Reed's (REED) Q2 2026 Earnings Call: Margin Improves, Financing Reviewed

Key Takeaways

• Q2 2026 net sales were $7.5 million, down from $9.5 million a year earlier due primarily to lower volumes from recurring national customers. Sales increased 5% sequentially from Q1 2026.
• Gross margin improved to 24% from 8% year over year. Inventory write-offs fell to $0.1 million from $1.6 million.
• Net loss narrowed 29% to $4.3 million, or $0.36 per share, while EBITDA loss decreased 30% to $4.0 million.
• Operating cash use declined to $2.2 million from $5.0 million. Reed’s ended the quarter with $2.4 million in cash and $9.2 million in total debt, net of deferred financing fees.
• Management is targeting gross margin expansion into the mid-30% range over time through pricing, trade-spend efficiency, logistics improvements and tighter inventory management.
• Reed’s is evaluating financing alternatives to support the business and future growth.

Key Financial Data

Business and Operating Performance

Reed’s substantially completed its portfolio rationalization, liquidating underperforming and non-strategic SKUs. Inventory declined to $7 million, supporting an improved cash conversion cycle.

The company consolidated its contract manufacturing network and removed two co-manufacturers whose production and outbound logistics costs exceeded benchmarks elsewhere in the network. New operations software and an internally developed sales and demand planning tool are intended to improve forecasting, raw-material purchasing and working-capital efficiency.

Commercial efforts focused on rebuilding retail relationships, regaining shelf space and restoring heritage glass bottle packaging. Reed’s national broker partner now has more than 75 sales professionals supporting retail coverage and in-market execution.

Second-half product initiatives include 4-packs of 7.5-ounce mini cans covering tonic, club and grapefruit mixers, all with a hint of ginger. Reed’s also plans to introduce its canned ginger ale in glass bottles and is developing premium ginger beer in several exotic flavors.

Management Outlook

Management expects gross margin to expand into the mid-30% range over time. Planned drivers include selective SKU-level price increases, lower trade-spend leakage, manufacturing optimization and reduced inventory write-offs.

The company also expects further inventory reductions in Q3 as it expands its planning and inventory-management capabilities. Management said retail commitments secured through renewed customer engagement should begin to materialize from later in Q3 through Q1 2027.

Reed’s is evaluating financing alternatives to support the business and its growth plans.

Risks and Items to Watch

• Year-over-year sales remained under pressure because of lower volumes from recurring national customers.
• Reed’s continued to report operating and EBITDA losses despite meaningful improvement from the prior year.
• Cash declined to $2.4 million at June 30, 2026, while total debt remained $9.2 million, increasing the importance of the financing alternatives under review.
• Growth depends on maintaining in-stock performance, restoring retail shelf space and converting customer commitments into sales.
• New product launches require careful inventory management to avoid tying up cash in high minimum-order production runs.

Analyst Q&A Highlights

Management said relationships with major retailers remain intact and cited engagement with Food Lion, Publix, Sprouts, Kroger, Wegmans, Ingles, Harris Teeter and Albertsons. Reed’s also expects to meet with Whole Foods in October, with restored glass bottle packaging forming part of its retail recovery effort.

To limit working-capital demands from new products, Reed’s is using production partners capable of lower minimum-order quantities. Management said this should allow the company to test demand without producing 20,000 to 30,000 cases per new SKU.

For margin improvement, Reed’s is using AI-supported customer and product analysis across its largest accounts, which management said represent 85% to 90% of the business. The company is also considering selective price increases for SKUs requiring additional margin support.

Full Earnings Call Transcript

Complete Earnings Call Transcript

Management Remarks

Operator

Good morning, and welcome to Reed's Second Quarter 2026 Earnings Conference Call for the three months ended June 30, 2026.

My name is Mark, and I will be your conference call operator for today. Today's call will include prepared remarks from Neal Cohane, Reed's Interim Chief Executive Officer; and Douglas McCurdy, Reed's Chief Financial Officer.

Following the remarks, we will open the call for questions.

Before we begin, please take note of the company's cautionary statement. Today's call will include forward-looking statements, including statements about Reed's business strategy, growth initiatives, financial projections, operational improvements, the impact of corrective efforts, financing plans, and liquidity. These statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those contained in the forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements inherently involve risks and uncertainties and only reflect management's view as of today, August 12, 2026.

Reed's assumes no obligation and does not intend to update these forward-looking statements except as required by law. For more information, please refer to the Risk Factors section of the company's annual report filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission on March 25, 2026, and in other filings that the company makes from time to time with the SEC.

When discussing results, the presenters may refer to non-GAAP measures which exclude certain items from reported results. Please refer to Reed's second quarter 2026 earnings release on Reed's investor website at investor.reedsinc.com, and the company's quarterly report on Form 10-Q for the quarter ended June 30, 2026, expected to be available on the website soon, for definitions and reconciliations of non-GAAP measures and additional information regarding results, including a discussion of factors that could cause actual results to materially differ from forward-looking statements.

While we believe the non-GAAP financial measures provide useful information for investors, the presentation of this information is not intended to be considered in isolation or as a substitute for the financial information presented in accordance with GAAP.

I will now turn the call over to Mr. Cohane. Please, go ahead.

Neal Cohane

Thanks, Mark, and good morning, everyone. We're now halfway through 2026, and I want to speak very plainly about where we stand. The second quarter results reflect early progress from corrective actions initiated earlier this year.

Net sales increased 5% compared to the first quarter. Gross margin expanded as well, and we expect continued expansion in the mid-30% area over time. Selling, general, and administrative costs decreased 18% compared to the first quarter, and we will continue to better balance these expenses.

Net loss decreased, and we are focused on achieving profitable growth. While these results represent improvement from the first quarter, the work is not finished, and the results are not where we want them to be. We need to continue improving sales execution, retail placement, and operating efficiency.

Let me give you some context on the key areas of progress during the second quarter. The first area is inventory. In the first quarter, inventory write-offs had a significant impact on our margins. In the second quarter, those write-offs declined materially as we substantially completed the portfolio rationalization work. We have liquidated underperforming and non-strategic SKUs, and we are now operating with a leaner, more focused inventory position. Overall, we reduced inventory to $7 million and improved our cash conversion cycle.

The second area is commercial execution. We regained shelf space and grew doors by reengaging national and regional retail accounts and restored our heritage glass bottle packaging. We have also invested in our national broker partner, which now has more than 75 sales professionals partnering with us to achieve success across key channels by increasing retail coverage and non-in market execution -- I'm sorry, improving in-market execution.

The third area is cost structure. We have taken action to better align SG&A with the current size of the business and improve trade spend efficiency, which is contributing to higher gross margins. We will continue to review the cost structure and prioritize spending that supports commercial execution.

On the product side, we have several initiatives building for the second half of the year. Our new mixer line is just about ready to hit the streets, and many retailers across the country are clearing space for our new 4-pack, 7.5-ounce mini cans of tonic, club, and grapefruit mixers. All have a hint of ginger. Our top-selling ginger ale in cans will soon be available in glass bottles. We expect this to be one of the most successful SKUs in our portfolio. We're also currently working on the most unique line of premium ginger beer in several unique exotic flavors.

Moving on to the ops side of the business. Damian Warshall, our Chief Operating Officer, has now completed his first full quarter with Reed's. His initial focus was on inventory control, supply chain management, vendor relationships, and production efficiency. During this time, we launched a comprehensive review of our contract manufacturing network, consolidating production to align each item with the optimal facility and region. We believe that work is already producing results. We rationalized 2 co-manufacturers in our legacy network whose combined production and outbound logistics costs were running well above the benchmarks we were achieving elsewhere, tightening our cost structure and reinforcing our foundation as we scale.

We've also deployed new operations software that we believe meaningfully strengthens how we forecast and manage raw material purchasing on a national basis, enabling us to operate leaner, reducing the aggregate inventory we carry ahead of production while preserving our ability to serve demand.

Stepping back, the second quarter demonstrated sequential progress in gross margin, inventory management, and overall operating performance, but we recognize that substantial work remains. As we move through the second half of the year, we are focused on disciplined commercial execution, continued margin improvement, and positioning Reed's for profitable and sustainable growth.

In the third quarter, we see continued opportunity to bring national inventory levels down further as we make efforts to build out our inventory planning and management capabilities. All this work is expected to free up working capital and improve the efficiency of our production footprint. Over the past 2 months, our team has taken the initiative to develop an in-house proprietary sales and demand planning tool purposely built for how this organization plans, tracking the baseline needs of our customers, while dynamically accounting for seasonality and the distribution gains we expect to capture through the annual sales cycle. We believe this positions us for continued working capital gains as we keep optimizing inventory across the network.

Finally, we are also evaluating financing alternatives to support our growth going forward.

With that, I'll turn the call over to Doug, our CFO, who will discuss the second quarter results in greater detail. Doug?

Douglas McCurdy

Thank you, Neal. Turning to our results for the second quarter of 2026. All variance commentary is on a year-over-year basis unless otherwise noted.

Net sales for the second quarter of 2026 were $7.5 million, compared to $9.5 million in the prior year period. The decrease was primarily driven by lower volumes with recurring national customers. On a sequential basis, net sales increased 5% from the first quarter of 2026, reflecting early progress with our profitable growth initiatives.

Gross profit for the second quarter increased to $1.8 million, compared to $0.8 million in the prior year period. Gross margin increased to 24% compared to 8% in the prior year period. The improvement was primarily driven by lower inventory write-offs, which declined to $0.1 million from $1.6 million in the prior year period.

Delivery and handling costs decreased 30% to $1.1 million during the second quarter of 2026, compared to $1.6 million in the second quarter of 2025, primarily driven by continued improvements in logistics efficiency and freight optimization. Delivery and handling costs were 15% of net sales or $2.54 per case compared to 17% of net sales or $2.95 per case during the same period last year.

Selling, general, and administrative expenses decreased 6% to $4.7 million, compared to $5.0 million in the prior year period. The decrease was primarily driven by lower legal settlements and continuing efforts to optimize selling, general, and administrative expenses, offset by investment in personnel and related services to support our Asia growth initiative.

Net loss during the second quarter of 2026 decreased 29% to $4.3 million, or negative $0.36 per share, compared to a net loss of $6.0 million, or negative $0.78 per share, in the prior year period.

EBITDA loss decreased 30% to $4.0 million in the second quarter of 2026 compared to $5.7 million in the year-ago period.

Cash used in operations decreased to $2.2 million in the second quarter of 2026 compared to cash used in operations of $5.0 million in the year-ago period.

As of June 30, 2026, Reed's had $2.4 million of cash and $9.2 million of total debt, net of deferred financing fees. This compares to $10.4 million of cash and $9.2 million of total debt, net of deferred financing fees at December 31, 2025.

As Neal noted, we are evaluating financing alternatives to support the business going forward.

This concludes our prepared remarks. Operator, you may open the line for questions.

Operator

[Operator Instructions] Your first question comes from Aaron Grey from Alliance Global Partners.

Question-and-Answer Session

Aaron Grey

I guess, first one from me. Regarding some of the vendor relationships that you referred to, maybe talk about where those stand? I know there's been some changes, probably some disruption. So how do some of those key relationships stand today in terms of retaining or maybe gaining back some shelf space for some of those key partners?

Neal Cohane

Yes, Aaron, this is Neal. That's a great question. And I have to tell you, we reduced the size of our sales team because we now have a broker partner. I can tell you I've got the 4 best salespeople in the country today. I would match them up to any other small beverage company like ourselves. We've touched almost every one of our big customers, not completed yet, some are still ready to go, but we've touched and spoken with, and myself personally involved: Food Lion, Publix, Sprouts, Kroger, Wegmans, Ingles, Harris Teeter, Albertsons. Across the country, we've talked to everybody.

Everybody loves the brand. Everybody wanted to make sure we were, A, staying in stock and we could handle their business. Two, some want the glass bottle back, so we're bringing glass bottles back into some locations, which will be extremely helpful.

I think it was very, very tough. This brand was born on glass bottles back in 1986, '87. It was our legacy, was the glass bottle, and it was eliminated overnight, which hurt us and impacted our business significantly at places like Whole Foods, just one of our largest volume per outlet customers, completely hurt us there. We have a meeting coming up with Whole Foods in October, personally with the buyer. And I can tell you, I believe that's going to be a very, very effective meeting. We have a lot to talk about.

So, long answer to a short question. Yes, our relationships are very much intact, and our business is only going to get better. And we're seeing the results right now. While we're getting commitments now, we'll start seeing those commitments come to fruition sometime around the end of this third, mid-third to going into first quarter of next year.

Aaron Grey

Okay, great. Really appreciate that color and glad to hear in terms of some of that progress there. I guess, assuming that we get some of these accounts back and get some shelf space, how should we think about then ensuring that you're properly inventoried and capitalized on those growth opportunities, particularly as we think about where the balance sheet stands today and there might be some constraints?

Neal Cohane

Yes, the one thing that, you know, bringing Damian on. Damian knew our system very, very well. Damian also knows our bottling network very, very well. We have also met with the bottlers. We've met with our production houses. And we also are using Chris Reed, the founder of the company, and his production facility out on the West Coast. It's allowing us to reduce our minimum order quantities. So as we start bringing on new SKUs, we're not going to have to have and produce 20,000 and 30,000 cases per new SKU.

We're going to be able to get it to a very, very reasonable amount, which will preserve cash, and it'll allow us kind of to see the market, test the market, see where we need to make improvement. We're much smarter about how we do things in terms of creating -- rather than creating tons of inventory which will tie up cash. We're going to be very strategic how we do it. We're probably one of the best things we have going right now is our relationships with these guys.

Aaron Grey

Okay, that's great to hear. Maybe last question from me, just on the gross margin, right? Nice to see some of the sequential improvement during the quarter. Given all the puts and takes of what you're just talking about, being able to be more nimble and efficient in terms of the new SKU launches, and obviously having a big prioritization in terms of profitable sales as you now go forward and look for growth, how should we think about the evolution of the gross margin profile over the next 12 months?

Neal Cohane

Aaron, we have implemented and installed a system right now that is best-in-class. I would hold it up against any major beverage company in the country. We're using AI in a very strategic way to help us look and evaluate how our business is in every single one of our -- and I'll just say start with our top 25 customers because those customers drive a big part of our business, 85% to 90% of our business. We now can look and perform an ROI in minutes when it used to take a little while longer than that and not be as accurate. So we can see what our mix looks like, we can see what's driving the business quickly, we'll know it, we have it at our fingertips.

But we're also working on some strategic price increases. It's not across the board, but across SKUs that we know need to have a slight more bit of a little push so we can get our margins into the, as Doug said, into the 30s and mid-30s and above range.

Operator

[Operator Instructions] There are no further questions at this time. I will now turn the call over to Mr. Cohane for closing remarks. Please continue.

Neal Cohane

Thanks, Mark. Thanks for joining the call today. We believe the actions we are taking will position Reed's for continued improvement going forward and long-term sustainable growth. We appreciate your continued interest in Reed's, and we look forward to updating you on progress during the next call. Thank you.

Operator

Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes today's conference call. Thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect your lines. Have a good day.