Fox Factory Holding Corp. (NASDAQ:FOXF) Q4 2022 Earnings Call Transcript

Mike Dennison: Yes. Good question. It’s really about the speed in which the current inventory growth kind of clean itself up. So if that happens majority in Q1 and you see it much better in the range. If you see it happen in Q3, it’s going to be much worse in the range. So it’s not much of, it’s not really as much about demand. And again, as I said in the comments, I think demand is actually more positive than people give a credit for. It’s just that we’ve got a lot of big partners, big companies out there that are trying to chew through some clunky inventory systems and current inventory levels in their supply chains.

Alex Perry: That’s really helpful. And then can you just circling back to gross margin, can you just remind us the puts and takes there? So you have the channel mix headwinds from the increased OEM business, Gainesville improvement, presumably some freight tailwinds. But still, like all in, it seems like gross margins are going to be down on a year-over-year basis. Is that the right way to think about that?

Scott Humphrey: Yes, I think so, Alex, we’re going to do our best to mitigate the mix shift and part of that will be absolutely the efficiencies in Gainesville. But it is a big shift in mix for us that we’re going to have to work against. And so we’re going to come out of the gates, as Mike said, conservative in our guide as we see what we can do, especially on the aftermarket with new offerings and doing some things around our new acquisition to kind of offset that.

Alex Perry: Perfect. That’s really helpful. Best of luck going forward.

Scott Humphrey: Thanks, Alex.

Operator: And our next question will come from Craig Kennison with Baird. Your line is open.

Craig Kennison: Hey, good afternoon. Thanks for taking my question. You’ve addressed a lot already, but I wanted to ask about the M&A environment. I think you’ve been patient kind of waiting for deals to come your way and trying to stay disciplined on valuation. Should we look at this Custom Wheel deal as a sign that valuations have begun to normalize and you could maybe rekindle some of those dormant conversations?

Mike Dennison: Good question, Craig. Yes, absolutely. In the powered vehicle space, we see some good opportunities and the multiples are more in line with our historical expectations and what they should be. So we think that’s really good. And even more importantly, we’ve been wanting to do some acquisitions in the SSG space, but those valuations have just gotten crazy with some of the challenges in the supply chain and we take that as an opportunity to grow with some companies that could be very good for us in the SSG world that don’t have as rich evaluation maybe this year as they would have last year. So we think it actually creates some opportunities, and we’ve got a great balance sheet. So we’re going to go use it.

Craig Kennison: That’s helpful. And then just, I guess, as a follow-up, maybe could you comment on CapEx and maybe working capital as maybe a source of cash or maybe less of a drain on cash going forward next year, that might help you fund some of these deals?

Mike Dennison: Yes. I think CapEx, we’re expecting something in the 3% to 4% range. On the high end, probably this year, we really have spent a lot of time and energy investing for what we have in place now, which will take us pretty well through 2025 and our expectations on revenue there. We are looking at some additional lower-cost regions for manufacturing in the future, but that’s not going to be a CapEx ran in 2023, specifically. And then, of course, working capital, Scott, you can speak about.