The Honest Company, Inc. (NASDAQ:HNST) Q1 2024 Earnings Call Transcript

Dave Loretta: Yes. Andrea, let me just address that last point on the revenue side, the 3% growth over prior year. We still as we called out last quarter, there was some shift in order flow into the fourth quarter that accelerated that period’s net revenue, which was 10% up. Normally those orders would have been in the first quarter. So that sort of helps bridge any difference in what you would expect within the tracked channel progress. But let me kind of revisit the EBITDA and the flexibility that we’ve got there. And this is really the benefit of the business model that we’re building here is, it’s flexible in its nature. We’re not encumbered with a lot of fixed overhead and capital expenses. And the flow through in particular on revenue down to bottom line was quite notable, once the structural changes in the product cost and the fulfillment and logistics costs are now, really working well.

But I’ll also say part of the EBITDA benefit and the gross margin benefit this quarter was trade promotions were lighter than we would normally have them in the quarters and that helps flow through gross revenue to net revenue. So we will see trade promotion activity and marketing investment and expenses flexible in future periods that can that we can drive some of the momentum and keep it going through the balance of the year. So maintaining that flexibility on those two fronts is something that we want to keep in front of us and we’ll use in the right moments to really keep that top line momentum. Hopefully that helps. And I think the question around the NIL, as we shared there’s a transition plan, but any cost to kind of make adjustments to under that separation agreement are fully factored into our outlook.

We don’t expect any incremental beyond our outlook plans for expenses to make that transition. And frankly, the transition sort of been in motion over the last 12 months anyway. So it is a big impact on the product and assortment.

Andrea Teixeira: Great. Thank you very much. I’ll pass it on. Very helpful.

Operator: Our next question comes from Aaron Grey from Alliance Global Partners. Your line is now open.

Aaron Grey: Hi, good evening and thank you for the questions. So first question for me is I want to come off the back of the last one and just to get better color in terms of how you’re thinking about letting some of the top line flow through the bottom, especially in the back half, we’re looking for more top line growth. You kind of touched on it there, Dave, in terms of having that lever in terms of trade promotion and marketing. So is it fair to think that maybe you kind of push that lever a little bit more on the marketing and trade in the back half to drive growth longer term rather than let it flow through that bottom line versus letting it flow through maybe coming at the higher end of where guidance is today? Just in terms of how you think about that would be helpful. Thanks.

Dave Loretta: Yes. I mean, we’ve got marketing plans in place today, but there’s also a lot of flexibility because so much of what we do spend in the media content side is digital and that’s short term. And so we have the ability to kind of dial it up and dial it down based on return on ad spend. And we like having that flexibility during different periods of events that we’ve got planned with retail partners and to drive in our digital channels with our online retailers. So, it will be a flexible aspect to the model that we see going forward. But again fits within the guidance that we’ve given and even leaning towards the kind of the mid side of that guidance as I shared on my remarks. So pleased with the progress we’re making to execute at this stage.

Aaron Grey: Okay, great. Thanks for that. And same question for me. Just in terms of some other issues you have in terms of packaging specifically, can you give us any updates in terms of some expectations there? Have you guys done any types of pilots or what we could think in terms of some changes on packaging for some of your SKUs going forward? Thank you.

Carla Vernon: I love this question. So thank you for asking and it’s really great to hear from you, Aaron. So appreciate that. We packaging is really an important part of our brand maximization pillar. And I’m so pleased with the fact that we — we have Kate Barton as our Chief Growth Officer and Jonathan Mayle as our Head of Sales. And between the two of them, they’ve been really collaborating strongly on how we update and upgrade our packaging as a key piece of our marketing pillars. That uniform packaging update is something that we want to be making sure is strong across our portfolio. And over the last year, the team has been working diligently to iterate on the packaging to conduct both quantitative and in store physical in person qualitative analysis with several rounds.

Because I would say from those of us that are alumni of some of these great CPGs that we are in, we understand the power of packaging as your lead marketing vehicle, for especially for a brand like ours. As well as the importance of getting it right. So I would say that I’m able to talk about it because we have done some of these packaging tests now actually physically in our top brick and mortar retail stores with AB testing in different versions. And some of the updates are gonna be really fantastic. One of them that we’ve been talking about a lot is making sure that you know what’s inside the boxes from here forward. That’s been a key area. There’s a very exciting execution that will be introduced into the market and I see it’s going to make a big difference in making the products more shoppable for consumers, especially in our skin care beauty, beauty care product lines.

Aaron Grey: Okay, great. Thanks for the color. I’ll go and jump back in the queue.

Operator: Our next question comes from Ryan Meyers from Lake Street Capital Markets. Your line is now open.

Ryan Meyers: Hey, guys. Thanks for taking my questions. Congrats on another solid quarter. Just wondering if there’s any way that you can quantify new customers that you were able to add during the quarter?