John Casella: And I think the — probably the most significant aspect of those transactions, both of them, GFL and Twin Bridges, no real surprises, Adam. We were able to — I mean — and the relationship that Ned has built with GFL and Jason, the entire team, the transition has gone well. Scott Earl, as Ned said earlier, is working with our folks to really rethink routing and do the things from an integration standpoint that we need to do as quickly as we can. So we’re really excited about it. No surprises. If anything, the surprises are on the upside in terms of the participation from both companies and also from Scott in terms of looking at re-routing the opportunity to really create the value that Brad’s talking about. That is going to be a tailwind for us shortly. Margins also were not a surprise for us either. So they were a little bit lower, but that’s not a surprise either.
Adam Bubes: And then can you just talk about how much of the targeted synergies are you expecting to realize in 2024? So can you just help us understand the margin ramp of these assets from here?
Ned Coletta: Yes. So we had in the Mid-Atlantic about $8 million of synergies being recognized over three years, and we’ll get about a third of that from thereabouts in the first year in the Mid-Atlantic and with Twin Bridges in the capital District, we had about $4 million of synergies recognized over three years, and we’re probably tracking more to like 50% of that in the first year. We’ve had some really excellent progress on some early consolidations and we’re feeling great about that. And probably a little upside there as well over the three-year period.
Brad Helgeson: Yes. And that’s baked into the margin expansion that’s reflecting our guidance and kind of stepping back. If you add up the synergies for all the deals that were done last year, and I talked about the opportunity as we go forward, it’s about 100 basis points in total over time. So we’ll get some of that this year.
Adam Bubes: And during the GFL and Twin Bridges asset integration period, how are you thinking about the level of M&A you folks can sustain over the next 12 months? And how do higher interest rates change how you’re thinking about funding M&A?
John Casella: Well, let me take part of that for you, Adam. I think that from an integration standpoint, we couldn’t be more happy with the Mid-Atlantic team that Kyle Larkin has put up. And keep in mind, he ran those assets for some of our competitors before coming on board with Casella. So he’s built out an entire team for the Mid-Atlantic. The integration is going extremely well. Same thing with Twin Bridges, that’s going extremely well as well. So I don’t think that the integration of GFL or Twin Bridges is going to have any impact on us on a go — I mean, 2024 from an M&A standpoint. We still have significant work to do from an integration standpoint. But from a practical standpoint, we have very significant opportunities for continued growth.
We’ve been able to demonstrate the capabilities to integrate those businesses, very significant amount of M&A, and at the same time bring down lower our safety record, lower turnover. So I think that we did a lot of work over the last year, really looking at where are our weaknesses. We’ve approached most of those weaknesses. We’ve hired the people that we needed to in terms of some of the back office challenges of the growth that we’ve had. So we’re pretty excited about where we sit and looking forward to 2024.
Adam Bubes: And on the interest rate side, Brad, you want to hop in, I mean, it’s not a concern for us given.
Brad Helgeson: Yes, we’re over 75% fixed. So…
John Casella: I think that — the only thing that it does do is it may change how Ned looks at the financials and how we’re looking at. It may have some impact in terms of how we’re modeling acquisitions. Probably not. It probably has more of an impact in terms of creating more pressure on independents to sell their businesses.
Ned Coletta: Yes. And we’ve got close to $500 million of liquidity right now, both through cash. We’ve got $220 million of cash. We’ve got liquidity on our revolver. So we’re in a really good position to put money to work for shareholders with positive returns. And to John’s point, I mean, we’ve got a lot of work we’re doing on integration. So it really causes you to look towards quality, strategic fit and everything that’s in our near-term pipeline this year is super high quality. Great overlaps, great fit. We’re excited about the near-term pipeline.
John Casella: Yes. And I think that, quite honestly, Adam, we’ve stayed very disciplined in terms of making sure that it’s a high quality acquisition to integrate into the company and you don’t really hear much about the M&A that we pass on.
Adam Bubes: Great. I appreciate the color. Thanks so much.
John Casella: You’re welcome.
Operator: Thank you. And as of now, there’s no one left in the queue. But we will take a brief pause for anyone to queue up. I’m showing no one in the queue. I’ll turn it back to John Casella for any closing remarks.
