Six Flags Entertainment Corporation Common Stock New

Thank you. And I would now like to turn the conference over to Six Flags Management. Go ahead.

Thanks, Abby. And good morning, everyone. My name is Michael Russell, Corporate Director of Investor Relations for Six Flags. Welcome to today's earnings call to review our 2025 first quarter financial results for Six Flags Entertainment Corporation. Earlier this morning, we distributed via wire service our earnings press release, a copy of which is also available under the news tab of our investor relations website at investors.sixflags.com. Before we begin, I need to remind you the comments made during this call will include forward-looking statements within the meaning of the federal securities laws. These statements may involve risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ from those described in such statements. For a more detailed discussion of these risks, you may refer to the company's filings with the SEC. In compliance with the SEC's Regulation FD, this webcast is being made available to the media and the general public, as well as analysts and investors. Because the webcast is open to all constituents and prior notification has been widely and unselectively disseminated, all content on this call will be considered fully disclosed. On the call with me this morning are Six Flags Chief Executive Officer Richard Zimmerman and Chief Financial Officer Brian Withering. With that, I'll turn the call over to Richard.

Thank you, Michael. Good morning, everyone. Thanks for joining us today. I would like to start by sharing my perspective on where we are as we ramp up operations at all 42 of our parks in our first full year as the new six flags. We are making meaningful progress in tapping the full potential of the merger. We are seeing stronger market response to our exciting new slate of rides and attractions, improving guest satisfaction ratings, and executing on our plans to deliver significant cost savings. I'm very pleased with the pace of the integration work, and I want to thank our teams for their tireless efforts on all fronts over the past several months. As we noted in our earnings release this morning, our results showed the operating loss that is typical for a seasonal business that has very few parks in operation during the first quarter of the calendar year. While the operating loss in the quarter was greater than the combined loss of the legacy companies in 2024, It was only slightly greater than what we expected in our operating plan and was consistent with the level of off-season investment necessary to prepare our parks to open. Despite the weather and other macro-level challenges we have faced to begin the year, we remain confident in our outlook for the business, and especially in our 2025 operating plan. Our plan was built around a strategy to minimize lower-value operating days particularly in the first and fourth quarters, maximize the number of operating days in the second and third quarters, and make upfront investments that will enhance the guest experience and drive demand and revenue generation as we head towards the heart of the 2025 operating season. Our confidence is backed by the solid results we generated in April despite recent weather issues. The positive momentum we are seeing in long lead indicators such as season pass sales and school and youth group bookings and the excitement being generated in our markets by the compelling slate of new rides and attractions we are introducing this year. While overall April results fell short of expectations due to the recent bout of cold and wet weather, we are nonetheless encouraged with the improving trends we saw, particularly on good weather weekends earlier in the month of April. We are also pleased with the April trends in season pass sales, positive momentum that is encouraging as we head into the peak sales months of May and June, which combined are expected to represent close to 40% of the full year sales cycle. And as more parks began to reopen last week, bookings at our resort properties trended higher, up more than 10% versus the comparable week last year, another positive indicator consumers remain engaged as we get closer to daily operations in the peak summer season. Most importantly, We saw no detectable change in guest behaviors in April, despite broader market concerns. When the weather was good, we were encouraged by the strong demand we saw. Our guests continued to demonstrate a willingness to spend on goods and experiences they value, reinforcing our view that high-quality, close-to-home entertainment options like ours are highly resilient, even in a choppy macroeconomic environment. We believe this positions us well to achieve our 2025 performance goals. While the economic landscape remains unclear, we continue to focus on what we can control, executing our merger integration plan, optimizing our cost structure, and enhancing the guest experience to drive demand. We remain firmly on track to achieve the $120 million in merger cost synergies by the end of the year, six months earlier than originally contemplated at the announcement of the merger. As Brian will outline in a moment, and in keeping with our operating plan, We now expect current year operating costs and expenses to be more than 3% lower than combined 2024 actuals for both legacy companies. As part of our cost reduction plan, we are engaged in a corporate restructuring process designed to flatten our organizational structure, streamline decision-making, and drive cost efficiencies. As an example, earlier this month, we eliminated multiple senior executive leadership positions at the corporate level and consolidated functional ownership under a few key leaders. These changes and others we have underway will create new opportunities for the next generation of leadership within the company, support the cultivation of talent across the organization, and meaningfully reduce costs. Once this initiative is completed, we will have reduced our full-time headcount by more than 10%. Our system-wide reorg effort Along with additional cost-saving initiatives we've identified post-merger are designed to reset the company's cost base and deliver an incremental $60 million of cost savings above and beyond our original synergy target by the end of 2026. Before I turn the call over to Brian to review our results in more detail, let me take a moment to address the evolving tariff situation. While recent developments in U.S. trade policy have created marketplace uncertainties, based upon the tariffs as currently outlined, we believe our exposure is relatively limited. The fact that labor represents more than 50% of our operating cost structure inherently minimizes the potential impact of any new tariffs. On the non-labor portion of our cost structure, we believe we are well positioned to substantially absorb or offset any impact without significantly affecting our cost structure or margin outlook. Naturally, our teams are already actively working with suppliers and sourcing partners, pursuing mitigation strategies to offset these impacts through material substitutions, alternative sourcing, and where appropriate, pricing adjustments to protect our margins. We will continue to update the market as additional clarity becomes available. With that, I'll turn the call over to Brian for a review of our financials After his remarks, I'll return with some closing thoughts. Brian?