Mama's Creations Inc (MAMA) 2025 Q3 法說會逐字稿

Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for standing by. Welcome to Mama's Creations third-quarter fiscal 2025 earnings conference call. (Operator Instructions) This conference is being recorded today, December 16, 2024, and the earnings press release accompanying this conference call was issued after the market closed today.

女士們、先生們，午安。謝謝你的支持。歡迎參加 Mama's Creations 2025 財年第三季財報電話會議。（操作員說明）本次會議於今天（2024 年 12 月 16 日）進行錄製，本次電話會議附帶的收益新聞稿是在今天收盤後發布的。

On our call today is Mama's Creations Chairman and CEO, Adam L. Michaels; and CFO, Anthony Gruber.

今天參加我們電話會議的是 Mama's Creations 董事長兼執行長 Adam L. Michaels；和財務長安東尼·格魯伯。

Before we get started, I'll read a disclaimer about forward-looking statements. This conference call may contain, in addition to historical information, forward-looking statements within the meaning of federal securities laws regarding Mama's Creations.

在我們開始之前，我將閱讀有關前瞻性陳述的免責聲明。除歷史資訊外，本次電話會議還可能包含聯邦證券法含義內有關 Mama's Creations 的前瞻性陳述。

Forward-looking statements include, but are not limited to, statements that express the company's intentions, beliefs, expectations, strategies, predictions, or any other statements relating to its future earnings, activities, events, or conditions. These statements are based on current expectations, estimates, and projections about the company's business based, in part, on assumptions made by management.

前瞻性陳述包括但不限於表達公司意圖、信念、期望、策略、預測的陳述，或與其未來收益、活動、事件或條件有關的任何其他陳述。這些陳述是基於目前對公司業務的預期、估計和預測，部分基於管理階層的假設。

These statements are not guarantees of future performance and involve risks, uncertainties and assumptions that are difficult to predict. Therefore, actual outcomes and results may, and are likely to, differ materially from what is expressed or forecasted in the forward-looking statements due to numerous factors discussed from time to time in the company's 10-K and other documents which the company files with the US Securities and Exchange Commission.

這些陳述不是對未來業績的保證，並且涉及難以預測的風險、不確定性和假設。因此，由於公司 10-K 和公司提交的其他文件中不時討論的眾多因素，實際結果和結果可能而且很可能與前瞻性陳述中表達或預測的內容存在重大差異。

In addition, such statements could be affected by risks and uncertainties related to factors beyond the company's control. Matters that may cause actual results to differ materially from those in the forward-looking statements include, among other factors, the loss of key management personnel, availability of capital, and any major litigation regarding the company.

此外，此類陳述可能會受到與公司無法控制的因素相關的風險和不確定性的影響。可能導致實際結果與前瞻性陳述中的結果有重大差異的因素包括關鍵管理人員的流失、資本的可用性以及與公司有關的任何重大訴訟等。

In addition, throughout today's call, the company may refer to adjusted EBITDA, a non-GAAP financial measure, which we believe provides helpful information to investors about the performance of the business on an ongoing basis. A reconciliation of adjusted EBITDA to its most directly comparable GAAP financial measure is included in today's earnings release, which is available on the Mama's Creations website under the Investors tab.

此外，在今天的電話會議中，該公司可能會提到調整後的 EBITDA，這是一種非 GAAP 財務指標，我們認為它為投資者提供了有關公司持續業績的有用資訊。今天的財報中包含了調整後 EBITDA 與其最直接可比的 GAAP 財務指標的對賬，該財報可在 Mama's Creations 網站的「投資者」標籤下查看。

And finally, this conference call contains time-sensitive information that reflects management's best analysis only as of the date and time of this conference call. The company does not undertake any obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statements to reflect future events, information, or circumstances that arise after the date of this conference call.

最後，本次電話會議包含時間敏感訊息，僅反映截至本次電話會議日期和時間管理層的最佳分析。該公司不承擔公開更新或修改任何前瞻性陳述以反映本次電話會議之後發生的未來事件、資訊或情況的義務。

At this time, I'd like to turn the call over to Chairman and CEO, Adam L. Michaels. Adam, the floor is yours.

現在，我想將電話轉給董事長兼執行長 Adam L. Michaels。亞當，地板是你的。

Thank you, operator. And thank you to everyone for joining us today. I'd like to welcome you to our third-quarter fiscal '25 financial results conference call.

謝謝你，接線生。感謝大家今天加入我們。歡迎您參加我們的 25 財年第三季財務業績電話會議。

The third quarter was highlighted by 10% broad-based revenue growth as we completed CapEx investments in our Farmingdale facility to double our chicken capacity, added world-class executive leadership, and a continued focus on our four Cs: cost, controls, culture, and catapult.

第三季的主要收入成長了10%，因為我們完成了對Farmingdale 工廠的資本支出投資，使我們的雞肉產能翻了一番，增加了世界一流的執行領導力，並繼續關注我們的四個C ：成本、控制、文化、和彈射器。

Our goal to emerge as a leading one-stop shop deli solution on a national scale is grounded in a purposeful, persistent, and patient strategic plan to capture what is a generational change in consumer preferences.

我們的目標是成為全國領先的一站式熟食店解決方案，其基礎是有目的的、持久的和耐心的戰略計劃，以捕捉消費者偏好的代際變化。

Rising restaurant prices and inflation are bringing consumers back to the grocery store, both higher expectations. They want an experience and to be excited about quality products across formats and flavors. In turn, grocery retailers have had to pivot quickly and differentiate to be able to cater to customers, including the introduction of new deli prepared meals, the shelf space of which continues to expand.

餐廳價格上漲和通貨膨脹正在促使消費者重返雜貨店，這兩者都帶來了更高的期望。他們想要一種體驗，並對各種形式和口味的優質產品感到興奮。反過來，雜貨零售商必須快速轉型並實現差異化，以便能夠滿足顧客的需求，包括推出新的熟食預製食品，其貨架空間不斷擴大。

While Sircana forecasts volume growth in total retail food and beverage next year to be between 0% and 1%, deli prepared is growing at more than 5% today, and Mama's Creations is growing around 3x that fast, consistently and methodically gaining market share. So we are all in the right segment of the market with the right products at the right time.

Sircana 預測明年食品和飲料零售總量的成長將在0% 到1% 之間，而熟食店目前的成長速度超過5%，而Mama's Creations 的成長速度約為3 倍，持續且有條不紊地獲得市場份額。因此，我們都處於正確的市場領域，在正確的時間提供了正確的產品。

With this kind of growth, prepared foods have become the most important perimeter category for retailers and wholesalers. In a recent survey by Supermarket News, 66% of retailers and wholesalers said that they plan to increase their assortment of prepared foods in the year ahead, more than any other perimeter department.

隨著這種增長，預製食品已成為零售商和批發商最重要的外圍類別。《超市新聞》最近的一項調查顯示，66% 的零售商和批發商表示，他們計劃在未來一年增加預製食品的品種，這一數字比其他週邊部門都要多。

38% of retailers and wholesalers said they plan to expand the space of their prepared foods, which was the most of any of the fresh departments. The plans to expand prepared foods can be explained very simply. It is grounded in the increasing sales and profitability of these areas of the store.

38%的零售商和批發商表示，他們計劃擴大預製食品的空間，這是所有生鮮部門中最多的。擴大預製食品的計劃可以非常簡單地解釋。這是基於商店這些區域的銷售額和盈利能力的不斷增長。

The opportunity we are facing is clearly significant. We're in the right place at the right time and with the right product portfolio. The Mama's Creations product offering is, in my opinion, second to none in variety, quality, and service. Grocers are recognizing that.

我們面臨的機會顯然是重大的。我們在正確的時間出現在正確的地點，並擁有正確的產品組合。在我看來，Mama's Creations 的產品在品種、品質和服務方面都是首屈一指的。雜貨商正在認識到這一點。

Since I joined as CEO in September of 2022, we have refocused to address this incredible opportunity. We formed an initial 3C strategy to improve our costs, controls, and culture, areas that, in my opinion, required the most attention. We rebuilt and strengthened the foundations of our business and became brilliant at the basics.

自從我於 2022 年 9 月擔任執行長以來，我們重新集中精力抓住這難得的機會。我們制定了初步的 3C 策略，以改善我們的成本、控制和文化，在我看來，這些領域最需要關注。我們重建並加強了業務的基礎，並在基礎上取得了輝煌。

We methodically addressed the biggest pain points across each of these areas and implemented key operational KPIs under the mantra of what gets measured gets improved. The first was cost. Our gross margins were 11.9% in the quarter ending July 31, 2022, with significant potential that needs to be unlocked. The path to our targeted high 20% gross margin profile took countless small improvements throughout the organization.

我們有條不紊地解決了每個領域的最大痛點，並在「衡量的結果得到改進」的口號下實施了關鍵的營運 KPI。首先是成本。截至 2022 年 7 月 31 日的季度，我們的毛利率為 11.9%，有巨大的潛力需要釋放。為了實現 20% 的高毛利率目標，整個組織進行了無數的小改進。

From step changes in freight and procurement efficiencies, to implementing processes to reduce labor over time, our operations run much more efficiently today than ever before, being able to successfully navigate, as we have recently seen with historically high chicken prices, commodity headwinds that may come our way.

從貨運和採購效率的逐步變化，到隨著時間的推移實施減少勞動力的流程，我們的運營現在比以往任何時候都更加高效，能夠成功應對，正如我們最近看到的歷史性高雞肉價格，可能會出現的商品逆風。

The improved margins and cash flow are being directly and immediately put back into further investment in CapEx, such as the grills we installed in our Farmingdale facility, doubling chicken capacity and increasing labor efficiencies through reduced overtime, creating a cycle of higher and higher gross margins. Beyond COGS, we're building new capabilities in-house, which has allowed us to wean ourselves off of the higher professional services and support we relied on in the past.

提高的利潤和現金流將立即直接投入到資本支出的進一步投資中，例如我們在法明代爾工廠安裝的烤架，使雞肉產能翻倍，並通過減少加班時間提高勞動效率，從而形成毛利率越來越高的循環。除了銷貨成本之外，我們還在內部建立新的能力，這使我們能夠擺脫過去依賴的更專業的服務和支援。

Second were our controls. I have been sharing with you over the past year of the successful implementation of our NetSuite ERP system, providing unparalleled visibility to our business, improving pricing, margins, inventory management and so much more. Just this quarter, we added new modules to our NetSuite system, including a warehouse management system, which is already delivering value, driving our inventory to its lowest level since our team came together, freeing up even more cash flow.

其次是我們的控制。在過去的一年裡，我一直在與您分享 NetSuite ERP 系統的成功實施，該系統為我們的業務提供了無與倫比的可視性，改善了定價、利潤、庫存管理等等。就在本季度，我們在 NetSuite 系統中添加了新模組，其中包括倉庫管理系統，該系統已經在提供價值，將我們的庫存推至團隊成立以來的最低水平，從而釋放更多現金流。

New controls and quality are strengthening our policies and procedures, making us even prouder of our Grandma Quality manufacturing. Just recently, we added X-ray technology to our existing metal detection and are installing cutting-edge PCR testing to ensure that what comes into our plant is as safe as possible.

新的控制和品質正在加強我們的政策和程序，使我們對我們的祖母級品質製造感到更加自豪。就在最近，我們在現有的金屬檢測中添加了 X 射線技術，並正在安裝尖端的 PCR 測試，以確保進入我們工廠的物品盡可能安全。

I want to share my congratulations to our teams across East Rutherford and Farmingdale facilities for successfully navigating our third-party audits this year, including two industry-recognized SQF audits, as well as two major customer audits. With scores of 97 and 299, we're incredibly proud of their accomplishments. That said, my mother did ask where that one outstanding point went.

我想向東盧瑟福和法明代爾工廠的團隊表示祝賀，祝賀他們今年成功通過了第三方審核，包括兩項行業認可的 SQF 審核以及兩項主要客戶審核。憑藉 97 分和 299 分的成績，我們為他們的成就感到無比自豪。儘管如此，我母親確實問過那個突出的點去哪裡了。

To further focus on our first two Cs, we recently completed the build-out of our industry-leading senior team. Chris Darling, our new Chief Commercial Officer, brings over 20 years of experience in executive leadership from a storied career in the deli, where he led world-class commercial organizations at industry-leading firms such as Boar's Head, HEB, Ahold and Albertsons.

為了進一步專注於我們的前兩個 C，我們最近完成了行業領先的高級團隊的組建。我們新任首席商務官 Chris Darling 在熟食店的傳奇職業生涯中積累了 20 多年的行政領導經驗，他曾在 Boar's Head、HEB、Ahold 和 Albertsons 等行業領先公司領導世界級的商業組織。

Most importantly, Chris knows how to build a national brand, and particularly in the prepared meals solution space. He's already picked up the ball and is leading our fiscal year '26 planning. Hold on tight. I'm not sure Chris has ever planned anything small. Chris joined Skip Tappan, our Chief Operating Officer, an end-to-end supply chain leader bringing over 30 years of experience with Gordon Food Service, Walmart, Campbell Soup and Procter & Gamble.

最重要的是，克里斯知道如何建立全國品牌，特別是在預製餐解決方案領域。他已經接手並領導我們的 26 財年規劃。緊緊抓住。我不確定克里斯是否曾經計劃過什麼小事。Chris 加入了我們的營運長 Skip Tappan，他是一位端到端供應鏈領導者，在 Gordon Food Service、沃爾瑪、Campbell Soup 和寶潔公司擁有 30 多年的經驗。

In his first few weeks here, Skip has already had a deep impact on our business, bringing much needed structure to our staffing models to minimize overtime, which we are now moving from two extended shifts to a three-shift model, as well as implementing rigorous project management and KPIs to our growing operations and implementations. Most importantly, Skip has a great attitude and a hands-on approach to management, which has ingratiated himself quickly to the team.

在他來到這裡的頭幾周里，斯基普已經對我們的業務產生了深遠的影響，為我們的人員配置模型帶來了急需的結構，以最大限度地減少加班，我們現在正在從兩個延長輪班制轉向三班制模型，並實施嚴格的專案管理和 KPI 來支援我們不斷增長的營運和實施。最重要的是，斯基普有著良好的態度和親力親為的管理方式，這讓他很快就贏得了團隊的青睞。

With our world-class leadership team now in place, we are better positioned to fully optimize operations, execute on our catapult growth strategy and begin to more rigorously evaluate, acquire and integrate potential future M&A opportunities. I cannot stress enough the quality of our team that we have for a company our size. We are truly blessed.

憑藉我們世界一流的領導團隊的到位，我們能夠更好地全面優化運營，執行我們的彈射式成長策略，並開始更嚴格地評估、獲取和整合未來潛在的併購機會。對於我們這樣規模的公司來說，我對我們團隊的素質再怎麼強調也不為過。我們真的很幸運。

The third C was culture, where we implemented formalized processes and a company-wide culture committee to ensure we are doing right by our employees at every level of the organization. Our team has a passion for learning, and everyone on our team is striving to do more.

第三個 C 是文化，我們實施了正式的流程和全公司範圍的文化委員會，以確保組織各個層級的員工都做正確的事。我們的團隊充滿學習熱情，團隊中的每個人都在努力做得更多。

We just rolled out our second annual employee engagement survey and are excited to see the results next month. Our focus on culture is driving more production efficiency, higher retention and higher quality of our products because we're all pulling the wagon together. With the successful evolution of our finance operations and HR organizations underway and financial results reflecting this, we have put in place the processes and culture to begin to accelerate growth.

我們剛剛推出了第二次年度員工敬業度調查，很高興在下個月看到結果。我們對文化的關注正在推動更高的生產效率、更高的保留率和更高的產品質量，因為我們齊心協力。隨著我們財務營運和人力資源組織的成功發展以及反映這一點的財務業績，我們已經建立了開始加速成長的流程和文化。

At our Investor Day in East Rutherford in February, we announced the introduction of a fourth C, catapult, representing the investments in trade promotion and marketing that we are making to grow the business profitably at a faster rate. Our continued success demonstrates, with some help from new stores, new items and a little bit of trade rocket fuel, what type of growth is possible.

在二月於東盧瑟福舉行的投資者日上，我們宣布推出第四個 C（彈射器），代表我們為以更快的速度實現業務盈利增長而對貿易推廣和營銷進行的投資。我們的持續成功表明，在新商店、新商品和一點點貿易火箭燃料的幫助下，什麼樣的成長是可能的。

With the hiring of Chris Darling, the build-out of our sales leadership team, our first catapult lever is now complete. The sales team now works more seamlessly with our operations counterparts, and stronger demand and supply planning is enabling enhanced service levels and lower logistics costs. I am proud of how our new sales team has come together, and we are actively seeking out additional talent in areas that can step change our growth.

隨著克里斯·達林（Chris Darling）的聘用以及我們銷售領導團隊的組建，我們的第一個彈射器槓桿現已完成。銷售團隊現在與我們的營運團隊更加無縫地合作，更強大的需求和供應計劃正在提高服務水準並降低物流成本。我為我們新的銷售團隊的團結感到自豪，我們正在積極尋找能夠逐步改變我們成長的領域的更多人才。

The team delivered this quarter in spades, nicely balancing across our three growth pillars: driving average items carried at existing customers such as four new items at BJ's; driving velocities of existing items such as the successful Publix Pub Sub program; and getting into new doors, such as our first orders at Walmart and International Buy at Costco, opening up the Texas region and the Southeast region for the first time.

團隊本季的表現非常出色，很好地平衡了我們的三個成長支柱：推動現有客戶的平均商品銷售，例如 BJ's 的四種新商品；推動現有專案的速度，例如成功的 Publix Pub Sub 計劃；進入新的領域，例如我們在沃爾瑪的第一批訂單和在好市多的國際採購，首次開拓了德克薩斯地區和東南地區。

Coming from a humble Northeast authentic Italian meatball company, in two short years, meatballs are no longer our biggest items sold. And as of this quarter, over 47% of our sales are west of the Ohio River. Our one-stop shop deli solution is not a mantra or a tag line for a stress ball. It is our new way of working.

來自一家不起眼的東北正宗義大利肉丸公司，短短兩年時間，肉丸不再是我們銷售量最大的商品。截至本季度，我們超過 47% 的銷售額來自俄亥俄河以西。我們的一站式熟食店解決方案不是壓力球的口頭禪或口號。這是我們新的工作方式。

The second catapult lever is trade promotion, seeking to accelerate the velocities of our existing SKUs by driving trial in larger baskets. Combo buys with complementary products, multi-buys of our family of products and print and online circulars are just a few of the recent tactics we have used to deliver growth we have seen this year. This quarter saw our trade spend nearly triple sequentially, anchored by strong ROI programs at Publix with their Pub Sub program as well as digital coupon programs at BJ's.

第二個彈射槓桿是貿易促進，旨在透過推動更大籃子的試用來加快現有 SKU 的速度。與互補產品的組合購買、我們產品系列的多重購買以及印刷和線上宣傳只是我們今年為實現成長而採用的一些近期策略。本季度，我們的貿易支出比上一季度增長了近兩倍，這得益於 Publix 強大的投資回報率計劃及其 Pub Sub 計劃以及 BJ's 的數位優惠券計劃。

BJ's is a great example of a strong program ROIs, but even stronger stickiness. After our successful digital promotion, our weekly volumes have consistently stayed nearly 40% higher than the preprogram volume, even though we have stopped promoting.

BJ's 是一個很好的例子，它體現了專案投資回報率很高，而且黏性更強。在我們成功進行數位推廣後，儘管我們已經停止了推廣，但我們的每週銷量始終比預節目量高出近 40%。

On Instacart, another example, our ROAS, which is return on advertising spend, it's consistently over $5 and only getting better. While we are happy with the revenue part of a circular promo, we find an added benefit with this type of promotion. The stores are more vigilant about ensuring our products are on the shelves at all times, driving even further velocity.

另一個例子是 Instacart，我們的 ROAS（廣告支出回報率）一直超過 5 美元，而且只會越來越好。雖然我們對循環促銷的收入部分感到滿意，但我們發現這種類型的促銷還有額外的好處。商店更加警惕，確保我們的產品始終在貨架上，從而進一步推動速度。

The third lever in catapults, led by Lauren Sella, our CMO, is marketing, which saw a 75% increase in investment this quarter, reflecting a return to norms and correcting historical underinvestment in this area. We had a significant step-up in media investment in Q3, supporting with search the rollout of our new Walmart items as well as our BJ items.

由我們的首席行銷長 Lauren Sella 領導的彈射器的第三個槓桿是行銷，本季度投資增長了 75%，反映出回歸正常並糾正了該領域歷史上投資不足的情況。第三季度，我們大幅加大了媒體投資力度，透過搜尋支持沃爾瑪新商品以及 BJ 商品的推出。

In addition, we invested in promoting our 3-pound jumbo meatball sleeve as part of the Costco National Buy as well as marketing our Mama Mancini branded meals in Publix stores. This media was precisely targeted to Costco shoppers in the National Buy regions as well as shoppers around the Publix locations through social, programmatic and search campaigns.

此外，我們還投資推廣 3 磅重的巨型肉丸套，作為 Costco 全國大採購的一部分，並在 Publix 商店行銷我們的 Mama Mancini 品牌餐點。該媒體透過社交、程序化和搜尋活動，精確定位了 National Buy 區域的 Costco 購物者以及 Publix 地點周圍的購物者。

With the Costco National Buy, we also ramped up our Instacart presence. And an impressive 70% of the sales through the platform in the quarter were new to brand, helping to bring in new buyers to our portfolio. We're also thrilled to announce that Mama's is being recognized by the industry for our innovation, having received two additional traded innovation awards.

透過 Costco National Buy，我們也擴大了 Instacart 的影響力。本季該平台的銷售額中有 70% 是新品牌，令人印象深刻，這有助於為我們的產品組合引入新買家。我們也很高興地宣布，Mama's 的創新得到了業界的認可，並獲得了另外兩項交易創新獎。

Our on-the-go cups one, the Prepared Foods Spirit of Innovation Awards in the alternative channel category and our retail paninis received the Convenience Store News 2024 Best New Product Award in the Deli category. These awards not only drive awareness of those specific products, but also bring additional valuable trade visibility to Mama's Creations.

我們的隨身杯子榮獲另類通路類別的預製食品創新精神獎，我們的零售帕尼尼榮獲熟食店類別的《便利商店新聞 2024 年最佳新產品獎》。這些獎項不僅提高了這些特定產品的知名度，也為 Mama's Creations 帶來了額外有價值的貿易知名度。

As we discussed last quarter, we're continuing to drive our convenience store channel penetration. In October, we were first-time exhibitors at the National Association of Convenience Stores, NACS, trade show in Las Vegas. We saw a lot of positive response to our offerings and are continuing the discussions with potential retailers.

正如我們上季度所討論的，我們正在繼續推動便利商店通路的滲透。10 月，我們首次參加在拉斯維加斯舉行的全國便利商店協會 (NACS) 貿易展。我們看到對我們的產品有很多積極的反應，並且正在繼續與潛在零售商進行討論。

We're investing mid-single-digit millions in CapEx this year, already paid for and funded from cash flow from operations, with the goal of improving automation at both of our production facilities while concurrently building new in-house capabilities earlier in the value chain.

今年，我們在資本支出上投資了數百萬美元，已經從營運現金流中支付和資助，目標是提高我們兩個生產設施的自動化程度，同時在價值早期建立新的內部能力鏈。

These investments, paired with ongoing operational improvements, have the potential to offset some of the commodity pricing fluctuations and ultimately move our gross margins into the low 30% range over the long term while concurrently growing our trade promotion investments from low single-digit percentage of revenue today towards our long-term goal of 10%.

這些投資，加上持續的營運改進，有可能抵消部分大宗商品價格波動，並最終將我們的毛利率長期降至30% 的低水平，同時將我們的貿易促進投資從較低的個位數百分比增加到今天的收入朝著我們 10% 的長期目標邁進。

After sixs long months of construction, I can now say our Farmingdale facility is construction hat-free. I will be the first to tell you that it did not go as planned. And we all learned a lot about town permitting, limited pride equipment providers have in their trade and the quality of their installations.

經過長達六個月的建設，我現在可以說我們的法明代爾工廠已經不再需要建造帽子了。我會是第一個告訴你事情沒有照計畫進行的人。我們都了解了很多關於城鎮許可、有限的設備供應商對其貿易和安裝品質的自豪感。

While there are so many things I'm excited about with the recent hiring of Skip, it's the structure and project management that Skip will bring to our next CapEx expansion that makes me feel even better about what's to come. But as they say, it is all behind us, and we continue to march forward.

雖然最近聘用 Skip 有很多事情讓我感到興奮，但 Skip 將為我們下一次資本支出擴張帶來的結構和專案管理讓我對即將發生的事情感覺更好。但正如他們所說，一切都已過去，我們繼續前進。

We now have two new grills in our Farmingdale facility. This doubles our chicken capacity, which will allow for higher labor efficiencies through reduced overtime, as previously, our chicken grills were running effectively, 20-plus hours a day. We also were able to upgrade our existing grills with new parts, which have increased their reliability substantially.

我們的法明代爾工廠現在有兩個新的烤架。這使我們的雞肉產能增加了一倍，從而透過減少加班來提高勞動效率，就像以前一樣，我們的烤雞架每天有效運行 20 多個小時。我們還能夠使用新零件升級現有的烤架，從而大大提高了其可靠性。

In addition, the installation of additional chicken processing equipment insources key value-added services that are previously outsourced, lowering our cost of goods. And in the case of chicken, it has the potential to lower our cost by close to a full $1 per pound and improve margins in what remains a difficult commodity environment, with chicken prices still nearly 50% higher year-over-year.

此外，安裝額外的雞肉加工設備將先前外包的關鍵加值服務內購，從而降低了我們的商品成本。就雞肉而言，它有可能將我們的成本降低近 1 美元/磅，並在商品環境依然困難的情況下提高利潤，雞肉價格仍同比上漲近 50%。

We have been learning how to effectively trim our chicken, balance sales of the various chicken output cuts to maximize how much we can trim and expect it to start to make a more meaningful impact on our margin profile early next year. That being said, nothing worth doing is easy, and the installation of these new chicken grills were no different.

我們一直在學習如何有效地修剪我們的雞肉，平衡各種雞肉減產的銷售，以最大限度地提高我們可以修剪的數量，並期望它在明年初開始對我們的利潤狀況產生更有意義的影響。話雖這麼說，沒有什麼值得做的事情是容易的，這些新的烤雞架的安裝也不例外。

As previously discussed, the conclusion of significant construction at Farmingdale bled into the first half of the third quarter. While it is now complete, that pain impacted margins by about 400 basis points in the third quarter, with all construction now completed. The team has already done a great job bouncing back, and results from November have already seen this impact being fully reversed.

如前所述，法明代爾的重大建設工程在第三季上半段結束。雖然現在已經完工，但隨著所有建設現已完成，第三季的利潤率受到了約 400 個基點的影響。團隊已經完成了出色的恢復工作，從 11 月的結果來看，這種影響已經完全扭轉。

These CapEx investments are incredibly important given the commodity pressures we're seeing today, from jumbo chicken breast that were on the market for about $1 per pound in January to a recent high over the summer of $2 a pound. It is now stabilizing around $1.50 a pound, still nearly 50% higher than prior year at this time.

考慮到我們今天所面臨的大宗商品壓力，這些資本支出投資非常重要，從 1 月份市場上每磅約 1 美元的巨型雞胸肉到夏季每磅 2 美元的近期高點。目前價格穩定在每磅 1.50 美元左右，仍比去年同期高出近 50%。

We've been incredibly proactive and aggressive in addressing these trends through the aforementioned CapEx investments, labor management improvements and successful pricing actions across the board, with only a select few necessary pricing actions remaining, which will help us to weather the worst of future storms.

我們透過上述資本支出投資、勞動力管理改進和全面成功的定價行動，非常積極主動地應對這些趨勢，只剩下少數必要的定價行動，這將幫助我們度過未來最嚴重的風暴。

While we may be fairly differentiated in our ability to maintain relative margin strength in this unprecedented commodity cost environment, our retailer partners are well aware of these pressures and have been understanding of what is needed to combat these industry-wide headwinds. As we continue to improve and build on our four Cs, I am incredibly proud of our team's accomplishments and believe we are only at the beginning of our journey.

儘管在這種前所未有的商品成本環境下，我們維持相對利潤實力的能力可能相當不同，但我們的零售商合作夥伴充分意識到這些壓力，並且了解需要採取哪些措施來應對這些全行業的不利因素。隨著我們不斷改進和發展我們的 4C，我對我們團隊的成就感到無比自豪，並相信我們的旅程才剛剛開始。

In 2023, we built the foundation of a more resilient and flexible organization. And now in 2024, we are investing in the CapEx upon this foundation to position us for a high level of purposeful and profitable growth in the year ahead as we strive to create sustainable long-term value for our fellow shareholders.

2023 年，我們為更具彈性和靈活性的組織奠定了基礎。現在，到 2024 年，我們將在此基礎上投資資本支出，以便我們在未來一年實現高水準、有目的的獲利成長，同時努力為我們的股東創造可持續的長期價值。

With that, I'd now like to turn the call over to Anthony Gruber, our Chief Financial Officer, to walk through some key financial details for the third quarter of fiscal '25. Anthony?

現在，我想將電話轉給我們的財務長 Anthony Gruber，讓他詳細介紹 25 財年第三季的一些關鍵財務細節。安東尼？

Thank you, Adam. Revenue for the third quarter of fiscal 2025 increased 10% to $31.5 million as compared to $28.7 million in the same year ago quarter. The increase was largely attributable to successful pricing actions, as well as volume gains driven by increased demand, successful trade promotions, same customer cross-selling of new items, and new customer door expansion.

謝謝你，亞當。2025 財年第三季的營收成長 10%，達到 3,150 萬美元，而去年同期為 2,870 萬美元。這一成長主要歸因於成功的定價行動，以及需求增加、成功的貿易促銷、同一客戶交叉銷售新產品以及新客戶門擴張推動的銷售成長。

While we continue to take appropriate pricing actions, still over 90% of our growth is volume driven. We have continued to gain share in all nine quarters since this team has been together.

雖然我們繼續採取適當的定價行動，但我們 90% 以上的成長仍然是由銷售驅動的。自從這個團隊聚集在一起以來，我們在所有九個季度中繼續獲得份額。

Gross profit totaled $7.1 million or 22.6% of total revenues in the third quarter of fiscal 2025 as compared to $8.6 million or 30.1% of total revenues in the same year-ago quarter.

2025 財年第三季的毛利總計 710 萬美元，佔總營收的 22.6%，而去年同期為 860 萬美元，佔總營收的 30.1%。

The difference in gross margin was primarily attributable to significant commodity cost increases from historical averages, as well as nonrecurring impact from construction surrounding the now completed installation of strategic CapEx projects at the company's Farmingdale facility.

毛利率的差異主要歸因於商品成本較歷史平均水準顯著增加，以及圍繞該公司法明代爾工廠現已完成的戰略資本支出項目安裝的施工產生的非經常性影響。

Management estimates construction pressures negatively impacted corporate margins by approximately 400 basis points, with additional pressures coming from chicken pricing. These construction challenges are now firmly behind us, as we saw a step change improvement in our preliminary unaudited November gross margin profile, fully reversing the construction headwinds seen in Q3, with significant room for further growth.

管理層估計，建設壓力對企業利潤產生了約 400 個基點的負面影響，另外還有雞肉定價的壓力。這些建築挑戰現在已被我們牢牢拋在身後，因為我們看到 11 月未經審計的初步毛利率狀況出現了逐步改善，完全扭轉了第三季度的建築逆風，並具有巨大的進一步增長空間。

Operating expenses were $6.6 million in the third quarter of fiscal 2025 as compared to $5.9 million in the same year ago quarter. As a percentage of sales, operating expenses were 20.8% as compared to 20.7% in the same year ago quarter.

2025 財年第三季的營運支出為 660 萬美元，而去年同期為 590 萬美元。營運費用佔銷售額的百分比為 20.8%，去年同期為 20.7%。

Operating expenses as a percentage of sales were relatively flat, driven by further freight efficiency improvements of an additional 90 basis points versus prior year, offset by a 75% increase in marketing spend versus prior year, an area of historical underinvestment to help drive repeatable and profitable growth.

營運費用佔銷售額的百分比相對持平，這是由於貨運效率比上年進一步提高了90 個基點，但被營銷支出比上年增加75% 所抵消，營銷支出是歷史上投資不足的領域，有幫助於推動可重複和可重複的銷售。

Net income for the third quarter of fiscal 2025 totaled $0.4 million or $0.01 per diluted share as compared to net income of $2 million or $0.05 per diluted share in the same year-ago quarter. Third-quarter net income totaled 1.3% of revenue as compared to 7% in the same year-ago quarter. Adjusted EBITDA, a non-GAAP measure, totaled $1.7 million for the third quarter of fiscal '25 as compared to $3.5 million in the same year ago quarter.

2025 財年第三季的淨利總計 40 萬美元，即稀釋後每股收益 0.01 美元，而去年同期淨利為 200 萬美元，即稀釋後每股收益 0.05 美元。第三季淨利佔營收的 1.3%，而去年同期為 7%。25 財年第三季調整後 EBITDA（非 GAAP 衡量標準）總計 170 萬美元，而去年同期為 350 萬美元。

Cash and cash equivalents as of October 31, 2024 totaled $9.3 million as compared to $11 million as of January 31, 2024. The change in cash and cash equivalents was primarily driven by $5 million in capital investments and $2.5 million of debt pay down year-to-date, partially offset by working capital improvements as third quarter cash flow from operations increased 23.7% year over year.

截至 2024 年 10 月 31 日，現金及現金等價物總額為 930 萬美元，而截至 2024 年 1 月 31 日為 1,100 萬美元。現金和現金等價物的變化主要是由於今年迄今 500 萬美元的資本投資和 250 萬美元的債務償還減少所致，部分被營運資本改善所抵消，第三季度營運現金流同比增長 23.7%。

As of October 31, 2024, total debt stood at $6.3 million. This cash war chest, coupled with our commercial lines of credit, reduced debt and a stronger balance sheet is preparing us well for whatever inorganic opportunities proactively or reactively come our way.

截至 2024 年 10 月 31 日，債務總額為 630 萬美元。這筆現金儲備，加上我們的商業信貸額度、減少的債務和更強大的資產負債表，正在為我們主動或被動地迎接任何無機機會做好準備。

Looking ahead, we believe that our normalized gross margin profile, not including major commodity fluctuations, will continue to hover in the high 20% range. Our long-term goal leveraging strategic CapEx investments, procurement efficiencies, and continuous operational improvements would be targeting margins consistently maintained in the low 30% range while rightsizing our trade promotion investments from low single-digit percent of revenue today, closer to our goal of 10%.

展望未來，我們相信，不包括主要商品波動的正常毛利率狀況將繼續徘徊在 20% 的高點區間。我們利用策略資本支出、採購效率和持續營運改善的長期目標是將利潤率始終保持在30% 的低水平，同時調整我們的貿易促進投資，從目前收入的低個位數百分比開始，更接近我們的目標10%。

Turning to adjusted EBITDA. Our long-term goal is to achieve adjusted EBITDA margins in the teens percentage range. This completes my prepared comments.

轉向調整後的 EBITDA。我們的長期目標是實現調整後 EBITDA 利潤率在十幾%範圍內。我準備好的評論就這樣完成了。

Now before we begin our question-and-answer session, I'd like to turn the call back to Adam for some closing remarks. Adam?

現在，在我們開始問答環節之前，我想將電話轉回給 Adam，讓他做一些結束語。亞當？

Thank you, Anthony. In summary, the quarter continued our cadence of purposeful and profitable growth, with the temporary construction-related pressures now largely behind us as of the middle of the third quarter. Looking ahead, there's a compelling and growing opportunity in the deli space as grocery stores invest in grab-and-go food offerings to inch into the restaurant territory and inflation pushes consumers towards alternatives.

謝謝你，安東尼。總而言之，本季繼續了我們有目的的獲利成長節奏，截至第三季中期，與建設相關的臨時壓力已基本消除。展望未來，隨著雜貨店投資外帶食品以進入餐廳領域，而通貨膨脹則促使消費者轉向其他選擇，熟食店領域將迎來一個引人注目且不斷增長的機會。

In the past two years, we have built the team and company to become an innovative prepared foods leader in what is currently a fragmented market. We have several levers available to drive growth, from new SKUs and existing customers to new Tier 1 customers and continued investments in marketing and trade promotion to increase velocities of our existing in-store items.

在過去的兩年裡，我們打造了團隊和公司，成為當前分散市場中創新預製食品的領導者。我們有多種槓桿可用於推動成長，從新的 SKU 和現有客戶到新的一級客戶，以及對行銷和貿易促銷的持續投資，以提高現有店內商品的銷售速度。

We also believe that supported by our strong balance sheet, attractively priced M&A opportunities in the industry could enable us to become a consolidator in a fragmented prepared foods market and emerge as a leading one-stop shop deli solution on a national scale. The fun has only just begun, and I look forward to speaking with you all in the year ahead.

我們也相信，在我們強勁的資產負債表的支持下，行業中價格有吸引力的併購機會可以使我們成為分散的預製食品市場的整合者，並成為全國範圍內領先的一站式熟食店解決方案。樂趣才剛開始，我期待在未來的一年與大家交談。

With that, I'll turn it over to the operator to begin our question-and-answer session. Operator?

這樣，我會將其交給操作員以開始我們的問答環節。操作員？

(Operator Instructions) Ryan Meyers, Lake Street Capital.

（操作員說明）Ryan Meyers，Lake Street Capital。

Hey, guys. Thanks for taking my questions. As we think about the revenue for the fourth quarter, obviously, traditionally, we'll see a step down from the third quarter. Do you expect that trend will continue here in Q4? Or are some of the recent customer wins with Walmart and even Costco enough to offset what we traditionally see here sequentially? Really, any commentary on Q4 would be helpful.

嘿，夥計們。感謝您回答我的問題。當我們考慮第四季度的收入時，顯然，傳統上我們會看到比第三季度下降。您預計第四季這種趨勢會持續嗎？或者最近沃爾瑪甚至好市多贏得的一些客戶是否足以抵消我們傳統上依次看到的情況？確實，任何有關第四季度的評論都會有所幫助。

Thanks, Ryan. Actually, I think that the sales team has done an incredible job trying to adjust, fix that. I know historically, we did have a little softer Q4. Some of the things are still there, right? So think of Thanksgiving.

謝謝，瑞安。事實上，我認為銷售團隊在嘗試調整、解決這個問題方面做得非常出色。我知道從歷史上看，我們的第四季確實有點疲軟。有些東西還在那裡，對嗎？所以想想感恩節。

People -- they take our products off the shelf for a week, put more turkeys there. Same thing for Christmas time, they take our products off and put more hams there.

人們——他們把我們的產品下架一周，然後放更多的火雞。聖誕節時也是如此，他們把我們的產品拿下來，放更多的火腿。

But what we're seeing is actually, the sales team did a great job at getting some incremental rotations. You mentioned -- I just mentioned earlier that our trade programs are getting a lot stronger, a lot deeper, a lot broader with respect to seeing the same Publix Pub Sub program. We're doing it again.

但我們實際上看到的是，銷售團隊在增加輪調方面做得很好。你提到——我剛才提到，我們的貿易計劃變得更強大、更深入、更廣泛，與相同的 Publix Pub Sub 計劃相比。我們又來了。

This -- in Q4. Definitely, we've had more of these rotations of Pub Sub programs than we've had in the past. So maybe a little bit, but I certainly feel even more confident in Q4 this year than I did last year because of the great work the sales team is doing.

這在第四季。當然，我們的 Pub Sub 計劃輪換次數比過去更多。也許有一點，但由於銷售團隊所做的出色工作，我對今年第四季的信心肯定比去年更有信心。

And then equally, I have to say the operations team, to fulfill this, is awesome as well. So I hope to tell you that not as strong as much of a pullback as it was in prior years.

同樣，我不得不說，實現這一目標的營運團隊也很棒。所以我希望告訴大家，這次回檔的力道沒有前幾年那麼大。

Okay. Got it. And then thinking about the gross margins, you called out the 400 basis point impact from the construction related costs and the remainder was commodity. Have you guys seen any improvements in the commodity pricing yet? And then as a follow-up to that, when do you think you'll see the full impact to the margin improvement from the recent CapEx project?

好的。知道了。然後考慮毛利率，您指出了建築相關成本的 400 個基點影響，其餘的則是商品。你們看到商品定價有什麼改善了嗎？作為後續行動，您認為您何時會看到最近的資本支出項目對利潤率改善的全面影響？

Yes. So two questions in there. The first 1 is, are we done with all the construction stuff? And the answer is yes, absolutely. That impact, we did not see in November already, and things are going well there.

是的。所以有兩個問題。第一個是，我們所有的建築工作都完成了嗎？答案是肯定的，絕對的。我們在 11 月還沒有看到這種影響，而且那裡的情況進展順利。

Commodity wise, it's still tough. But again, I got to give credit to my team. So we're talking about -- so chicken, for instance, that has come down. So I think when I spoke to you last, we're -- if you were looking at the market numbers, they're north of $2. Now it's close to $1.50.

商品方面，仍然很困難。但我再次必須讚揚我的團隊。所以我們正在談論——例如雞肉，它已經下降了。因此，我認為當我上次與您交談時，如果您查看市場數據，您會發現價格在 2 美元以上。現在接近 1.50 美元。

And I think that there's some slight improvement that could still be there.

我認為仍然可能存在一些細微的改進。

And then beef prices, again, is equally, right? Equally important to us. The team has done a great job at doing some -- working with our partners. You're seeing some really good top line numbers. That allows us to commit -- to partner with our suppliers to say, look, things are going really well here.

那麼牛肉價格又是一樣的，對嗎？對我們同樣重要。團隊在某些方面做得非常出色—與我們的合作夥伴合作。您會看到一些非常好的頂線數字。這讓我們能夠承諾——與我們的供應商合作，說，看，這裡的事情進展得非常順利。

If I could tell you that we're going to have this amount of volume, can you get a better price on your side? And the answer is yes. So not only do I see the numbers coming down a little bit for us, but because we have a better sense of our business and the business is doing better, we're actually able to capture some better procurement numbers, some better numbers on our costs.

如果我可以告訴您，我們將有這樣的銷售量，您能獲得更好的價格嗎？答案是肯定的。因此，我不僅看到我們的數字有所下降，而且因為我們對我們的業務有了更好的認識，而且業務做得更好，我們實際上能夠捕獲一些更好的採購數字，我們的採購數字成本。

So I'm optimistic that Q4 and then going into next year. So Anthony Morello and team are doing a great job. I spoke to you in the past about possibly looking at contracts for the year, right? These are not financial contracts. These are just actual -- we're going to take in X amount of chicken or beef for that matter as well. And if we're able to do that, our suppliers are able to get us better rates.

因此，我對第四季以及明年的情況持樂觀態度。所以安東尼·莫雷洛和他的團隊做得很好。我過去曾與您討論過可能會考慮今年的合同，對吧？這些不是金融合約。這些都是實際的——為此我們也將攝取 X 數量的雞肉或牛肉。如果我們能夠做到這一點，我們的供應商就能提供我們更好的價格。

So I will tell you, as challenging -- the markets are going to continue to be challenging next year, and you can read the same stuff I am. Potential things that impact tariffs. Obviously, that doesn't impact us personally because everything we do is domestic, but that has a knock-on effect on people that don't do that, right?

所以我會告訴你，作為具有挑戰性的——明年市場將繼續充滿挑戰，你可以讀到我寫的同樣的東西。影響關稅的潛在因素。顯然，這不會影響我們個人，因為我們所做的一切都是在國內，但這會對不這樣做的人產生連鎖反應，對嗎？

Although there are some headwinds there, our team is doing an amazing job preparing for next year, and we're already seeing some of the contract conversations that we're having a superior pricing model relative to this year. So I'm really optimistic going forward.

儘管存在一些阻力，但我們的團隊正在為明年做出色的準備工作，我們已經看到一些合約對話，表明我們擁有比今年更優越的定價模型。所以我對未來非常樂觀。

Got it. That sounds good. Thanks for taking my questions.

知道了。聽起來很好。感謝您回答我的問題。

Thanks, Ryan.

謝謝，瑞安。

Eric Des Lauriers, Craig-Hallum.

埃里克·德斯·勞裡爾斯，克雷格·哈勒姆。

Great. Thank you for taking my questions. First one for me, just a bit of a follow-up on gross margins here. So obviously, chicken prices, commodity prices, overall headwind in the quarter. Backing out, the construction headwinds, about mid-20%s gross margins.

偉大的。感謝您回答我的問題。對我來說，第一個是毛利率的一些後續行動。很明顯，雞肉價格、大宗商品價格在本季整體呈現逆風。由於建設逆風而退出，毛利率約為 20% 左右。

Do you need commodity prices to improve to get you back to your high 20%s gross margin target or some of these things that you just mentioned, contracts and other areas of efficiency, can those in and of themselves get you back to that high 20%s target? And then just on the new longer-term target of the low 30%s. Just wondering what might need to happen to get you into that range? Thanks.

您是否需要提高大宗商品價格才能回到 20% 的高毛利率目標，或者您剛才提到的一些事情、合約和其他效率領域，這些因素本身能否讓您回到 20% 的高毛利率目標% s目標？然後是低 30% 的新長期目標。只是想知道需要發生什麼才能使您進入該範圍？謝謝。

Yeah. So first, Eric, I'd tell you the holidays are coming up. So as a gift, if you could get me lower commodity prices, I'm all for that. So I won't -- I'll totally accept that. That said, we do not need commodity prices to go back down to last year's numbers to get us to the mid to high 20%s that we've always been talking about.

是的。首先，艾瑞克，我要告訴你假期即將到來。因此，作為禮物，如果你能讓我降低商品價格，我會全力以赴。所以我不會——我會完全接受這一點。也就是說，我們不需要大宗商品價格回落到去年的水平，就能達到我們一直在談論的 20% 的中高水平。

Again, the beauty of bringing Skip in and Chris, all these new folks is the ability to have -- bringing great ideas and to give us, me included, a release valve so I could do other things.

再說一遍，引入斯基普和克里斯，所有這些新人的美妙之處在於，他們能夠帶來偉大的想法，並為我們（包括我）提供一個釋放閥，這樣我就可以做其他事情。

I'll give you a great example. So Steve in Farmingdale and our team has cut SKUs -- another 100 SKUs. We're now down to 250 SKUs in our Farmingdale facility. That was a total of 0.5 point of revenue of all those numbers, but we're seeing actually two-thirds of that revenue flowing back into our existing products. So I'm able to have significant improvement in operations, lowering COGS, lowering our costs, increasing our efficiencies in labor, all by -- almost for free.

我會給你一個很好的例子。因此，Farmingdale 的 Steve 和我們的團隊削減了 SKU——另外 100 個 SKU。現在，我們法明代爾工廠的 SKU 已減少至 250 個。所有這些數字總共佔收入的 0.5 個百分點，但我們實際上看到三分之二的收入回流到我們現有的產品中。因此，我能夠顯著改善運營，降低銷貨成本，降低成本，提高勞動力效率，而這一切幾乎都是免費的。

That's the type of focus. Those are the types of things, and I can give you 10 more that are going to help us continue to move that gross margin up. Would I love more commodity tailwinds? Absolutely. But do I need them for us to be successful in our high 20%s? We do not.

這就是焦點的類型。這些就是這些類型的事情，我可以給你另外 10 個將幫助我們繼續提高毛利率的事情。我會喜歡更多的商品順風嗎？絕對地。但我需要它們才能讓我們在 20% 的高收入群體中取得成功嗎？我們沒有。

Thank you. That's very helpful. And then just in terms of the new longer-term targets of the low 30%s, I guess this parlays into the next question I have. Just wondering if you have any other CapEx projects earmarked for the quarters ahead? And if so, could you just talk about how we should be thinking about those? Are these as intensive of an installation process as we saw this year?

謝謝。這非常有幫助。然後就低 30% 人口的新長期目標而言，我想這可以解決我的下一個問題。只是想知道您是否有任何其他指定用於未來幾季的資本支出項目？如果是這樣，您能否談談我們應該如何考慮這些問題？這些安裝過程是否像我們今年看到的那樣密集？

So I guess just a comment overall on any new CapEx projects over the next couple of quarters and then the ability to what you need to do to get to the low 30%s longer-term target. Thanks.

因此，我想只是對未來幾季的任何新資本支出項目進行總體評論，然後是您需要採取哪些措施才能實現 30% 的長期目標。謝謝。

Yeah. There's still -- again, I'll tell you -- and this is what always happens, right? You put the money in and you don't get the return that day. The biggest thing for us has to be optimizing the trimming of the chicken. So we have the machinery in.

是的。我再告訴你，還有這種情況總是會發生，對吧？你把錢存進去，那天你並沒有得到回報。對我們來說最重要的事情是優化雞肉的修剪。這樣我們就有機器了。

It is working. There's nothing too (technical difficulty) anymore, thank goodness. But we haven't optimized it, right? We haven't optimized it on how we do it, and we haven't optimized it on being able to sell all the items.

它正在發揮作用。謝天謝地，再也沒有什麼（技術困難）了。但我們還沒有優化它，對吧？我們還沒有優化它的操作方式，也沒有優化它能夠銷售所有物品。

I'm really excited next week. We have a big major launch at another -- with one of our club customers on this exact trim product of chicken. You're going to look at it and you're going to say that's awesome because of the revenue. You're going to say it -- it's awesome because it's branded. You're going to say it because it's an awesome customer.

下週我真的很興奮。我們在另一家公司推出了一款大型產品——我們的一位俱樂部客戶推出了這款精確的雞肉產品。當你看到它時，你會說這太棒了，因為它的收入。你會說——它太棒了，因為它是品牌的。你會這麼說，因為這是一位很棒的客戶。

I'm going to say, actually, I don't care about all three of those. I care about it because it unlocks, it uses up some of the other parts of the chicken that allows us to sell our portions chicken, our chicken breasts, at a lower price. Again, that is just one example of many that I could give to help us understand how we're going to keep guiding further and further up into the high 20%s.

我想說，實際上，我並不在乎這三個。我關心它，因為它會解鎖，它會消耗雞肉的其他部分，使我們能夠以較低的價格出售我們的雞肉，我們的雞胸肉。再說一次，這只是我可以舉出的許多例子之一，以幫助我們了解我們將如何繼續引導越來越多的人進入前 20%。

And then again, guys, let's remember -- and I take responsibility that construction did not go as I would like it. We are in the 30%s last year. There is no reason why we're not going to absolutely get there again. To your question on more CapEx, I do like to digest. My mother always yells at me if I eat too much too quickly.

再說一次，夥計們，讓我們記住——我對施工沒有按照我希望的方式承擔責任。去年我們處於30%左右。我們沒有理由絕對不會再到達那裡。對於你關於更多資本支出的問題，我確實想消化一下。如果我吃太多太快，我媽媽總是對我大喊大叫。

I think we're perfectly fine in our Farmingdale facility. I think I'm really excited about some opportunities next year in our East Rutherford facility. There's more opportunities to drive more productivity. And -- oh, by the way, we can't seem to make the chicken fast enough, so we can add more capacity there.

我認為我們在法明代爾的工廠一切都很好。我想我對明年在東盧瑟福工廠的一些機會感到非常興奮。有更多的機會來提高生產力。而且——哦，順便說一句，我們似乎無法讓雞足夠快，所以我們可以在那裡增加更多的容量。

But we're going to do that after we see the Farmingdale facility making the margins that they've made a year ago. And again, I'm patient. If you take one thing from my conversation earlier and my messages earlier, it's patience and profitability. I'm not going anywhere, and we're going to be patient. Hope that's helpful.

但當我們看到法明代爾工廠的利潤達到一年前的水平後，我們就會這樣做。再說一遍，我很有耐心。如果你從我之前的談話和我之前的資訊中了解到一件事，那就是耐心和盈利能力。我不會去任何地方，我們會耐心等待。希望有幫助。

Great. Thank you for taking my questions. Yeah, it's very helpful. Thank you.

偉大的。感謝您回答我的問題。是的，這很有幫助。謝謝。

Anthony Vendetti, Maxim Group.

安東尼文代蒂，馬克西姆集團。

Thank you. Yeah, Just a couple of questions on the revenues and then the Northeast region. So if you could talk about what specifically -- was it a particular customer like Walmart, a Costco that drove the outperformance in revenues this quarter? And then -- or was it a region? You mentioned west of Mississippi, I think it's 47% of revenues.

謝謝。是的，只有幾個關於收入和東北地區的問題。那麼，如果你能具體談談是什麼——是像沃爾瑪、好市多這樣的特定客戶推動了本季營收的優異表現嗎？然後——還是一個地區？你提到密西西比州以西，我認為它佔收入的 47%。

And then also on the regions, I think the Northeast was down 12.6%. Any specific reason there, what's going on in the Northeast region? Obviously, we made up for that in other regions. So maybe if you can tie all that together? Those are my questions. Thanks.

然後就地區而言，我認為東北地區下降了 12.6%。有什麼具體原因嗎，東北地區到底是怎麼回事？顯然，我們在其他地區彌補了這一點。那麼也許你可以將所有這些結合在一起嗎？這些都是我的問題。謝謝。

Yeah. That's perfect. Thank you. So I think the thing that I love the most to your first question, I love the balance of our portfolio. So looking at it, chicken versus beef. Looking at our different club customers, all three of them did extraordinarily well this quarter. Our retailers, I've spoken to you earlier last time, it's about the growth on the West Coast. Albertsons is doing a great job. I think we added three or four new divisions of Albertsons, thanks to Tony and the team.

是的。那很完美。謝謝。所以我認為我最喜歡你的第一個問題，我喜歡我們投資組合的平衡。所以看一下，雞肉與牛肉。看看我們不同的俱樂部客戶，他們三個在本季度都表現得非常好。我們的零售商，我上次早些時候已經和你們談過了，這是關於西海岸的成長。艾伯森做得很好。我認為我們增加了三到四個新的艾伯森部門，這要感謝托尼和他的團隊。

So new items, I told you the balance of new items that we got in, like BJ's, the new programming, the new doors. Walmart, it's still very early. I could tell you that we're getting reorders. That's probably a good thing. The reorders are twice the size, more than twice the size of the initial orders, that's a good thing. So I would tell you, everywhere, we're doing well. There's no one thing that's kicking the curve.

那麼新項目，我告訴過你我們加入的新項目的平衡，例如 BJ、新節目、新門。沃爾瑪，現在還很早。我可以告訴你，我們正在收到重新訂單。這可能是件好事。重新訂購的數量是初始訂單數量的兩倍，是初始訂單數量的兩倍以上，這是一件好事。所以我想告訴你，我們在任何地方都做得很好。沒有任何一件事能夠打破曲線。

You mentioned earlier, the regions. It's amazing. I mentioned this earlier, it's quite possibly the thing I'm proudest of. Northeast meatball company to a fact that meatballs aren't even the biggest item we have anymore, so I'd like it to continue to grow well. And we're in all 50 states.

您之前提到過，地區。太棒了。我之前提到過這一點，這很可能是我最自豪的事情。東北肉丸公司承認，肉丸已經不是我們最大的產品了，所以我希望它能繼續發展得很好。我們遍佈 50 個州。

Actually, Luke was very proud to say it's the only thing that he cares about me, making sure I'm doing. We sold in Puerto Rico this year because of the Costco Southeast rotation. My -- you name it. We are in all 50 states, District of Columbia and Puerto Rico. I love that breadth.

事實上，盧克非常自豪地說這是他唯一關心我的事情，確保我在做。由於 Costco 東南部輪換，我們今年在波多黎各銷售。我的——你說得出來。我們的業務遍及所有 50 個州、哥倫比亞特區和波多黎各。我喜歡那種廣度。

You did mention, and I spoke to you -- we spoke about it last quarter as well. There is a legacy business that we had from our acquisition, a New York street business that, for some of it, some of it is very good. Other parts of it, quite honestly, it was not profitable.

你確實提到過，我也和你談過——我們上個季度也談過這個問題。我們從收購中獲得了一項遺留業務，這是一家紐約街頭業務，對於其中一些業務來說，其中一些業務非常好。老實說，它的其他部分沒有盈利。

And I've been very transparent with you last quarter that we only sell profitable -- we only take profitable growth. So I have been very -- the team and I have been very intentional about reducing that unprofitable sales.

上個季度我對你們非常透明，我們只出售獲利的產品——我們只獲取獲利的成長。所以我和我的團隊一直非常有意識地減少無利可圖的銷售。

Well, first, obviously, giving them the opportunity to make it profitable. And if not, pulling back from it. So the slight decline that you see on the East Coast -- our core customers, every customer that you know is actually doing better, the Aholds of the world, right? These are doing better.

嗯，首先，顯然，給他們一個獲利的機會。如果沒有，就退出。所以你在東海岸看到的輕微下降——我們的核心客戶，你認識的每個客戶實際上都做得更好，世界上的阿霍德人，對嗎？這些都做得更好。

Wise is doing tremendous. We actually have some store -- new C-store customers, some new Cups customers, they're doing really well. That's over 100% growth. What's happening is we're being very intentional to pull back on the unprofitable street business, which is not the future of our $1 billion company.

明智正在做巨大的事情。我們實際上有一些商店——新的便利商店顧客，一些新的 Cups 顧客，他們做得非常好。這是超過 100% 的增長。正在發生的事情是，我們非常有意識地撤回無利可圖的街頭生意，這不是我們價值 10 億美元的公司的未來。

Okay. So just the last follow-up on that is the Northeast region, what do you think accounted for the decline there?

好的。最後一個跟進的是東北地區，您認為該地區下降的原因是什麼？

Yes. The street business accounts for 100% of the Northeast decline.

是的。街道生意佔東北衰落的100%。

Okay. Great. I appreciate the call. (multiple speakers)

好的。偉大的。我很感謝您的來電。（多個發言者）

I'll hop back in the queue. Yes. No problem. Thanks.

我會跳回到隊列中。是的。沒問題。謝謝。

Absolutely.

絕對地。

George Kelly, ROTH Capital Partners

喬治凱利，羅仕資本合夥人

Hey, everybody. Thanks for taking my questions. First one is just on the quarterly impact from pricing. Curious how much of that 10% growth was driven from pricing? And then you talked in your prepared remarks about planning to take additional pricing. I was just curious how much you plan on taking and when?

嘿，大家。感謝您回答我的問題。第一個是定價對季度的影響。想知道這 10% 的成長有多少是由定價推動的嗎？然後你在準備好的評論中談到了計劃採取額外的定價。我只是好奇你打算服用多少以及什麼時候服用？

Yeah. So as hard as I work to take price and see that realize, my sales team is doing too well at driving too much volume and selling too well. Pricing probably accounts for 10% of that growth. So almost 90% of our growth is volume-driven. And I promise you, I'm working hard on taking pricing.

是的。因此，儘管我努力定價並意識到這一點，但我的銷售團隊在推動銷售和銷售方面做得很好。定價可能佔這一增長的 10%。因此，我們幾乎 90% 的成長都是由銷售驅動的。我向你保證，我正在努力定價。

It's just the sales team is doing better than me at selling. So that's to your first question.

只是銷售團隊在銷售方面比我做得更好。這就是你的第一個問題。

The pricing that we're taking is targeted. So if you remember from when we all started two years ago, pretty much I took pricing in mass on every single customer, every single product, every single everything because we are so out of place on our pricing.

我們採取的定價是有針對性的。因此，如果你還記得，從兩年前我們開始的時候起，我幾乎對每個客戶、每個產品、每個東西都進行了大規模定價，因為我們的定價非常不合適。

We have done a great job. Sales team gets all the credit for getting us to a place where it is now -- and you guys have heard me say this before, you know me. Every quarter, I look at every single item on every single invoice for every single customer.

我們做得很好。銷售團隊為我們取得現在的成績而贏得了所有的讚譽——你們以前聽過我說過這句話，你們了解我。每個季度，我都會查看每位客戶的每張發票上的每一項。

A friend, Bill Gates, helps me with the sort function. And every single item that does not hit our margin target, sales team knows they get a call from me.

比爾蓋茲的朋友幫我實現了排序功能。對於每一個未達到我們利潤目標的商品，銷售團隊都知道他們接到了我的電話。

It is a very, very, very short list now. It is hard for me to find stuff. So the pricing that we have to take is not going to be dramatic because it's down to only a few items on a few customers. But it's not something I do quarterly or annually. It's literally something I do every week.

現在這是一個非常非常非常短的清單。我很難找到東西。因此，我們必須採取的定價不會太高，因為它僅限於少數客戶的少數商品。但這不是我每季或每年都會做的事情。這實際上是我每週都會做的事情。

Every week, I'm looking at order level profitability, and we don't wait to identify issues and immediately speak to customers to either take a price, right? We have to. Or we offer them alternative items that we already have existing. But we cannot -- again, you guys know I do a lot of nonprofit work, but I do that at night, not during the day.

每週，我都會關注訂單水平的盈利能力，我們不會等到發現問題並立即與客戶交談以接受價格，對嗎？我們必須。或者我們為他們提供我們已有的替代品。但我們不能——再說一遍，你們知道我做了很多非營利工作，但我是在晚上而不是白天做的。

Okay. That's helpful. Thank you. And then two additional quick unrelated follow-up questions. First, can you just comment on what you're seeing with respect to M&A, multiples? Are there things you're being shown, et cetera?

好的。這很有幫助。謝謝。然後是另外兩個不相關的快速後續問題。首先，您能否評論一下您在併購、倍數方面所看到的情況？是否向您展示了一些東西等等？

Just a quick update there? And then second question. You laid out the construction and commodity improvement and some internal measures to improve your gross margin. I know that's really put a damper on the gross margin this year, some of these unexpected things have really limited your ability to accelerate trade spend.

只是快速更新嗎？然後是第二個問題。你們制定了建設和商品改進以及一些內部措施來提高毛利率。我知道這確實抑制了今年的毛利率，其中一些意想不到的事情確實限制了您加速貿易支出的能力。

And I'm curious with what you see now, do you think next year in fiscal year '26, you'll have an ability to really accelerate trade spend? And that's all I had. Thank you.

我很好奇您現在所看到的情況，您認為明年第 26 財年您是否有能力真正加速貿易支出？這就是我所擁有的一切。謝謝。

So I'll go backwards since you just asked the question. Trade, we're moving up. So just to put it in perspective, and you guys are better at this math than I am. Trade between trade, R&D and marketing, we increased our spend 42%. So it's significant.

既然你剛才問了這個問題，我就倒退一下。貿易，我們正在前進。因此，從長遠來看，你們在數學方面比我更好。貿易、研發和行銷之間的貿易，我們的支出增加了 42%。所以這很重要。

So trade -- it was like $1 million -- more than $1.5 million in those areas. Trades up 25% from last year. I told you marketing was up 75%. So we're getting there, right? Do I want to spend more? Absolutely. But did you see some of this trade spend in marketing in this quarter? We did.

因此，這些領域的貿易額約為 100 萬美元，超過 150 萬美元。交易量較去年增長 25%。我告訴過你行銷成長了 75%。所以我們快到了，對吧？我想花更多錢嗎？絕對地。但您是否看到本季行銷方面的一些貿易支出？我們做到了。

I have to be able to invest. I'm going to be very prudent, but we are definitely investing. I can tell you that I have more trade in the fiscal year plan for next year, that we actually have a Board meeting on Wednesday, so I got to get the Board to approve it. But I will continue to drive towards our goals on increasing trade and increasing marketing.

我必須有能力投資。我會非常謹慎，但我們肯定會投資。我可以告訴你，我在明年的財政年度計劃中有更多的交易，我們實際上在周三召開了董事會會議，所以我必須讓董事會批准它。但我將繼續努力實現我們增加貿易和增加行銷的目標。

To your first question on M&A, I guess I'm cheating because I keep talking about all the reasons why I'm excited with Skip and Chris coming in here. Reason 73, why I'm so excited is because it actually frees up some of my time.

對於你關於併購的第一個問題，我想我在作弊，因為我一直在談論為什麼我對斯基普和克里斯來到這裡感到興奮的所有原因。原因73，我之所以如此興奮，是因為它實際上解放了我的一些時間。

I will tell you, I probably shouldn't have been spending as much time as I was on all the construction and all the running of the day to day. What's happening is now the team is freeing me up to be focusing. I'm already spending more time in just this quarter on M&A than I have in the past.

我會告訴你，我可能不應該花那麼多時間在所有的建設和所有的日常運作上。現在發生的事情是團隊讓我能夠集中精力。光是本季我就已經比過去花了更多的時間在併購上。

I like what I see. We have a nice pipeline. Again, this is something that I share with the Board every quarter. Anthony is -- has already given me a hard time with the number of NDAs that we have to sign and everything and data rooms that we're opening up. But I'm busy doing that.

我喜歡我所看到的。我們有一個很好的管道。同樣，這是我每季與董事會分享的內容。安東尼已經讓我對我們必須簽署的保密協議數量以及我們正在開放的所有內容和資料室感到困難。但我正忙著做那件事。

That said, I just will not overpay. We -- I want M&A. I expect that we'll have M&A. But unlike in my past careers, I do not need M&A. And that means that I'm not going to overpay for something when we have such great growth internally.

也就是說，我不會多付錢。我們－我想要併購。我預計我們會進行併購。但與我過去的職業生涯不同，我不需要併購。這意味著當我們內部實現如此巨大的成長時，我不會為某些東西付出過高的代價。

So I'm happy with the pipeline. There are some people that are a bit more realistic than others on what those multiples should be. And that's fine. That's their prerogative. It's equally my prerogative to say, no, thank you.

所以我對管道很滿意。對於這些倍數應該是多少，有些人比其他人更現實一些。那很好。這是他們的特權。我同樣有權利說，不，謝謝。

There have been times that people have given a multiple. I respectfully hopefully said, no, thank you, and they came back 6 months later. So again, I feel good about the pipeline of M&A. I feel great about the time I'm going to have now that Skip and Chris are here.

有時人們會給出倍數。我滿懷希望地恭敬地說，不，謝謝，6 個月後他們回來了。再說一遍，我對併購通路感到滿意。斯基普和克里斯都在這裡，我對即將度過的時光感到非常高興。

Understood. Thank you.

明白了。謝謝。

Thank you. And this concludes our question-and-answer session. I'll now hand the call back to Chairman and CEO Adam L. Michaels for his closing remarks.

謝謝。我們的問答環節到此結束。現在，我將把電話轉回給董事長兼執行長 Adam L. Michaels，讓他致閉幕詞。

Thank you, operator, and thank you again to each of you for joining us on today's earnings conference call. We look forward to continuing to update you on our progress as we strive to deliver value to our fellow shareholders and execute on our vision of becoming a national one-stop shop deli solution provider. Thank you and happy holidays.

謝謝運營商，並再次感謝大家參加今天的收益電話會議。我們期待繼續向您通報我們的最新進展，我們努力為我們的股東創造價值，並實現我們成為全國一站式熟食解決方案提供商的願景。謝謝你，節日快樂。

And ladies and gentlemen, this does conclude today's teleconference. Thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect your lines at this time, and have a wonderful day.

女士們、先生們，今天的電話會議到此結束。感謝您的參與。您現在可以斷開線路，度過美好的一天。