Federal Signal Corporation (NYSE:FSS) Q4 2022 Earnings Call Transcript

Ian Hudson: I think it’s mainly a function of supply chain, Chris, because I think, obviously, the backlog at the end of the year that gives us great visibility. I think what we’ve seen so far this year, the orders have been pretty strong as well. So I think in terms of the visibility, the backlog provides — it gives us great visibility. So supply chain is the primary driver of the size of the range. And again, it’s mostly on the dump truck side of the business.

Christopher Moore: Got it. That’s helpful. I think Jennifer talked about supply chain — excuse me, lead time still being something of an issue. Vactor seems to be a good barometer on lead times, my understanding last fall, they were 10 to 11 months there versus a normal 6 to 9. Has that changed much at all?

Ian Hudson: About the same, and it’s — we’ve increased the output in the production, but at the same time, the demand has remained really strong.

Christopher Moore: Got it. And maybe just one last for me. So I guess, everyone is kind of waiting for the new normal to return. It doesn’t look like that’s going to happen. So just maybe you could talk a little bit about some of the things that you were kind of forced into doing that you’re not going to go back on whether that might be sourcing or making internally? Just trying to understand kind of how the — how Federal Signal is positioned a little bit better post pandemic?

Jennifer Sherman: Yes. So I think there are silver linings in everything. And the silver lining has come out of this pandemic supply chain is Mark Weber has really led a great initiative in terms of coordination among our businesses for critical parts. So we’ve had several examples. One is our Elgin business had a problem with a part to China and our Jetstream business stepped in and is now manufacturing that part. Our sewer cleaner business had a problem with the part and our SSG business stepped in and was able to manufacture that part. We have examples across the enterprise, where given the various capabilities that we have, we can step in and help sister businesses. That’s been very beneficial. We’ve started to in-source more in terms of we need to make sure that we’ve got in certain situations, critical parts, and that’s been an important part of the success that we had in 2022.In general, our supply base because of our exposure to public revenue stores, we’ve had — our supply base is primarily a North American supply base and it has been historically.

That has benefited us through the tariff situation through the pandemic and through the supply chain challenges. Our teams — we have great suppliers and our teams have done a great job in terms of — we continue to pay our suppliers timely through the pandemic. And in the supply chain environment, they partnered with us to work through, and we’ve often been at the top of the queue. So I do believe we, as a company, are much more nimble. We’ve qualified additional suppliers, which is important and I think we’re incredibly well positioned for 2023.

Operator: The next question is from Walt Liptak with Seaport.

Walter Liptak: Great quarter, great long-term, too. That was impressive hearing about the CAGR over the long-term. I wanted to ask about the first quarter. You talked about it being seasonally lower, but you also said that you’re going to be adding to the fleet. And so I think we can work out the numbers from the guidance, but I wonder if you could just provide a little bit more details on what’s going on seasonally, why you can’t get more trucks out the door?