H. B. Fuller Company

on your telephone keypad. If you would like to withdraw your question, press star 1 again. Thank you. I would now like to turn the conference over to Steve Prezant. May we begin your conference?

Thank you, Operator. Welcome to HP Fuller's first quarter 2025 investor conference call. Presenting today are Celeste Mastin, President and Chief Executive Officer, and John Corcoran, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. After our prepared remarks, we will have a question and answer session. Before we begin, let me remind everyone that our comments today will include references to certain non-GAAP financial measures. These measures are supplemental to the results determined in accordance with GAAP. We believe that these measures are useful to investors in understanding our operating performance and to compare our performance with other companies. Reconciliation of non-GAAP measures to the nearest GAAP measure are included in our earnings release. Unless otherwise noted, comments about revenue refer to organic revenue, and comments about EPS, EBITDA, and profit margins refer to adjusted non-GAAP measures. We will also be making forward-looking statements during this call. These statements are based on current expectations and assumptions that are subject to risks and uncertainties. Actual results could differ materially from these expectations due to factors covered in our earnings release, comments made during this call, and the risk factors detailed in our filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, all of which are available on our website at investors.hbfuller.com. I will now turn the call over to Celeste Mastin. Celeste?

Thank you, Stephen, and welcome, everyone. I'm encouraged by our first quarter financial performance and positive organic sales growth. Despite weak overall market conditions, we remain focused on maintaining pricing discipline, driving market share gains, and effectively managing our cost structure. Simultaneously, we continue to execute our long-term strategic plan to optimize our portfolio mix and streamline our manufacturing cost structure to drive our business toward our greater than 20% EBITDA margin target. As we look ahead, we remain cautious given weak overall market demand and unpredictable geopolitical conditions around the globe. Nevertheless, we are off to a solid start to the year and remain confident we can successfully adapt and execute in this dynamic environment to deliver both growth in organic sales and EBITDA for the year while expanding EBITDA margin. Looking at our consolidated results in the first quarter, organic revenue increased 1.9% year-on-year, driven primarily by positive volume trends. Consolidated pricing was also positive as our index-based pricing headwinds have subsided, and we made solid progress on our price increase efforts, particularly in HHC. From a profitability perspective, EBITDA of $114 million, which was at the high end of our guidance range, declined year on year as expected, and EBITDA margin was 14.5%, keeping in mind the first quarter is always our seasonally lowest margin quarter of the year. The impact of higher raw material costs more than offset positive pricing and volume leverage. As we progress through the year, we expect this trend to reverse. resulting in a favorable net benefit from price and raw material actions for the remainder of the year. Now let me move on to review the performance in each of our segments in the first quarter. In HHC, organic revenue was up 4% year-on-year on solid volume growth and positive pricing. Volume was up low single digits, driven by strength in hygiene and flexible packaging. Pricing was also positive as delayed price increases from the fourth quarter began to be realized. The positive volume trends in HHC are very encouraging and primarily reflect market share gains. However, we anticipate that market dynamics in HHC will remain challenging and variable for the remainder of 2025 due to weak consumer demand. HHC's EBITDA margin of 12.7 percent was down versus last year, as expected, as volume growth and pricing actions were more than offset by higher raw material costs. We expect the price versus raw material dynamic to continue to improve throughout the year as we secure additional pricing gains and annualize against the impact of higher raw material costs. In engineering adhesives, Organic revenue declined 2% in the first quarter. Strength in the electronics and automotive market segments was offset by ongoing challenges in solar. Excluding solar, organic growth was positive in the first quarter. EBITDA increased 16% in EA, and EBITDA margin increased 180 basis points year-on-year to 18.7%. Favorable net pricing and raw material cost actions Restructuring benefits and the ND industry's acquisition drove the increase in EBITDA year-on-year. In Building Adhesive Solutions, or BAS, organic sales increased 2% year-on-year, driven by continued strength in roofing and improving trends in the infrastructure and mechanical market segments. EBITDA for BAS increased 2% year-on-year as volume gains and restructuring savings were partially offset by higher variable compensation. The first quarter for BAS is the seasonally lowest volume and EBITDA margin quarter. Geographically, America's organic revenue was down 1% year-on-year, driven by declines in HHC and EA, but largely offset by BAS. which achieved organic revenue growth of more than 8% year-on-year, driven by continued strength in roofing. In EIMEA, organic revenue increased 4% versus the first quarter of last year, driven by double-digit organic growth in HHC. Our hygiene business performed especially well, with several new customer wins and easier comparisons due to currency restrictions in the Middle East in the first quarter last year. In Asia Pacific, organic revenue increased 7% year-on-year. Strength in China was responsible for the majority of the growth in the Asia Pacific region. Now let me turn the call over to John Corcoran to review our first quarter results in more detail and our outlook for 2025. Thank you, Celeste.