Flexsteel Industries 2026 財年第四季法說會摘要

Flexsteel Industries (NASDAQ: FLXS) 公布第四季營收小幅成長，但由於前一年同期受益於有利的匯率折算基期較高，調整後獲利能力有所下滑。全年銷售額成長 4%，調整後稀釋每股盈餘 (EPS) 創下 4.94 美元的歷史新高，自由現金流超過 4,700 萬美元。

重點摘要

• 2026 財年第四季淨銷售額年增 0.7% 至 1.154 億美元，將 Flexsteel 的連續成長紀錄延伸至第 11 個季度。
• 全年銷售額約為 4.59 億美元，成長 4%；調整後營運利潤率達約 7.5%，調整後稀釋 EPS 則創下 4.94 美元的歷史新高。
• 第四季調整後營運利潤率為 7.1%，低於去年同期的 9.0%。去年同期的利潤率包含有利的外幣折算所帶來的 160 個基點收益。
• 平均售價年增約 10% 至 11%。雖然整體出貨量有所下滑，但健康與保健產品以及策略客戶持續維持成長。
• Flexsteel 正退出其 homestyles DIY 組合家具業務，該業務在 2026 財年創造了約 1,200 萬美元的銷售額，且毛利率低於平均水準。
• 管理層預計 2027 財年第一季銷售額為 1.11 億至 1.15 億美元，年增 1% 至 4%，營運利潤率為 6.5% 至 7.0%。

關鍵財務數據

業務與營運表現

本季軟體沙發銷售額增加 290 萬美元。但部分增幅被 homestyles DIY 組合家具銷售額下滑 180 萬美元，以及 Flexsteel 品牌臥室、餐廳和零星櫃類家具銷售額下滑約 30 萬美元所抵銷。

管理層表示，健康與保健類別再次實現年成長。Zecliner 產品、新型 Zen 椅及策略客戶帶來了出貨量成長，而客製化產品在零售端仍面臨挑戰。

平均售價較去年同期上漲約 10% 至 11%。儘管總出貨量有所下滑，但管理層表示，銷量萎縮幅度尚不足以抵銷價格調整帶來的效益。

由於競爭加劇且回報率不佳，Flexsteel 決定退出 homestyles DIY 組合家具類別。公司預計在未來三到六個月內將剩餘庫存變現，並準備出售位於印第安納州亨廷堡的物流中心。管理層表示，退出該業務應能適度提升整體產品組合的獲利能力。

若扣除 homestyles 業務，管理層估計第四季成長率約為 2.3%，而 2026 財年成長率將更接近 6.5% 至 7%。

管理層財務展望

針對 2027 財年第一季，管理層預期：

• 淨銷售額為 1.11 億至 1.15 億美元，年增 1% 至 4%。
• 營運利潤率為 6.5% 至 7.0%。
• 軟體沙發的成長將足以抵銷已停產 homestyles 類別的營收下滑。
• 供模型推算參考，營業費用（SG&A）占營收比重預計介於 15% 高段至 16% 低段。

管理層預期成本管控舉措與小幅調漲價格可抵銷大部分供應鏈通膨影響。然而，這些措施的效果以及通膨的嚴重程度仍可能稀釋毛利率及營運利潤率。

公司強調，第一季營運利潤率區間不應被視為常態或底部。管理層對透過產品組合管理、生產力提升、嚴格成本控管及執行力所實現的結構性獲利能力改善仍充滿信心。

風險與關注焦點

消費者需求仍不均衡，信心低迷與負擔能力壓力影響了非必需消費。管理層亦觀察到更高價位的消費者對性價比的敏感度有所提高。

高企的能源價格正推升原料、外包成品、國內運輸及進口海運貨運的成本。管理層提及的原物料包括聚酯、合板及鋼材。

關稅政策仍具不確定性，而與中東衝突相關的地緣政治不確定性降低了能見度。管理層認為消費者需求是第一季營收預測中最主要的變數來源。

以 2026 財年年化基準計算，退出 homestyles 業務將減少約 1,200 萬美元的營收，但管理層預期對整體產品組合獲利能力僅有適度的正面影響。

分析師問答環節亮點

• 價格與出貨量：管理層表示，平均售價上漲 10% 至 11%。整體出貨量下降，但健康與保健產品、Zecliner、Zen 椅及策略客戶均實現了出貨量成長。
• 退出 homestyles 業務：該類別在 2026 財年貢獻了約 1,200 萬美元的銷售額，且毛利低於平均水準。Flexsteel 預期退出該業務會帶來銷售壓力，但能適度改善產品組合獲利能力。
• 毛利率壓力：管理層正透過節省成本和小幅調漲價格來應對原料、貨運及運輸通膨，同時密切關注對需求的潛在影響。
• 消費者定位：儘管消費者對性價比的意識有所提高，Flexsteel 仍不打算改變其策略或行銷方針。管理層持續專注於為目標客戶提供差異化的創新產品。
• 資本配置：優先事項仍為維持強健的資產負債表、資助有機成長投資，以及評估預期報酬超越公司資本成本的併購（M&A）機會。過剩資本可能會透過股利和股票回購發還給股東。

法說會完整逐字稿

完整財報電話會議逐字稿

管理層陳述

Operator

Good morning, everyone, and welcome to the Flexsteel Industries Fourth Quarter Fiscal Year 2026 Earnings Conference Call. [Operator Instructions] Please also note that today's event is being recorded. At this time, I'd like to turn the conference call over to Mike Ressler, Chief Financial Officer for Flexsteel Industries. Please go ahead.

Michael Ressler

Thank you, and welcome to today's call to discuss Flexsteel Industries Fourth Quarter Fiscal Year 2026 Financial Results. Our earnings release, which we issued after market close yesterday, Monday, August 17, is available on the Investor Relations section of our website at www.flexsteel.com under News & Events.

I'm here today with Derek Schmidt, President and Chief Executive Officer. On today's call, we will provide prepared remarks, and then we will open the call to your questions. Before we begin, I would like to remind you that the comments on today's call will include forward-looking statements, which can be identified using words such as estimate, anticipate, expect and similar phrases.

Forward-looking statements, by their nature, involve estimates, projections, goals, forecasts and assumptions and are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results or outcomes to differ materially from those expressed in the forward-looking statements. Such risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to, those that are described in our most recent annual report on Form 10-K, as updated by our subsequent quarterly reports on Form 10-Q and other SEC filings as applicable.

These forward-looking statements speak only as of the date of this conference call and should not be relied upon as predictions of future events. Additionally, we may refer to non-GAAP measures, which are intended to supplement, but not substitute for the most directly comparable GAAP measures. The press release available on the website contains the financial and other quantitative information to be discussed today. And with that, I'll turn the call over to Derek Schmidt. Derek?

Derek Schmidt

Good morning, and thank you for joining us today. I am pleased to share our fourth quarter and fiscal year 2026 results. While the operating environment became increasingly challenging throughout the year, particularly during the second half, our team continued to execute at a high level and delivered another year of strong financial and strategic progress.

During fiscal year 2026, we generated sales of approximately $459 million, representing 4% growth over the prior year despite a weak and highly variable demand environment for furniture. We expanded adjusted operating margins to approximately 7.5%, generated record adjusted earnings per diluted share of $4.94, and produced more than $47 million of free cash flow. Our strong cash generation enabled us to return meaningful capital to shareholders through share repurchases, and we recently increased our dividend by 25% while maintaining a strong balance sheet.

These results are encouraging given the number of external challenges our industry faced during the year. Demand remained inconsistent, tariff policies continue to evolve, geopolitical events created heightened macroeconomic uncertainty, and inflationary pressures intensified as rising energy prices drove higher transportation and material costs. Despite these headwinds, our organization remained agile, disciplined and focused on execution.

I believe our performance this year demonstrates the resilience of our business model and the progress we've made strengthening our operating capabilities over the past several years. Turning to the fourth quarter. Net sales were modestly above the prior year period, continuing a streak of 11 consecutive quarters of year-over-year growth. While we are never satisfied with modest sales growth, the quarter must be viewed within the context of an increasingly difficult demand environment, which weakened significantly following the start of the war with Iran.

Consumer confidence remains subdued, affordability challenges continue to pressure discretionary spending, and ongoing uncertainty related to the conflict in the Middle East has weighed on economic sentiment. Even consumers shopping at higher price points have become increasingly value conscious in recent months. Importantly, many of the strategic initiatives driving our long-term growth continue to perform well.

Our Health and Wellness category once again delivered positive year-over-year growth, and we continue to make progress with strategic accounts and key new product introductions. While growth rates moderated along with the broader market, these initiatives continue to outperform the overall business and reinforce our confidence in the long-term opportunity ahead.

From a profitability perspective, we delivered adjusted operating margins of approximately 7.1% in the quarter. While this was below the prior year period, which benefited from an unusually large foreign currency gain, profitability was sustained sequentially from the third quarter and remained strong relative to both our historical performance and industry norms. Our results continue to reflect the benefits of disciplined product portfolio management, operational productivity improvements and prudent management of selling and administrative expenses while continuing to fund critical growth investments.

Beyond the financial results, I am particularly pleased with the strategic progress we made during fiscal year 2026. Over the past several years, we have invested heavily in strengthening our consumer insights capabilities, accelerating innovation, improving product development processes and expanding our marketing capabilities. During fiscal year 2026, we continued building on these investments and further strengthened our ability to bring relevant products to market that resonate with both consumers and retail partners.

We believe these capabilities are becoming increasingly important competitive advantages. Better consumer insights lead to better products, better products improve retail adoption and consumer demand and stronger marketing builds brand awareness and drives traffic to our retail partners. Together, these investments are helping us create a more durable growth platform, capable of generating long-term share gains across a variety of market conditions.

As we look ahead, however, we remain measured in our outlook for the near term. Consumer demand remains uneven. Inflationary pressures have increased and visibility remains limited. Rising energy costs are creating additional pressure across transportation, freight and raw material inputs. The tariff environment also remains highly fluid with uncertainty surrounding both future trade policies and potential changes to existing tariff structures. As a result, we expect industry conditions to remain challenging as we enter fiscal year 2027.

While the near-term environment may remain difficult, our strategy and priorities are unchanged. We will continue to operate with agility, maintain disciplined cost control, protect our strong financial position and invest in the capabilities that we believe will drive long-term growth and shareholder value creation. We have successfully navigated periods of disruption before, and I am confident that the combination of our balance sheet strength, operating discipline and strategic investments position us well to continue strengthening our competitive position over time.

With that, I'll turn the call over to Mike, who will provide additional details on our fourth quarter financial performance and outlook for Q1 fiscal year 2027.

Michael Ressler

Thanks, Derek. For the fourth quarter, net sales were $115.4 million or growth of 0.7% compared to net sales of $114.6 million in the prior year quarter. The increase was driven by a $2.9 million increase in sales of soft seating products, partially offset by a $1.8 million sales decline in our ready-to-assemble products sold under the homestyles brand. Sales of Flexsteel branded bedroom, dining and occasional case goods products were down roughly $0.3 million in the quarter.

Sales order backlog at the end of the period was $70.1 million, an increase of approximately 5.5% compared to the same period in the prior year. On a sequential basis, backlog is down approximately 11.8% from third quarter. The sequential decline in backlog aligns with historical patterns driven by softer demand leading into the summer season.

From a profit perspective, the company delivered GAAP operating income of $16.3 million or 14.2% of sales in the fourth quarter compared to operating income of $14 million or 12.2% of sales in the prior year quarter. GAAP operating margin of 14.2% includes a 780 basis point benefit from IEEPA tariff refunds received in the quarter and a negative 70 basis point impact from costs related to the exit of our homestyles branded ready-to-assemble product category, including employee separation costs and inventory liquidations and write-downs.

Excluding the impact of these items, adjusted operating margin was 7.1% of sales in the current quarter compared to adjusted operating margin of 9.0% of sales in the prior year quarter. Prior year quarter adjusted operating margin included a 160 basis point benefit from favorable foreign currency translation. Regarding refunds received for previously paid IEEPA tariffs, the company evaluated the appropriate accounting and business considerations for those funds. And based on the facts and circumstances of the matter, reported a reduction to cost of goods sold in the period.

Priorities for cash and liquidity include funding investments in consumer insights, innovation, new products and marketing to execute our growth strategy and strengthen our competitive advantage. During the quarter, the company made the decision to exit the ready-to-assemble product category, which has become increasingly competitive, difficult to sustain a competitive advantage, and no longer generates attractive returns.

Over the next 3 to 6 months, we expect to monetize remaining inventory and prepare our Huntingburg, Indiana distribution center for sale, which currently only services the ready-to-assemble category and is not required to support our long-term growth priorities.

Moving to the balance sheet and statement of cash flows. The company ended the quarter with a cash balance of $16.7 million, working capital of $94.6 million and no bank debt. Cash flow generated from operations in the quarter totaled $24.3 million, driven by strong net income and effective working capital management. During the quarter, the company repurchased roughly 1.3 million shares of outstanding stock for $62.6 million and paid $1.1 million in cash dividends or $0.20 per share.

Turning to our outlook for Q1 fiscal year 2027. We project net sales of $111 million to $115 million or 1% to 4% growth versus the prior year quarter. We anticipate sales growth from soft seating products to outweigh sales declines from the ready-to-assemble homestyles branded product category that we are exiting. The key determinant to our top line forecast with the largest variability will be consumer demand.

From a profitability perspective, the company expects operating margin in the range of 6.5% to 7.0%. Since the beginning of the conflict in the Middle East, we have experienced material supply chain inflation driven by elevated energy prices, including impacts to raw materials, sourced finished products, domestic transportation and inbound ocean freight. The company implemented a wide range of initiatives and pricing in the market.

We anticipate our mitigation actions to mostly offset cost inflation. However, we may experience some dilution to gross margins and operating margins in the quarter depending on the effectiveness of our actions and the ultimate severity of supply chain inflation. With that, I'll turn the call back over to Derek to share his closing perspectives.

Derek Schmidt

Thanks, Mike. Fiscal year 2026 was a year that demonstrated both the strength of our strategy and the resilience of our organization. We delivered sales growth, expanded margins, generated record earnings, produced strong free cash flow and returned significant capital to shareholders despite operating in one of the most uncertain environments our industry has faced in recent years.

As we enter fiscal year 2027, we recognize that many of those external challenges remain. Demand conditions continue to be uneven, inflationary pressures are building and geopolitical and trade-related uncertainty remain elevated. While these factors may create near-term volatility, they do not change our long-term outlook for the business. Our focus remains squarely on what we can control, serving customers exceptionally well, driving innovation and product development, strengthening our brand, improving productivity and allocating capital thoughtfully.

We believe our strong balance sheet, disciplined operating model and continued investment in long-term growth initiatives position us well to navigate the current environment while continuing to create value for our shareholders. With that, we'll open the call to your questions. Operator?

Operator

[Operator Instructions] Our first question today comes from Anthony Lebiedzinski from Sidoti.

分析師問答

Anthony Lebiedzinski

So first, can you talk about the impact of pricing versus unit volumes in the quarter? I know it varies by product category, but if you could give us some additional details, that would be very helpful.

Michael Ressler

Anthony, yes. So obviously, pricing in Q4 of this year was meaningfully higher than what it was in the prior year. On average, I would say pricing was up probably 10% to 11%. What we're encouraged by is given the magnitude of pricing that we had to take throughout the year to cover a variety of cost pressures that we did see unit volume declines, but not to the level that more than offset the pricing action.

Areas where unit volumes are up and what's really encouraging within some of our strategic growth areas such as our Health and Wellness category, the Zecliner product we have, the new Zen chairs, those are performing very well as also seeing nice unit volume growth with strategic accounts. Areas where I would say volumes are probably underperforming or where we're down a little bit is the made-to-order category, which we've kind of talked about, that category continues to be more challenged at retail. And then obviously, case goods down a little bit. We're encouraged by the momentum we're gaining at the retail channel, but we've kind of scaled some of our growth ambitions across the national accounts for case goods.

Anthony Lebiedzinski

And then I have a 2-part question here. So as far as it relates to the homestyles brand, can you give us a sense as to how much annual sales you were doing with the brand? And then I guess the second part here is that I assume that homestyles was not contributing to the bottom line. Is that correct? And if so, how should we think about the bottom line impact as you exit from homestyles?

Michael Ressler

Yes, Anthony. So the homestyles business, that category has been challenged for a while, particularly got even more challenged when tariffs went into effect. But if you were to peel homestyles out of our business, our growth in the quarter would have been closer to 2.3%. So just around $12 million in sales this year.

As far as profitability goes, it was lower performing in terms of gross profit versus our category average. So as we kind of work ourselves out of that, we will have some decline in sales, but I would expect a little bit of improvement in our overall portfolio profitability, but relatively modest given the small amount of sales that contributed to the company.

Derek Schmidt

Anthony, I'll just add. So I mean, as you start to think about your modeling, homestyles was probably roughly about $12 million of sales in fiscal year '26. So that will go away. What we're encouraged by overall sales for fiscal year '26 were up about 4%. If you were to take the homestyles drag out, we would have been closer to 6.5%, kind of closer to 7%. And we feel really good about that performance given the challenging environment that we operated in.

Anthony Lebiedzinski

And then Derek, I thought your quote was interesting in your press release when you talked about that even consumers shopping at higher price points have become increasingly value conscious. So with that in mind, how are you adapting your product portfolio and marketing messaging to try to take advantage of this?

Derek Schmidt

Yes. Maybe a little bit of context, Anthony. I would say that the upper income consumers are still shopping and they're still buying. But I think they're more cognizant of the external landscape and the economic environment and a bit more cautious. That said, we're actually not changing our strategy, we're not changing our marketing message. Those are consumers we understand. We understand their needs, their problems, and we're driving innovation to meet their needs better than the competitive alternatives.

And our marketing message is around why that innovation is differentiated and why it serves their needs better than the competition. So I don't think we're changing anything strategically or in our marketing message. But certainly, we're keeping a strong pulse on the health of the consumer across different income levels. But I think it's not surprising given the external environment, rising inflation that consumers across all income levels are a bit more cautious.

Anthony Lebiedzinski

Yes. And then so as we think about gross margins, it looks like excluding the tariff refunds and the onetime exit costs related to homestyles, you guys were at about 23% for the fourth quarter. I know you mentioned that with the exit of homestyles, that should be a bit of a lift for the gross margin. But I know there are some pressures on ocean freight costs and other costs as well. So as we think about the different puts and takes about the gross margin, how do we think about the gross margins kind of on a go-forward basis?

Michael Ressler

Yes, Anthony, in our Q1 outlook, we guided 6.5% to 7% operating margin. The biggest factors there would be the impact of all these cost pressures on our gross margin. So clearly, we've had inflation on raw material inputs from poly to plywood to steel, freight costs, transportation costs and fuels impacting the cost to get raw materials and everything into our plants.

We've experienced cost inflation on our sourced finished product. Certainly, seen recent spikes in ocean freight rates to bring finished product in. So there's a lot of moving parts. It's super dynamic. What I would tell you is like we've done in the past, we're going to continue to approach it from multiple angles.

We've implemented cost savings initiatives to help mitigate it, and we've also implemented a modest amount of pricing, what we believe is -- can be absorbed in the market, but we'll obviously watch what we see on unit volume demand given we want to be very competitive in the market. So our target is to continue to mitigate the impact of that stuff. But certainly, the severity of what happens with inflation could certainly impact gross margins, and that's kind of why we gave you that range in the operating margin for the quarter.

Derek Schmidt

The thing I'd add, Anthony, I wouldn't necessarily characterize our guidance range of 6.5% to 7% as a new normal or even a floor. As you're well aware, I mean, we've made some substantial structural improvements to the profitability of the business over the past couple of years through product portfolio management, productivity, cost discipline, improved execution. And longer term, we remain confident in that structural profitability improvements that we've made. I just think the near-term external environment will determine the pace of further improvement on our margin structure.

Anthony Lebiedzinski

And then as far as SG&A, that came in slightly ahead of our estimates. I know you guys continue to focus on driving innovation and consumer research and consumer insights. So how do we think about just SG&A going forward here as we look to update the models?

Michael Ressler

Anthony, what I would tell you is we're going to continue to be prudent in managing SG&A spending, but we're also going to continue to invest in those things that are enabling us to gain share and strengthen our competitive advantage. So think about it in terms of probably high 15%, low 16 percentage range for your model.

Anthony Lebiedzinski

And lastly for me, just as we think about capital allocation, so in fiscal '26, you bought back a lot of your stock and you raised the dividend 25%. So going forward, how do we think about your capital allocation priorities?

Michael Ressler

Yes. So I would say relatively intact. We want to continue to maintain a strong balance sheet, give us flexibility to operate in the dynamic environment that we're in. We're going to continue to fund the investments that we talked about that are driving our organic growth. And then if you look out beyond that, as you think about M&A and things like that, we'll continue to evaluate investment opportunities, but they certainly would need to deliver ROI above our cost of capital. And if those things don't exist, we'll return excess capital to shareholders through dividend and repurchases based on the cash and capital needs of the business.

Operator

Our next question comes from Balzhan Tleuzhanova from Freedom Broker.

Balzhan Tleuzhanova

Congrats, both of you on this quarter -- strong quarter. Yes. My question was about capital allocation, but Anthony asked this question. So I have no question anymore.

Operator

[Operator Instructions] We do have an additional question from Donald Hall from DMH Advisors.

Unknown Analyst

I believe I heard that in the fourth quarter, you are exiting the ready-to-assemble category of your product line?

Derek Schmidt

Correct.

Unknown Analyst

Can you give us an idea of the magnitude that has on your revenue? Is it 10% of revenue...

Derek Schmidt

Yes, it is -- yes, we addressed that. Anthony asked that question. This year was approximately $12 million.

Unknown Analyst

$12 million, okay.

Derek Schmidt

Correct.

Unknown Analyst

And then I believe I heard that in the first quarter, you expect revenue to increase 1% to 4% in spite of that withdrawal. Did I hear that correctly?

Derek Schmidt

Correct. Yes.

Operator

And I'm showing no additional questions, we'll be ending today's question-and-answer session. I'd like to turn the floor back over to the management team for any closing remarks.

Derek Schmidt

All right. In closing, I want to thank our employees for their hard work, commitment and outstanding execution throughout fiscal year 2026. I believe the accomplishments we delivered this year from strong financial performance to meaningful strategic progress are a direct reflection of the talent, dedication and resilience of our team.

And while we enter fiscal year 2027 facing a continued uncertain environment, we do so from a position of strength. We have a strong balance sheet, a resilient operating model, a clear strategy and a team that has repeatedly demonstrated its ability to adapt and execute through changing conditions. I remain highly confident in our ability to navigate these challenges while continuing to strengthen our business, gain share over time and create long-term value for our customers and shareholders.

Thank you again for joining us today and for your continued interest in Flexsteel, and we look forward to updating you on our progress next quarter.

Operator

And with that, ladies and gentlemen, we'll be concluding today's conference call and presentation. We do thank you for joining. You may now disconnect your lines.