Latham Group Q1 2026 Earnings Call - Margin Expansion Driven by Lean Manufacturing and Sunbelt Strategy

Conference Moderator, Conference Operator: Good afternoon, welcome to the Latham Group First Quarter 2026 Earnings Conference Call. All participants will be in listen-only mode. Should you need assistance, please signal a conference specialist by pressing the star key followed by 0. After today’s presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. To ask a question, you may press Star then 1 on your telephone keypad. To withdraw your question, please press Star then 2. Please note this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Casey Kotary, Investor Relations Representative. Please go ahead.

Casey Kotary, Investor Relations Representative, Latham Group: Thank you. This afternoon, we issued our first quarter 2026 earnings press release, which is available on the investor relations portion of our website. On today’s call are Latham’s President and CEO, Sean Gadd, and CFO, Oliver Gloe. Following their remarks, we will open the call to questions. During this call, the company may make certain statements that constitute forward-looking statements which reflect the company’s views with respect to future events and financial performance as of today or the date specified. Actual events and results may differ materially from those contemplated by such forward-looking statements due to risks and other factors that are set forth in the company’s annual report on Form 10-K and subsequent reports filed or furnished with the SEC, as well as today’s earnings release. The company expressly disclaims any obligation to update any forward-looking statements except as required by applicable law.

In addition, during today’s call, the company will discuss certain non-GAAP financial measures. Reconciliations of the directly comparable GAAP measures to these non-GAAP measures can be found in the slide presentation that is available on our investor relations website. I’ll now turn the call over to Sean Gadd.

Sean Gadd, President and Chief Executive Officer, Latham Group: Thank you, Casey Kotary, and thank you all for joining us today to review our first quarter results and discuss our business outlook. Our first quarter results represent a good start to 2026. We are especially pleased with our performance given the adverse weather conditions that plagued most of North America. There are several key takeaways from the quarter that are worth noting. First, it was another quarter in which we saw year-on-year sales growth in each of our product lines. Latham’s category leadership position across our product portfolio and our geographic diversification are key competitive advantages for us. Secondly, we continue to effectively execute our Sunbelt strategy, showing double-digit sales gains in fiberglass pools in our priority Florida market. We are taking further actions to accelerate our growth in this region.

Third, we expanded our margins benefiting from operating leverage inherent in our business model and from the lean manufacturing and value engineering initiatives that continue to yield very positive results. Oliver will provide additional detail on this later on in the call. Lastly, we are pleased to confirm our 2026 guidance, which anticipates significant sales growth and even stronger growth in adjusted EBITDA within a challenging macro environment and where pool starts will be about flat from last year. Our guidance includes moderate increase in transportation and commodity costs due to today’s high oil prices, which we are mitigating with temporary fuel surcharges. We are closely monitoring the dynamic situation in the Middle East and the potential impacts on costs and consumer demand.

Taking a closer look at our first quarter results, in-ground pool sales increased 3.5%. Virtually all of that growth can be attributed to the 1-month contribution from the Freedom Pools acquisition. Adverse weather was definitely a factor in our organic performance, keeping organic in-ground pool sales steady year-on-year. However, April sales trends were in line with our expectations. We are on track for fiberglass pools to approach 80% of our full-year in-ground pool sales in 2026. The Freedom Pools acquisition we completed on February 26 is integrating as expected. As we’ve noted, the acquisition expands our presence in Australia and New Zealand, markets where fiberglass pool models have a strong foothold and broadens our reach into new markets in Western Australia, including Perth, which is the fastest-growing city in the country.

We recently spent a week in Australia bringing together the Narellan and Freedom teams. In addition to this transaction being immediately accretive to Latham and giving us a market-leading position in the country, we anticipate achieving considerable revenue synergies from this combination over time, as well as gaining first-hand experience from the direct-to-consumer business model. Cover sales advanced 6% in the first quarter, driven by growth in order cover demand as consumers increasingly recognize the safety and economic benefits of this excellent product. Our industry-leading order covers are compatible with all in-ground pool types. In many parts of the U.S., they provide the homeowner with an alternative to fencing while delivering additional cost savings from reduced evaporation and chemical usage.

Educational marketing campaigns, including our partnership with Olympic gold medalist and pool safety advocate, Bode Miller, and his wife, Morgan, to promote pool safety, have served to build consumer awareness and increase attachment rates for the covers to new pool installations. First quarter liner sales were up 9% year-over-year, reflecting increased demand and buying in advance of the pool season. We continued to gain traction with our Sunbelt strategy in the first quarter and are moving forward with plans to accelerate our growth in this important region. Many of the investors and analysts whom I’ve met since taking on the CEO role in January have asked me where I see the major growth opportunities ahead for Latham, what our playbook is for capturing that growth. Let me start by saying that the opportunity is substantial.

We do not need to wait for the recovery in the U.S. pool market to drive growth. There are enough pool starts for us to go and attack the Sand States now, given our relatively low penetration in that region. The key here is that fiberglass is a growing category, and we are the number one player in it in the U.S., and so we are best positioned to gain share. Fiberglass pools are an excellent fit for the Sand States for many of the same reasons that the category is growing nationally. Fast and easy installation, lasting durability, low maintenance, and we have an exceptional designed range of sizes and options to choose from, many of which are smaller, rectangular shaped pools with attached spas that are perfect for our target communities. Latham has laid a good foundation for growth in the Sand States.

There is definitely increased brand awareness among consumers and dealers in Florida, thanks to several high-profile marketing campaigns paired with local activations. In 2026, we plan to build on that foundation to set the stage for accelerated long-term growth. As you know, I have many years of experience successfully selling against the standard in the building product industry. When I applied that experience to Latham’s current position in the Sand States, I have identified several actions to capture consumer demand and provide additional value to our dealers. First, we are building out a commercial organization with the key pillars being sales strategy, sales operation, and sales execution, with responsibilities to design and drive sales plans, product leadership, and sales effectiveness. Our goal is to provide a world-class commercial organization that supports our growth, not just in Florida, but across all the Sand States and all of North America.

Second, we have introduced a new market development framework and approach at Latham that I believe will make us even more effective at capturing share. The key element of this framework is segmentation, meaning that we’ll be very selective with our target Sunbelt State markets in determining the specific sections and neighborhoods that offer the greatest opportunity for us. In essence, it’s all about neighborhoods. We’re looking for neighborhoods with a large number of homes, with home values, lot sizes, and household incomes that fall within our parameters. These can be in, adjacent to, or outside of master planned communities. Third, we’ll be adding sales resources in the field to make sure we stay close to the consumer throughout the pool buying process. In this way, we’ll be able to assist our dealers in converting more leads into sales and getting greater understanding of the consumer journey.

We know that consumers are looking for designs that fit their lifestyles, and we believe that Latham has the best range of products to meet those needs. In 2026, we are increasing our investment in branding and marketing in a very targeted way to capture greater consumer awareness. Together with our network of trusted dealers, we’re able to fulfill the demand we generate. In support of all this, we are revamping our marketing and advertising campaigns to give homeowners a full understanding of the true benefits of fiberglass and why it is the right solution for their backyard to enable their dreams of creating wonderful memories to come true. With that, I will turn over the call to Oliver Gloe, our CFO, for a financial review. Oliver.

Oliver Gloe, Chief Financial Officer, Latham Group: Thank you, Sean, and good afternoon, everyone. I am pleased to report on what was a solid start to 2026. Please note that all comparisons we discuss today are on a year-over-year basis compared to the first quarter of fiscal 2025, unless otherwise noted. Net sales for the first quarter of 2026 were $117 million, 5% above $111 million in Q1 2025, of which 3% represented organic growth and 2% represented the 1 month’s benefit of the Freedom Pools acquisition we completed at the end of February. Organic growth was led by the continued strength of auto covers and increased demand for our pool liners. By product line, in-ground pool sales were $60 million, up 4% from Q1 2025, with virtually all the year-on-year growth coming from Freedom’s fiberglass pool sales.

Cover sales were $33 million, up 6%, and liner sales were $24 million, up 9% compared to the first quarter of 2025. We achieved a first quarter gross margin of 32%, reflecting a 220 basis point increase above last year’s 30%. This performance is primarily due to volume leverage along with production efficiencies driven by our lean manufacturing and value engineering initiatives. SG&A expenses increased to $37 million, up 20% from $31 million in Q1 of 2025. This was largely tied to strategic investments in sales and marketing to accelerate fiberglass adoption, digital transformation initiatives, and acquisition and integration related costs, which includes $2.3 million of performance-based compensatory earn out expenses related to our Coverstar Central acquisition in 2024.

Target synergies have been realized for Coverstar Central. We are pleased with the contribution from the acquisition, which has exceeded our initial expectations. This earn out will total roughly $9 million over the course of the year, with similar impact in each remaining quarter in 2026. Net loss was $9 million or $0.07 per diluted share compared to a net loss of $6 million or $0.05 per diluted share for the prior year’s first quarter, primarily due to the beforementioned increase in SG&A expenses. First quarter adjusted EBITDA was $12 million, 9% above $11 million in the prior year period, primarily resulting from volume leverage and efficiencies gained through our lean manufacturing and value engineering initiatives. Adjusted EBITDA margin was 10.4%, a 40 basis point expansion compared to last year’s first quarter. Turning to the balance sheet.

We continue to maintain a strong financial position, ending the first quarter with a cash position of $27 million. In line with our expectations, net cash used in operating activities was $48 million, reflecting a seasonal increase in working capital needs ahead of peak pool selling season. We ended the quarter with total debt of $311 million and a net debt leverage ratio of 2.8, also in line with our expectations. Capital expenditures were $23 million in Q1 2026 compared to $4 million in the prior year period. The increase is primarily due to the purchase of 4 key fiberglass manufacturing facilities in Florida, Texas, California and West Virginia for $18 million, including a $12 million deposit made in 2025 that was settled in Q1 2026. Additionally, we incurred $5 million of CapEx relating to ongoing projects in line with our expectations.

As a reminder, we expect CapEx to range between $42 million and $48 million in 2026. This includes $25 million of maintenance CapEx, expenditures related to the purchase of the fiberglass manufacturing facilities that I just mentioned, and investments to upgrade our newly acquired Freedom Pools manufacturing facilities. While the beginning of 2026 was affected by adverse weather conditions across North America, we are encouraged that April sales trends have been in line with the historical seasonal ramp. We continue to monitor geopolitical developments and their potential impact on our freight and raw material costs, but we believe we are well positioned to manage effectively through this pool building season. We are pleased by the steady progress we are seeing from our fiberglass awareness and adoption initiatives, highlighted by strong consumer engagement with our branding and marketing campaigns and continued gains in Florida, our initial Sand State target market.

Based on our performance to date and our current visibility into the remaining season, we are pleased to reaffirm our guidance for 2026 revenue growth of 9% and adjusted EBITDA growth of 13% at the midpoint, amid expectation for new U.S. pool starts to be flat with last year. With that, I’ll turn the call back to Sean for his closing remarks.

Sean Gadd, President and Chief Executive Officer, Latham Group: Thanks, Oliver. In summary, we are pleased with our first quarter performance, encouraged by recent order trends, and excited by the growth opportunities we see on horizon. Latham is firmly on track to outperform the market for new U.S. pool starts again in 2026, and we intend to take advantage of soft markets to accelerate our Sunbelt strategy and strengthen our execution. I see tremendous opportunity for Latham to drive market penetration in the Sunbelt strategy as well as the rest of North America, Australia and New Zealand. With that, operator, please open the call to questions.

Conference Moderator, Conference Operator: We will now begin the question-and-answer session. To ask a question, you may press star then one on your telephone keypad. If you are using a speakerphone, please pick up your handset before pressing the keys. To withdraw your question, please press star then two. Please limit yourself to one question and one follow-up. At this time, we will pause momentarily to assemble our roster. Our first question comes from Ryan Merkel with William Blair. Please go ahead.

Ryan Merkel, Analyst, William Blair: Hey, everyone. Appreciate the question. Wanted to start off with sort of the fiberglass backlog and orders as you enter the season. How is that looking? Have you seen trends pick up now that the weather has cleared?

Sean Gadd, President and Chief Executive Officer, Latham Group: Yeah, thank you for that question, Ryan. In terms of backlog, I think we’re seeing what we would have expected to see, coming out of the first quarter. The order file, in April looks strong to us and looks like it is picking up per the season. We feel good enough that we obviously have reaffirmed guidance, but generally, we are seeing the pickup in orders, and feel pretty good with trends.

Ryan Merkel, Analyst, William Blair: Got it. Okay. Thanks for that. My second question is the fiberglass conversion is key to the story, Sean, you know that, and you’re adding a bunch of resources, it seems. I’m curious, what are the biggest tweaks that you’re making to the strategy, and then any early results, or maybe it’s a little too early?

Sean Gadd, President and Chief Executive Officer, Latham Group: Yeah, we are definitely making some tweaks. I will tell you it’s too early. The main thing, and I talked about it earlier on, is we are segmenting the market a little bit differently to how we have done it in the past. We’ve got our criteria now built up where we know or we feel like if a neighborhood fits that criteria, the likelihood of them going to Latham and then to fiberglass is higher. We like that. We’re starting to test that, and if we get those right, with the right dealers, we’ll be able to start building out more and more neighborhoods. We’re early, but I feel like that’s definitely on a good path for us.

The second thing we’re doing is adding heads, and really I’m trying to organize the commercial organization into sort of three areas. Sales strategy, which is really just understanding where is the opportunity, doing more of the segmentation, becoming a little bit smarter around sales. Then sales operations, which for me is really about converting what we think about the market into real game plans that the sales team can execute, then measuring that sales team and then sales team to go and execute. Just getting a little bit more organized so that we get the most out of our sales organization. That’s really across the whole U.S. but including the same space.

Ryan Merkel, Analyst, William Blair: That’s great. That’s interesting. Okay. Appreciate that. I’ll pass it on.

Sean Gadd, President and Chief Executive Officer, Latham Group: Thank you.

Conference Moderator, Conference Operator: Our next question comes from Greg Palm with Craig-Hallum Capital Group. Please go ahead.

Greg Palm, Analyst, Craig-Hallum Capital Group: Yeah, thanks. You know, wanted to piggyback on the first question a little bit since a lot has happened in the last couple of months since you, since we were all on the phone together. It doesn’t sound like demand environment has changed, like, all that much, I guess, relative to maybe what you would have thought a couple months ago. Maybe you can just confirm that again, but from a, you know, an input cost side of things, you mentioned freight. You know, wanted to get your sense on how you’re dealing with that and also anything else that’s on your radar, whether it be, you know, increasing resin prices. Are you seeing any availability shortages of key inputs like that? Anything else that should be on our radar?

Sean Gadd, President and Chief Executive Officer, Latham Group: Thanks, Greg. I’ll start by talking about the market a little bit. We still see the market overall for this year look likely to remain flat. Our assumption for that hasn’t changed. We are seeing some green shoots coming out, and we feel good about that. Like I said, our order trend for April looks strong and into the start of May. We feel good about that. Pkdata data would have indicated that some more growth starting to occur with cheaper pools. Again, we like that. That’s a good sign for us. Obviously, pools are getting smaller, that is good.

Obviously, the volatility is not helping. I know we have a sound approach. I think we’ll work through that. From a, from a dealer perspective, you know, when we caught up with the dealers, what they’ll tell us is it’s pretty competitive, 4 or 5 quotes per job, which is generally up. From my take is, you know, it’s certainly uncertain, but I believe less people will be traveling. The price of gas doesn’t help. They’re staying at home. I think that’s the opportunity. I think that’s what the green shoots are we’re seeing, is that people will rather now spend time at their home and hopefully with that build a pool.

Oliver Gloe, Chief Financial Officer, Latham Group: Greg, let me address the second part of your question with regards to the conflict in the Middle East and some of the updates here on input costs. Let me start off by saying we don’t see availability to be an issue as of today. Partially that’s due to our supply diversification coming out of COVID. Done a lot to be multi-sourced and be as diversified as possible. We are seeing obviously headwinds in costs, right? That comes in 2 forms. 1 is transportation, the price at the pump, and especially in the world of fiberglass, we are obviously incurring, you know, transportation costs. It’s expensive to ship those fiberglass pool across the nation.

In terms of mitigation, what we’ve done on that side is to introduce temporary fuel surcharges that we plan to fully mitigate us when it comes to transportation costs. I think it’s too early to tell what the impact is gonna be on the commodity side. Obviously, suppliers are reaching out. We are exposed to, you know, the, again, the conflict in the Middle East as we consume a lot of oil derivatives in the world of resins, vinyl and so forth. Again, I think it’s too early to tell. Certainly currently in discussions with the suppliers. I think we’re making the first purchase orders as we speak under slightly higher price levels. You know, we’ll have to see our the very dynamic situation evolves.

I’m confident in the playbook that we have. We have applied that playbook during COVID. We have applied that playbook certainly last year. I think, you know, we have confidence that the playbook will also work this year as we work through commodities.

Greg Palm, Analyst, Craig-Hallum Capital Group: Okay, great. On some of these initiatives that you talked about, you know, resegmentation, adding sales resources, I’m curious, how do you feel about your current dealer network right now and how important of a lever can that be not just adding new and more dealers, but also leaning into some of your more successful ones? Maybe you can talk a little bit about that as well.

Sean Gadd, President and Chief Executive Officer, Latham Group: Sure. I’ll start with dealers are very important. They are obviously the extension of us as they sit across the kitchen table. We need them to basically close the sales. What I will tell you is, I believe we’ve got the opportunity to get more out of our current network, which is like goal number 1. I’m talking really about our core, what I would call our core markets, Midwest, Northeast Canada, and that’s really about account management. We’re gonna be defining what account management looks like for Latham and making sure our organization’s trained around good account management. I expect to get more out of our current network. Then I think about adding where we’ve got white space.

We’re always gonna be looking for dealers to take on white space if our current dealer network doesn’t get us there. That is gonna be part of the strategy. Then when I think about the sand states and material conversion, we have a good network of dealers there right now, that we are gonna be feeding as we go into these neighborhoods. And they will be able to get the benefit of referrals and everything else that comes out of those neighborhoods. Feel good about the network in the sand states, particularly Florida, but our intention will be over time to grow it.

Greg Palm, Analyst, Craig-Hallum Capital Group: Yeah, fair enough. Okay. We’ll leave it there. Thanks.

Sean Gadd, President and Chief Executive Officer, Latham Group: Thank you.

Conference Moderator, Conference Operator: Our next question comes from Timothy Boyce with Baird. Please go ahead.

Casey Kotary, Investor Relations Representative, Latham Group1: Hey, guys. Good, good afternoon.

Sean Gadd, President and Chief Executive Officer, Latham Group: Good afternoon.

Casey Kotary, Investor Relations Representative, Latham Group1: Maybe just first question just on the kind of the resegmentation of some of the sales force and things like that. Is the plan that there’s incremental, you know, investments in terms of dollars that’s going into some of the initiatives, or are you just kind of reallocating what you have?

Sean Gadd, President and Chief Executive Officer, Latham Group: Going to do a little bit of both. We are definitely gonna get ahead a little bit because we need more people on the ground and actually thinking about our game plan. That will be additive. Our intention will be, if you think about sales as a, sorry, estimated as a percentage of sales, you should be over the medium and long term, that should stay the same. We will continue to fund that as we grow, and then we will look at opportunities to sort of trim back on the back side of the business to give us some space to spend on the front side of the business and invest.

Casey Kotary, Investor Relations Representative, Latham Group1: Okay. Then, Oliver, just on the price cost question, I guess it’s not totally clear if higher resins are kinda in the guide or is it kind of a wait and see approach right now? If you do see higher resins, you guys have the ability to, you know, take costs out or improve efficiencies or pass them on price. Is that kind of the main message?

Oliver Gloe, Chief Financial Officer, Latham Group: That’s probably more the latter. I think transportation cost is relatively foreseeable, what that means to us, and that’s in the guide, right? With commodities, I think it’s too early to tell.

Casey Kotary, Investor Relations Representative, Latham Group1: Okay. Sounds good. Thank you, guys.

Sean Gadd, President and Chief Executive Officer, Latham Group: Thank you.

Conference Moderator, Conference Operator: Our next question comes from Andrew Carter with Stifel. Please go ahead.

Andrew Carter, Analyst, Stifel: Hey. Thank you. Good afternoon. I wanted to ask and just double-click to make sure we understand exactly what the pricing is for the year. You are putting in temporary fuel surcharges. Can you give a magnitude of how much that’s kinda incremental to the old guidance? You are not taking any price increases on products for resins. Just wanna make sure and triple-check that. I think you said we’re well prepared for materials during the season. I’m guessing is that a comment that everything’s good for now and you take a price increase later? Kinda finally, if you have to take a price increase, can you take one mid-season or does that mess things up? Just how do those dynamics work around when you have to make a decision on pricing?

Oliver Gloe, Chief Financial Officer, Latham Group: Love it. Andrew, I would say the transportation cost and the temporary surcharge, I’d say for the year is probably worth 60 basis points. Again, it’s very dynamic and volatile. You know, obviously as the headwinds change, that temporary surcharge can change over time as well. That’s just order of magnitude. I think again, for commodities, too early to tell. You know, quite frankly, we haven’t even ordered or is just about to start ordering materials that would be subject to a change in pricing. It’s really too early to tell. You know, obviously the materials get shipped to our sites, work their way through inventory ultimately as they get consumed in the P&L.

We’ll again, we have our playbook, and we’ll react in time as necessary. If I remind you last year, we actually did do a mid-season price increase catering to, you know, the environment last year, that came in in June. It’s not, it’s not preferred, but it’s also not unheard of.

Andrew Carter, Analyst, Stifel: Thanks. I’ll pass it on.

Oliver Gloe, Chief Financial Officer, Latham Group: Thanks, Andrew.

Sean Gadd, President and Chief Executive Officer, Latham Group: Thank you.

Conference Moderator, Conference Operator: Our next question comes from Scott Stringer with Wolfe Research. Please go ahead.

Scott Stringer, Analyst, Wolfe Research: Hey, guys. Thanks for the question. I’m just wondering if the adverse weather mentioned in 1Q pushed some sales into the second quarter. The guidance obviously implies some acceleration through the rest of the year, right? I guess it would just be helpful to know the tailwind from sales being pulled into 2Q if that is the case. Thanks.

Oliver Gloe, Chief Financial Officer, Latham Group: I would say, you know, the adverse weather really means, you know, we had a lot of snow, ice on the ground in January and February. If you think of our annual organic growth of 6%, we certainly didn’t quite achieve that in Q1, it was probably half of that. I would attribute that to weather. If you translate that to shipping days, that equates to about a shipping day in today’s seasonality. You know, I’m not reading too much into that. The season is young. Q1 is a comparatively small quarter. Again, translating our under proportional organic growth in Q1 vis-à-vis the annual guide into shipping days, it’s 1 day.

I think that’s another way of saying, you know, we put in the prepared remarks that really the trends in April have been as expected. We are seeing the seasonal ramp. Whether we’ll, you know, catch up on that one day in Q2 or in Q3, we will see it early in the quarter. Certainly nothing we have seen in Q1 and in our ramp in April that would make us change our view on 2026 and the guide.

Scott Stringer, Analyst, Wolfe Research: Okay, got it. I think you guys talked about this a little bit earlier, but just curious on the visibility into 2Q and 3Q for in-ground pool installs. Is that pretty much set or just curious, you know, how much variability is there over the next 2 quarters for that segment? Thanks.

Sean Gadd, President and Chief Executive Officer, Latham Group: Well, I’ll start and I’ll hand it over to Oliver. I think from a Q2 perspective, we’re all but set, I mean, based on our lead times currently. That looks like, you know, as I said, we’ve started the quarter really well. Q3 is still obviously, while we’ve got orders that do fall into Q3, it’s probably too early to tell. Again, from what we’re hearing inside of the market and from what we’re seeing, we still feel very confident of what the order file looks like, and that we’ll be able to, we’ll continue to hold guide.

Oliver Gloe, Chief Financial Officer, Latham Group: If I compare today’s order book versus prior years, really nothing that would, you know, cause us to think differently about the seasonal pattern vis-à-vis, you know, the last year. Again, all confirming, you know, our guidance there.

Scott Stringer, Analyst, Wolfe Research: Got it. That’s helpful. Thanks for the time, guys.

Oliver Gloe, Chief Financial Officer, Latham Group: Thank you. Thanks, Alex.

Conference Moderator, Conference Operator: Our next question comes from Matthew Bouley with Barclays. Please go ahead.

Elaine Ku, Analyst, Barclays: Good afternoon, guys. You have Elaine Ku on for Matthew Bouley today.

Oliver Gloe, Chief Financial Officer, Latham Group: Good afternoon.

Elaine Ku, Analyst, Barclays: Good afternoon. For my first question, I’m just curious, like, what are the top concerns you’re seeing from buyers today? Like between rates, economic uncertainty, you know, just the need to step up more consumer awareness of fiberglass pools, what’s kind of the biggest challenge today?

Sean Gadd, President and Chief Executive Officer, Latham Group: From what I’ve heard, you know, the number 1 thing would be, which is tied to interest rates, is, you know, basic financing is difficult to get. Anybody who’s hasn’t got the cash or is able to get, got a good FICO score is unable to get financing. We’re hearing that a fair bit, which isn’t all that different to what we would’ve heard last year. You know, I think the other part would be the dealers are saying that, you know, they’re fighting, they’re having to fight for the sale a little harder than they would previously. When I mentioned 45 quotes, that’s typically 2-3 quotes. Everyone’s fighting for the business pretty hard.

Reality is, you know, we feel in an environment where things are tough, actually feel good about fiberglass pools because obviously pools are getting smaller. That fits our trend. Pools have low maintenance, the actual cost on an ongoing basis is lower than our alternatives out there. The expenditure on chemicals and like I said, on evaporation is lower, especially if you have an auto cover. The durability of the pool means that there’s no ongoing expenses done with the pool. While we see the market as a little tough, we still see it not adversely affecting us relative to last year.

Elaine Ku, Analyst, Barclays: Got it. In terms of your increased branding and marketing spend, can you walk us through the cadence of what that might look like through the year and its impact on SG&A? Also, you know, what does this sort of look like? Like is it a targeted brand program for dealers? Is it more salespeople on the ground? Or is it more on like the ads and marketing spend? Thank you.

Sean Gadd, President and Chief Executive Officer, Latham Group: Yeah, it’s a bit of both. We’re running a national campaign. The national campaign’s good ’cause it, you know, it lifts all markets up, which is great. The other good part about a national campaign is when you think about the sand states, there’s a trend of people moving from the Midwest, Northeast into the sand states. We like that because fiberglass is the standard in those markets, so they know us. We like the marketing campaign being a national format. The increase, I’ll just talk about the timing. The start of the timing is really set for the pool season. We started sort of February, mid to late February, and we’re moving all the way through to sort of July, August.

That’s with the timeframe for the national campaign. When I think about my neighborhoods, that’s gonna be way more tactical in nature. I’m talking about things like digital marketing. I’m talking about door hangers and marketing around the homes. I’m talking about doing events at the home to inspire the neighborhood. Those are pretty tactical, small expenses that we will run in every neighborhood.

Oliver Gloe, Chief Financial Officer, Latham Group: When it comes to, you know, the increase and the cadence of the increase, you know, as we, as we said earlier on, I think over the foreseeable future, SG&A as a percent of sales will roughly be flat. It was 20.5% last year. We expect it to be a similar amount this year. And the majority of that is spent, as you heard from both in the sales organization and marketing. There’s a little bit of digital transformation in there and also inflation on the core, meaning G&A. Again, the majority is going into the sales organization and marketing.

There’s also a little bit of increase in the absolute dollar number as we bought Freedom and Freedom, and that comes with about $3 million of SG&A. That gives you the $20.5 million. I would like to remind you that in addition, we have the earn-out expenses for Coverstar Central. That is about $9 million. It’s tied to 2026, so it won’t recur in 2027, neither did it occur in 2025. That is a earn-out expense that is tied to 2026. With regards to cadence, it’s roughly the same as usual.

You will see that Q1 and Q2 are a little bit heavier, and that is because we are running our marketing campaign, our national TV campaign, earlier and longer in 2026 versus 2025.

Elaine Ku, Analyst, Barclays: Great. Thanks. I’ll pass it on.

Oliver Gloe, Chief Financial Officer, Latham Group: Thank you.

Conference Moderator, Conference Operator: Our next question comes from Susan Maklari with Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead.

Charles Perron-Piché, Analyst, Goldman Sachs: Hey, everyone. This is Charles Perron-Piché in for Susan. Thanks for taking my question. First, I’d like to shift gear a little bit and talk about the auto cover and the opportunities that you see in this market. Considering, you know, the changing macro dynamics, is there any impact you’re seeing in terms of the adoption and any efforts you can do here to, you know, further expand the penetration over the coming years?

Sean Gadd, President and Chief Executive Officer, Latham Group: Yeah, I’ll start with that. I think the answer is no, we’re not seeing a decrease in adoption. We had a pretty good quarter in auto covers and covers in general. I mean, we had very large growth last year. We expect it to grow this year. We expect it to grow in the coming years as well. It’s really about awareness for us. Reality is, most people still don’t know that auto covers are available. Auto covers can fit on every pool. It doesn’t really matter if it’s a fiberglass pool or not. The market is actually very large for us. We’ve got our value-added resellers set up to take advantage of that.

Then we also are now getting our sales organization, latent sales organization around that product, and it’s still early for that to happen. We see that as more upside as we go. The product is got Well, the product is a good product. It does what it needs to do. Consumers who have it, love it, and I think, we’ve just got to make sure we continue to drive the awareness, and I don’t see that trend changing.

Charles Perron-Piché, Analyst, Goldman Sachs: Got it. Okay, that’s helpful, Sean. Switching gear, I appreciate all the colors so far on the call on input cost and inflation. Should we see, you know, more unfavorable dynamics coming through from a cost perspective, can you talk about the opportunities to further lean on your lean in manufacturing and value engineering initiatives to further protect your margins?

Oliver Gloe, Chief Financial Officer, Latham Group: I think, lean and value engineering continues to be a key contributor to our P&L. Like you’ve heard me on prior calls, the contribution is about $2, two and a half million per quarter. In Q1, it was $2 million, and that’s just because Q1 is a light quarter, and lean and value engineering programs go up and down with volume. I think, as some of those programs mature, you’ll see the tailwind that’s really now getting into our DNA. This is how we lead our plants and factories, it’s part of the everyday cadence.

You’d see a lot of a lot more programs, maybe not of the same magnitude because the low-hanging fruits, you know, are being cleared here. That’s more common for lean manufacturing, whereas value engineering, they’re really in the beginning of the journey. I think there are still some low-hanging fruits out there that our team of PhD-level scientists is pursuing. Again, both initiatives under full steam and certainly in Q1, delivering what we expected them to deliver, and there’s no change in our thoughts for the rest of the year.

Charles Perron-Piché, Analyst, Goldman Sachs: Got it. Thank you for the color, guys, and good luck with the quarter.

Sean Gadd, President and Chief Executive Officer, Latham Group: Thank you.

Oliver Gloe, Chief Financial Officer, Latham Group: Thanks, Sean.

Conference Moderator, Conference Operator: Our next question comes from Shaun Calnan with Bank of America. Please go ahead.

Casey Kotary, Investor Relations Representative, Latham Group0: Hi, guys. Thank you for taking my question. Just first, the double-digit growth in Florida was quite impressive. What do you think has led to the success in Florida versus the other sand states? Can you talk about what lessons you can take from Florida to apply to the other sand states?

Sean Gadd, President and Chief Executive Officer, Latham Group: Yeah. I’ll start with, it is obviously our largest focus of all the sand states. We are set up quite well from a sales number perspective. We’re working on dealers now over the last 18 months, so we’ve got a set of dealers that are really the right dealers for us to help fulfill the demand that we’re creating. We’ve been running a marketing in general campaign for now 18 months, so we’ve seen the flow of that. We have got, I mean, we’ve got a really good, strong proposition, value proposition relative to concrete.

We’re getting deeper and deeper into the market and being able to communicate it. We are seeing good growth, and we feel good that, and I feel good that, you know, if a homeowner understands the benefit of fiberglass over concrete, there’s a really high chance they would go with fiberglass. We’re just very early still in the adoption curve. Our mission is to make sure our awareness continues to get driven up and that we have the connection between that awareness and our leaders positioning at the kitchen table. I’ll just remind you, at the end of the day, while we are very pleased with the numbers, we really look to accelerate that. In reality, we’re still working on pretty small numbers when we think about Florida.

Casey Kotary, Investor Relations Representative, Latham Group0: Okay, great. Then just one cleanup question on the surcharges. Are you aiming to offset the higher transportation costs on a dollar basis or a margin basis?

Oliver Gloe, Chief Financial Officer, Latham Group: On a dollar basis. You know, the headwind is, you know, as we incurred is being passed on with the temporary surcharges.

Casey Kotary, Investor Relations Representative, Latham Group0: Okay, great. Thank you.

Oliver Gloe, Chief Financial Officer, Latham Group: Thanks, Sean.

Conference Moderator, Conference Operator: Our next question comes from Andrew Carter with Stifel. Please go ahead.

Andrew Carter, Analyst, Stifel: Hey, thanks.

I wanted to double-click and make sure on that incentive cost. You’re not backing that out, so if you were to put that back in, the incremental here is still $28 to $38 in investment year. I just want to understand that and double-click. Thanks. No, it’s not. I’m sorry, the earn out. The earn out around Coverstar. My fault.

Oliver Gloe, Chief Financial Officer, Latham Group: Right. The earn out is included in SG&A and will be sitting on top the 22.5% as percent of revenue. As it is an expense tied to an acquisition for EBITDA purposes, it is backed out.

Andrew Carter, Analyst, Stifel: Okay. It is just not excluded. It is within guidance, that expense. Just double-checking.

Oliver Gloe, Chief Financial Officer, Latham Group: Correct. It’s an add back to EBITDA, and it is in SG&A.

Andrew Carter, Analyst, Stifel: Okay. My fault. Sorry about that. Thank you.

Sean Gadd, President and Chief Executive Officer, Latham Group: Thanks, Andrew.

Conference Moderator, Conference Operator: This concludes our question and answer session. I would like to turn the call back over to management for closing remarks.

Sean Gadd, President and Chief Executive Officer, Latham Group: Thank you very much. I just wanna thank everybody for getting on the call. We felt like we had a strong quarter, obviously marred a little bit with weather, but the momentum’s there. April looks strong, and we feel confident about our guide. With that, I want to conclude the call. I look forward to seeing all the folks on the call over the coming weeks and months at different types of events. Again, thank you for everyone for attending. Thank you.

Conference Moderator, Conference Operator: The conference is now concluded. Thank you for attending today’s presentation. You may now disconnect.