Membership Collective Group Inc.

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by. My name is Emma, your CORA's call operator. Welcome and thank you for joining the membership collective group's second quarter earnings conference call. Throughout today's recorded presentation, all participants will be in a listen-only mode. The presentation will be followed by a question and answer session, and if you would like to ask a question, you may do so by pressing star followed by one on your touchtone telephone. Please press the star key followed by zero for operator assistance. And I would now like to turn the conference over to Rebecca Edelman. Please go ahead.

Thank you for joining us for the Membership Collective Group's second quarter 2021 financial results. Before we begin, I'd like to remind everyone that certain statements may be made on this call today that are forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements are subject to various risks and uncertainties and reflect our current expectations based on our beliefs, assumptions and information currently available to us. Although we believe these expectations are reasonable, we undertake no obligation to revise any statements to reflect changes that occur after this call. Description of these factors and other risks that could cause actual results to differ materially from these forward-looking statements are discussed in more detail in our filings with the SEC. During the call, we also refer to certain non-GAAP financial measures. These non-GAAP measures should be considered in addition to, and not as a substitute for, or in isolation from, our GAAP results. Reconciliations to most comparable gap measures are available in today's earnings press release, which is available on our investor relations section of our website at www.membershipcollectivegroup.com.

Hello everyone and thank you for joining us. I'm delighted to welcome you all to the second quarter earnings call of the Membership Collective Group. I'm Nick, CEO and founder of the MCG, and I'm joined by Andrew, Group President and Hemera CFO. I'm looking to take you through some of the highlights of the last quarter before handing over to Andrew and Hemera, who will take you through the operational and financial results. The last few months have been incredibly exciting for the MCG. Our successful IPO in New York marked the beginning of a new, really exciting chapter for MCG, and I'm hugely grateful for the support and contribution of our members, the people who work for us, and all our investors. We believe that the MCG is a unique and special business with significant white space and huge potential for growth. Our listing means we are extremely well positioned to continue growing our business and to focus on making membership even better. That's what has driven us on for the last 26 years. Over the last few months, we have been able to reopen our houses, restaurants and workspaces as restrictions have eased. We have loved welcoming members back to SOA houses around the world, to the NED in London and to the Scorpius Beach Club in Mykonos. And one of the most challenging periods of our history, we are happy to get back to doing what we do best. Obviously, as we sit here today, the world is still living with COVID-19 and ongoing restrictions are still having an impact on our industry's recovery. including the recent mask and vaccine mandates in North America and other restrictions across Europe. That said, we have seen over the last few months gives me confidence that when COVID restrictions fully and finally lift, our business will be back to full strength. In fact, against the challenging backdrop of the last quarter, we've opened two houses, one here in London and one in Austin, Texas. And today, we open the doors of Sewer House Tel Aviv in Jaffa District. Originally built as a convent, we have retained and restored many of the original features and designed interiors that are inspired by the city's cultures, colours and influences. It's a beautiful house that I know our members will love. Looking ahead... I'm excited that by the end of the year, we will have opened seven new houses, including three hugely anticipated locations in Paris, Rome and Brighton in England. Soho House Paris sits in one of the city's most vibrant neighbourhoods and is a beautiful former 19th century townhouse spread over five floors with 36 bedrooms due to open next month. The anticipation in the city of Paris is enormous and our membership demand, I've never seen anything quite like it. It's hugely exciting for us. Opening after that, in the heart of San Lorenzo, is Soa House Rome, our first house in Italy. Set in a 10-storey building, the house features a rooftop pool, 49 bedrooms and 20 long-stay apartments. Again, very exciting. I've been looking forward to opening houses in France and Italy for many years, so this is going to be a really exciting period for us. Again, this is all about making membership better. Every day I continue to be overwhelmed by the loyalty of our members. Our membership retention has remained exceptionally strong, and I've been amazed by the increase in applications for Sewer House membership during the quarter. a 40% increase versus pre-pandemic levels. I've never seen anything like it in the 26 years I've been running Sewer House. Our membership waiting list now stands at a record high of 64,000. During this quarter, we have also relaunched the SHAP, the Sewer House app, our digital platform that allows members to bring Sewer House into their pockets. More on that from Andrew later. Beyond Soho House, we have seen robust growth of our newer membership brands, adding over 8,000 members across Soho Friends members, Soho Works Lounge members and Soho Home Plus, which gives me real confidence in the future success of these new tailored memberships. And we've only just began. Now let me hand over to Andrew, who will take you through some more of the detail.