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23-05-2025
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Q1 2025 BJ's Wholesale Club Holdings Inc Earnings Call
Catherine Park; Vice President, Investor Relations; BJ's Wholesale Club Holdings Inc Robert Eddy; Chairman of the Board, President, Chief Executive Officer; BJ's Wholesale Club Holdings Inc Laura Felice; Chief Financial Officer, Executive Vice President; BJ's Wholesale Club Holdings Inc William Werner; Executive Vice President - Strategy and Development; BJ's Wholesale Club Holdings Inc Peter Benedict; Analyst; Robert W. Baird & Co., Inc. Kate McShane; Analyst; Goldman Sachs Robbie Ohmes; Analyst; BofA Global Research Mike Baker; Analyst; D.A. Davidson & Company Chuck Grom; Analyst; Gordon Haskett Edward Kelly; Analyst; Wells Fargo Securities, LLC Simeon Gutman; Analyst; Morgan Stanley Tom Nass; Analyst; TD Cowen Steven Zaccone; Analyst; Citi Rupesh Parikh; Analyst; Oppenheimer & Co., Inc. Mark Carden; Analyst; UBS Equities Operator Hello, and welcome to BJ's Wholesale Club Holdings, Inc. first quarter fiscal 2025 earnings conference call. (Operator Instructions)I will now pass the call over to your host, Cathy Park, VP of Investor Relations. Please go ahead. Catherine Park Good morning, and welcome to BJ's first quarter fiscal 2025 earnings call. With me today are Bob Eddy, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer; Laura Felice, Chief Financial Officer; and Bill Werner, Executive Vice President, Strategy and remember that we may make forward-looking statements on this call that are based on our current expectations. Forward-looking statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from what we say on this see the Risk Factors sections of our most recent SEC filings for a description of these risks and uncertainties. Please also refer to today's press release and latest investor presentation posted on our Investor Relations website for our cautionary statement regarding forward-looking statements and non-GAAP that, I'll turn the call over to Bob. Robert Eddy Good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining us. This morning, we reported a strong start to the year with our first quarter top and bottom line results exceeding grew net sales by nearly 5% and and we managed the business well, resulting in operating income and net income growth of 27% and 35%, respectively. Our team continues to execute on our long-term strategic priorities as we work hard to take care of the families who depend on are always looking for value, but it's paramount in challenging times like these. Due to this, BJ's remains a leading destination for our members to find what they need and want at a great value. The drivers of our business remain continues to grow nicely. Our continued improvements in merchandising and digital convenience are driving traffic, and we're gaining share in our clubs and gas stations. Finally, we are accelerating our club openings to serve more are excited about our momentum. Our comparable club sales, excluding gas sales grew by 3.9% in the first quarter and were led by traffic and units once again. Traffic grew for the 13th consecutive quarter, contributing about 2.5 points to our comp in the across the country have digested meaningful inflation over the past few years and the uncertain economic environment drove members to prioritize value in their purchases during the quarter. Members are consistently spending with us, especially in household Perishables, Grocery, and Sundries division delivered more than 4% comp growth in the first quarter, with unit volumes increasing across all three divisions. Perishables remains the strongest driver of our growth as more and more members make us their weekly destination for produce, dairy and also saw terrific growth in our own brands during the quarter. Our general merchandise and services division comps decreased slightly in the first quarter. We delivered positive comps in apparel and toys where the combination of an elevated assortment, low price points and compelling value have kept our members also grew comps in consumer electronics, led by computer equipment, such as laptops, desktops and monitors. Unfavorable weather and pressures on consumer sentiment impacted big-ticket highly discretionary categories such as patio sets, gazebos and outdoor sheds in the said, we are maintaining our momentum on our transformation strategy, and it's clear that members are responding well to an improving treasure hunt. Tariffs have been top of mind for companies and consumers alike in recent is less impacted by imports than many of our competitors, but tariffs aren't new to us, and we have a great team to help us find our way in an incredibly dynamic environment that's been changing by the day. We have strong capabilities in areas like analytics and input cost tracking, tools we've used in past disruptions and are applying with discipline today.I'm so proud of our teams across merchandising, supply chain, finance and analytics, who have remained agile in navigating these challenges. This includes sourcing from alternative countries of origin, reassessing orders and collaborating with our vendors all to drive the best outcomes for our always leaning into our model to deliver value, and while upward pressure on costs may drive prices higher, we are doing everything possible to minimize the impact to our members. Moreover, we will invest for the long term as we should gain share in a market disrupted by rising we gain more clarity, our teams are ready to adapt and pivot, but our guiding principles will remain the same, delivering great value is nonnegotiable for BJs, and we will always make the right decisions for our first quarter results underscore the progress we are making on our four strategic priorities. As a reminder, these priorities are improving member loyalty, giving our members an unbeatable shopping experience, delivering value conveniently and growing our business starts and ends with our members. We are strengthening membership quarter after quarter. We're growing total member counts in new and existing clubs and upgrading more members into our premium tiers, while keeping our renewal rates tier members spend more and are more likely to renew, driving greater lifetime value. Over the past couple of years, we enhanced our credit card program, invested in a gas discount for our Club Plus members, and in January, we added benefits for Plus members by giving them two free same-day deliveries every investments in our value proposition are paying off. In the first quarter, higher tier membership penetration grew by over 100 basis points sequentially from the fourth quarter, surpassing 40% for the first time in our history. Our momentum in membership is a direct reflection of the unbeatable shopping experience we provide at BJ' merchandising strategies span our entire box and aim to deliver exceptional value to our members. That means having the right products at the right price presented in the right way. Great pricing is foundational to our model. Our advantage structure allows us to consistently offer up to 25% of grocery store prices, and we are committed to maintaining this pricing, we deliver value through our highly curated assortment, which we have dramatically improved over the past few years. We renovated our general merchandise business to regain credibility in our treasure launched Fresh 2.0 to win our members shop and grow trip frequency. We continuously elevate our own brands to deepen loyalty. The result is great member engagement and market share as evidenced by our growth in traffic, comp sales and, of course, in membership. I'd like to provide a little more color around our current work in you know, we launched our Fresh 2.0 initiative in produce last year based on the insight that perishables, especially produce, dictate our member's first weekly shop. We knew that if we won in produce, we would win trip frequency and wallet launching in the second quarter of last year, the program has driven quarterly produce comps of high single digit to low double digits. We're not only introducing new members into our produce category, but they are regularly reengaging in produce as success we've seen in produce has given us confidence to extend Fresh 2.0 to meat and seafood, which we piloted in Florida late last year and launched chain-wide this month. Similar to our early work in fresh produce, our meat and seafood initiatives are built on comprehensive market studies and competitive research determined that our biggest opportunity was in our assortment and presentation. First, we optimized our assortment to better reflect localized member preferences, adding items that members wanted and removing less relevant we added signage and dividers in our coolers for cleaner presentation and easier navigation, reminiscent of our efforts in produce. We also reflowed our merchandise to reflect how our members shop example, we created a single destination for preseasoned and marinated proteins, making these ready-to-cook products easier to find. While these products comprise a small percentage of our protein sales today, the example illustrates how we're leveraging our understanding of shopper behavior to rethink all aspects of our part of these efforts, we've also armed our field team members with better tools and reporting to track performance and reduce salvage. Our members love the improvements in Fresh, and we will continue to invest to drive trips, baskets and member of what members love, let's talk about our digital conveniences. Today, our members have multiple ways to save their time in addition to 25% lower grocery store prices through BOPIC, Express Pay, curbside pickup and same-day delivery. These have helped fuel double-digit growth in digitally-enabled comp sales each year for the past four the first quarter, digitally-enabled comp sales grew by 35% year over year and 56% on a two-year stack. We're using technology to achieve greater labor efficiencies and accommodate the continued growth of our digital business. Consider our journey with digital order OPEC curbside and same-day delivery comprised the majority of our digitally enabled sales and our team members are picking these orders in our clubs. Over the past 18 months, with the product location data provided by our autonomous inventory robots and the help of developed and rolled out tools that optimized order batches and pick routes. This has enabled us to reduce the time required to pick an item by over 45%. As more members adopt our digital conveniences and reward us with their spending and loyalty, we will continue investing to drive operational efficiencies and member lifetime we're making meaningful progress on our real estate strategy. We hit the ground running in the first quarter, opening five new clubs, including our very first club on Staten Island as well as four gas stations. Our new clubs are performing well against our expectations, and our future growth pipeline is strong. We remain on track to open 25 to 30 new clubs over the next two we continue to demonstrate the success of our new club playbook, we've also asked ourselves how we can bring the same level of premium experience to the existing chain. In the past several years, we've updated our clubs with the latest signed packages and invested to support our key growth initiatives, including digital and Fresh also looking to identify relocation opportunities to better position our fleet for tomorrow. As part of this strategy, we expect to open a relocated club in the coming months in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania. We will have more relocations planned over the next several years, including in Rotterdam, New York next back and assessing the current state of the consumer, broader uncertainty in the marketplace continues to drive consumers toward value and our members are relying on BJ's to provide it. Spending behavior remains solid across our membership in the first quarter as we drove healthy year-over-year growth in spend and trips across our high, mid- and low-income in these uncertain times, some things remain constant, and here's what you can expect from us. You can expect us to stay committed to delivering the value our members rely on every time they shop with us. You can also expect us to remain focused on our long-term growth business model is built to win in both good times and times when consumers feel pressured. This especially holds true today as the investments we're making in the business are driving year is turning out to be more dynamic than we all thought, and I'd like to thank our team members who continue to rise to the occasion and work tirelessly to take care of the families who depend on us. I'm confident in our ability to execute through the near term together and more convinced than ever that we're set up for long-term sustainable growth.I'll now turn it over to Laura to provide more details on our results and outlook. Laura Felice Thanks, Bob. First, I'd like to echo Bob's gratitude for our team members across our clubs supply chain and club support center, whose dedication to BJ's led to another strong sales in the first quarter were $5 billion, increasing 4.7% year over year. Merchandise comp sales, which exclude gas sales, increased by 3.9% year over year led by traffic and units as our value prop continues to resonate with our performance was consistently strong in February and April, with the later Easter shift impacting March. Total comparable club sales in the first quarter, including gas sales grew 1.6% year over year. Lower year-over-year retail gas prices partially offset our market share gains at our quarter comp gallons rose about 2% year over year with total volume growing even faster due to new stations coming online. This compares to continued year-over-year volume declines across the broader industry in the enabled comp sales in the quarter grew 35% year over year, contributing significantly to our overall sales growth. Members who use our digital conveniences are better members with greater spend and higher NPS scores than members who only shop in a result, we will continue to invest in enhancing our digital conveniences in the future. Membership fee income, or MFI, grew 8.1% to approximately $120.4 million in the first quarter, led by strong membership acquisition and retention across the chain. MFI also benefited from a fee increase that went into effect on January 1, quarter merchandise gross margins increased by approximately 30 basis points year over year with minimal tariff-related impacts in the quarter. We continue to manage our margins prudently and our category management process is yielding profitable growth across the broader expenses in the first quarter were approximately $760.9 million, resulting in approximately 10 basis points of year-over-year deleverage as a percentage of net sales. This was primarily driven by our continued investments to drive our strategic priorities and more specifically, in outsized growth in depreciation as we accelerate new club our fuel business, first quarter profit per gallon ran above last year's levels and slightly higher than our expectations, resulting in year-over-year growth in gas profits. All in, we reported first quarter earnings per share of $1.13 and adjusted earnings per share of $ first quarter performance reflects our strong membership and traffic, merchandising improvements and digital conveniences, all reinforced by our investments in the business to drive long-term growth. Our effective tax rate of 22.2% was driven by higher-than-anticipated tax move to our balance sheet. We ended the first quarter with absolute inventory levels down 2% on a per club basis. In stocks also improved by 30 basis points year over year thanks to the team's great work in allocating the right amount of product to the right clubs at the right capital allocation strategy is consistent with our historical framework as we continue to take a disciplined approach to maximize shareholder value. We believe the best use of cash is applying it towards profitably growing the such, investments to support membership, merchandising, digital and real estate initiatives continue to be funded entirely by our cash flows in the first quarter and our capital expenditures were approximately $140.5 million. Our strong balance sheet provides meaningful flexibility, allowing us to look past the short-term noise and continue pursuing our long-term growth ended the first quarter with less than half a turn of net leverage. In light of these priorities, our share repurchases were lower than our typical ranges in the first quarter. Our overall philosophy around buybacks has not changed, and we will continue to return excess cash to shareholders this to our outlook for fiscal 2025. We are operating in uncertain times. Despite the greater level of unpredictability, we are confident in our team, our positioning in the marketplace and the growth drivers that are within our will stay focused on our long-term priorities to drive continued traffic and market share gains. In terms of our financial outlook, the range of potential outcomes have become wider since we issued our annual guidance. We expect the current environment to increasingly influence costs and consumer spending patterns, which may ultimately impact our financial on what we know today, we are keeping our initial full year guidance unchanged, which as a reminder, was 2% to 3.5% comp sales growth, excluding gas, and $4.10 to $4.30 in adjusted earnings per share. We will continue to evaluate this guidance as the year these caveats in mind, here's how we're broadly thinking about the year. On the top line, please remember from our last call that we expect our first half comps ex gas to be a little bit better than the back half. In other words, we expect our first quarter comps ex gas to be the high watermark for the the margin side, we will continue to exercise strong cost discipline, while investing in our value proposition for the long term. This becomes especially important in a rising cost environment. We remain confident in the underlying strength of our company, and we believe we're well positioned to deliver sustainable growth to maximize shareholder back over to you. Robert Eddy Thanks, Laura. We've made tremendous progress transforming our business, investing in the right talent, sharpening our strategic focus and delivering more value and convenience to our members. Membership is at record levels, and we're launching exciting merchandising initiatives to drive even stronger digital capabilities are playing a key role in our growth, and we're scaling our new club playbook to expand our footprint profitably. Our long-term strategies remain crystal clear. We will continue to invest for the future and do the right thing for our members, team members and communities in order to take care of the families that depend on again for joining us today and for your support of BJ's Wholesale Club. We will now take your questions. Operator (Operator Instructions) Peter Benedict, Baird. Peter Benedict Yes, I guess I'm just going to ask about the real estate strategy. Can you just remind us how you think about locations as you accelerate the pace of club openings here, how you think about the target markets, the competitive considerations, the pool of potential members in a market. Just curious for an update on that as you're going to accelerate these club openings in the next couple of years. Robert Eddy Yes. Thanks for the question. Maybe I'll start off and hand it over to Bill. You've seen us in the last few years get pretty aggressive from a real estate perspective given the success of the effort and the new clubs that we've been able to open to serve members around our geography and into new success of those clubs has given us the confidence to continue to do that and push into new markets while opportunistically expanding existing markets. And so as that success was built in the last couple of years, we continue to put pressure on Bill and team to go even faster. And I think we're in a place where discount retailer in the club sector is so we're trying to go as fast as we can. And we're really excited about what we've seen so far in our real estate portfolio and the pipeline is as big as it's ever been. So we're very pleased with what the team's work. And maybe I'll hand it over to Bill. He can tackle some of your specific points. William Werner Yes. Thanks, Bob. Peter, I would say that we are more excited about our real estate progress than any time in the company's history that I've been here. And I think certainly for people who have been here a long time, it's probably the most exciting point in time maybe since the company was it really starts with the share gains that we've seen across the portfolio, as we gain share, that opens up the models for more and more opportunities for us to continue to build new clubs. And we talked about year end accelerating the transformation to 25 to 30 clubs over the next two continue to put our foot on the gas in terms of opportunities both in new and existing markets. We've seen broad-based success across both some of our core infill just opened up our first club here in Staten Island this quarter, which was a great win for the team, that clubs off to an amazing start as well as new markets, like we just opened up in Myrtle Beach and Southern Pines, both clubs and the Carolinas and the response of the community has been amazing so far to us coming up from the all the proof points we have are great. We continue to be pretty aggressive in terms of getting to market and trying to get the clubs on the ground, and we'll continue to do that going forward. Operator Kate McShane, Goldman Sachs. Kate McShane We wanted to ask a longer-term question with regards to the longer-term algorithm. Just as you see the continued strength in membership, is there anything we should be considering that could change in the longer-term algorithm? And should we still be thinking of a three-year maturity ramp for new customers? Or has anything changed there as you enter new markets with new stores? Robert Eddy Well, okay. Thanks for the question. We're very pleased with what's going on in membership for sure. We continue to build the size and the quality of the membership as we've talked about for many quarters now. Our ability to attract new members, our ability to renew them at all-time high rates, our ability to engage them and push them up into the premium tiers, we talked about a new all-time high this morning as our next opportunity really is to continue to figure out how to better activate and engage these members. And to the degree that we're able to make progress doing that, then I think you might see your way forward to changing certain components of the as we sit here today, for the past few years, we've been working towards that economic algorithm that we put forward a couple of years ago on our Investor Day. This quarter was a nice progress towards that, and we don't necessarily see that changing all that much at this point in time, particularly given the level of uncertainty out there in the market. Anything to add, Laura? Laura Felice No, I think you covered it all, Bob. I think, Kate, I'll just maybe pick up on your second point about the membership the maturity of our members. And similar to Bob's commentary on acquisition of members and how they're shopping, I think that hasn't changed either from what we're seeing right now. We will continue to watch that. But that plays into how we're thinking about the long-term algo and leaving it as it is right now. Operator Robbie Ohmes, Bank from America. Robbie Ohmes I want to follow up on Laura's commentary at the end there before Q&A. -- the high watermark of the comps, but also the margin investments that you mentioned, is that -- like on the margin investment side, is that the Fresh impact? Is that the meat and seafood launch that you're thinking about? Or is it tariffs?Or is it competition or signs of the consumer weakening, maybe more color on how you guys are thinking about margin investments for the rest of the year? And also a little more color on why the comps could fade as you move through the year. Laura Felice Robby, thanks for the question. Maybe I'll start with your second point on margin investments. And so nothing has changed how we think about the business and value continues to be our North Star. And so we're always looking at pricing and making sure we're delivering the best value to our members every so that's how we'll continue to think about it as the year progresses. As you know, it's a dynamic environment. But I think value, if we continue to stay with that. That is what our members are rewarding us with as they continue to show up in our clubs and shop and drive their second question on comp cadence for the year. It's a similar answer to when we set out our guidance in Q4. In looking at the year, we thought that the first half would be stronger than the second half from a cadence perspective, that is unchanged as we see the environment right of that is lapse of last year. And some of it is how we're thinking about Fresh 2.0 and other points of our business. So I think nothing new to report there, but we will continue to watch it as we go through the year. Robbie Ohmes And just to clarify, Fresh 2.0 and then the meat and seafood launch, are they a significant headwind to margin or not so much? Robert Eddy Robby, I think what we say is -- and you'll remember this because we've talked about it so much the gross margin rates across our our four divisions are about the same. The contribution margin rates might differ with perishables being lower given the increased labor associated with -- from a gross margin perspective, they're all within striking distance of one mixing towards perishables doesn't necessarily help or hurt gross margin all that much, provided we don't mess up from a salvage perspective. What it does do is drive the engagement of our members, right? That was the entire thesis behind Fresh 2.0, right?How can we get people -- we know our Fresh members are involved in produce, in particular and meat as well. How do we get more of our members to engage with us in those categories? And even though that takes some effort and it takes some investment, particularly in places below gross margin, as I talked more people we can get into those categories, the better off we are. So we certainly saw that from a previous perspective in the first innings of Fresh 2.0 and now in the middle innings, we're taking those lessons that we've learned and that same thesis towards meat and seafood and will ultimately take it to a bakery and dairy and the other disciplines within the perishable is same thesis arguably hopefully, will be the same result if we can continue to make our clubs a weekly shopping destination for our members. That augers towards all sorts of good things, participation in other categories, growth in general merchandise, more trips, more traffic, more renewal rate, all the things that we hope to prove we've certainly seen great results in produce, and we're hoping for the same type of a thing to be seen in meat, but it shouldn't be a margin story. If we do things right, it should be a sales story and a membership study. Operator Mike Baker, D.A. Davidson. Mike Baker Fresh 2.0 question with a couple of just digging in a little bit deeper. You said you're seeing high single-digit to low double-digit growth in produce from that initiative. If you said it, I missed it, but can you tell us what understanding it's early innings, what lift are you seeing in meat and seafood?And then can you the relative size of the opportunity in meat and seafood and that dairy and bakery to come relative to the size of the produce business? Robert Eddy Mike, thanks for the question. I guess what I would say is individually produce and meat are about the same size from a category perspective. They're not exactly the same, but they're somewhat comparable. So obviously, produce helped drive our business all last year, we did talk about high single digits to low double-digit unit movement in certainly something we continue to see in the first quarter. We would anticipate a similar result in meat. And the thing that we don't yet understand and hopefully occurs is ng reaction to that, right, meaning one plus one equals equals people are shopping heavily in produce and in meat, it should really change their member profile and the number of trips and their renewal rates. And so we've seen good results in meat so far. That was certainly a category that we liked the results of in the first way too early to see how it might drive trips in total or how it might be that multiplier effect with produce, given it's only been out in the wild for a few weeks now. But we are excited about what we're seeing. We're excited about the member engagement. And we'll continue to invest in these haven't quite flushed out really anything yet from bakery and dairy and other categories. Yes, we've been focusing on this year. But I think what you should take away from this conversation is a big opportunity for us. If we do it right, it could materially change our business for the long so we'll continue to really invest heavily in getting this stuff right and hopefully, it works out for our members first and foremost because if it works out for them, it will work out for us. Operator Chuck Grom, Gordon Haskett. Chuck Grom Congrats on a great quarter. Laura, on the guide and the expectation for a wider range of outcomes, I think we can all appreciate that given where we are. But is there a way to think about how much you exceeded your internal first quarter plan to assess some of that conservatism? And then one near-term question. Just curious how May sales are running relative to April strength? Laura Felice Chuck, thanks for the question. Look, I think as you can appreciate and you alluded to, it's a dynamic environment, and very fluid right now. And so that is a piece of what we took into consideration as we maintained our guidance for the full -- the teams are working diligently to make sure that we continue to deliver value to our members, and we're doing it in the right places across the business. And so that's how we're thinking about the year as we go forward. Your question on May sales, you know we don't really comment on current maybe I'll leave that for now. But we were really happy with the first quarter. I think that 3.9% comp was fantastic and proves the strength of our membership and continued momentum of the business. Operator Edward Kelly, Wells Fargo. Edward Kelly I wanted to follow up on the subject of tariffs. Curious just to start, as you think about the guidance that you provided and reiterated today, I'm assuming that the guidance includes your best estimate of the current tariff rates and the impact that, that might have on you could just confirm what's in guidance related to that. And then the second part of the question is just related to how you're thinking about pricing and elasticities on the items that you have that are impacted. And then how you're planning inventory against that uncertainty just to ensure that you don't have markdown issues as it relates to the consumer response. Robert Eddy Listen, I appreciate the nature of the question. It's certainly an uncertain market out there. It's something we're all really trying to figure out, while it's hard to quantify the impacts given that uncertainty. What I would tell you is, first, we import less than many of our we will likely be a bit less affected and others. With that said, even for us, this is a large complex problem to figure out. We have significant muscle around dealing with inflation and cost been employing all sorts of tactics none of which will surprise you to blunt the impact, including resourcing items from different countries, changing items, even eliminating items from our assortment where the elasticity might make -- may not make any sense for our members. Certainly, we're spending a ton of time with our supplier partners working the problem I guess, finally, what I would say, we will act according to our purpose and taking care of the families that depend on us. These actions might differ day-to-day, but our performance in the past quarters and years has all been centered around that powerful idea of doing the right thing for our would expect to invest for the long term as much as possible within the framework of our economic structure. For example, during the first quarter, we invested heavily in eggs and gas prices have come down meaningfully as we would expect to, and we're looking to gain market share in these times of disruption. So when consumers are challenged, they come towards value, and we're a great place to come for them to achieve that we'll have to be agile because the answer seems to change by the hour, by the day, but you can expect steadfast support of our members as we go through whatever is coming in the next few weeks. We've tried to run a range of scenarios. Obviously, today's tariff situation and maybe whatever could happen of that is in our guidance ranges. That could obviously change. We don't know what's coming tomorrow. So we try to make our best guesses. And we've -- as we've talked about in the prepared remarks, our inventory is in better team has done a pretty remarkable work over the past couple of quarters, both increasing in stock, which is obviously incredibly important to running a great business for our members, and reducing inventory levels overall down 2% on a per club we're trying to be very judicious from a buying perspective. We're trying to do the right thing for our members and hopefully, that gets us through this period of disruption. Operator Simeon Gutman, Morgan Stanley. Simeon Gutman Good quarter. I wanted to ask and make it two parts. First, share gains. Food retail clearly continues, and it's going well. It seems like you bent the curve on other categories, discretionary, which you're taking share. We can't see given the markets how granular that share gain looks how you feel or you would assess your share gain in nonfood categories? And then you -- is there visibility on where that higher tier penetration can get to? Are there the leading indicators and how a member is spending such that, that penetration rate can keep going north of 40%? Robert Eddy Yes. Good questions. We're pretty happy with our share gains in the past quarter -- in the past few quarters. We continue to grow it in both food and nonfood. The general merchandise share is a bit harder to as we look across Circana data and other sources of data that we have, certainly, we're building in the grocery business quarter after quarter after quarter after quarter. In the GM business, even though those comps were slightly negative during the quarter, we still took share in we're doing the same things that have been we've been doing it in the past few quarters to make it work right. Playing the right stuff on the shelf, being sensitive to what the right value is, what the right price is, how we're displaying it as we transform general merchandise. And that's helping us gain is a great example. This quarter, we had great share in electronics. We've built share in a number of GM categories. And even if we look back longer term, Circana data all the way back through the pandemic as has gone up in all four of our big important thing outside the club, obviously, from a share perspective is fuel. We continue to gain tremendous amounts of share with positive gallon growth quarter in, quarter out, while the market continues to go backwards from a a gallon so we're gaining tremendous amounts of share. And that dovetails nicely into the higher tier penetration question that you put forward. We're gaining share in fuel, not just because of our fantastic everyday pricing, where, on average, we're about $0.20 lower than what the average market price would we've -- as you know, we've done a tremendous job trying to integrate gas into our membership offering. Where every tier of our members, our higher team members now as a gas discount, whether you have a credit card or not. So all the way up to $0.15 a gallon for our highest tier that's on top of that great opening price point gas that's $0.20 lower than the market. We're also having some fun with our team members who are running $0.25 off a gallon on top of all the other things that they can get we're trying to get those team members even more involved in the fuel game, so that they can tell our members about it. I think the overriding goal for higher tier membership is somewhere over 50%. That's where our club competitors ended the quarter right around 41%. And so we still have tremendous amounts of headroom to do that. We need to make sure that we're putting the right offer out there for people or making sure that they're engaged in the business and getting the rewards associated with doing that. And that will mentum by itself.I thought this is a cool quarter to look at because with the fee increase out there, there could have been -- there probably was some pressure to not grow higher tier penetration so to grow it at the fastest rate that we've grown it in a while, we were up well over 100 basis points was impressive to me and to us. The team did a nice job figuring out the right offers to put out there the team in the field at the desk. Membership desk did a nice job converting people. Our digital team did a great job getting in front of people when they're on the website are playing on the so we're excited about it. We think it's a great road to grow the franchise, to grow the lifetime value of our membership, and we'll continue to invest to do that in the future. Operator Oliver Chen, TD Cowen. Tom Nass It's Tom Nass on for Oliver. I wanted to ask on digital convenience. Seems to be trending quite impressively. Is there any color you could give on the impact that may or may not have on margins for the business overall?And then as a follow-up, it would be great to hear your outlook for the year on the general merchandise category. And then related to that, how private label fits into the equation with any opportunities or developments planned there? Robert Eddy Yes. Tom, thanks for the question. Digital has been more and more important over the past several years. We're trying to save our members' time in addition to 25% of their groceries. And what they're telling us is they love what we're grows week in, week out, quarter, quarter in, quarter out, two year stack and digital sales well over 50% again this quarter. So what we're doing is clearly resonating. The predominance of that business, you remember is in and curbside and same-day as we as we fulfill those orders, obviously, they cost a little bit more. They can cost a little bit more because our members -- our team members are doing the picking for our members. And even in the case of curbside, putting in their basket, but -- their member shopping behavior tends to increase, the more engage people get in these digital conveniences. And so that incrementality tends to pay the bill for the increased costs. Those costs are largely below gross just specifically to your margin question, it's not really a gross margin story again from from a contribution margin perspective, these sales will be slightly less accretive. But certainly, the incrementality is what we're looking for. We're trying to grow lifetime value, we're trying to grow engagement in the our members are telling us every day that these conveniences are incredibly helpful. We also made nice games inside the club and another element of our digital sales, which is Express Pay, the ability to check out using your upon a time, that was an incredibly small part of our business, and it's growing every day there, too. General merchandise a little bit softer in the first quarter. All of that was in discretionary high-ticket goods. And I think what you're seeing is the consumer confidence playing out in there and some weather, quite honestly.I mean, it's pouring here today in front of where the day we can. So not a great incentive to go buy a patio set or lawn fertilizer at this point. But I think as we go forward, I think the consumer will ebb and flow with whatever happens from an economic in other less discretionary or smaller ticket businesses within GM, we saw some strength. We did well in apparel. We did well in electronics. But I think what you're seeing is people heading more towards need categories than lot categories until there's greater certainty about what's going to happen in the I would expect that situation to persist for as long as that uncertainty persists. And then your final question on private label, another all-time record in private label penetration that's, I think, going to two things: one, the continuing search for value for definitely seeing members be a little bit more promotionally since you're definitely seeing them look at that own brands a little bit more -- but our team is doing a phenomenal job creating own branch products that are great great quality of great now we're even in some cases, splitting them more prominently in the clubs. And we're changing packaging and doing all sorts of other things to really put those in a more robust I would anticipate the consumer continuing to search for value as we talked about, which would highlight some own brands and then we will try and exercise some self-help as well and to continue to improve our own brands is incredibly important, as you know, from a margin story perspective as well as from a loyalty perspective, even if it comes with a little bit of top line degradation, we'll take the margin on the loyalty all day long. Operator Steven Zaccone, Citi. Steven Zaccone I was going to ask two in one. So the first is just really strong merchandise margin strength in the first quarter. Maybe how should we think about that over the course of the year because the compares get a little bit tougher, but just help us understand your outlook then a follow-up on Chuck's question earlier. I guess what I was curious on is the commentary around the wider range of outcomes while still maintaining the guidance. Is that just acknowledging the macro has gotten much more doesn't sound like anything you're seeing in the business has changed, right? Like it seems like still pretty good momentum from your specific business. Robert Eddy Look, we're quite pleased with the margin strength during the quarter. It was a little bit of probably our easiest compare during the year. We had some stuff going on last year as we launched Fresh 2.0 that we were able to this quarter. But look, we have a bunch of different irons in the fire to grow margins over time that we've talked about probably just talk about at on the last question, that's a good it category management process as we continue to figure out how to put the right brands and products on the shelves at the right value. We're also trying to figure out what the right margin mix is in each category as well, and that should hopefully let us alter margin rates there are a few other ones around the business, working better with salvage, changing what we do from a transportation perspective, doing retail media advertising. Those things are all not transformationally large, but they're all individually important. So we'll continue to work on all those things.I would hope that margins continue to perform well during the year. The big question mark, obviously, is what happens from a cost base perspective. And as I said in the response to Ed's question about tariffs, we will go forward and invest to gain market share and do the right thing for our members, unless no matter what happens within the economic structure of what we can so while we do see some daylight from a margin perspective, we also anticipate investing more as we go through the year. So that's really why we left the guidance unchanged for the year. It's certainly a dynamic really knows what's going to happen, but we will control -- we can control on the operational side on the merchandising side, and we will invest for the future of the business, even if that means margins suffer a bit. And I think that answers your question on the wider range as well. Operator Rupesh Parikh, Oppenheimer. Rupesh Parikh So I guess just going back to your relocation commentary. I guess as you look at your store base, do you see a number of opportunities there. And then as you think of relocation opportunities, would this be incremental to what you typically would open in a typical year for stores? Robert Eddy Let me pass it over to Bill. William Werner Yes, we talk a little bit about the relocations in the script, and we have a couple right now in the pipeline. I think what you can expect of us is to continue to look at the markets and the communities that we serve and look for opportunities within our existing store base where we have opportunities to serve more members in the instance where either the retail landscape in the market has changed or the population of the market has so as we think about the real estate program broadly, like I said, in my first response, the models are changing pretty quickly, probably quicker than they've ever had in terms of population changes as well as our share I think our investor base should expect us to play offense and look for these very opportunistic opportunities that become available to us to reposition for the future. And we should absolutely go take advantage of them when it makes sense for our members and the company. Operator Mark Carden, UBS. Mark Carden So another one on real estate. Just as you think about store growth, how are you thinking about the potential impact from higher materials costs just related to tariffs? Do you see it providing much of a risk impacting the timing of your new store in DC growth?Does it impact how you think about prioritizing new market entry versus, say, boosting store counts in your existing markets? Is there an opportunity to play offense? Just any color there. William Werner Mark, and thanks for bringing up the point about the DC. We haven't talked about that much, but the construction of our new DC is going great. We're making tremendous progress with that. And we'll be very excited for us to get that online here in the coming year or terms of the costs, obviously, we've seen some impact of costs within the construction portfolio. And as we think about that over the long term, right, these are 20-, 40-year investments that we're making in new so we're certainly working as we would with any other product that we buy, whether it's our products for merchandise reselling our clubs or our construction costs to leverage our scale, given the number of projects that we have in the pipeline right now to deliver the savings where we can and get these things built as efficiently as as we step back, we feel really great about the overall investment envelope of a new club and the returns that we generated. So we're going to keep going. Operator That's all the time we have left to for questions. I will now turn it back over to Bob Eddy for closing remarks. Robert Eddy Well, thanks, everybody, for your attention this morning. Thank you for your support of our company. We've got a lot going for us. We have had great results over the past couple of a more dynamic environment that we face today than maybe we've ever faced, but we will continue to do the right things to take care of the family to depend on us, and that will power our growth going forward. So we will -- we wish you a great summer. We will talk to you at the end of the next quarter. Operator This concludes today's conference call. You may now disconnect.
Epoch Times
23-05-2025
- Business
- Epoch Times
BJ's Wholesale Club Beats Earnings Estimates on Favorable Shopping Trends
Based on strong membership and digital sales growth, BJ's Wholesale Club Holdings, Inc. reported earnings for the first quarter of fiscal year 2025 that beat market estimates. Despite the challenging consumer environment, the company maintained its guidance for the rest of the year. On May 22, the operator of membership warehouse clubs in the eastern half of the United States reported adjusted earnings of $1.14 per diluted share for the quarter ended May 3, surpassing Zacks' average analyst estimate of 91 cents. Revenues were $5.15 billion, up 4.8 percent from a year earlier, due to an 8.1 percent rise in membership fee income and a 35 percent jump in digitally enabled comparable sales growth. 'We reported a strong start to the year, demonstrating the power of our model and continued momentum in our long-term growth priorities,' said Bob Eddy, chairman and CEO of BJ's Wholesale Club. 'Delivering great value is essential in today's environment, and I am proud of our team members who remain committed to caring for the families who depend on us.' BJ has been benefiting from several shopping trends, including the growing popularity of wholesale clubs and superstores. According to Related Stories 5/21/2025 5/21/2025 Another trend is the merging of online and offline sales, giving rise to a new channel known as 'digitally enabled sales.' Customers can place orders online and either pick them up at local stores or have them delivered to their homes the same day. This approach has helped traditional brick-and-mortar retailers compete more effectively with Amazon. Adding to these favorable retail trends is the application of membership fees, which allows wholesale club operators to target more affluent customers through market segmentation. In addition to boosting sales, these factors have helped wholesale clubs better allocate capital, creating superior returns for investors. According to data published by BJ Wholesale Club's return on invested capital (ROIC) was 10.44 percent, nearly twice the rate the company paid to raise capital in the markets. BJ's shares fell by 1.3 percent on May 22. The stock has been up 29.79 percent year to date, and 212 percent over the past five years, beating the S&P 500 Index, which is flat for the year and up by 98 percent over the same five-year period. Laura Felice, executive vice president and chief financial officer of BJ's Wholesale Club, sees the company continuing its growth path and maintaining its guidance for the rest of the year. 'As we look to fiscal 2025, we are confident in our team, our positioning in the marketplace, and the growth drivers that are within our control. We will remain focused on executing against our long-term priorities to drive continued traffic and market share gains,' she said. 'Based on what we know today, we are leaving our fiscal 2025 guidance unchanged and will continue to evaluate as the year progresses.' On March 6, the company's guidance for fiscal 2025 called for comparable club annual sales growth, excluding the impact of gasoline sales, in the range of 2.0 percent to 3.5 percent, and adjusted earnings per share in the range of $4.10 to $4.30. Meanwhile, the company remains on track to open 25 to 30 new clubs over the next two years as it updates and upgrades its business model. 'In the past several years, we've updated our clubs with the latest sign packages and invested to support our key growth initiatives, including digital and Fresh two-point zero,' Eddy said during the earnings conference call. 'We're also looking to identify relocation opportunities to better position our fleet for tomorrow.' Georgios Koimisis, a professor of economics and finance at Manhattan University, is skeptical about BJ's ability to continue its winning streak on Main Street and Wall Street. 'BJ's stock has outperformed the broader market this year,' he told The Epoch Times via email. 'However, while BJ's seems to be managing costs and profits well, it has not consistently grown sales beyond expectations.' Koimisis sees this situation worsening in the current environment of rising long-term interest rates and plunging consumer confidence. 'With growing economic uncertainty, any slowdown in consumer spending could shift focus from profits to sales performance, making sustained revenue growth a more important factor of investor confidence going forward,' he said.
Yahoo
07-03-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
BJ's Wholesale Club Holdings Inc (BJ) Q4 2024 Earnings Call Highlights: Record Sales and ...
Net Sales: $5.1 billion, a 5.4% increase year over year. Comparable Club Sales (Excluding Gas): Increased by 4.6% year over year. Total Comparable Club Sales (Including Gas): Grew 4% year over year. Digitally Enabled Comp Sales: Grew 26% year over year. Membership Fee Income: Increased by 7.9% to approximately $117 million. Merchandise Gross Margins: Decreased by approximately 10 basis points year over year. SG&A Expenses: Approximately $758.2 million, increased due to new unit growth and strategic investments. Fourth-Quarter Earnings Per Share: $0.92; Adjusted EPS: $0.93. Inventory Levels: Up 4% year over year, flat on a per club basis. Capital Expenditures: Approximately $588 million in fiscal 2024. New Clubs and Gas Stations: Opened seven new clubs and 12 gas stations in fiscal 2024. Membership: Above 7.5 million members with a 90% renewal rate. Warning! GuruFocus has detected 4 Warning Sign with BJ. Release Date: March 06, 2025 For the complete transcript of the earnings call, please refer to the full earnings call transcript. BJ's Wholesale Club Holdings Inc (NYSE:BJ) reported record net sales, membership, and adjusted earnings per share for fiscal 2024. Membership reached an all-time high with over 7.5 million members and a renewal rate of 90%. Comparable club sales, excluding gas sales, grew by 4.6% in the fourth quarter, marking the 12th consecutive quarter of traffic growth. The company's digital conveniences fueled a 26% year-over-year growth in digitally enabled comp sales for the fourth quarter. BJ's opened seven new clubs and 12 gas stations in fiscal 2024, with plans to open 25 to 30 clubs over the next two fiscal years. Fourth-quarter merchandise gross margins decreased by approximately 10 basis points year over year. The company anticipates slight deleverage in SG&A due to accelerated new club openings and increased depreciation. BJ's faces economic and geopolitical uncertainties that could impact costs and consumer behavior in fiscal 2025. The company is cautious about potential impacts from tariffs, which could raise prices and disrupt supply chains. There is a noted sensitivity to discretionary purchasing among consumers, which could affect general merchandise sales. Q: Could you provide more color around the cadence of the comp throughout the fourth quarter and how you're looking at 2025, given the implied slowdown? A: Robert Eddy, CEO: The comp cadence was strong throughout the fourth quarter, with November and December being very good months, and January being the strongest. Traffic momentum has continued into Q1, although there's been some sensitivity to discretionary purchasing. Laura Felice, CFO: We expect the first half of 2025 to be stronger than the second half, with the business currently trending well from a traffic perspective. Q: How are you generally thinking about the tariff risk and its potential impact? A: Robert Eddy, CEO: Tariffs could raise prices for Americans and disrupt supply chains. However, BJ's has less exposure to tariffs than many retailers and has strong capabilities in managing cost inflation. Rising prices often lead consumers to seek value, benefiting BJ's. We remain focused on delivering outstanding value to our members. Q: What's driving the strength in your digital business? A: Robert Eddy, CEO: The strength is driven by saving members time and making shopping more convenient. Our digital offerings like BOPIC, Curbside Pickup, Same-Day Delivery, and Express Pay are popular. We've enhanced our app and website to improve the shopping experience, and 90% of our digital business is fulfilled through our clubs. Q: Can you provide insights into the performance of new clubs and your expansion strategy? A: William Werner, EVP Strategy and Development: New clubs are performing well above plans, both in new and existing markets. We see opportunities for growth in both infill and new markets. The company plans to open 25 to 30 new clubs over the next two years, supported by a strong real estate strategy and a robust pipeline. Q: What are your expectations for merchandise margins in the coming year? A: Robert Eddy, CEO: We had a good year in terms of merchandise margins, although we invested in price to support members amid rising commodity costs. We have efforts in place to raise margins through better sourcing and efficiencies. The impact of tariffs is uncertain, but we are committed to providing value to our members. For the complete transcript of the earnings call, please refer to the full earnings call transcript. This article first appeared on GuruFocus.
