Star Group L.P.

Good morning and welcome to the STAR Group Fiscal 2024 Second Quarter Results Conference Call. All participants will be in listen-only mode. Should you need assistance, please signal a conference specialist by pressing the STAR key followed by 0. After today's presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. To ask a question, press STAR then 1 on your telephone keypad. To withdraw from the question queue, please press STAR then 2. Please note this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the call to Chris Witte, Investor Relations Advisor. Please go ahead.

Thank you, and good morning. With me on the call today are Jeff Woosnam, President and Chief Executive Officer, and Rich Anbury, Chief Financial Officer. I would now like to provide a brief safe harbor statement. This conference call may include forward-looking statements that represent the company's expectations and beliefs concerning future events that involve risks and uncertainties and may cause the company's actual performance to be materially different from the performance indicated or implied by such statements. All statements other than statements of historical facts included in this conference call are forward-looking statements. Although the company believes that the expectations reflected in such forward-looking statements are reasonable, it can give no assurance that such expectations will prove to have been correct. Important factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from the company's expectations are disclosed in this conference call, the company's annual report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended September 30, 2023, and the company's other filings with the SEC. All subsequent written and oral forward-looking statements attributable to the company or persons acting on its behalf are expressly qualified in their entirety by the cautionary statements. Unless otherwise required by law, the company undertakes no obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events, or otherwise, after the date of this conference call. I'd now like to turn the call over to Jeff Woosnam. Jeff?

Thanks, Chris, and good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining us to discuss our second quarter and fiscal year-to-date results. Temperatures in the second quarter were 15.2% warmer than normal throughout STARS footprint. While slightly colder than the same period last year, it was unfortunately not enough to drive higher delivery volumes. However, we were able to move deep impact on adjusted EBITDA, even with a lower weather hedge benefit and some ongoing inflationary pressures, by improving per-gallon margins and employing solid expense control. We also kept net customer attrition at modest levels during the quarter and, as previously noted, closed on two strategic acquisitions in February on Long Island, giving us a total of four transactions thus far in the current fiscal year. Our team has remained very busy evaluating various heating oil and propane opportunities that align with our goal of strengthening and broadening our portfolio of brands. Through the first six months of fiscal 2024, temperatures were 0.2% warmer than the same period last year and 14.7% warmer than normal. While there is nothing we can do to control the weather, we believe our team is quite adept at adjusting to it and making the most of the conditions. An area of note is the year-over-year improvement we've made in service and equipment installation profitability, which has been an area of focus for us. I'm quite pleased with our progress, which I believe is evidence of the quality of service that we provide and certainly a direct result of the hard work and dedication of our employees. With the heating season now behind us, we believe we are well positioned for the remainder of fiscal 2024, as well as the opportunities that summer brings to further invest in our people and business development activities. With that, I'll turn the call over to Rich to provide additional comments on the quarter's results.