Good morning, and thank you for joining Lifetime Brands Fourth Quarter 2025 Earnings Call. With us today from management are Rob Kay, Chief Executive Officer, and Larry Winoker, Chief Financial Officer.

Before we begin the call, I'd like to remind you that our remarks this morning may contain forward-looking statements that relate to the future of the company. These statements are intended to qualify for the safe harbor protection from liability established by the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act.

Any such statements are not guarantees of future performance and factors that could influence our results are highlighted in our earnings release and other factors are contained in our filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Such statements are based upon information available to the company as of the date hereof and are subject to change for future development.

Except as required by law, the company does not undertake any obligation to update such statements. Our remarks this morning and in our earnings release also contain non-GAAP financial measures within the meaning of Regulation G promulgated by the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Included in such release is a reconciliation of these non-GAAP financial measures with the comparable financial measures calculated in accordance with GAAP. With that introduction, I'd like to turn the call over to Rob Kay.

Please go ahead, Rob.

Thank you, and good morning. A year ago, we entered 2025 knowing it would be a challenging year.

What we did not fully anticipate was just how dynamic the external environment would become. The tariff escalations, retail customer disruption, consumers' reactions, the operational demands were all significant.

Yet, when I look at where we stand today, I'm proud of how our team performed and where we finished the year. Let me walk you through the key dynamics that shaped both the fourth quarter and the full year, and the decisions we made, including those that carried short-term costs, and why they were right for our business.

Overall, what drove Lifetime's 2025 performance was the macro environment, largely shaped by US tariff actions and the market's reaction to them. The biggest impact of this was the second quarter implementation of 145% tariffs on goods sourced from China, following the Liberation Day tariffs implemented on many countries throughout the globe.

This resulted in widespread disruption and, in some cases, cancellation of orders for our products, both by our customers and internally by Lifetime, as the immediacy of the implementation would have resulted in selling products at a loss. As the year progressed and some stability was introduced on tariff rates, Lifetime was a first mover in implementing price increases across all our channels to offset the tariff cost.

While this initially hurt our volumes, as we were selling our products at a higher price than most of our competition, the market eventually caught up and pricing parity was restored. However, Lifetime benefited from enhanced profitability due to the price increases, which led to improved performance relative to the overall market and many of our peers.

In particular, we note that bottom line results showed a positive year-over-year growth by the fourth quarter of 2025. Contributing to this performance was our pricing strategy, a comprehensive cost efficiency and reduction program, and improved results in our international business.

First, as we told you earlier in the year, the impact of the 145% tariffs on China-sourced product was significant. It negatively impacted shipments in the second quarter and flowed into disruption in the third.

We specifically called out that some of that deferred volume would come back in 2025, with a fuller normalization expected in 2026. As you can see, we benefited by the current quarter with some resumption in shipment levels from missed second quarter shipments, particularly in tabletop and kitchenware.

The most visible example is Costco, our largest year-over-year decline in any single customer through September. They pulled back sharply on tabletop programs as tariff uncertainty peaked.

As conditions stabilized, a portion of those programs shipped in the fourth quarter and we performed very well with Costco in Q4. That recovery was a meaningful contributor to our strong finish.

The second major factor driving performance was Lifetime's decision to move first on pricing to offset tariff costs. We did not wait to see what the market would do.

We built a detailed plan with each of our customers, communicating the rationale clearly and implementing the increases. As I mentioned above, there were short-term consequences.

In the third quarter, we were priced higher than the market, and that created some volume headwinds. A portion of our shelf performance suffered while competitors had not yet moved.

By the fourth quarter, the market had largely caught up. Pricing parity had returned across all our categories.

Because we had been selling at higher prices earlier than most, we captured better margins during that window. If you look at our results, particularly the bottom line, you can see that clearly.

We had a modest outperformance on the top line, but we significantly exceeded expectations on the bottom line. Our first-mover pricing decision was a key contributor to that outcome.

The third element of our Q4 performance was cost discipline. Variable costs naturally flex with volume, but we also took deliberate action on our cost structure throughout the year.

We streamlined infrastructure, and SG&A came in at $38 million in Q4, down 12% versus the prior year quarter. That's a meaningful reduction, and it reflects real work done on the cost base.

Combined, these three factors drove a strong quarter and finish to the year. The fourth quarter came in ahead of expectations, and I think the results speak to the strategy working.

Revenue was modestly below prior year, which we anticipated, but margins expanded and the bottom line was strong. Larry will take you through the detail in a moment.

While the year was challenging due to tariffs, we took the decisive actions I've discussed to mitigate their effects. Given the circumstances, we performed well, as evidenced by our results.

In the fourth quarter, adjusted income from operations was up over 30% from the prior year quarter, and full-year adjusted EBITDA was over $50 million, despite a 5% decline in net sales. We continued to experience positives from our investment in new product development.

The Dolly brand grew to approximately $18 million for the year, an increase of over 150%, a great reflection on where the strategy is gaining traction. We are encouraged by the trajectory heading into 2026.

Our International segment continued to demonstrate resilience. For the full year, international sales came in at $56.7 million, up 1.7% as reported.

On a constant currency basis, International was down modestly at 1.7%, a solid result given the backdrop, particularly as we gained share in national accounts in light of a continued decline in independent shops, which historically have been the core of the European customer base. On Project Concord, our international restructuring initiative, we made continued progress throughout the year, and the financial benefits are flowing through.

That said, I want to be transparent. The final phase of Concord implementation was delayed modestly due to legal and structural constraints that took longer than anticipated to work through.

We expect those to be fully resolved and implemented in the first half of 2026. The direction here remains clear, and we remain committed to completing Concord and realizing the full benefits of the program.

As announced early last year, we also took deliberate action on our distribution infrastructure, announcing the relocation of our East Coast distribution center to Hagerstown, Maryland. The facility will span approximately 1 million square feet, adding 327,000 square feet of incremental capacity over our current New Jersey facility, which it will replace, and is expected to commence operations in the second quarter of 2026.

This move is consistent with how we approach the business: identifying where we can drive long-term efficiency and positioning Lifetime's operations to support our multi-year growth initiatives, while significantly containing Lifetime's future distribution expenses. As we enter 2026, we do so with momentum, a leaner cost structure, and a clearer sense of where the opportunities are.

On guidance, consistent with our historical cadence, we intend to provide detailed, full-year 2026 guidance in conjunction with our first-quarter results in mid-May. At that point, we will have a clearer line of sight into the year and can speak to it with specificity you deserve.

What I can tell you now is that recovering sustainable top line growth is the priority. We have done the work on the cost base and proven we can protect margins.

Now the focus shifts to driving volume through our existing customer relationships, through the brands and product lines that are gaining tractions, and to the pipeline of strategic activity that we continue to develop. Finally, I want to acknowledge that this type of year, navigating real disruption while delivering results that exceeded where we started, does not happen without an exceptional team.

I'm grateful for everyone at Lifetime who stayed focused, executed under pressure, and kept our commitments to customers and shareholders alike. With that, I'll turn the call over to Larry to review the financials in more detail.

Thanks, Rob. As we reported this morning, net income for the fourth quarter of 2025 was $18.2 million, or 83 cents per diluted share, compared to $8.9 million, or 41 cents per diluted share, in the fourth quarter of '24.

Adjusted net income was $23 million for the fourth quarter, or $1.05 per diluted share, as compared to $12 million, or 55 cents per diluted share, in '24. Income from operations was $20 million for the fourth quarter of 2025, as compared to $15.5 million in '24.

Adjusted income from operation for the fourth quarter '25 was $26.4 million, compared to $20.2 million in 2024. Adjusted EBITDA for the full year '25 was $50.8 million.

Adjusted net income, adjusted income from operations, and adjusted EBITDA are non-GAAP measures, which are reconciled to our GAAP financial measures in the earnings release. Following comments are for the fourth quarter of 2025 and '24, unless stated otherwise.

Consolidated sales decreased 5.2% to $204.1 million. US segment sales decreased 5.5% to $185.3 million.

Sales were favorably impacted by the increase in selling prices to mitigate the impact of higher tariffs on foreign-sourced products. However, retailers' buying disruption and consumers' dampened spending reaction to the high tariff environment dampened demand in our industry.

Within the segment, product lines decreases were in kitchenware and home solutions, partially offset by an increase in tableware. International segment sales decreased 2.3% to $18.8 million, and excluding the impact of foreign exchange translation, the decrease was $1.4 million, or 6.8%.

The decrease came from the UK e-commerce. Gross margin increased to 38.6% from 37.7%.

US segment gross margin increased to 38.8% from 37.6%. The improvement was driven by lower ocean freight rates, some favorable product mix, and the timing of inventory costs recognized under FIFO inventory accounting.

These factors more than offset the adverse effects of tariffs in the current quarter. For International, gross margin decreased to 36.8% from 38.6%, driven by higher customer support spending in the current period.

US segment distribution expenses as a percentage of goods shipped from its warehouses was 8.3% versus 9.1%. The decrease was attributable to improved labor management efficiencies, largely resulting from the fully implemented new warehouse management system in our West Coast facility, and the effect of higher tariff-induced selling prices without a commensurate increase in expenses.

International segment distribution expenses as a percentage of goods shipped from its warehouses was 19.8% versus 18.1%. The increase was due to higher sales to prepaid freight customers and the expansion of sales into the Asia Pacific region.

Selling, general, and administrative expenses decreased by 12% to $38 million. US segment expenses decreased by $3.2 million to $29.6 million.

As a percentage of net sales, the expense decreased to 16% from 16.7%. The decrease was driven by lower employee expenses, including incentive compensation.

International SG&A decreased $1.5 million to $3.1 million. As a percentage of net sales, the expense decreased to 16.7% versus 24.2% due to lower employee and advertising expenses, as well as a foreign currency transaction gains.

Unallocated corporate expense decreased $500,000 to $5.2 million due to lower employee expenses, also including incentive compensation, partially offset by higher professional fees. Interest expense decreased by $600,000 due to lower average borrowings and lower interest rates on our variable rate debt.

For income taxes, the benefit rate is primarily driven by the release of a valuation allowance against deferred tax assets recorded in the second quarter. Looking at our debt and liquidity, our balance sheet continues to be strong, notwithstanding the higher working capital needs that resulted from tariffs.

At year end, our liquidity was $76.6 million, which includes cash plus availability under our credit facility and receivable purchase agreement. Our adjusted EBITDA to net debt ratio at year end was 3.9 times, 3.9 times.

Lastly, as Rob discussed, the relocation of our East Coast distribution center is expected to begin operating in the second quarter. I'll add that the costs, that is exiting the New Jersey facility and starting up the Maryland facility, including capital expenditures, are expected to be at or below our forecast.

This concludes our prepared comments. Operator, please open the line for questions.

Hey, guys. Good morning.

I know you don't typically give full-year official guidance until the first quarter, but just wanted to hear a little bit more about building blocks for growth in '26. I know you said you intend to grow in the year.

Maybe you could just talk about some of the puts and takes around the pricing you took in '25 that sort of wraps into '26, new product launches, existing growth with some of the successful lines like Dolly. I guess some of those are maybe a little bit offset by volume declines more recently, but just how do you think about those factors qualitatively as we kind of think about the forecast for '26?

Any commentary on seasonality this year would be appreciated as well. Matt,

well from a seasonality, we're expecting more of a normal seasonality. There were disruptions in '25 that were tariff-oriented, which put a total curve on normal seasonality.

I think we don't expect it to not normalize in 2026. Some of the things you mentioned, pricing increases, which is kind of a one-time event, happened throughout 2025.

The impact of those will be fully felt because they were fully implemented in '25, you get the full impact of that in 2026, with of course the caveat is who knows what's going to happen. From a new product introduction, I know that we've been introducing a much greater amount of new product than a lot of competition, just because times are tough and a lot of people are paring back.

A couple of areas we're seeing good traction. One we talked about, the Dolly brand.

That's actually expanding beyond the dollar channel where we have firm commitments. While we had tremendous growth in '25, we expect that trajectory to continue in '26.

We see some good growth there. Our food service initiative, that's a business where you have to build a book of business and then it becomes a bit of an annuity for a period of time.

Particularly Mikasa Hospitality has gained a lot of traction. While a small base, we expect substantial increase in those revenues in 2026.

The end market in '25 for food service establishments was very challenged. You saw new store openings decline, you saw store closings throughout a lot of multi-unit franchises and the like.

Unknown where that heads in 2026. The industry thinks it'll go up, but nonetheless, we've gained market share, and not end-market driven, we'll see some nice growth in that area in 2026.

Those are some of the key drivers. Hopefully, gives you some perspective, Matt.

That's helpful. Thanks, Rob.

We wanted to also hear a little bit about what you're hearing from your large retail customers in terms of willingness to take on inventory. What does sell-through look like or POS data that you're seeing in kind of your key SKUs versus sell-in, and how are you thinking about that for '26?

We've seen a pretty large divergence from channel to channel, with certain channels performing very strong from a POS perspective, and certain ones being weaker. We saw a continuing trend in the fourth quarter that we've seen over the last couple of years that there's been an uptick in e-commerce, so that the holiday season continued the trend that we saw in 2024 where a lot of consumers waited to make their purchases from historical purchase cycles, because they knew they could get delivery rather quickly, and that helped e-com in the fourth quarter and therefore drove full-year performance.

That trend should continue. There is a high bifurcation.

From perspective of what you see from time to time, particularly with larger retailers, and we saw some of this in '25, they pull back on safety stock issues, there's a divergent between sell-in and sell-through, and we saw some of that in '25. We don't expect that to be a major impact in '26.

In part of that is in some of the more sophisticated people that have done that have paired back a lot, and if they pair back more, they would harm their sell-through and their velocity, which is obviously not in their interest to do so. We don't expect that to be a factor in '26.

Very helpful. Then maybe just one more if I could.

The net leverage at the end of the year looks good under 4 times. Wanted to just hear how you guys are thinking about cash priorities this year.

Obviously, you've got a lot of organic growth initiatives in play, but then you have the European restructuring that's still maybe ongoing or maybe just recently implemented. How do you balance the organic investments that you need to make versus the M&A funnel versus buying back your stock?

Just wanted to hear a little bit about sort of capital allocation decision-making for '26.

There's actually a lot of internal growth initiatives that we're pursuing, but they're not capital intensive except for the DC, there's not too much on the come for that. We also will get the benefit of the $13 million of government funding, mostly from Maryland, that'll offset.

Not really any issue and constraints there. Plenty of availability.

We have no intention to change anything on our dividend policy. We will look to ultimately restructure our debt arrangements because at this point and where we are in terms of the life of that, we're not in an ability to buy back stock, we're not using cash at this point to do that, because we have agreements with our lenders in place.

We'll ultimately restructure that'll allow us to do so when we do that. The M&A environment is the strongest I've seen in decades for strategic, because, first of all, financials aren't investing, our competition for a longest time has been financials at very, very high valuations, valuations have been down, but a lot of businesses that are institutionally owned, there's something that needs larger company or infrastructure help, to move product from a China-based system to distributed geography, you need a lot of infrastructure to do that, both from a supply chain, quality.

It takes a lot of effort and work. With the fluctuations of moving it all over the place, it's a lot of smaller, less capitalized people are having troubles, let alone the systems and everything to deal with the constant pricing fluctuations as tariffs change and evolve.

That combination has made it very attractive, we're seeing real deal flow at real valuations that we haven't seen literally in decades. We have some large opportunities we're looking at.

You don't know if they'll come through, but it's one of the things that we expensed in the fourth quarter. Related to that, hopefully we will see some highly accretive opportunities if we can execute.

Sounds great. Appreciate all the detail, and I'll turn it over.

Hey, good morning, guys. Thanks for taking the questions.

This was your best Q4 EBITDA margin that we can recall with sales down, even better than 2020 and 2021 when sales were up. Gross margins were nicely up, presumably from the benefit of tariff pricing.

I'm curious what drove SG&A lower and how sustainable that is.

It's a great question, Brian, and hi. It's sustainable.

It's all a function of how fast we want to grow. If we have opportunities and it's a good return on that, we can increase investment, which would increase infrastructure and SG&A, but with a return.

In the current state of the business, with what we have on the plate, including the growth we intend for 2026, there's not a need for investing in SG&A. We'll also see the further benefits one way or the other with our international operations, which will continue to benefit those line items.

Brian, let me just

something

on the US gross margins, the comment I made about the FIFO inventory. We had talked about how we were increasing our sales price to offset the tariff, which should have a negative effect on the gross margin percentage, neutral to dollars.

Because we still have some pre-tariff inventory, we're seeing some benefit there, but that's not going to continue, right? As that rolls off, it'll come back a bit.

Just wanted to,

Sorry to belabor, but but as Brian, you've seen us for a little bit, is, in any given particularly quarter reporting period, you're going to get margin fluctuations based upon mix, channel mix particularly, but also product.

Understood. Next, I'm curious which of your brands saw sales increases in 2025 outside of Dolly as you know overall sales declined for a fourth straight year?

What gives you guys confidence that the top line inflects this year?

The main confidence that we see there is the disruptions that we saw in '26, and again in the fourth quarter we got some rebound of things that didn't ship from Q2 and Q3, but we'll have a much more normalization in a lot of the core business in 2026, because some of that did not come back in '25, will in '26. That's going to be a natural driver for our business.

We talked about Dolly will continue to grow, and we're seeing good traction there. In cutlery, we've had a tremendous run for a few years, and a lot of that is new product implementation, our Build-A-Board line went from nothing and created a whole marketplace.

The growth trajectory of that piece of cutlery will not continue the trajectory of growth, but we established a new business and will maintain. There are some other things in that line that we're introducing that hopefully will produce some good growth.

There are some things we haven't disclosed that are new, that get us into new space, totally internal investment, that hopefully will hit '26. If not, will hit '27.

Unfortunately, we can't disclose that at this moment, but there are some things that are totally organic, internal initiatives that are completely new that hopefully will drive some nice growth for us.

Great. Just on the brand growth for the year, any brands perform better than the company average?

Taylor had a phenomenal year. Taylor's a great business.

From the retailers, our customers' perspective, it's very attractive to them because what they track, GMROI, is a key metric, which is the velocity and the margins they make. It's very profitable for them.

It's very good. It had a very good year across the board in '25.

Again, that trajectory will not continue in '26, but we had a banner year and that continues to do well. Farberware, across different things, very strong.

Farberware's our growth engine. KitchenAid, we'd lost some share a couple years ago at Walmart.

That has run through our numbers. We've sold some of that that hit us in '25, so that's actually the opportunities and we relaunched the kitchen tool piece of that with a new line that's getting tremendous traction.

We also introduced just recently for '26, a KitchenAid storage product, which we think is beautiful, but is getting, more importantly, acceptance in the marketplace. Not in '25, but '26 is looking pretty good, KitchenAid.

Great. You mentioned the Dolly brand, obviously sales up really nicely, up 150% for the year.

How big is that now, and what is your expectation for sales growth contribution or shipments in 2026?

So '24 we started that program. It was a small base, right?

Part of that 150% is off a small base. We shipped $18 million in '25.

We will have substantial growth in '26 as well.

Got it. Okay.

Then finally, obviously topical given the war in Iran at the moment, can you remind us how you're positioned on freight in terms of spot versus contract, your cost exposure to oil and resin, and anything else we should be mindful of there?

So [laughs] how many questions are there? I'd take a hour to answer.

From a couple of things in Iran, one is what we're seeing is container rates are starting to go up. We'll probably start to experience that.

We have very attractive, long-term contracts for freight, but the reality of what happens in very high escalating periods is the shippers start to ignore those, to be honest. Long-term contracts are a benefit, but sometimes there's only so much that you can benefit.

You'll get some of it, but not all of it in very high inflationary ocean freight environments. We do very little business in the Mideast, we won't get much disruption there.

We'll get no disruption. We actually have a lot of upside that may not come on some new business, but either way, it is not material.

Our European business is in jeopardy of seeing some supply disruption, because the shipments are coming, it's going to be longer if they have to go around Africa and the like. We think our inventory levels aren't going to impact that.

From a cost of goods sold perspective, plastics have resins, resins are impacted by petroleum costs. We have not seen anything.

We'll see how that plays out, but if you look at it as a total percentage on a building material basis, it isn't going to have a huge impact on us.

Great. Very helpful.

Thanks very much. Pass it on.

Good morning, and thanks for taking the questions. Certainly nice to see the better-than-expected results here in the fourth quarter.

It sounds overall like you guys should be able to maintain your SG&A costs. As far as your distribution costs, those also came down in the fourth quarter.

How should we be thinking about that line item, and then I have a couple of other questions as well?

On distribution, and as I noted, our West Coast facility is running very efficiently, given the new warehouse management system that's working quite well. As I noted, as a percentage because we had selling price increases, but there wasn't any meaningful cost increase.

We'll continue to see that expense benefit as a percentage. We think there'll be some I'd say mild disruption expenses perhaps when we move into the Maryland facility, but we anticipate those and we've done it many times, these moves.

We're going to put in that new warehouse management system in that facility. We're anticipating it to run quite well.

On SG&A, and this also goes to Brian's question a little bit, is the moves we've taken are sustainable. The only thing where you'll see some bounce-back in '26 versus '25 is look, from a sort of target incentive compensation perspective, we paid out hardly any, particularly and nothing to management.

With improved performance in '26, there will likely be corresponding payment of incentive compensation. That's not the bulk of the SG&A cost reduction that was achieved in '25.

Got it. Okay.

Thanks for that. Then in terms of the International segment, Larry, you may have said this, but maybe perhaps I missed it, but in terms of the operating loss for the quarter, for the year, can you provide comments on that?

There was a loss, it wasn't as pronounced as we had in 20 in '24. As Rob mentioned in his comments, we're not done.

The Concord and we'll call Concord 2.0 continues. There's some other things that we had hoped to achieve, but there's legal and other roadblocks that slowed us down, but we're hoping to achieve during 2026.

Got it. Then, and just a couple of other things here.

As far as the fourth quarter you had a tax benefit which you addressed, Larry. How should we think about the tax rate for '26?

Any sort of commentary there on that?

Sure. It's very hard with our numbers to figure out a tax rate, but we should be in the high 20% range.

That's based on Well, like you say, we have some unusual occurrences this quarter, more unusual than others, but what distorts our provision historically has been the loss internationally where because of a history of losses, you can't record a tax benefit, and that would distort it. We get the international operations to break even or better, our tax rate should be in the 28 28 27%, 28%.

That's a combination of the US federal rate and state.

Gotcha. Got it.

Okay. Then, lastly, as far as the Maryland distribution center, it sounds like it's very well on track.

In terms of thinking about the CapEx for this year, do you guys have a ballpark estimate what that could be?

Like I said, we're anticipating it to be below budget, but let's not count it, we're very confident we're going to achieve the budget, I think we should be it. For CapEx, I think we had originally forecasted $9 million.

It might be perhaps less than that, a little less. Of all that, we've spent a couple million of it in '25.

Let's call it around $7 million for that, just for that in '26. Also bear in mind, there'll be a little offset compared to historically, because we won't have the maintenance that we typically have in our New Jersey facility, because we are putting in new racking and other things and turrets and other things in the Maryland facility.

There'll be maybe another million-dollar benefit against what we would otherwise spend for routine maintenance.

Understood. Thank you very much, and best of luck.

Thanks, Anthony.

Ladies and gentlemen, showing no additional questions at this time, I would like to turn the floor back over to management for any closing remarks.

Thanks, Jamie. Thank you, everyone, for listening and your interest in Lifetime Brands, and we look forward to further dialogue in the future.

Have a great day.