ローカル・バウンティ（LOCL）2026年第2四半期決算説明会：売上高は14%増、EBITDA赤字が縮小

主要ハイライト

• 2026年第2四半期の売上高は、テキサス、ジョージア、ワシントンの各拠点における生産・販売の増加に支えられ、前年同期比14%増、前四半期比約4%増の1,390万ドルとなりました。
• 調整後EBITDA赤字は前年同期比17%縮小の580万ドルとなりました。経営陣は、生産ネットワークの成熟と小売顧客向けの拡大に伴い、下期も改善が続くと予想しています。
• 調整後売上総利益率は、前年同期の30%、2026年第1四半期の約29%から27%に低下しました。同社は、ジョージア拠点での販売チャネル多様化に伴う一時的な梱包効率の低下が圧迫要因であるとしています。
• Local Bountiは今秋、米国大西洋岸中部地域の約400店舗において、リニューアルした1人前サラダキットのパイロット展開を開始することを決定しました。最近開始されたその他の小売プログラムは580店舗以上をカバーしています。
• 四半期末時点の現金・現金同等物および拘束性現金は、営業キャッシュアウトにより第1四半期の1,880万ドルから減少して1,010万ドルとなりました。四半期末以降、既存の戦略的投資家から1,250万ドルの追加資金提供を受けました。
• アップグレードされたジョージア、テキサス、ワシントンの各拠点における収量能力は、改修前の水準を約10%上回る状態を維持しました。カリフォルニアの1拠点における初期投資により、総生産量は前年同期比で約10%増加しました。

主な財務実績

事業およびオペレーション実績

Local Bountiは今秋、大手小売業者とのパイロット展開を通じて1人前サラダキットラインをリニューアルし、大西洋岸中部地域の約400店舗に供給します。Harris Teeterの250店舗以上での6SKUの展開と、160店舗規模の地域小売店での個別展開は本格稼働しており、会社の計画通りに進展しています。

また同社は、7月に米国中南部地域の約66店舗で5SKU、8月初旬にはロッキー山脈地域の約110店舗で4SKUを発売しました。ベビーリーフレタスやオーガニックバターレタスなどの商品において、複数の全米規模の小売顧客との供給契約を延長しました。

シーザーロマーノ・サラダキットは5月に新たな配送センターを追加し、前年の好調な販売ペースを維持しています。また、経営陣は、従来のサプライチェーンが需要対応に苦慮していることから、ルッコラを新たな機会として捉えています。

オペレーション面では、ジョージア、テキサス、ワシントンで昨年完了したタワー改修により、収量能力が約10%向上しました。経営陣によると、プロジェクトの進展に伴い、カリフォルニアでの効率化投資により最大20%の収量改善が見込まれています。カリフォルニアの1拠点における初期の取り組みにより、総生産量は前年同期比で既に約10%増加しています。

より効率的な播種手法の導入により、種子コストは前年同期比で約20%削減されました。同社はまた、調達、保守メンテナンス、労働効率、物流管理におけるコスト削減を追求しています。

経営見通し

経営陣は直近数四半期で見られた改善傾向が続くと見込んでおり、売上高の成長とコスト管理を調整後EBITDA黒字化に向けた主な推進力としています。同社は、ネットワークの成熟と小売顧客向けの事業拡大に伴い、下期に調整後EBITDA赤字が改善すると予想しています。

また経営陣は、小売浸透率の向上と投入コストの低下が、時間をかけて利益率の向上を後押しすると見込んでいます。なお、売上高、利益率、または調整後EBITDAに関する具体的な数値目標は提示されませんでした。

リスクと注視すべき点

• 調整後売上総利益率は、ジョージア拠点でのチャネルミックスの変化と一時的な梱包効率の低下により、前年同期比および前四半期比で低下しました。同社は、その後プロセスが改善され運用に移されたとしています。
• Local Bountiは営業損失を計上し続けており、第2四半期も営業キャッシュアウトとなりました。掲げている調整後EBITDA黒字化の目標にはまだ達していません。
• 四半期末時点の現金残高は前四半期比で870万ドル減少しましたが、その後に実施された1,250万ドルの戦略的投資はこの残高に含まれていません。
• ワラント負債の公正価値の変動は、GAAP純利益に大幅なボラティリティをもたらす可能性があります。同項目は第1四半期の520万ドルの利益から、第2四半期には140万ドルの損失へ転じました。
• 経営陣は環境制御型農業（CEA）における食品安全上の優位性を強調する一方で、「どのようなシステムであってもリスクを100%排除することはできない」と警告しました。

決算説明会トランスクリプト全文

決算説明会の完全なトランスクリプト

経営陣による説明

Operator

Good morning. and welcome to Local Bounti's Second Quarter 2026 Earnings Conference Call.

[Operator Instructions]

Please also note today's event is being recorded. At this time, I'd like to turn the conference call over to Jeff Sonnek, Investor Relations at ICR. Jeff, please go ahead.

Jeff Sonnek

Thank you, and good morning. Today's presentation will be hosted by Local Bounti's President and Chief Executive Officer, Kathleen Valiasek and Interim Chief Financial Officer and Chief Accounting Officer, Tony Hughes.

Comments made during today's call contain forward-looking statements within the meaning of the safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. All statements other than statements of historical facts are considered forward-looking statements. These statements are based on management's current expectations and beliefs as well as a number of assumptions concerning future events. Such forward-looking statements are subject to known and unknown risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from the results discussed in the forward-looking statements. Some of these risks and uncertainties are identified and discussed in the company's filings with the SEC.

We'll also refer to certain non-GAAP financial measures today. Please refer to the press release, which can be found on our Investor Relations website investors.localbounti.com for reconciliations of non-GAAP financial measures to their most directly comparable GAAP measures. And with that, I'd now like to turn the call over to Kathy.

Kathleen Valiasek

Thank you, Jeff. And good morning, everyone. I want to start by recognizing the work our team put in to achieve the results for sharing today. The second quarter continued the trajectory we've been building with disciplined execution across every part of the organization, and I want to walk you through that today. Revenue grew 14% year-over-year to $13.9 million and grew again sequentially from the first quarter. Adjusted EBITDA loss improved 17% year-over-year to $5.8 million, and adjusted G&A came down 17% year-over-year as well, all supporting our primary goal of achieving positive adjusted EBITDA.

We've talked for a while now about our ongoing strategic partnership discussions across the retail landscape. But I'd say in light of recent events in our industry, those conversations have never felt more relevant than they do right now. Food safety has become a genuinely mainstream conversation for consumers over the last several weeks, and that's translating directly into how retailers think about where and how they source their produce. Conversations that use to center on cost and availability now also focus on traceability water sourcing, food safety and environmental control. All questions that our CEA model was specifically built to solve for. We're seeing that shift show up almost daily across our retail network, including with prospects who aren't even our customers yet. Retailers want to understand how our water is sourced, treated and monitored in a closed loop, and while growing in doors under controlled conditions is structurally safer than open field agriculture, which is exposed to unpredictable outside conditions like runoff, wildlife and weather.

Our model also collapses much of the traditional supply chain. We take a plant from seed to finished package in a captive environment, which is a meaningful advantage when a retailer needs to understand and trace the product's journey quickly. To be clear, no system eliminates risk 100% but growing indoors remove several of the specific pathways like contaminated irrigation water, and wildlife exposure that drives these outbreaks in the first place. Conventional produce supply chains built around open fields and exposed to uncontrollable environmental impacts have a hard time addressing those difficult conversations with confidence. That shift doesn't create demand overnight, but we expect it to be a significant driver of long-term growth as retailers and ultimately, consumers increasingly choose product based on where and how it has grown and the brand behind it. The strategic conversations we've been having across our network for a while now carry more weight and move with more urgency than they did even a quarter ago.

So turning to the commercial side. Following discussions with a major retailer, we are relaunching our single-serve salad kit line and agreed with that retailer to a pilot launch throughout the Mid-Atlantic region in approximately 400 stores this fall. It's an encouraging step in building this product line that our commercial team is genuinely excited about and we expect can be a driver of continued growth for this product line in the future. We'll have more to share as that develops. So the rest of our commercial base continued to perform well across our approximately 13,000 doors and continues to build on our base of blue-chip retail relationships. The 2 accounts we discussed last quarter, a 6 SKU rollout covering more than 250 Harris Teeter stores and a large regional retailer operating 160 stores are both now fully launched and tracking in line with expectations. In July, we also launched a new retail partner in the Mid-South region featuring 5 SKUs across approximately 66 stores and in early August, launched a new retail partner in the Rocky Mountain region, featuring 4 SKUs across approximately 110 stores.

Between the first and second quarter, we were also awarded bids extending supply agreements with multiple national retail accounts. These relationships span key product lines, including baby leaf lettuce, and organic butter lettuce. These wins are a good measure of how our existing retail partners actually view us. Our Caesar Romano salad kit also continues to perform well. The additional distribution center we picked up in the first quarter, launched in May and is tracking in line with the strong velocity we saw last year. And we continue to see real opportunity in Arugula where the conventional supply chain has struggled to keep up with demand. Our greenhouse grown approach is a natural fit there, and it's a conversation more actively continuing with the retail partners. Selectively, these wins reflect the strength of our relationships with blue-chip retailers and their continued confidence in us to deliver consistent, high-quality products over the long term.

Turning to operations. The tower upgrades we completed across Georgia, Texas and Washington last year continue to deliver, running at roughly 10% higher yield capacity than before those upgrades, and our yields remain at the highest levels in the company's history. Looking at our California facilities, the selective investments we've talked about before are on track, aimed at improving efficiency in those legacy assets and strengthening our position in living butter head lettuce, and we still believe they can improve yield by as much as 20% as those projects progress through the year. In fact, our initial investments at one of our California facilities is already driving an approximate 10% increase in total production versus the prior year period. It isn't limited to California either. Across all of our facilities, we continue to make tangible progress on the cost side of the business. For example, more efficient seating practices have lowered our seed costs by approximately 20% year-over-year, and we expect to continue garnering cost savings across procurement, maintenance, labor efficiency and freight management across the network. With that, I'll turn it over to Tony for the financial review.

Anthony Hughes

Thank you, Kathy, and good morning, everyone. Turning to our results. Second quarter revenue grew 14% to $13.9 million compared to $12.1 million in the second quarter of last year, and grew approximately 4% sequentially from $13.3 million in the first quarter. The increase was driven by increased production and growth in sales from our Texas, Georgia and Washington facilities. Adjusted gross margin for the second quarter was 27%, excluding depreciation, stock-based compensation and other noncore items, compared to 30% in the prior year period and approximately 29% in the first quarter. The sequential and year-over-year decline is a function of our strategy to diversify our channel mix at our Georgia facility and resulted in temporary packing inefficiencies, which have since been refined and implemented.

As we look longer term, we expect that our increased penetration of the retail channel in combination with our broader efforts to lower input costs will support enhanced margins over time. Adjusted G&A expense for the second quarter was $4.1 million, down from $5 million in the second quarter of last year, a reduction of approximately 17% year-over-year, and essentially in line with the $4.1 million we reported in the first quarter. GAAP net loss for the second quarter was $19.8 million compared to $21.6 million in the second quarter of last year, and $12.7 million in the first quarter of 2026. The year-over-year improvement was primarily driven by a $1.5 million improvement in loss from operations reflecting lower operating expenses, along with a modest reduction in net interest expense. The sequential increase in GAAP net loss for the first quarter was almost entirely explained by noncash items. The change in fair value of our warrant liabilities swung from a $5.2 million gain in the first quarter to a $1.4 million loss in the second quarter, driven by changes in our stock price during the period.

Adjusted EBITDA loss for the second quarter was $5.8 million compared to a loss of $7.1 million in the second quarter of last year, a 17% year-over-year improvement. Relative to the first quarter, the loss was stable, and we still expect the pattern of continued improvement to hold in the second half as our network continues to mature and scale alongside our retail customers. Looking at our trending for the first half of the year, revenue is up 15% to $27.2 million, and adjusted EBITDA loss has improved approximately 24% to $11.5 million compared to $15.3 million in the first half of last year. These results reinforce that we are on the right path. With respect to the balance sheet, we ended the quarter with cash, cash equivalents and restricted cash of $10.1 million, down from $18.8 million at the end of the first quarter reflecting cash used in operations during the quarter. Subsequent to quarter end, and prior to today's call, we received an additional $12.5 million investment from an existing strategic investor which is not reflected in that $10.1 million balance.

Combined with the $15 million investment we received in March and the transactions we executed in 2025, these commitments continue to give us the financial flexibility to be strategic about growth and partnership decisions as we advance towards profitability. In terms of our outlook, we expect the trajectory of improvement we've demonstrated over the past several quarters to continue. Revenue growth and continued cost discipline remain the 2 biggest levers we have towards our goal of positive adjusted EBITDA. With that, I'll turn it back to Kathy for closing remarks.

Kathleen Valiasek

Thank you, Tony. To close, I'd say this was a quarter that moved us forward on every front that matters. The commercial pipeline turning into real placements, our operational discipline continuing to compound, and our strategic investor who knows the business well, choosing to back it with more capital. And all of it against a backdrop where the case for how we grow food has generally never been more relevant.

There is more work ahead of us before we get to positive adjusted EBITDA, but every quarter like this one narrows that gap. I'm grateful to the entire Local Bounti team for the execution and to our investors and partners for their continued confidence. That concludes our prepared remarks. Thank you again for joining us today and for your continued interest in Local Bounti.

Operator

Thank you. That does conclude today's teleconference and webcast. You may disconnect your line at this time, and have a wonderful day. We thank you for your participation today.