United Parks & Resorts Q1 2026 Earnings Call - Weather Woes Mask Strong Per Cap Growth and Aggressive Buybacks

Tina, Conference Operator: Thank you for standing by. My name is Tina, and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the United Parks & Resorts first quarter 2026 earnings conference call. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speaker’s remarks, there will be a question-and-answer session. To ask a question, simply press star 1 on your telephone keypad. To withdraw your question, press star 1 again. It is now my pleasure to turn the call over to Matthew Stroud, Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Matthew Stroud, Investor Relations, United Parks & Resorts: Thank you, and good morning, everyone. Welcome to United Parks & Resorts first quarter earnings conference call. Today’s call is being webcast and recorded. A press release was issued this morning and is available on our investor relations website at www.unitedparks.com/investors. Replay information for this call can be found in the press release and will be available on our website following the call. Joining me this morning are Marc Swanson, Chief Executive Officer, and James W. Forrester, Jr., Interim Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer. This morning, we will review our first quarter financial results, and then we will open the call to your questions. Before we begin, I would like to remind everyone that our comments today will contain forward-looking statements within the meaning of the federal securities laws.

These statements are subject to a number of risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to be materially different from those forward-looking statements, including those identified in the Risk Factors section of our annual report on Form 10-K and quarterly reports on Form 10-Q filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. These risk factors may be updated from time to time and will be included in our filings with the SEC that are available on our website. We undertake no obligation to update any forward-looking statements. In addition, on the call, we may reference non-GAAP financial measures and other financial metrics such as adjusted EBITDA and free cash flow. More information regarding our forward-looking statements and reconciliations of non-GAAP measures to the most comparable GAAP measure is included in our earnings release available on our website and can also be found in our filings with the SEC.

Now, I would like to turn the call over to our Chief Executive Officer, Marc Swanson. Marc?

Marc Swanson, Chief Executive Officer, United Parks & Resorts: Thank you, Matthew. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us. Our first quarter results fell short of our expectations, primarily due to unfavorable weather and a decline in international attendance. As many of you likely experienced yourselves, the weather was unfavorable in San Diego and Florida in January and February and again in Florida and Texas during their peak spring break periods. Our international attendance decline was consistent with the broader United States international tourism declines resulting from geopolitical and other dynamics. Attendance in the first quarter was negatively impacted by approximately 140,000 guests due to weather and approximately 80,000 guests due to declines in international visitation. Adjusting for these impacts, attendance would have increased more than 1% for the quarter. We delivered another strong quarter of in-park execution, growing our in-park per capita and producing another quarter of record results.

We also saw strong pass sale performance during the quarter, with paid pass sales up approximately 10% during the quarter and up approximately 12% through April 30, 2026. Looking ahead, our advanced bookings revenue for Discovery Cove and our group business are both currently outpacing 2025 levels, with Discovery Cove bookings up a double-digit percentage. We continue to strongly believe our stock is materially undervalued and as such continued to repurchase shares in the first quarter by an approximately 2.6 million shares for nearly $93 million. This action emphasizes the strong cash flow generation of this company, our long-standing commitment to returning excess cash to our shareholders, and our belief that our shares are materially undervalued.

As a reminder, for 2026, we have a truly outstanding lineup of new rides, shows, and attractions, an updated events calendar, an expanded concert lineup, and new and upgraded food and retail locations. All this is supported by a revamped and enhanced marketing plan and strategy. We are confident these planned investments will drive attendance and guest spending across our parks. Despite the headwinds in the first quarter, we are encouraged by our forward indicators and remain committed to delivering strong financial performance and growth in revenue and adjusted EBITDA in 2026. I want to thank our ambassadors, whose preparation and hard work are vital as we soon enter the busy summer period.

I also want to be sure to communicate that we are well aware of and acknowledge the current reality of geopolitical and macro uncertainties and the current level of gas prices in particular and the potential impact on consumers. As a reminder, we operate a resilient business that offers incredible value to our visitors, and we have a long track record of successfully navigating through uncertain and volatile times, including when there is financial pressure on consumers. Because I’m sure it’s on many of your minds, what I can tell you today is that we can’t obviously see a material slowdown or other issues with our consumers’ interest and willingness to spend, especially with the growth in our in-park per cap.

We are closely monitoring conditions and are prepared to adjust our plans if we see any changes. For 2026, along with our new rides and attractions, we just recently announced an exciting summer entertainment lineup across several of our parks, including exciting new drone shows, new nighttime animal presentations, and other fun. We believe these additions will be well-received and popular with our guests. We’re also thrilled to note that Discovery Cove has just been named Newsweek’s number 1 best theme park for 2026 in the publication’s Readers’ Choice Awards, placing the Orlando destination among the country’s top summer travel experiences as voted by Newsweek readers nationwide. Congratulations to Discovery Cove. Now, let me give you a brief update on some of our strategic initiatives.

On real estate, as discussed on our last call, we have received a number of inbounds on our real estate portfolio. During the first quarter, we enlisted the help of advisors to assist us in managing the interest of the various parties and have recently received the latest round of comprehensive formal proposals from multiple parties. We are currently evaluating these proposals along with the advisors, we’ll update you as and when there is more information to share. On sponsorships, during Q1, we entered into two sponsorship agreements with high-quality brands. Based on our current pipeline, we expect to enter into several more in the coming months and expect to realize over $15 million in sponsorship revenue in 2026. As previously discussed, we expect this business to be at least a $30 million line of business in the coming years.

On international, we continue to be in discussions with multiple partners and expect to be able to share more news in the coming quarters. On IP partnerships, we are in multiple active discussions to bring compelling and well-recognized IP into our parks in innovative and exciting ways and with different global partners. Later this year, we expect to have some exciting announcements related to these opportunities in 2026 and in 2027 and beyond. On marketing, we have been making significant changes and enhancements to our plans and strategies. Admittedly, we have had some hiccups in our execution across some of the parks and in corporate as we transition to a more dynamic and ultimately more effective media and marketing model. We have been testing, learning, and making fundamental changes to our media mix, channel, and geography allocation, creative, and partners.

We expect to improve considerably in our execution over the course of the year and are excited to launch a dedicated SeaWorld brand national campaign across key markets later this month. Please be on the lookout for this first meaningful national campaign from us in many years. We are very excited about this. On costs, we continue to be committed to and make progress on our $50 million gross cost savings target for 2026 that we discussed last quarter. On the technology front, we are actively pursuing various initiatives, including implementing AI-powered camera technology, autonomous cleaning robotic technology, more digital ordering kiosk in our food and beverage locations, automated front turnstiles, and automated parking tools to help us deliver more revenue, reduce costs, and improve guest experience.

Regarding capital allocation, we continue to benefit from a strong balance sheet and the flexibility to invest in and grow our business and to opportunistically allocate capital with the goal to maximize long-term value for shareholders. Given where our public shares currently trade, we find very compelling value in purchasing our shares, and we expect to do so as long as our stock trades at levels we find attractive. When and if we hit a limit on share repurchases, we and our board will consider other forms of capital return, including regular and/or special dividends, debt paydown, and other investment opportunities. During the first quarter, we repurchased 2.6 million shares for an aggregate total of approximately $92.7 million.

Subsequent to the end of the quarter, we have repurchased an additional 1.8 million shares for an aggregate total of approximately $64.8 million. I’m truly excited about the significant investments we are making and the many initiatives we have underway across our business that we are confident will improve the guest experience, allow us to generate more revenue, and make us a more efficient and more profitable enterprise. We are building an even stronger and more resilient business that we expect going forward will deliver improved operational and financial results and increases in value for our stakeholders. With that, Jim will discuss our financial results in more detail. Jim?

James W. Forrester, Jr., Interim Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer, United Parks & Resorts: Thank you, Marc. During the first quarter, we generated total revenue of $278.3 million, a decrease of $8.7 million when compared to the first quarter of 2025. The decrease in total revenue compared to the first quarter of 2025 was primarily a result of a decrease in attendance, partially offset by an increase in total revenue per capita spending. Attendance for the first quarter of 2026 decreased by approximately 171,000 guests when compared to the prior year quarter. The decrease in attendance was primarily due to unfavorable weather and a decrease in international visitation compared to the prior year quarter. As Marc noted, our attendance would have been up more than 1% adjusted for weather and international. In the first quarter of 2026, total revenue per capita increased 2.1%.

Admission per capita decreased 0.5%, in-park per capita spending increased 5.3% to a record $40.62. Admission per capita decreased primarily due to lower realized pricing on certain admission products and the net impact of the admissions product mix when compared to the prior year quarter. In-park per capita spending improved primarily due to an increase in demand across many in-park offerings when compared to the first quarter of 2025. Operating expenses increased $10 million when compared to the first quarter of 2025. The increase in operating expenses is primarily due to an approximately $3.7 million increase in non-cash self-insurance adjustments and an approximate $3.3 million increase in one-time non-recurring consulting and other costs when compared to the first quarter of 2025.

Selling, general, and administrative expenses increased $3.9 million compared to the first quarter of 2025. The increase in selling, general, and administrative expenses is primarily due to a non-cash $3.1 million increase in information technology costs, primarily related to the amortization of a new enterprise resource planning system when compared to the first quarter of 2025. We reported a net loss of $34.1 million for the first quarter, compared to a net loss of $16.1 million in the first quarter of 2025. We generated adjusted EBITDA of $58 million, a decrease of $9.5 million when compared to the first quarter of 2025. The decline in EBITDA was driven by lower revenue and a modest increase in expenses.

During the first quarter, we repurchased 2.6 million shares for an aggregate total of approximately $92.7 million. Subsequent to the end of the quarter, we have repurchased an additional 1.8 million shares for an aggregate total of approximately $64.8 million. Of the $500 million stock repurchase authorization approved in 2025, the company has approximately $198 million remaining. Our deferred revenue balance as of the end of March was $203.8 million. Deferred revenue increased approximately 4.1% when compared to March of 2025, reflecting a healthy outlook for ticketing, our group business, and our ancillary products. As a reminder, our deferred revenue balance contains a number of products, including ticketing, vacation packages, annual and seasonal passes, group sales, and ancillary products.

Through April 2026, our paid pass base, excluding any free passes, was up compared to April 2025. As Marc mentioned, we are pleased to have seen paid pass sales up 12% so far this year through April 30th. We believe we have our best pass benefits program ever and one of the best in the industry, and we expect we will continue to drive additional increases in pass sales and a strong pass base for the remainder of the year. We are especially pleased since we are in the peak advertising and selling season right now. We spent $69.6 million on CapEx in the 1st quarter of 2026, of which approximately $62.7 million was on core CapEx and approximately $7.0 million was on expansion and/or ROI projects.

For 2026, we expect to spend approximately $175 million-$200 million on core CapEx and approximately $50 million of CapEx on growth and ROI projects. Let me turn the call back over to Marc, who will share some final thoughts. Marc?

Marc Swanson, Chief Executive Officer, United Parks & Resorts: Yeah. Thank you, Jim. Before we open the call to your questions, I have some closing comments. In the first quarter of 2026, we came to the aid of 211 animals in need. Over our history, we have helped over 43,000 animals, including bottlenose dolphins, manatees, sea lions, seals, sea turtles, sharks, birds, and more. I’m really proud of the team’s hard work and their continued dedication to these important rescue efforts. Our 2026 roadmap is defined by a compelling lineup of new rides, attractions, and events, an updated events calendar, an expanded concert lineup, and upgraded food and retail locations, all supported by a revamped marketing plan designed to increase guest visitation and spending.

With very clear opportunities to grow attendance, revenue, and adjusted EBITDA, we are excited about the rest of 2026 and the years to come. Now we will take your questions.

Tina, Conference Operator: As a reminder, to ask a question, simply press star one on your telephone keypad. We do ask that you limit questions to one and one follow-up and then re-queue. Our first question comes from the line of Steven Wieczynski with Stifel. Please go ahead.

Ben Chaiken, Analyst, Mizuho0: Hey, guys. Good morning. Marc, I guess I’m interested in your comments, you know, that you guys think you can grow your EBITDA this year, especially with the first quarter results coming in below, you know, what you obviously were, you know, were hoping for. You know, as we think about the rest of the year, yeah, I guess I’m probably a little bit surprised you seem so comfortable giving that, you know, giving that so-called, let’s call it guidance, given, you know, we still aren’t sure what weather’s gonna look like. Obviously, international visitation remains somewhat subdued, there’s obviously other potential headwinds out there as well. As we think about the last 3 quarters of the year, can you maybe just run through some of the gives and takes here?

Maybe do you think the EBITDA, if there is growth year-over-year, you know, from here on out, it’s gonna be more top-line driven or is it gonna be more cost-driven? Thanks.

Marc Swanson, Chief Executive Officer, United Parks & Resorts: Yeah. Hey, Steven, I can take that question for you. I think about the year in a couple different ways here. First of all, we’ve got a really good lineup of new rides and attractions, events and new things coming to our parks that’s largely still ahead of us. As a reminder, our, you know, the bulk, you know, the vast majority of our year is still ahead of us. Even though we’re here at the end of April, the vast majority of our attendance and revenue is still ahead of us. There’s a really good lineup of new things to do in our parks that’s, you know, will support, you know, what we believe will be more visitation and more spending in the parks.

We also, like you mentioned with the weather component, you know, we recognize there’s some favorable comparisons on a go-forward basis. We also recognize, you know, we don’t control the weather, but to the extent weather does improve over last year, that should be a benefit for us. We’ll have to wait and see, obviously. Then we know we will start to lap some of the international decline that we’ve experienced here. If you remember, that was more of a second half component last year. Those are some of the things. Really, you know, my confidence is driven by all those things, but also a couple other things that you heard us mention.

One is the increase in the paid pass sales in the first quarter was pretty substantial, as you heard me and Jim say. You may not have caught it, but Jim also pointed out that our deferred revenue is now up, you know, 4% at the end of March, and it looks like it’s, you know, retaining pretty close to that for the end of April as well. If you remember, at the end of last year that was down 4%. A pretty substantial improvement in deferred revenue, which is another go forward indicator, to kinda go along with the increase in the Discovery Cove’s booking revenue and the guest sales pacing ahead as well. The guest sales revenue pacing ahead of last year.

All those things taken together I think give us a good amount of confidence that, you know, going forward here we will see growth in our parks. I’m really excited again about the attractions, the lineup, the things we’re doing in marketing to hopefully put us in a better spot there and then certainly the pass sales. We’re just getting into that peak period, as Jim mentioned. Hopefully that gives you some color.

Ben Chaiken, Analyst, Mizuho0: Yeah, it does. I appreciate that, Marc. The second question, look, I’m not sure how much you’re gonna say here, but, you know, given the fact we’re, you know, what’s it? It’s May 11th. We’re, you know, we’re essentially kinda halfway through the, or almost through the, your second quarter. You know, wondering if you could kinda give us some high-level thoughts around what you know, what you kinda witnessed in April, and then maybe what you’ve seen so far in May. I mean, it seems like from our seat, weather seems like it was somewhat normal for the most part around most of the country in April and thus far in May.

Anything you can say just in terms of how the second quarter has kinda started, I think would be helpful as well. Appreciate it.

Marc Swanson, Chief Executive Officer, United Parks & Resorts: Sure. Steve, I wanted to add one more thing on your prior question, just a little bit more. I didn’t mention the growth in the in-park per caps. Again, you’ve seen that accelerate even in Q1 from where it had been in the prior quarters, and then you have also seen the admissions per cap come back, still slightly negative, but improving from prior quarters. I think if we can continue to grow in park and hopefully get admissions per cap to a better spot as well, that’s another thing that, you know, contributes to that growth, obviously, going forward.

As far as the month of April, remember, with the shift of Easter, you had certainly some Easter days shift out of Q2 of this year into Q1. You know, that was an expected headwind in the month of April. That probably gives you some color on how we think about that month. You know, weather’s a little bit mixed. I mean, certainly we had some better weather in like Williamsburg in April. I know here in Orlando, or in Florida really, one of the few days after Easter, you know, we haven’t had a ton of rain, but when it has rained, it’s, you know, it was right after Easter there for a couple days where we had some poor weather.

We’ll see how it balances out. You know, hopefully it’s a more normalized trend and we’ll see where we’re going forward. I mean May is such a backloaded month that, you know, I don’t know that we can get much read on things, you know, this early in the month.

Ben Chaiken, Analyst, Mizuho0: Okay, Marc. Appreciate it. Thanks for the color.

Tina, Conference Operator: Your next question comes from the line of Patrick Scholes with Truist. Please go ahead.

Patrick Scholes, Analyst, Truist: Good morning. Thank you. You had briefly mentioned about, it was about $30 million or so expectations from partnership. I wonder, can you talk a little bit or give a little more granularity on how that impacted your per cap strength actually in the quarter? Is there a way to break that out? You know, what was how much of the per cap growth came from increase in sponsorship in 1Q? Thank you.

Marc Swanson, Chief Executive Officer, United Parks & Resorts: Yeah, I can help you. I mean, it’s still a, I think, a fairly small amount in the quarter. Some of the deals that we’ve signed have been more recent. You would see those, you know, more on a go-forward basis. You know, I wouldn’t call it a huge contributor at all to Q1. We’re excited about the go forward there, obviously.

Patrick Scholes, Analyst, Truist: Okay. Okay. You know, how are you thinking about the tailwind this year, from various holiday shifts, whether it’s, you know, Juneteenth, July Fourth, and especially the Jewish holidays?

Marc Swanson, Chief Executive Officer, United Parks & Resorts: That’s true.

Patrick Scholes, Analyst, Truist: When I look at, certainly, hotel bookings in Orlando, looks, you know, really strong in that. Curious your thoughts around that? Thank you.

Marc Swanson, Chief Executive Officer, United Parks & Resorts: Sure. I can help you with that question. You know, as, you know, as far as the operating calendar, you know, I, you know, there’s always puts and takes to that. Like, I mentioned last quarter that, you know, we had 1 last Saturday in March, for example, so of this year compared to last year. That was a, you know, a meaningful impact on the first quarter, not having that. It offset some of the Easter days that, you know, or partially offset some of the Easter days shifting into the month of March. You know, on a go-forward basis, we just had the Easter shift here with some Q2 days shifting into Q1.

If you look at, you know, the Fourth of July, you know, it’s on a Saturday. You know, ideally, I’d love to have that not on a Saturday because we’re typically busy on Saturdays regardless, especially in July. Nonetheless, we’ll get a, you know, we should still get a three-day weekend out of that for a lot of people, not everybody. I don’t know if that’s probably just a push compared to last year. Then, you know, go forward, things move around a little bit, but we’re. You know, I don’t know that there’s anything significant standing out in my mind right now.

We do get a little bit of a longer summer with kind of the early Memorial Day-ish and Labor Day being a little bit later if you kind of line up when those actually occur. It’s a longer kind of time between them than normal. With so many schools, you know, not tied to those holidays anymore as far as when they get out of school or go back, I don’t know that it’s a significant impact.

Patrick Scholes, Analyst, Truist: Okay. Thank you. I’m all set.

Tina, Conference Operator: Our next question comes from the line or is from Arpine Kocharyan with UBS. Please go ahead.

Arpine Kocharyan, Analyst, UBS: Hi. Thanks very much for taking my question. OpEx was a bit higher than expected. Was there any timing factors for the quarter? I think you mentioned a couple of things in your prepared remarks. Mostly, I’m trying to understand how we should be thinking about overall OpEx for 2026, that mid-single digit sort of increase. Would you say you’re in the low single-digit range for full year or closer to that mid-single digit for OpEx for this year?

James W. Forrester, Jr., Interim Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer, United Parks & Resorts: Yeah. Arpine Kocharyan, it’s Jim. I think you’ve obviously asked a good question about the inflation that we’re seeing for our OpEx. If you look at our adjusted EBITDA, our expenses are a very modest 1% growth. You are probably now focused on what we’re showing in our financial statements for OpEx and selling general administrative costs. I will say that that OpEx is being driven by a lot of non-cash or one-time items. I think we mentioned the $3.7 million in the non-cash reserve. There’s also a significant amount related to taking care of the cold weather impacts to the Florida market and others predominantly, but mostly in Florida for loss of plant material and repairs for damages from cold weather freezing that we incurred in that February timeframe.

Marc Swanson, Chief Executive Officer, United Parks & Resorts: For Selling General Administrative, you’re gonna see that increase almost exclusively is related to the amortization of our new ERP that we implemented back in October that will be amortized over the length of the agreement.

James W. Forrester, Jr., Interim Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer, United Parks & Resorts: Okay.

Again, that’s a non-cash, again, in the first quarter.

Yeah

non-cash and non-cash going forward.

Arpine Kocharyan, Analyst, UBS: Yeah. Yeah. No, that makes sense. Thank you. That’s helpful. You know, going back to one-time items, I was actually looking at it. It probably makes sense to probably follow up more in detail after the call on this. You know, what you’re adjusting back to EBITDA, something like $7 million for the quarter, and I think footnote mentions a bunch of business optimization costs. Could you maybe give a little bit more detail what those are? Seems to be ongoing for several quarters here. Just trying to understand what makes those costs one-off, you know. Then similarly, that $3.3 million that you’re adjusting EBITDA back for, what are those costs for?

Marc Swanson, Chief Executive Officer, United Parks & Resorts: Yes. As I mentioned, the consulting costs might be related either to some areas we’ve got on procurement, where we continue to try to ensure we are minimizing costs and doing strategic sourcing or having others who might have helped us in the implementation of that ERP system or addressing our impacts from the cold weather.

Arpine Kocharyan, Analyst, UBS: Okay. Okay. Thanks.

Tina, Conference Operator: Your next question is from the line of Ben Chaiken with Mizuho. Please go ahead.

Ben Chaiken, Analyst, Mizuho: Hey, good morning. I wanted to follow up on the deferred revenue. If I’m not mistaken, I think this is the first time in maybe 18 months that you’re seeing a positive inflection here. Obviously, you highlighted the increase, but what do you think is driving this? What caused the inflection? Thanks.

Marc Swanson, Chief Executive Officer, United Parks & Resorts: Yeah. Hey, Ben, it’s Marc. I can take that. You’re right, it has not been positive on a kind of year-over-year basis in quite a while, to your point. You know, there’s a couple things, but remember, as James mentioned, our deferred revenue has all our advanced products. You’ve got, you know, season passes in there. You’ve got ancillary products. You’ve got tickets. It’s a combination of all those things. It’s experiences in our parks. I don’t know that there’s necessarily just one thing dominating it, but, you know, obviously having better sales of passes has helped our in-park performance. You know, a lot of the in-park stuff we can sell in advance.

That sits in there until people come, that type of thing.

Ben Chaiken, Analyst, Mizuho: Okay. That’s, that’s helpful. Then maybe going back to the comment before that you touched on in the first question regarding higher EBITDA year-over-year. You kinda gave us the reasons you were constructive, but maybe we could unpack the variables somewhat. Is this, is this top line driven? And if so, where are you seeing the most traction or where are you expecting to see the most traction? Is this attendance or is this pricing? Is it both? Then maybe why. Thanks.

Marc Swanson, Chief Executive Officer, United Parks & Resorts: Sure. I mean, I think it’s some of the points I made, I made to Steve. You know, look, on a go-forward basis, I like the setup of our events, our attractions, the things that are still to come. I like the setup of obviously, hopefully having improved weather. You know, we’ll have to see. Obviously last year, especially the second half of the year and whatnot, the weather was not real cooperative for us. Hopefully we get a little bit better on the weather. Obviously we’re gonna lap the international decline more in the second half of the year. Hopefully that’s no longer a drag as we lap that.

Supporting that is really the growth in the in-park per caps. You know, in this quarter our total per cap was up. You know, you know, even if you had the exact same attendance, and I’m not suggesting that’s what we’re shooting for, but even if you did, if you can grow your per caps, you know, that’s gonna drive the revenue growth there. We did a good job, you know, this past quarter of growing our per cap overall. You know, we put per cap in there, we put attendance, put the sponsorship revenue, and obviously the costs. We’ve gotta continue to manage to a level that is acceptable, and Jim talked about that.

That’s kinda how it all comes together on a go-forward basis.

Ben Chaiken, Analyst, Mizuho: Okay. Just to follow up very quickly, I mean, I guess the deferred revenue seems like quite an inflection. You didn’t seem to obviously point to attendance. Maybe you are, but we’re not harping on it. I guess, is there a reason why plus 4 deferred revenue wouldn’t translate to slightly positive attendance for the year?

Marc Swanson, Chief Executive Officer, United Parks & Resorts: No.

Ben Chaiken, Analyst, Mizuho: Is there something that-

Marc Swanson, Chief Executive Officer, United Parks & Resorts: Yeah. No, I wasn’t, I wasn’t suggesting we’re not gonna grow attendance. I mean, certainly that’s our plan and that’s our expectation. I was just pointing out, you know, kind of some of the other drivers as well. Certainly the lineup of things we have across our parks, we believe will drive people to visit, obviously.

Ben Chaiken, Analyst, Mizuho: Thank you. Appreciate it.

Tina, Conference Operator: Your next question comes from the line of Lizzie Dove with Goldman Sachs.

Lizzie Dove, Analyst, Goldman Sachs: Hi. Good morning. Thanks for taking the question. I wanted to just go back to cost for a second. You know, you mentioned you’re still targeting the $50 million of gross cost savings for this year, but you’ve had, you know, various wage headwinds. You mentioned the advertising campaign that you’re ramping up. Anything you could share just in terms of that, like, gross to net translation this year and your ability to kind of flow that through to the bottom line?

Marc Swanson, Chief Executive Officer, United Parks & Resorts: Yeah, let me start and then Jim can add anything he’d like to add. Yeah, obviously, as you guys know, we hold ourselves to a pretty high standard with costs. We’ve done a lot of work over the years. If you look at the margin expansion, especially since 2019, you know, I think we’ve done good in that area. More recently here, obviously we need to do a better job, clearly. We’re keeping that EBITDA expense growth. You know, the cost that sit between revenue and adjusted EBITDA, you know, for this quarter, as Jim mentioned, was under 1%. Our goal is to obviously achieve the cost savings that we’ve set out to achieve.

You know, in a lot of cases they’re gonna maybe offset other headwinds, other inflationary pressures that we have. We wanna manage to a, you know, as low a growth as possible or realize savings, right? That’s kinda how we think about it, you know, holistically. Obviously we hold ourselves to a pretty high standard with that.

James W. Forrester, Jr., Interim Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer, United Parks & Resorts: Lizzie, I’d just add.

Lizzie Dove, Analyst, Goldman Sachs: Got it. Okay.

James W. Forrester, Jr., Interim Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer, United Parks & Resorts: reiterating the growth, the very modest growth we had, we did an exceptional job in managing our hourly labor and our theme park labor over the quarter in the face of some headwinds. We also have had a very focused effort on things like reducing claims or the introduction of technology to reduce labor costs. All of those are bearing fruit. I think we will continue to see those pay off in the coming quarters as well.

Lizzie Dove, Analyst, Goldman Sachs: Got it. I wanted to ask about just capital allocation and leverage here. You know, you’ve obviously been buying back stock pretty consistently, and appreciate 1Q is typically like a lower cash flow generation quarter, but I think you closed out with a cash balance of around $29 million. Curious just how you think about buybacks from here, you know, taking on more leverage and, you know, just where you feel comfortable longer term from that leverage standpoint.

Marc Swanson, Chief Executive Officer, United Parks & Resorts: Sure, I can help you with that question. Look, we’re comfortable where the leverage ratio is now at the end of Q1. Not to say we wouldn’t be comfortable with something higher or something lower and that’s something we work with our board on. You kind of already noted it, you know, we’re kind of coming out of the trough of cash generation just given the seasonality of our business. On a go-forward basis, you know, we would expect obviously cash to start to grow. So that’ll be the catalyst for, you know, growing the cash and continuing to fund the share repurchases.

You know, I think if you just step back and look over the full year, which I know you’ve done, you know, we continue to generate a good amount of cash each year, and I expect we’ll continue to do that going forward. What we do, just to give you some comfort is, you know, obviously if we had to if we ever got to a situation where our leverage was really getting up there or something, as we look at our use of cash and things like that, you know, we’re careful to take in mind the leverage ratio before making any of those decisions.

Like I said, we’re comfortable now and we expect, obviously that to improve going forward as we enter, you know, a traditionally busier time of the year.

Tina, Conference Operator: Your next question comes from the line of James Hardiman with Citigroup. Please go ahead.

Sean Wagner, Analyst, Citigroup: Hi, this is Sean Wagner on for James. You had mentioned that weather should improve, particularly in the back half of the year, but also in 2Q last year, you had characterized it as among the worst weather you had seen in the second quarter. I mean, obviously a lot depends on how weather turns out this year. Assuming more normal weather, do you get any operating days back because of closures last year? Or are operating days expected to be relatively flat this year?

Marc Swanson, Chief Executive Officer, United Parks & Resorts: Sean, I think we’ll, you know, they’re going to be fairly consistent. We might pick up a day or two as, you know, mainly in water parks that may have closed last year. A lot of times with the weather, you know, we’re able to open, but just, you know, a lot of people may not come if it’s been raining or it rains, you know, in the afternoon or early in the morning, whatever it may be. That can have an impact. We’ll see where that shakes out obviously, but, you know, we’re optimistic. You know, I’m generally optimistic about weather every year, hopefully this is the year it gets better for us, we’ll see. We did have, I didn’t call this out.

We did have fewer operating days in the first quarter, since you mentioned that. You know, our park in California, our Sesame Place, we did not open in January and February and really the first couple weeks of March. You know, we lost some operating days there and then obviously we had some days where just given, especially the cold in Florida, where we had some days where our water park was closed.

Sean Wagner, Analyst, Citigroup: Okay, that’s fair. I guess I think on your last call you indicated that there’s some pricing headroom in ticket pricing headroom in many markets and that admissions per caps should grow over time. We did see that improve sequentially from the declines we’ve seen for a handful of quarters now, but wondering how we should think about that going forward. Do you have any sort of expectations on when that inflects positively? Or how should we think about maybe comparisons with some of the promotions or pricing that you guys ran last year?

Marc Swanson, Chief Executive Officer, United Parks & Resorts: Sure. Look, I think your first comment, you know, and what I’ve made in the past is, yeah, our goal and our expectation is to grow pricing over time. We certainly recognize there’s room to do that in a lot of our markets. We’re always gonna defer to driving total revenue. You know, the good news is, as you noted, the admissions per cap has improved to where it was, you know, it’s down less than it has been in prior quarters. To your point, we’re making progress on that area and, you know, I expect we’ll continue to do that going forward.

Look, there might be times where we do an offer or we do something that might be at odds with per cap. We’re really focused on driving total revenue. I think, you know, we’ve kind of demonstrated here, the movement, like you said, the last couple of quarters has been in the right direction with admissions per cap.

Sean Wagner, Analyst, Citigroup: Okay. Thank you very much.

Tina, Conference Operator: Once again, to ask a question, press star one on your telephone keypad. Our next question is from the line of Chris Woronka with Deutsche Bank. Please go ahead.

Chris Woronka, Analyst, Deutsche Bank: Hey, guys. Good morning. Thanks for taking the question. Marc, you know, you’ve talked I think in the last couple years about how some of your marketing programs are, you know, you’re trying to kind of modernize them, and I’m curious as to whether you’re seeing any real tangible impacts from that yet or whether those are still more to come. Thanks.

Marc Swanson, Chief Executive Officer, United Parks & Resorts: Yeah. Chris, did you say marketing programs, right? Okay.

Chris Woronka, Analyst, Deutsche Bank: Yeah, yeah.

Marc Swanson, Chief Executive Officer, United Parks & Resorts: Yeah.

Chris Woronka, Analyst, Deutsche Bank: Some of the marketing efforts. Yeah. Uh-huh.

Marc Swanson, Chief Executive Officer, United Parks & Resorts: Yeah. Okay. Sorry, I just wanna make sure I heard. Look, I think, as all of you know, I mean, the there’s more ways than ever to market to people now, right? It’s changing pretty rapidly, you know, almost all the time with all the just ways that people consume media and get information and all that. Certainly it’s something you’ve gotta be on top of, and as I mentioned, I think, you know, we certainly could have done things better and had some hiccups. As we look at like how we allocate our spend, how we allocate the mix of that and where we advertise, what locations and what kind of platform? You know, I think there’s tweaks there.

You know, the good news is we test and learn, and we try to optimize going forward. We’re going to continue to do that. We’ve had a lot of discussions around kind of this area in the, in the, in the recent weeks and months. We’ll, you know, confident in the, in the plan going forward, but obviously aware that things are always changing, right. We’re trying to stay ahead of it.

Chris Woronka, Analyst, Deutsche Bank: Okay. Appreciate that. Marc, on the land sales, I know you know you won’t have much to say yet, but the question would be, you know, for the potential buyers you’re looking at, how important is their use of If these are land parcels near your parks, how important is their kind of intended usage and, you know, is there a chance that what they would do is either complementary or perhaps non-complementary to the park, the surrounding park? Thanks.

Marc Swanson, Chief Executive Officer, United Parks & Resorts: Sure. I think, you know, as far as like, you know, I think you’re maybe alluding to like a hotel or entertainment district or housing, whatever it may be, some of the things that we’ve mentioned in the past. I mean, obviously, our goal is to find something that, you know, would complement our offering in the sense that people stay longer at our park, people come here for more days, whatever it may be. Kind of what you see, you know, everybody else in the business doing with their hotels, right? It’s meant to complement the spend and the stay by our guests. That’s what we would look for, obviously, and there’s probably different ways you could execute on that.

Certainly, I think it would be a component of how we could benefit from that land being used to benefit our parks as well.

Chris Woronka, Analyst, Deutsche Bank: Great. Thanks.

Tina, Conference Operator: With no further questions in queue, I will now hand the call back over to Marc Swanson for closing remarks.

Marc Swanson, Chief Executive Officer, United Parks & Resorts: Thank you, Tina. On behalf of Jim and the rest of the management team here at United Parks & Resorts, I wanna thank you for joining us this morning. As you heard today, we are confident in our long-term strategy, which we believe will drive improved operating and financial results and long-term value for stakeholders. We invite everyone to join us at our parks this summer to experience the energy and excitement we are offering. Thank you, and we look forward to speaking again next quarter.

Tina, Conference Operator: Thank you again for joining us today. This does conclude today’s presentation. You may now disconnect.