jesse Singh
Tim, you know, the only other thing I'd add to that is, you know, specific types of investments. You know, we're obviously building pretty significant brand momentum in the marketplace. And, you know, we continue to expand our footprint. And, you know, aligned with that, you know, under the – You know, behind the scenes, we continue to invest in digital. We continue to invest in our capability to reach and expand our presence and awareness with customers. And as such, you know, we're building this company for a multi-year journey. We'll continue to look at opportunities and investments that allow us to accelerate that, you know, moving forward to continue to make sure that we sustain and expand our position for the long term.
Tim Moodries
Okay. Okay, great. Well, good luck on the rest of the year, guys. Thanks for the call. Appreciate it. Thanks, Jim. Thanks, Tim.
Operator
Our next question comes from Ryan Merkle with William Blair. Your line is open.
Ryan Merkle
everyone. I guess first off, I had a question on Eva Dobb margins in the back half. Should we be thinking flattish year over year in the third quarter with a little more lift in the fourth quarter just due to the price-cost dynamics that Ralph was talking about and then capacity maybe turning on a bit?
Green Builder Media
Hey, Ryan. Good morning. Without getting specific on quarters, I think your observation is right. The third quarter is you know, the third quarter has, you know, pressure from two sides, you know, on EBITDA margins. One is the flow through of commodity costs relative to pricing, you know, which I remarked on earlier, you know, that, you know, we're covering the inflation that we're seeing on the year, you know, through our pricing and cost actions. But, you know, the pricing will come into effect in the latter part of the third quarter, so we're not fully getting there in Q3. And then Q3 was also, you know, pressured by what I just mentioned regarding last year. Our SG&A was abnormally low, and then we went more normalized. But I think what's important, too, is you then look at the full year and the outlook that we provided. We're continuing to expect you know, very solid EBITDA margin growth, you know, following very solid EBITDA margin growth in 2020, you know, towards the, you know, overall, you know, longer-term goal that we talked about of 500 basis points. But there is some quarter-to-quarter fluctuation, as you pointed out.
Ryan Merkle
All right. That's helpful. And then just second, just maybe an update on the retail expansion. I'm assuming that the shortage of product maybe limited that a little bit, but do you expect to continue to increase your stocking presence, you know, out in the future?
Jesse Singh
Yeah, Ryan, as we've discussed in the past, we have a modest stocking position both in the U.S. and Canada. We continue to work with our retail partners to make sure that we are helping them meet the demand of of their end consumers, and we feel really good about our opportunity to continue to do that and work with them to continue to help them service their customers more specifically. Without getting into specific on what's stocking or what's in stock versus what's special order, the way to think of that growth is it has been accretive and continues to be accretive to our aggregate residential growth. So even though we're showing some really nice growth numbers, we've continued to be able to support our channel partners in a way that we see stronger growth in the retail channel than we do in our aggregate growth. But one other area I'll highlight is we not only participate with Deck Rail and Accessories in that category, but we also have our exteriors businesses that, you know, have done a really, really nice job of having fantastic product availability and delivery that's put us in a position to really grow that business with, you know, with our channel partners also.
Ryan Merkle
Thanks, Jesse. Appreciate it. Appreciate it. Thanks, Ryan.
Operator
Our next question comes from Keaton Mantora with BMO Capital Markets. Your line is open.
Jesse
Good morning, Jessi. Thanks for taking my question. Coming back to the recycling side, I think, you know, last year, I think from a mixed standpoint, you're at about 54%. I'm just curious, you know, kind of what is the opportunity that you guys see over the next few years to take that recycled mixed number higher? I'm not looking for an exact percentage, but just sort of You know, just some perspective on where that could go.
Jesse Singh
Yeah, thanks for the question. So as you look at our business, you know, a lot of the recycle numbers you hear from other parties really start to relate specifically to their deck rail and accessories business and decking specifically. So on the decking side, our cap composite decking uses 100% recycled plastic and wood in the core. So we're already there. Our opportunity there is to cost reduce what's used from a recycle standpoint. On our cap polymer decking, we're at 50% recycle in the core we see a meaningful opportunity to continue to expand that. Just the nature of the product is it might be difficult to get to 100%, but we certainly see an opportunity to continue to move that percentage up over time. And so if you add that up, that's higher than 54%. The 54% number really relates to the entirety of our business. And it also relates to the opportunity. So, you know, to your point, without getting specific, you know, we truly believe and hope that through some reengineering and continued focus that we would be able to get that into the 60s, you know, generally. But, you know, right now that's part of our billion-pound ambition. We need to do a lot of work to move into that area, given all of the other businesses that we have that don't naturally lend themselves as much to the use of recycled materials. So there's some engineering work that needs to get into that.
Jesse
Got it. That's helpful. And then my second question, are you seeing any acceleration in share gains from WordPress You know, lumber is at an all-time high right now, and I appreciate sort of the value proposition is not based just on price, but I'm just curious if, you know, what you're hearing from your customers with sort of where lumber is right now.
Jesse Singh
Yeah, you're certainly right. If we look at the dynamics in the lumber market, you're dealing with prices that in many materials, whether that's pressure treated or cedar or redwood, in some cases availability is an issue. In other cases, the price has moved to such a point that it makes composites, you know, a very attractive material. you know, right out of the gate. And we believe that there's conversion that's occurring there. If we look back in history, when these types of events have occurred, it has facilitated conversion. But similar to price, you know, once the underlying structure goes back, the Right now, it's difficult to give you an exact data point, except to say that we certainly believe that there is a meaningful opportunity from a demand standpoint to accelerate that conversion. We don't yet have the exact data. And I think as an industry scale manufacturing, that will also facilitate that conversion. Got it.
Jesse
That's a very helpful perspective. Good luck in the back half of the year. Thank you. Appreciate it.
Operator
Our next question comes from Stanley Elliott with Stiefel. Your line is now open.
Matthew
Hey, good morning, guys.
Green Builder Media
Thank you all for squeezing me in. Hey, Jesse, in the past, you guys have talked about 500 basis points plus a margin. Just curious how that relates to the billion pounds you're talking now about recycling, just trying to frame and square up those two together.
Jesse Singh
Yeah, as we've highlighted, you know, the 500 basis points, and we took a step towards that last year. And if you look at our guidance, it implies that we're going to take another step towards that this year. As you look at the underlying elements, you know, we haven't disclosed specifically, you know, what's SG&A and what's SG&A leverage and what is gross margin leverage. But a meaningful part of the gross margin that we're talking about will come from our execution of recycling. I would once again separate the billion pounds. I think the billion pounds for us is aspirational and is something that we can hopefully get to aggressively if we do that. part of that would be in the 500 basis points. Another part of that could be additive as we progress against that target.
Green Builder Media
Perfect. And then I apologize if you all had mentioned it, but did you talk about, I mean, we talked about softer inventories or lighter inventories in the channel. Is there a way to quantify that by any way? Or I guess is it fair to assume that most of the pro channel is still on allocation at this point?
Jesse Singh
Yeah, we have – we've got very detailed data on what – so we go through two steps of distribution. Our distributor customer partners, we have very good data on what they have in inventory. and what their sales are out the door. And as such, we're able to not only look at the raw inventory on the ground, we're able to look at days on hand given their current and expected sales momentum. So when we refer to days on hand at distribution, that's really based on, you know, solid data and solid math. As we look at inventory at the dealer base, that is a softer number for us, but dealers typically carry less inventory and turn the inventory much faster. So when we talk about, you know, in the first quarter having lower inventory levels, it was both at distributors and at dealers, and we believe we took a step towards supporting our dealer base in replenishing their inventory, and we expect to take additional steps this quarter on providing them with the inventory that they need as we move forward. So hopefully that gives you this perspective on the underlying data and analytics that we're using to determine, you know, what's the right inventory level.
Green Builder Media
Perfect, guys. Thanks for the time. Appreciate it. Best of luck. Thank you.
Operator
That's all the time we have for questions today. I'll turn the call over to Jesse Singh for closing comments.
Jesse Singh
Great. Thank you all for taking the time this morning. As you can see, our strategy and operational execution are on track, and it's allowing us to benefit from long-term secular trends in the markets that we play in. And as highlighted on the call, we continue to become more confident in about the opportunity that we have ahead of us given long-term trends in outdoor living and other demographic trends that are around us. Thank you again to all of you, and thank you again to the AZAC team, our channel partners, and our customers for such a great effort and for their partnership. Look forward to talking to you next time around. Thank you.
Operator
This concludes today's conference call. You may now.
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