BellRing Brands, Inc. (NYSE:BRBR) Q4 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

Paul Rode: Yes. Darcy, I’ll take the first question. You can take the second part of the question. Yes, we are modeling our marketing spend being kind of the 3% to 3.5% range. We don’t think we’ll get to 4%, that is more likely as we go forward with our full production capacity going, but we’ll be in that 3%, 3.5% range is our expectation for ’24.

Darcy Davenport: Yes. Your second part of the question, I just want to be clear. So, we are supporting — fully supporting in marketing the parts of the business where we have capacity. So think of we are fully supporting Dymatize, Premier Protein Powder, our Premier bottles. What we are waiting on until from a marketing perspective until Q4 is really the Tetra side of the business on Premier Protein. And that is purely a reflection of capacity. We just need to make sure that we have the capacity and we have the right level of inventory that we can — that we can support it from a marketing perspective and see the lift.

Matt McGinley: Got it. That makes sense. And with the debt repayments that you made on your revolver last year and into this one, you have a zero balance, and I don’t believe you can call your senior notes until a couple of years out. I think in the prepared remarks, it sounds like working capital would be more of an investment this year, but you’d still probably be building cash over the course of this year. Do you expect share repurchase to become more of a priority this year? Or does it make sense to sit on larger cash balances this year to, I guess, to have some dry powder if you see opportunities that present themselves?

Paul Rode: Yes. In ’24, we expect to continue to look at share repurchases as the primary use of our capital. I would say that in ’23, we actually — we bought back 125 million of shares. So I wouldn’t say it was light in ’23 as well. But as we go into ’24, to your point, the — we could build cash, but share repurchases and being opportunistic there is the more likely use of our capital.

Operator: [Operator Instructions] Our next question comes from Bryan Spillane with Bank of America. You may proceed.

Bryan Spillane: So I guess two kind of follow-ups. One, I think, Matt asked earlier about are promotion level this year kind of normalized. What about — can you comment also on just marketing, Darcy? I guess I was thinking back, you’ve had capacity spend on limitation for a while, on and off. And so, you — I think my impression has maybe restrained marketing spend a bit. So, now that you have more capacity and we’re looking at this year, is this a normal year? Or would you expect that you have more capacity, again, assuming demand continues to increase that marketing, whether it’s in absolute dollars or percentage of sales, how would that evolve with having more production?

Darcy Davenport: Yes. From a marketing perspective, it is not a normal year. So we would — because we’re really starting — like I said, we are supporting the size of the business that we have capacity. So normal year for Dymatize, Premier Protein Powder, bottles, but on the Tetra side of the business, which is really the bulk of the Premier Protein business, we are only marketing — we were planning to only market in Q4. So getting into ’25, we would absolutely be spending — and probably our biggest spend would be — the reason why we’re not doing Q2 this year is capacity, and we don’t — and the last thing we want to do, and we’re pushing promotion first and then marketing in the back half. So I think ’25 will be more of a normal marketing year for the entire business because we’ll have all of our greenfields up to — fully scaled up, and we’ll be able to really drive the business.

Bryan Spillane: Okay. And then my second — my follow — other follow-up is just to Pam’s question around GLP-1s. And I guess I was hearing it and listening to the prepared remarks. One question is just in terms of research, it sounds like what you’re doing with a lot of consumer research, but will you do any like product formulation research or anything that might be able to connect the efficacy of Premier to patients on GLP-1 and tied to that? Kind of like what we see in infant formula? Is there the potential to market to doctors and nutritionists, right, to sort of promote the efficacy of the product and helping people on that weight loss journey?

Darcy Davenport: Yes. So first, the exciting news is that we don’t have to do much. I mean, our products are very well formulated, positioned and already resonating with GLP users. I mean, you can go on social media and you see our brand pop-up kind of on Reddit and Facebook feeds, et cetera. However, I think that — and I would also say that we have experienced marketing to certain groups where certain specific kind of medical needs. And we do it in a way that doesn’t change our brand overall brand positioning, but we do it in a very kind of specific surgical way, which I think is how we would do this. And so we have some experience there. We just want to figure out the right place to communicate. Your last question around — would we go after doctors, et cetera, we have some experience there.