MUELLER WATER PRODUCTS

Welcome and thank you for standing by. Your lines have been placed on a listen-only mode until the question and answer session. At that time, if you would like to ask a question, you may press star 1. Today's conference is being recorded. If you have any objections, you may disconnect at this time. And I'll turn the call over to Whit Kincaid. You may begin.

Good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining us on Muir Water Products' first quarter conference call. Yesterday afternoon, we issued our press release reporting results of operations for the quarter ended December 31st, 2024. A copy of the press release is available on our website, newerwaterproducts.com. I'm joined this morning by Marty Zakis, our Chief Executive Officer, Paul McAndrew, our President and Chief Operating Officer, and Steve Heinrichs, our Chief Financial Officer and Chief Legal Officer. Following our prepared remarks, we will address questions related to the information covered on the call. As a reminder, please keep to one question and a follow-up and then return to the queue. This morning's call is being recorded and webcast live on the Internet. We have also posted slides on our website to accompany today's discussion. They also address forward-looking statements and our non-GAAP disclosure requirements. At this time, please refer to slide two. This slide identifies non-GAAP financial measures referenced in our press release, on our slides, and on this call. It discloses the reasons why we believe that these measures provide useful information to investors. Reconciliations between non-GAAP and GAAP financial measures are included in the supplemental information within our press release and on our website. Slide three addresses forward-looking statements made on this call. This slide includes cautionary information identifying important factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those included in forward-looking statements. Please review slides two and three in their entirety. During this call, all references to a specific year or quarter, unless specified otherwise, refer to our fiscal year, which ends the 30th of September. A replay of this morning's call will be available for 30 days at 1-866-511-1891. The archived webcast and corresponding slides will be available for at least 90 days on the Investor Relations section of our website. I'll now turn the call over to Marty.

Thanks, Witt. Good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining our quarterly earnings call. I'll start with a brief overview of our first quarter performance. We are very pleased with our strong start to the year. We achieved record first quarter results for adjusted EBITDA and adjusted net income per diluted share. Our net sales growth of 18.7% exceeded expectations as we experienced healthy order levels supported by resilient end market demand and our focus on delivering outstanding customer service. Our disciplined execution on higher volumes led to a record first quarter adjusted EBITDA and a 340 basis points year-over-year improvement in our adjusted EBITDA margins. We achieved a record first quarter adjusted net income per diluted share of 25 cents, an increase of 92% compared to the prior year. We generated $42 million of free cash flow in the quarter after allocating $12 million towards capital expenditures. These results were due to great execution from our teams as we lapped an abnormally strong first quarter of free cash flow generation last year. We are increasing our guidance for 2025 net sales and adjusted EBITDA, primarily to reflect our strong first quarter results and benefits from recent price actions. Our guidance delivers gross and adjusted EBITDA margin gains this year, supported by our operational and commercial initiatives, including the anticipated benefits from the recent closure of our legacy BRAS boundary. Our updated guidance does not include any potential cost increases or impacts associated with the recently announced tariffs. Our latest price actions were communicated prior to the recently announced tariffs. As a reminder, more than 90% of our annual sales are in the U.S. and we are largely vertically integrated for many of our major product categories. We believe the proposed new tariffs would be a headwind that we could manage through with a combination of price actions and efficiencies as needed. With our teams continuing to execute at a high level, including delivering benefits from our manufacturing and supply chain efficiencies, I am confident that we can execute our key strategies while managing external challenges. I am excited that our new CFO, Melissa Rasmussen, will join Mueller early next month. After a comprehensive search, we are confident that she will help deliver long-term value to shareholders. As a reminder, upon Melissa's arrival, Steve will transition to a consulting role through the end of fiscal 2025 to help ensure a smooth transition. Since this is Steve's last earnings call, I want to take the time to thank him for his tremendous contributions over the years. He has provided strong leadership and counsel throughout his tenure. We all wish him the best in his future endeavors. With that, I'll now turn it over to Paul to address some of our commercial and operational insights.