Vera Bradley Q3 2025 Earnings Report

Vera Bradley EPS Results

• Actual EPS: -$0.27
• Consensus EPS: $0.06
• Beat/Miss: Missed by -$0.33
• One Year Ago EPS: N/A

Vera Bradley Revenue Results

• Actual Revenue: $80.58 million
• Expected Revenue: N/A
• Beat/Miss: N/A
• YoY Revenue Growth: N/A

Vera Bradley Announcement Details

• Quarter: Q3 2025
• Date: 12/11/2024
• Time: Before Market Opens
• Conference Call Date: Wednesday, December 11, 2024
• Conference Call Time: 9:30AM ET

Vera Bradley (NASDAQ:VRA) (NASDAQ: VRA) is a lifestyle and accessories designer specializing in colorful, patterned handbags, luggage, travel accessories and coordinated home décor. Founded in 1982 by Barbara Bradley Baekgaard and Patricia R. Miller, the company first gained recognition for its quilted cotton bags sold at craft shows before expanding into an established fashion brand. Headquartered in Fort Wayne, Indiana, Vera Bradley has built a reputation for distinctive prints and functional design aimed primarily at women’s casual and travel needs.

The company’s product portfolio includes day bags, weekenders, backpacks, wallets, and organizational cases, as well as an expanding range of travel gear such as rolling luggage and travel pouches. In recent years, Vera Bradley has also introduced athleisure-inspired styles, home textiles and accessories, and pet accessories under the same signature prints. Products are distributed through a diversified retail network that encompasses company-owned stores, e-commerce platforms, outlet centers and wholesale partnerships with department stores and specialty retailers.

Since completing its initial public offering in 2010, Vera Bradley has pursued an omnichannel growth strategy, with ongoing investments in digital capabilities, supply chain enhancements and customer relationship management. The brand serves primarily the U.S. market, with select international distribution agreements in Canada and Asia. Founders Barbara Bradley Baekgaard and Patricia R. Miller remain influential in shaping the company’s creative vision, while management focuses on extending the brand’s reach through design innovation and strategic retail expansion.

Vera Bradley Q3 2025 Earnings Call Transcript

Key Takeaways

• In Q3, consolidated net revenues fell 30% year-over-year to $80.6 million and the company recorded a $7.5 million net loss versus prior-year income.
• Adjusted holiday assortment and promotional strategy drove better-than-forecast Black Friday through Cyber Monday sales at higher margins, with strong demand for heritage prints and giftable items under $50.
• Brand awareness rose by 700 basis points, including a 9-point gain in the 35–54 demographic and a 7-point increase among higher-income households, reflecting successful repositioning.
• Strategic reduction of low-margin clearance SKUs expanded Q3 gross margin by 80 basis points and positions the company for improved long-term profitability.
• Fiscal 2025 guidance anticipates mid-teens revenue decline to ~$385 million, a ~52.5% gross margin, and an $9 million operating loss, underscoring ongoing transformation headwinds.

Presentation

[Operator]

Greetings, and welcome to the Vera Bradley Third Quarter Fiscal 2025 Earnings Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. A brief question-and-answer session will follow the formal presentation. If anyone should require operator assistance during the conference, please press star zero on your telephone keypad. As a reminder, this conference is being recorded. It is now my pleasure to introduce your host, Mark Dely, Chief Administrative Officer. Thank you. You may begin.

[Mark Dely, Chief Administrative Officer at Vera Bradley]

Good morning and welcome, everyone. We'd like to thank you for joining us for today's call. Some of the statements made during our prepared remarks and in response to your questions may constitute forward-looking statements made pursuant to and within the meaning of the safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, as amended. Such forward-looking statements are subject to both known and unknown risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those that we expect. Please refer to today's press release and the company's most recent Form 10-K filed with the SEC for a discussion of known risks and uncertainties. Investors should not assume that the statements made during the call will remain operative at a later time. We undertake no obligation to update any information discussed on today's call.

[Mark Dely, Chief Administrative Officer at Vera Bradley]

I will now turn the call over to Vera Bradley CEO, Jackie Ardrey. Jackie?

[Jackie Ardrey, CEO at Vera Bradley]

Thanks, Mark. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us on today's call. The third quarter was extremely challenging as we remained in the early stages of Project Restoration, our strategic initiative to transform our business model, and transition Vera Bradley's brand positioning. We have made meaningful adjustments to our assortment and value proposition in response to customer feedback. With the current consumer mindset focused on value, we have more work ahead of us on our repositioning journey that I will talk to you later. I am pleased to report that we're seeing steady progress with several green shoots late in the third quarter, which have continued into the fourth quarter to date. We have modestly adjusted our promotional strategy to deliver an improved value proposition and are seeing better results, but we remain committed to driving shareholder value through improved brand resonance and reduction of low-margin revenue.

[Jackie Ardrey, CEO at Vera Bradley]

With the launch of our holiday assortments late in the third quarter and the careful strategic promotional adjustments we executed, we experienced a steady trendline improvement across the majority of our Vera Bradley direct-to-consumer channels. We are seeing strong customer response to Heritage prints, key giftable price point products, and continued success in elevated price point offerings like leather. We experienced a marked improvement in our brand awareness and equity scores in the quarter, and we continued to broaden our reach with younger and higher-income household consumers. Recognizing the need to address our value proposition, in November, we made the strategic decision to selectively post value pricing offers to drive continued shopper engagement across our branded and outlet channels.

[Jackie Ardrey, CEO at Vera Bradley]

I'm pleased to report that the response has been strong, with our revenue modestly exceeding forecasts over the Black Friday weekend through Cyber Monday week and at higher margins as discounting levels for each channel remained below the prior year. Product highlights over the initial holiday period included strong selling from our Wicked collection, Disney IP, and key price point items under $50 designed for gifting. I want to shift gears and spend a moment on our intended and dramatic reduction in non-go-forward clearance units from our branded channels. We had expected those clearance unit sales to successfully migrate to our outlet channels. That was not the case, and as a result, we experienced a meaningful sales impact in Q3. To be clear, these are highly discounted, low-profit units that are not reflective of our repositioning efforts.

[Jackie Ardrey, CEO at Vera Bradley]

Although the clearance bucket will partially refill over the next several quarters, our overall reduction in SKUs, coupled with a more disciplined buying practice, will enable us to drive significantly higher profitability on our clearance units while not impeding our brand repositioning journey. Vera Bradley's gross margin expanded 80 basis points in Q3 from reduced liquidation and clearance mix. Importantly, we remain committed to driving shareholder value through brand elevation and a continued reduction of low-margin revenue, which is reflected in our Q4 guidance that Michael will detail shortly. Shifting to Pura Vida, the third quarter highlight was the successful opening of our store at Disney Springs, which is off to a great start. We continue to experience outsized performance in our Pura Vida store fleet, while high e-commerce acquisition costs have remained an e-commerce channel headwind.

[Jackie Ardrey, CEO at Vera Bradley]

Let me provide more detail on our progress with Project Restoration for Vera Bradley. I'm particularly encouraged by several key achievements in our brand metrics, including our first awareness increase since 2021, showing a 700 basis point increase in our Ipsos data. We've also made meaningful gains in brand attributes, building equity and being seen as stylish, colorful, and fun. Our customer acquisition efforts are also showing promising results. Our target demographic of 35-54-year-old customers has increased by 9 percentage points, and we're seeing a 7-point increase in higher-income customer acquisition. This validates our strategy of appealing to a more broad and affluent customer base. Regarding our direct channel performance, we're seeing differentiated results across channels. Our e-commerce business is outperforming stores, and our online outlet is showing particularly strong performance.

[Jackie Ardrey, CEO at Vera Bradley]

While we continue to face traffic and conversion challenges in our branded channels, we're encouraged by the progress in our product and pricing strategy. We're successfully implementing lower discounts across channels. Finally, for our outlet stores, we are continuing to test a number of pricing and merchandise initiatives to improve traffic and conversion. In our product assortment, we've seen strong reception in Heritage prints and success in key price point gifts. We've also identified and addressed several style execution opportunities, making adjustments based on customer feedback, the majority of which will be available in early February. These include modifications to strap lengths, pocket configurations, and closure types, changes that will better serve both new and existing customers. In our transformation efforts focused on the channel pillar, we generated strong performance in Q3 with Urban Outfitters.

[Jackie Ardrey, CEO at Vera Bradley]

Our partnership expanded significantly for holiday, both in stores and online, and we're seeing strong continued selling momentum. I'm most excited about the promising discussions with many brands that we're having across categories for future partnerships, which creates an exciting opportunity to attract new customers to the new and improved Vera Bradley offering. We've also been working hard to redefine how we approach inventory sourcing, procurement, and management, an integrated process involving several teams within the organization. I'm especially pleased with the progress this team has made in a short time, delivering a tighter SKU assortment, more disciplined inventory management, and material sourcing improvements that enabled our ability to react quickly to consumer feedback, as I mentioned earlier. As we look ahead to the remainder of the year, we're seeing some early positive indicators, but we remain prudent in our outlook given the broader market environment.

[Jackie Ardrey, CEO at Vera Bradley]

We continue to manage the business with strong financial discipline, maintaining our debt-free position, and focusing on operational improvements. In closing, I want to acknowledge that while this is a challenging period of transformation, we remain confident that Project Restoration is the right path forward for the long-term health and positioning of Vera Bradley. The combination of our trendline business improvement, the upward trajectory in brand scores, our broadening consumer reach, and the new inbound interest generated for brand-right collaborations validates our strategic direction. We all remain dedicated to returning the company to long-term profitable growth and creating value for our shareholders. Finally, I want to thank our talented teams across the organization for their commitment to our brand and to each other during this transformational period. I wish everyone a happy holiday.

[Jackie Ardrey, CEO at Vera Bradley]

I'll now turn the call over to our CFO, Michael Schwindle, to review our financial results in detail.

[Michael Schwindle, CFO at Vera Bradley]

Thanks, Jackie. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us. I will open us up for some questions in a few minutes, but first, we'll cover the results for the quarter, as well as briefly discuss our updated guidance for the year. For the sake of clarity, all the numbers I am discussing today are non-GAAP and exclude charges as outlined in today's press release. A complete detail of items excluded from the non-GAAP numbers, as well as a reconciliation of GAAP to non-GAAP numbers, can be found in that release. For the third quarter, our consolidated revenues totaled $80.6 million compared to $115 million in the prior year third quarter. Our net loss for third quarter totaled $7.5 million or $0.27 per diluted share, compared to a net income of $6.1 million last year or $0.19 per diluted share.

[Michael Schwindle, CFO at Vera Bradley]

In terms of segment performance, Vera Bradley Direct segment revenues for the current year third quarter totaled $52.5 million, a 27% decrease from $72.3 million in the prior year third quarter. Comparable sales similarly declined 27%, with the largest impact in the outlet channel, which continues the challenges similar to prior quarters. Total revenues year over year were also impacted by five store closures. We did open five new outlet stores during the quarter, with four of these just two days before the end of the quarter. Another two outlet stores also opened about two weeks into our fourth quarter. While the third quarter impact from late quarter opens was negligible, we are very pleased with the sales performance of our new outlet stores to date, and we look forward to continued success in the coming years.

[Michael Schwindle, CFO at Vera Bradley]

Vera Bradley Indirect segment revenues totaled $18 million, a 28% decrease from $25 million in the prior year third quarter. The decrease was related primarily to a decline in specialty and key account orders, as well as a decrease in liquidation sales. Segment revenues were also impacted by approximately $1.2 million of anticipated orders that experienced a slight shipping delay at the end of third quarter but will benefit fourth quarter. Pura Vida segment revenues totaled $10.1 million, a 42.9% decrease from $17.7 million in the prior year third quarter, primarily due to declines in e-commerce and wholesale revenues partially offset by new retail stores. Similar to what we have stated on prior calls, in response to rapidly rising digital marketing costs that began in late third quarter last year, the Pura Vida team remains focused on marketing efficiency as well as digital marketing diversification.

[Michael Schwindle, CFO at Vera Bradley]

Non-GAAP third quarter gross margin totaled $43.6 million or 54.1% of net revenues, compared to $63 million or 54.8% of net revenues in the prior year. The year-over-year margin rate decline was driven by incremental promotional activity at Pura Vida, while Vera Bradley experienced an 80 basis point margin rate improvement over last year, as Jackie described earlier. Non-GAAP SG&A expense totaled $51 million or 63.2% of net revenues, compared to $55.1 million or 48% of net revenues for the prior year third quarter. The current quarter expenses were lower than the prior year by 7.4% and are primarily due to cost reduction initiatives along with some reduction in variable-related expenses from the lower sales volume. We continue to closely examine areas of our organization for process as well as cost opportunities, and our teams are increasingly diligent and attentive to cost management.

[Michael Schwindle, CFO at Vera Bradley]

The third quarter GAAP consolidated operating loss totaled $7.2 million or 9% of net revenues, compared to an operating income of $8 million or 7% of net revenues in the prior year. Now, turning to the balance sheet, our quarter-end cash and cash equivalents totaled $13.7 million compared to $52.3 million at the end of last year's third quarter. We continue to have no borrowings on our $75 million ABL facility at quarter-end. Total quarter-end inventory was $131.3 million compared to $129.1 million at the end of last year's third quarter. Now, relative to prior years, we did have an inventory receipt acceleration of approximately $10 million from fourth quarter into third quarter, which increased inventory and decreased cash relative to the prior year, but this will reverse in our fourth quarter.

[Michael Schwindle, CFO at Vera Bradley]

We have been intensely focused on redefining how we approach inventory acquisition and management and continue to take strategic actions in our merchandising and sourcing processes to improve both product flow and quality. As Jackie noted earlier, we are very pleased with the progress that our merchandising, our planning, and our sourcing teams have made to drive these changes. These efforts have already meaningfully impacted our ability to navigate this year, and they will continue to drive improvements as well as reduce inventory levels into the future. During the third quarter, we also repurchased approximately $5.3 million of common stock, which was approximately one million shares at an average price of $5.50. This brings the total repurchase for the nine months to date to approximately $21.2 million. At the end of the quarter, we had approximately $4.4 million remaining on our $50 million repurchase authorization, which expires this month.

[Michael Schwindle, CFO at Vera Bradley]

In anticipation of this expiration, our board of directors has approved an additional $30 million repurchase authorization, which commences at the expiration of the current authorization and extends for three years. The company does not currently plan to purchase under the 2024 share repurchase program but anticipates utilizing the newly approved share repurchase authorization in the future, depending on market conditions as well as the company's cash position. Finally, I'd like to go through our revised guidance for fiscal 2025. As a reminder, all of our forward-looking guidance is on a non-GAAP basis. As a point of context, please keep in mind that the current year represents a 52-week year, while the prior year, as reported, was comprised of 53 weeks.

[Michael Schwindle, CFO at Vera Bradley]

In light of the current business trends, the continued macro and consumer spending uncertainty, and the anticipated length of time to bear the fruits of Project Restoration, we are planning and managing the business through a conservative lens for the balance of this year. We have been actively assessing a number of responses to the environment and are evaluating several operational changes to the organization, which will both streamline our cost structure and improve our flexibility and responsiveness. For the full year of Fiscal 2025, we expect consolidated net revenues of approximately $385 million. Vera Bradley overall sales year-to-go are expected to decline in the mid-teens range, a sequential improvement in Q4 over Q3.

[Michael Schwindle, CFO at Vera Bradley]

As Jackie noted, we continue to see improvement in several areas of the Vera Bradley business, such as our digital channels, but expect to see continuing trends in comparable stores as well as in Pura Vida, partially offset by new store growth in both brands. We expect our gross margin for the year of approximately 52.5% compared to 54.5% in fiscal 2024. The decline in gross margin rate is driven by increased promotional cadence in our direct segments in the first half of the year, along with increased liquidation sales year to date, partially offset by product cost improvements and lower supply chain costs. Consolidated SG&A expense is expected to be approximately $213 million compared to $234.7 million in fiscal 2024. Year-over-year SG&A expense reductions are the result of continued structural cost reductions across many aspects of our business, along with decreased variable costs.

[Michael Schwindle, CFO at Vera Bradley]

All of this is expected to result in a consolidated operating loss of approximately $9 million compared to an operating income of $22.2 million in fiscal 2024 on a 52-week basis, along with an EPS loss of approximately $0.25 per share compared to $0.54 per share EPS income last year on a 52-week basis. We also expect net capital spending of approximately $13 million versus $3.8 million last year. This spend reflects investments associated with new and remodeled stores as well as technology and logistics enhancements. As a reminder, this level of spend represents a high-water mark associated with Project Restoration, along with new store development that I previously discussed. Wrapping up our guidance here, we expect continued progress on disciplined inventory management, such that our end-of-year inventory is expected to be 5% lower than last year-end's level, which at that time had decreased 17% from the preceding year.

[Michael Schwindle, CFO at Vera Bradley]

On a unit quantity basis, our year-end inventory will be approximately 10% below last year. As a result, we expect end-of-year cash to be approximately $35 million, which reflects these guidance comments along with the share buyback activity that I noted earlier. And that concludes our prepared formal remarks. Operator, can you open up the line for questions, please?

[Operator]

Thank you. We will now be conducting a question-and-answer session. If you would like to ask a question, please press Star 1 on your telephone keypad. A confirmation tone will indicate your line is in the question queue. You may press Star 2 if you would like to remove your question from the queue. For participants using speaker equipment, it may be necessary to pick up your handset before pressing the Star keys. One moment, please, while we poll for questions. Thank you. Our first question comes from the line of Eric Beder with SCC Research. Please proceed with your question.

[Eric Beder, Senior Research Analyst at SCC Research]

Good morning.

[Michael Schwindle, CFO at Vera Bradley]

Morning, Eric.

[Jackie Ardrey, CEO at Vera Bradley]

Hey, Eric.

[Eric Beder, Senior Research Analyst at SCC Research]

So, I want to talk a little bit about the store openings and how you feel that piece starts to flow. And I know you just opened the full-price store in Natick. How should we be thinking about that going forward as you kind of move through in terms of Project Restoration?

[Michael Schwindle, CFO at Vera Bradley]

Great question. Thank you, Eric. I think as we look at the store openings, we have seen opportunities within the national outlet fleets that mostly Tanger and Simon have to continue to expand our footprint there. The outlet stores that we have opened are in the Simon Premium Outlets portfolio. We think there's a great alignment there as they continue to work to innovate their properties, and we're very excited about those opportunities. So we feel very good about that. In terms of the branded store opportunities, we're being admittedly very cautious. We had an opportunity to return to Natick, and we saw that as a great opportunity, and we went ahead and moved back into that space. So we're excited to see how the consumer reengages with us in the Boston area.

[Jackie Ardrey, CEO at Vera Bradley]

I think, Eric, just to add to, we talked a little bit today and more expansively about some of the operational improvements that we're pursuing across the portfolio. That certainly includes our store outlook so as we're opening these new stores, we're looking at some new operational models that we expect to help us improve performance.

[Eric Beder, Senior Research Analyst at SCC Research]

Okay. And when you look at, I know we're still in the early innings here with Project Restoration. When you look at kind of winning pieces and losing pieces, how should we be thinking about it when we step above it here? Is the newer customer spending money differently than the prior customer? And kind of the spacing between one making up for the other, how does that kind of look? And I guess the other question is, how do collaborations kind of work in the new world? Obviously, you have Wicked that came through. You did a Disney collaboration after Project Restoration. How should we be thinking about that as a potential traffic driver and margin driver going forward? Thank you.

[Jackie Ardrey, CEO at Vera Bradley]

Yeah. Thanks, Eric. That's a great question. So some of the green shoots in Project Restoration that we're building on right now are about first attracting this new customer who is younger, more affluent. And the most important part of this is that the customer acquisition is happening at lower discount levels. So that's the key here. That's certainly going to take more time to play out, but that's an important green shoot in Project Restoration. There's also a real top-of-the-funnel effect that happened here, and we're really encouraged by this. Our brand awareness and sentiment scores, increasing as much as they did in such a short time, is an important part of our story. And it's the very beginning part of the story, but it's an important part of the story. We've also made this progress in the 35-54-year-olds. That's, again, a key part of the strategy.

[Jackie Ardrey, CEO at Vera Bradley]

And then the collaborations, both with the outside properties and IP like Wicked. First of all, those are about kind of being in culture. And so being able to continue to expand our brand awareness and be where the customer is. So that's really important. We're continuing to evaluate how those properties can live in both outlet and in the brand channels because she has some significant interest in those from us. So we definitely also are looking at other partnerships and collaborations. Again, we've had this really successful one with Urban. So there's the internal licensing, and then there's the external collaborations that help us expand our reach. So we're really looking at how do we expand both of those, the internal and the external, to get the new customer at lower discounts and build on that success.

[Eric Beder, Senior Research Analyst at SCC Research]

Great. Good luck for the rest of the year.

[Jackie Ardrey, CEO at Vera Bradley]

Thanks, Eric.

[Michael Schwindle, CFO at Vera Bradley]

Thank you, Eric.

[Operator]

As a reminder, if you would like to ask a question, press Star 1 on your telephone keypad. Our next question comes from the line of Daniel Harriman with Sidoti. Please proceed with your question.

[Daniel Harriman, Equity Research Analyst at Sidoti]

Thank you. Good morning, Michael. Good morning, Jackie. Thank you for taking my call and questions.

[Michael Schwindle, CFO at Vera Bradley]

Good morning, Daniel.

[Daniel Harriman, Equity Research Analyst at Sidoti]

Unfortunately, Eric's question was so strong, and Jackie's response kind of hit on what my main points were going to be. But just Jackie and Michael, going back to the green shoots that we're seeing here, obviously, the environment is very difficult and has been for a couple of quarters now. But you've got your first awareness increase in three years. You're resonating more with that age cohort that you're going after and also seeing additional sales from that higher-income consumer, which were all part of what you were going after with Project Restoration. In terms of timing, are you pleased with how quickly that feedback has gotten to you, or were you expecting it a little bit sooner? And then just secondly, and again, you touched on this, but can you talk about any future partnerships that we could be expecting outside of Urban Outfitters?

[Daniel Harriman, Equity Research Analyst at Sidoti]

You touched upon that last quarter and then a little bit now. So any information would be helpful. Thanks.

[Jackie Ardrey, CEO at Vera Bradley]

Sure. Yes. And we expected that question. What I want to say, what I want you to take away is that, first of all, we are disappointed in this result. It was a tough quarter, but we're really encouraged by the green shoots that we're seeing, all the ones that I've talked about. And we're taking those and really mining them in the organization to be sure that we can learn all that we can, make the right pivots. And I'm really proud of how quickly we've been able to adjust to all of the feedback that we've gotten from customers and from our selling data. We are really increasing our focus on improving operations and then working these green shoots, the most important of which are the inbound interest that we're getting that I wish I could talk more about and specifically about. I just can't at this time.

[Jackie Ardrey, CEO at Vera Bradley]

But we are getting quite a bit of inbound interest from other brands, which was not the case for us. So that is what I would like you to take away, is that that's another green shoot that we are really working internally. And the inbound amount of calls and partnerships from different brands across different categories is something that we'll talk more about when we can. But that's what I would leave you with.

[Daniel Harriman, Equity Research Analyst at Sidoti]

Okay. Thanks so much, Jackie, and we just wanted to say we enjoyed our recent store visit. We're impressed with the holiday collection and wish you all the best in the coming quarter.

[Jackie Ardrey, CEO at Vera Bradley]

Great. Thank you.

[Michael Schwindle, CFO at Vera Bradley]

Thank you, Daniel.

[Operator]

We have no further questions at this time. I'd like to turn the floor back over to Ms. Ardrey for closing comments.

[Jackie Ardrey, CEO at Vera Bradley]

Thank you. In closing, we remain committed to driving shareholder value through Project Restoration and look forward to sharing Q4 results on our next call. Thank you, everyone.

[Operator]

Ladies and gentlemen, this does conclude today's teleconference. You may disconnect your lines at this time. Thank you for your participation, and have a wonderful day.

Participants

Executives

• Mark Dely, Chief Administrative Officer
• Jackie Ardrey, CEO
• Michael Schwindle, CFO

Analysts

• Daniel Harriman, Equity Research Analyst at Sidoti
• Eric Beder, Senior Research Analyst at SCC Research