Casella Waste Systems Q4 2024 Earnings Report

Casella Waste Systems EPS Results

• Actual EPS: $0.41
• Consensus EPS: $0.16
• Beat/Miss: Beat by +$0.25
• One Year Ago EPS: N/A

Casella Waste Systems Revenue Results

• Actual Revenue: $427.49 million
• Expected Revenue: $419.53 million
• Beat/Miss: Beat by +$7.96 million
• YoY Revenue Growth: N/A

Casella Waste Systems Announcement Details

• Quarter: Q4 2024
• Date: 2/12/2025
• Time: After Market Closes
• Conference Call Date: Thursday, February 13, 2025
• Conference Call Time: 10:00AM ET

Casella Waste Systems (NASDAQ:CWST) is a regional solid waste services company headquartered in Rutland, Vermont. Founded in 1975, the company provides waste collection, transfer, disposal, recycling and resource-recovery services to residential, commercial, industrial and municipal customers.

Casella’s services include curbside and commercial waste collection, construction and demolition debris management, transfer station operations, recycling of paper, cardboard, plastics and other materials, and organics recycling. The company also operates landfills and develops landfill-gas and other renewable-energy projects that support the recovery of value from waste.

The company primarily serves communities and businesses across the northeastern United States, including Vermont, New Hampshire, New York, Massachusetts, Maine and Pennsylvania. Casella was founded by John W. Casella, who has served as the company’s chairman and chief executive officer.

Casella Waste Systems Q4 2024 Earnings Call Transcript

Key Takeaways

• Casella delivered another strong year with 2024 revenues, adjusted EBITDA and adjusted free cash flow each growing over 20% for a third consecutive year while maintaining a low 2.54x net leverage ratio.
• The company closed eight acquisitions in 2024 adding over $200 million of annualized revenue and has already closed three more in 2025 with $40 million, backed by a pipeline of $700 million in potential deals and $900 million of available financing capacity.
• 2025 guidance calls for revenues of $1.775–1.805 billion (+15%), adjusted EBITDA of $410–425 million (+16%) and adjusted free cash flow of $165–180 million (+9%), assuming stable economics and no additional acquisitions.
• Operational improvements drove over 100 basis points of margin expansion in the base collection business through automation of 17 trucks, rollout of in-cab technology and route optimization, and completed recycling facility upgrades (Willimantic) are expected to contribute roughly $4 million of incremental EBITDA in 2025.
• Landfill volumes declined 8.2% year-over-year in Q4 2024 (with special and C&D tonnage down 11.8%), tempering disposal revenue growth and weighing on Q4 adjusted EBITDA margin, which contracted 60 basis points due to higher incentive compensation.

Presentation

[Operator]

Hello, and welcome to Casella Waste Systems, Inc. Q4 2024 conference call. At this time, all participants are on a listen-only mode. After the speaker's presentation, there will be a question-and-answer session. To ask a question during the session, you will need to press star one one on your telephone. You will then hear an automated message advising your hand is raised. To withdraw your question, please press star one one again. I would now like to turn the conference over to Jason Mead. You may begin.

[Jason Mead, Senior Vice President of Finance and Treasurer at Casella Waste Systems]

Good morning. Today, we'll be discussing our Q4 and full year 2024 results, which were released yesterday afternoon. This morning, I'm joined by John Casella, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Ned Coletta, our President, Brad Helgeson, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer, and Sean Steves, Senior Vice President and Chief Operating Officer of Solid Waste Operations.

[Jason Mead, Senior Vice President of Finance and Treasurer at Casella Waste Systems]

After a review of these results and an update on the company's activities and business environment, we will be happy to take your questions. But first, please be aware that various remarks we make about the company's future expectations, plans, and prospects constitute forward-looking statements for the purposes of the Safe Harbor Provisions under the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995.

[Jason Mead, Senior Vice President of Finance and Treasurer at Casella Waste Systems]

Actual results may differ materially from those indicated by these forward-looking statements as a result of various important factors, including those discussed in the risk factors section of our most recently filed Form 10-Q on file with the SEC. In addition, any forward-looking statements represent our views only as of today and should not be relied upon as representing our views in any subsequent date.

[Jason Mead, Senior Vice President of Finance and Treasurer at Casella Waste Systems]

While we may elect to update forward-looking statements at some point in the future, we specifically disclaim any obligation to do so even if our views change. These forward-looking statements should not be relied upon as representing our views as of any subsequent date to today, February 13, 2025. Also, during this call, we'll be referring to non-GAAP financial measures. These non-GAAP financial measures are not prepared in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles.

[Jason Mead, Senior Vice President of Finance and Treasurer at Casella Waste Systems]

Reconciliations of the non-GAAP financial measures are the most directly comparable GAAP measures to the extent they are available without unreasonable effort, and they are included in our press release filed on Form 8-K with the SEC. With that, I'll now turn it over to John Casella to begin today's discussion.

[John Casella, Chairman and CEO at Casella Waste Systems]

Thanks, Jason. Good morning, everyone, and welcome to our Q4 2024 conference call. This is another great year for the company. We really performed well against our key strategies, maintained focus on our core competencies, and continued to grow the business in a meaningful manner. I'm very proud of all that we've accomplished this year, and I truly appreciate the efforts around the organization that have supported our execution and growth thus far.

[John Casella, Chairman and CEO at Casella Waste Systems]

We have tremendous opportunities again in 2025 to drive value, and I'm very much looking forward to the year ahead. We closed eight acquisitions in 2024 with over $200 million in annualized revenues, and we are off to a fast start in 2025 with three acquisitions closing to date with approximately $40 million in annualized revenues.

[John Casella, Chairman and CEO at Casella Waste Systems]

Consistent with the last few years, we are working on several deals, and we're poised to put our balance sheet to work. It's amazing to consider our growth over the last two years. We've acquired over $500 million in revenues and put over $1 billion of capital to work. However, I find it equally remarkable that we are now a company of more than 5,000 employees with operations in 10 states and have welcomed hundreds of thousands of new customers to Casella over the last couple of years.

[John Casella, Chairman and CEO at Casella Waste Systems]

In particular, our new markets enable us to further build our brand through great service, community engagement, to invest in the support of new business opportunities, and to bolt on with acquisitions that have the right strategic fit. Terrific opportunity across the entire footprint with many, many opportunities from a tuck-in standpoint.

[John Casella, Chairman and CEO at Casella Waste Systems]

In further highlighting 2024, we grew revenues, Adjusted EBITDA, and Adjusted Free Cash Flow by all over 20%. That marks three years in a row of Adjusted EBITDA growth of over 20%. We also maintain a low leverage profile. Clearly, this speaks to our disciplined growth strategy, focus on integration, and the strength of our pricing and operating programs. Our landfills provide us with an excellent in-market position.

[John Casella, Chairman and CEO at Casella Waste Systems]

Although C&D and special volumes were down in 2024 due to various external dynamics, we're optimistic that we will experience modest volume growth in 2025 as these pressures ease. Further, our McKean Landfill is online and provides us with long-term opportunity to meet the disposal needs of our customers, as well as potentially partner with third parties that are seeking capacity. As we have grown the business, we have also increased our ability to internalize tonnages.

[John Casella, Chairman and CEO at Casella Waste Systems]

This has been the focus in 2024 and will continue to be so in 2025. Shifting to our collection business, it has been another strong year across our collection operations with year-over-year Adjusted EBITDA margin expansion in the base business of over 100 basis points. Sean and his team continue to look for those opportunities from a synergy standpoint, from a technology perspective in terms of driving our operating costs down.

[John Casella, Chairman and CEO at Casella Waste Systems]

This accomplishment is a reflection of our continued investment in automation, further rollout of in-cab technology and routing programs, as well as our flexible pricing. Most of our acquisition growth over the last several years has been in the collection line of business. In fact, now over 60% of our consolidated revenues are in collection.

[John Casella, Chairman and CEO at Casella Waste Systems]

As expected, the acquired businesses usually have initial margins at lower levels as compared to our typical collection business, which presents the ability to improve operations over time as we integrate and take the business to our operating standards. Sean and the team are focused on driving further value here in 2025. In resource solutions, we had one of the best years in history across our recycling processing operations and national accounts business.

[John Casella, Chairman and CEO at Casella Waste Systems]

We invested in and upgraded our Boston recycling facility in 2023. The operation performed very, very well in 2024, in fact, better than expected, and was a contributor to our success in the year. In early 2025, we wrapped up a similar upgrade in Willimantic, Connecticut. The operation was offline for part of 2024 but is now up and running.

[John Casella, Chairman and CEO at Casella Waste Systems]

As planned, it will take a few weeks to calibrate the new system, but we're excited to have that project complete. In our national accounts business, we grew volumes by over 4% in 2024. Our sales organization won new municipal, commercial, industrial, and institutional accounts while also growing our service with existing accounts. Given the expertise of our team, our expanding operating footprint, and our sales pipeline, we are positioned well to continue to grow this resource management offering.

[John Casella, Chairman and CEO at Casella Waste Systems]

This marks the 50th year of the company, and as I reflect on where we started from the simple beginnings that Doug started with that one truck and the construction of our first recycling facility in 1977, I feel absolutely blessed to have been a part of this and so incredibly proud of what we have been able to achieve collectively.

[John Casella, Chairman and CEO at Casella Waste Systems]

We are the product of hard work and perseverance of so many people over the years. As we look ahead, this is the best team that I've worked with. It's exceptional. We have a lot of momentum going into 2025, and I look forward to our continued execution and growth, and now I'll pass it on to Brad to go through some of the financial details.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

Thanks, John, and good morning, everyone. Revenues in the Q4 were $427.5 million, up $67.9 million, or 18.9% year-over-year, with $50.1 million from acquisitions, including rollover, and $17.8 million from organic growth, or 4.9%. Solid waste revenues were up 21.4% year-over-year, with acquisition growth of 17.8%, price up 5.4%, and volumes down 1.8%.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

Within solid waste, price in the collection line of business was up 6.2% and volume down 0.7%. Price was up 7.3% in the front-load commercial business, up 6.1% in residential, and up 5% in roll-off. Volume declines were concentrated in our Mid-Atlantic region with a higher rate of churn as we worked to improve the quality of revenue and margins in those recently acquired businesses. Collection volume was flat to positive elsewhere in our footprint across all lines of business.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

Revenues in the disposal line of business were up 1.4% year-over-year, with transfer and transportation revenue up 5.8% and landfill revenue down 5%. Landfill price growth of 3.2% was offset by lower volume of 8.2% in revenue terms. MSW tons into the landfills were up 4.8% in the quarter, but we saw continued weakness in special waste, C&D, and other tons, with those streams down 11.8% year-over-year.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

The average price per ton at the landfills was up 5.1% year-over-year, reflecting a mixed shift away from lower price streams as we help align on price in the face of volume pressure and prioritize preserving our valuable airspace. Resource solutions revenues were up 9.7% year-over-year, with recycling and other processing revenue up 8.1% and national accounts up 10.7%. Within processing operations, price was up 10.7%, driven by an increase of 13% in average commodity revenue over Q4 last year.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

Commodity prices overall remained firm so far this year, with recent softness in the fiber market largely offsetting strength in plastics and aluminum. Processing volume in revenue terms was down 2.5%, driven by the municipal biosolids business as we have been more price-sensitive in renewing municipal contracts in light of processing capacity constraints.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

I'd like to note that the Willimantic recycling facility came back online as scheduled in January, and following a shakeout period, we expect the facility to roughly double its processing speed, initially allowing us to reduce operating costs by going from two shifts to one. Adjusted EBITDA was $95 million in the quarter, up $12.8 million, or 15.6% year-over-year, with $11.5 million from acquisitions, including rollover, and $1.3 million from organic growth. Adjusted EBITDA margins were 22.2% in the quarter, down 60 basis points year-over-year.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

Bridging the year-over-year change in Adjusted EBITDA margin in the quarter, higher annual and long-term incentive compensation expense, driven by the strong Adjusted Free Cash Flow generation in 2024, impacted EBITDA in the quarter by approximately $5.5 million, representing 125 basis points of margin headwind, as the adjustment to the full-year accrual was concentrated in the Q4, magnifying the impact.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

Margins across the rest of the base business were up 55 basis points, and acquisitions represented a further tailwind of 10 basis points in the quarter. Cost of operations were $285.6 million in the quarter, up $46.5 million year-over-year, with $35.3 million of the increase from acquisitions and $11.2 million in the base business.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

Cost of operations in the base business were down approximately 30 basis points as a percentage of revenue in the quarter, reflecting continued operating leverage in the collection business and lower landfill costs such as leachate. General and administrative costs were $52.2 million in the quarter, up $9.1 million year-over-year. For fiscal year 2024, G&A costs were down 10 basis points as a percentage of revenue. In gross dollars, this expense line reflects increased spend to support our growth and invest in the technology that will enable us to scale effectively.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

But in percentage terms, we expect to continue to gain leverage here over time as we grow. Depreciation and amortization costs were up $11.7 million year-over-year, with all of that increase, or $12.4 million, resulting from the recent acquisition activity, including the amortization of acquired intangibles.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

As a reference, D&A associated with acquisitions was approximately 25% of acquired revenues in the quarter. This compared to 14% for our base business. GAAP net income was $4.9 million in the quarter, up $6.7 million year-over-year, with the charge for the landfill cap in the liner failure at the Ontario County Landfill in Q4 last year compared to a partial recovery related to that event in Q4 this year.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

This recovery in the P&L resulted from a settlement payment from one of the contractors involved in the capping, as well as an engineering assessment that more of the cap can be retained than originally estimated. I'd like to take a moment to discuss the change to the calculation of our non-GAAP metrics, adjusted net income, adjusted EPS, and adjusted operating income.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

Beginning with our presentation of 2024 results and going forward, we will further adjust these metrics to exclude the amortization of acquired intangibles. As we've discussed in the past, this amortization expense significantly weighs on the income statement in the early years of an acquisition, with an amortization schedule that expenses approximately 50% of the purchase price allocated to intangibles such as customer lists and non-competes in the first three years.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

We believe that this change will present a much clearer picture of the underlying trends in our business performance as we execute on our acquisition growth strategy that we believe is creating significant long-term value for our shareholders. On this basis, adjusted net income was $25.8 million in the quarter, up $8.7 million compared to prior year, with acquisitions and organic growth driving this increase. Adjusted EPS was $0.41 in the quarter and $1.35 for fiscal year 2024.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

Our book income tax rate was 35.7% for the year, with non-deductible expenses and discrete items pushing the rate above our statutory rate of approximately 27%, including state taxes. The reason this effective rate is higher than previous years is that lower GAAP net income in 2024, driven by acquisition-related expenses and amortization of intangibles, magnifies the impact of permanent differences and discrete items on the rate.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

We paid $6.8 million in cash taxes in 2024, which included overpayments that will be applied to 2025, and we expect to pay approximately $5 million again this year. We enter 2025 with an estimated $83 million of NOLs, which we expect will shield the vast majority of our federal tax liability in 2025.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

Assuming all else equal from a tax legislation and future acquisitions, we will begin to pay federal tax more meaningfully in 2026, but we expect to have more clarity on this outlook as the year progresses. Net cash provided by operating activities was $281.4 million in 2024, up $48.3 million year-over-year, mirroring our strong EBITDA growth for the year. Adjusted free cash flow was $158.3 million, up $30 million year-over-year, or 23%.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

This came in above the high end of our guidance range, boosted by strong AR collections to finish the year, with DSO of 36 days at December 31, down from 41 days the year prior. As I mentioned earlier this year, we struggled with collections at the operations acquired from GFL in our Mid-Atlantic region as a result of the transition services period for the carve-out of that business.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

However, we've been able to make good progress on turning this around over the past several months, bringing DSO in the Mid-Atlantic region down from 56 days at June 30 to 42 days at year-end. By comparison, the rest of Casella was at 35 days at December 31. So we still have a lot of work to do here, but it's certainly heading in the right direction.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

As of December 31, we had $1.1 billion of debt and $383 million of cash, and our consolidated net leverage ratio for purposes of our bank covenants was 2.54 times. As of today, after acquisitions completed thus far in 2025, we maintain approximately $900 million of potential financing capacity between excess cash and undrawn revolver. As laid out in our press release yesterday, we announced financial guidance for 2025.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

This guidance included revenue in the range of $1.775-$1.805 billion, or 15% growth at the midpoint, Adjusted EBITDA in the range of $410-$425 million, or 16% growth at the midpoint, and Adjusted Free Cash Flow in the range of $165-$180 million. Our guidance ranges reflect acquisitions completed to date in 2025 and assume a stable economic environment for the balance of the year. While we expect to continue to be acquisitive this year, our guidance does not reflect any further acquisition activity, nor does it assume any material changes in the inflation outlook or tariff policy.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

On the top line, our guidance includes $170 million from acquisitions, or approximately 11% growth, which includes both rollover and the impact of approximately $40 million in annualized revenue acquired so far in Q1, and approximately 4% organic growth at the midpoint.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

In the solid waste business, we're planning pricing of approximately 5%, which we aim to cover and stay ahead of inflation. As a reminder, we retain pricing flexibility across approximately two-thirds of our collection revenue, so we are well-positioned to respond to changing conditions if necessary as the year progresses. Solid waste volumes are expected to be flat to down 1%, with continued churn in our collection book of business reflected in that estimate, particularly with our new acquisitions in the Mid-Atlantic region.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

Bridging 2024 Adjusted EBITDA to our guidance, $30-$35 million is from acquisitions, and approximately $25 million, or 7%, is base business organic growth at the midpoint. Our Adjusted EBITDA guidance implies a margin range of approximately flat to 40 basis points of margin improvement in 2025, with underlying base business margin expansion of approximately 50 basis points at the midpoint of guidance.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

This improvement is expected to be driven by strong pricing, ongoing operating improvements in our collection business, the benefit of the Willimantic recycling facility coming back online following the completion of that retrofit, and improved landfill volumes year-over-year, including the benefit of increased internalization of MSW tons from our existing operations in our Western Region and the Royal acquisition, partially offset by a headwind of approximately 10 basis points related to increased investment in technology.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

This base business margin expansion is expected to be partially offset by acquisitions contributing at a lower initial Adjusted EBITDA margin than our consolidated margin, representing a headwind of approximately 30-40 basis points.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

We expect adjusted free cash flow to grow at approximately 9% at the midpoint of guidance, taking into account strong working capital performance to finish 2024, but our goal remains 10%-15% annually and will work hard as a team to achieve that. Our guidance reflects investing significantly in the business, with capital expenditures of approximately $215 million, which includes approximately $45 million of upfront spend in connection with recent acquisitions. With that, I'll turn it over to Ned.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

Thanks, Brad, and good morning, everyone. As Sean mentioned, I'm also extremely proud of our team and their continued advancement of our key strategies throughout 2024. We made excellent progress with our growth initiatives, including on organic sales growth, acquisitions, and long-term development projects. Our operating teams executed well, continuing to offset persistent inflation with our core programs and investments.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

Just as important, we continue to take the time to invest in our people to maintain and grow our winning culture and to ensure new team members understand and help to support our core values. On the acquisition growth front, our team was really busy in the Q4 and into early 2025, closing new transactions and integrating deals that were completed over the last year.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

As Sean mentioned, during 2024, we acquired eight businesses with over $200 million of annualized revenues, but this included three acquisitions with $100 million of annualized revenues in the Q4 alone. 2025 is off to a solid start with three acquisitions completed year-to-date with approximately $40 million of annualized revenues. We remain selective with our acquisitions, focusing on opportunities that have the right strategic fit that can help advance our efforts to densify certain markets, drive additional vertical integration, or establish new adjacent market areas.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

Our team continues to do an excellent job successfully onboarding acquisitions, with an early focus on welcoming new team members, establishing our core values, and beginning to integrate the back office, sales, and operations.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

It was another successful year for our sales teams across the organization, where we continue to focus efforts on winning premier customers in important segments where we can implement our resource management solutions, drive circularity, and create win-win long-term relationships. A few examples of this happened across the municipal, higher education, industrial, and multi-site retail segments, where we contracted roughly $150 million of annualized revenues in 2024, with new revenues representing roughly 25% and renewals 75%.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

This is a huge accomplishment for the team across the entire business during the year. From an operating perspective, we continue to execute very well against our core programs, including automated truck conversions, route optimizations, and even extra revenues generated through our onboard computing. During 2024, Sean and his team converted or automated 17 trucks, which eliminated 22 rear-load trucks from the road, which drove quite a bit of labor savings.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

We also rolled out 532 Routeware systems to our fleet, which is a little bit under 1,400 today. These efforts continue to boost safety, operating, and financial performance. Our recent acquisitions all present great opportunities to apply these same successful programs. As discussed last quarter, given the lingering softness in special waste and C&D volumes, we focused our efforts in the second half of 2024 on increasing landfill internalization across both newly acquired markets and markets entered over the last few years.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

To achieve this strategy, we purchased additional long-haul trucks and trailers and established new transportation lanes, mainly from four markets to our New York landfills. With these moves, we're driving an incremental 120,000 tons per year of internalization. We're working on additional opportunities for 2025 to create more internalization.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

Turning to development projects, as Brad mentioned, in January 2025, we completed the full technology and equipment upgrade at Willimantic for our recycling facility. This system is operating, and our team's very busy optimizing the equipment. Taking the site offline was a negative drag to the second half of 2024. However, we expect the project to generate roughly $4 million of EBITDA in 2025.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

We continue to evaluate other opportunities to advance our recycling and resource management infrastructure, with a focus on another recycling facility conversion in the near term. The first phase of investment in our rail service McKean Landfill was completed during the Q3 of 2024. To date, we've received roughly 7,500 tons of waste by rail at McKean.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

While the current infrastructure allows us to offload almost 5,000 tons per day of containerized solid waste, we are not rapidly ramping volumes to the site, as we believe the site provides long-term risk management to preserve our flexibility in the disposal-constrained northeast markets.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

As we look ahead, our M&A pipeline continues to be very active, with over 100 opportunities and roughly $700 million of revenues in various stages of diligence and development. The strength of our balance sheet and our robust liquidity positions us very well for continued return-focused growth. And with that, I'd like to turn it back to the operator for questions. Thank you.

[Operator]

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, as a reminder to ask the question, please press star one one on your telephone, then wait for your name to be announced. To withdraw your question, please press star one one again. Please stand by while we compile the Q&A roster. Our first question comes from the line of Trevor Romeo with William Blair. Your line is open.

[Trevor Romeo, Analyst at William Blair]

Hi, good morning. I really appreciate you taking the questions. The first one was actually maybe just to follow up on the M&A point, Ned, and kind of just thinking about the opportunity set and how 2025 could potentially shape up for M&A. You had some really strong activity the last two years, already closed three deals in 2025. Sounds like the pipeline is maybe a bit higher than you mentioned last quarter.

[Trevor Romeo, Analyst at William Blair]

We're just wondering if you could give us an update on what you're hearing from your discussions as far as willingness to sell, availability of targets, and then kind of from the buyer side, are you seeing any changes in competition for assets? Just kind of how you're expecting M&A to shape up this year?

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

Yeah, thanks for the question. The pipeline's as active, if not more active than it's been ever. We continue to do quite a bit of work. John and I are busy always meeting with potential sellers and just doing what we do. I mean, one of the greatest sources of potential acquisitions for us is our national accounts team.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

That team has worked constructively for 25 years with hundreds of small hauling companies up and down the Eastern Seaboard, and it continues to present a great stream for us to collaborate with small independent businesses and have them know more about us and our culture and our integrity, and that's really the best way to build that pipeline.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

There are always some great opportunities that come through banking processes, but the ones that come directly to us and we can have a meeting of the minds really are the best acquisitions, and we love that. There are a lot of those in the pipeline right now, so we're in various stages with other opportunities throughout the Northeast and down into the Mid-Atlantic footprint and also looking at some adjacencies.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

We're excited for 2025, and it's great to get off to such a nice start as well with a couple of high-quality deals. There's a big focus with a few acquisitions in Pennsylvania, one in Maryland, one in New York, one in Massachusetts, so across the board, we're adding density and great additions to the footprint.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

Yeah, if anything, it's more intense. Normally, we don't do as much in the Q4 as we've done this year. So it's really interesting. I think it's accelerating a bit.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

Yeah, and John, I should have actually mentioned this. We're always chasing what the bottleneck is. And for us, making sure we have the right resources to integrate and successfully integrate and meet the performance is very important in the balance for our people. And with our growth, we continue to look at where we add resources across even our acquisition integration teams, back office, ops, HR, and IT. And we're really trying to do all the heavy lifting and make sure we can continue to support a reasonable amount of growth.

[Trevor Romeo, Analyst at William Blair]

Great. Thank you both for that. And then kind of on a similar theme, I guess, I believe at least kind of in the reporting that was out there, the acquisition you made in Eastern Massachusetts, you acquired a MRF. It sounds like it's pretty close to the Charlestown MRF you already have in Boston. I'm just kind of wondering if you could talk about your plans for that facility and what kind of synergy opportunities you'd see there with your existing business.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

Yeah, we were able to acquire a great business called Save That Stuff, which is a really nice brand in Massachusetts. Erik Levy started this company 35 years ago. His values, his team really align well with ours. And it's a hauling company and a recycling kind of resource management company, so great fit to Casella. We've done an amazing job across the Massachusetts market, most especially Eastern Massachusetts, servicing high-end institutional industrial customers. And Erik's had a lot of the same focus in his team over the years.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

So it's very complementary, both on the hauling side where we have overlaps on routes, but then, as you said, on the processing side, there's a big overlap. Some of his processing capabilities can probably be handled in our recycling facilities, and it gives us more additional space to handle some unique industrial streams going forward. So a great complementary acquisition. We're very excited.

[Trevor Romeo, Analyst at William Blair]

Great. And then maybe just one more quick one for me, if you don't mind. Just wondering if you could kind of give an update on the Brookhaven situation in New York. I think we talked about the impending close at the end of 2024. Now that we're past that point, can you kind of just give us an update on where things stand in the market and if you're still expecting a good portion of those volumes to come back to Casella in 2025?

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

Yeah, I think that it started off slow, but Brookhaven's closed for sure. 110 Sand and Gravel is taking some of that material, but our tons are up at our facilities as well. So up slightly. We'd like to see them up more, but certainly moving in the right direction. So we think that we're likely to continue to see improvement in 2025. But in fact, Brookhaven did close.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

Yeah, it's closed for C&D.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

Yes.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

They're still taking that C&D hauls.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

Yeah.

[Trevor Romeo, Analyst at William Blair]

Okay. Thank you both very much.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

You're welcome.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

Thank you.

[Operator]

Please stand by for our next question. Our next question comes from the line of Tyler Brown with Raymond James. Your line is open.

[Tyler Brown, Analyst at Raymond James]

Hey, good morning, guys.

[John Casella, Chairman and CEO at Casella Waste Systems]

Good morning, Tyler.

[Tyler Brown, Analyst at Raymond James]

John, 50 years. Long time. You could have been in the hotel business.

[John Casella, Chairman and CEO at Casella Waste Systems]

Yeah, just think.

[Tyler Brown, Analyst at Raymond James]

But hey, just Brad, real quick, hey, can you possibly help us with Q1? I'm just wondering if all this weather is having an impact.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

Not significantly. I mean, obviously, Q1, we deal with weather every year. So I wouldn't call out anything in particular that's different from historical trends.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

If anything, tourism's great this year, Tyler.

[John Casella, Chairman and CEO at Casella Waste Systems]

Yeah, we're doing really well.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

That's ski season in 20 years in the Northeast.

[Tyler Brown, Analyst at Raymond James]

Okay. I know. You probably enjoy that. You guys didn't mention it in the prepared remarks, but can we talk about Ontario? Basically, what kind of happened there? How will the wind down of that operation play out? Where are those tons going to get directed?

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

Yeah. I mean, I think that we've got four years to play that out. So I think that we'll be able to move those tons to our other facilities. We'll look at that from a transportation-adjusted basis. And I think we're in a good position to close it out appropriately. But it's interesting because there's no alternative at this point in time.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

So it'll be interesting to see what does transpire. Anything can happen. I mean, we obviously believe at this point in time with the vote from the county that they're going to close in 2028, but that wouldn't be the first time that there's a change in direction. But we're prepared to close it out. And financially, we don't think that that's going to be a negative impact at all.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

And Tyler, as you know, but maybe others don't know, it's within 20 mi of Seneca Meadows as well, which is the largest landfill in New York State, which may have some complexity in their future permitting as well. So we've been actively working on a permit expansion at our Highland Landfill for three years, where we're looking to take the annual permit from 460,000 tons a year to a million tons a year.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

And that process continues to move along really positively. We've got opportunities, of course, to McKean and some other sites. So as John said, we have homes for our tons and for our customers. While not ideal, it just really shows the complexity of maintaining and expanding capacity across the Northeast.

[Tyler Brown, Analyst at Raymond James]

Yeah. Okay. So can we talk a little bit more kind of in that same vein? It sounds like there is a sizable opportunity to internalize tons. I think you mentioned four markets. It sounds like you made headway in 2024, but I'm a little unclear. Is that kind of already in the numbers? Is there more incremental benefit? Is that an EBITDA benefit, or is it just a defensive play?

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

Yeah, sorry. So in our 2025 numbers, we do have that internalization benefit. Some of it was in Q4. As you know, ordering long-haul trucks, trailers, all of that takes time. And if you look back over the last couple of years in the Northeast, we didn't always make the decision with new markets to instantly internalize those tons through our landfills. In many cases, we kept it flowing to third-party sites.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

As we looked at some of the headwinds in 2024 with construction, demo, and special waste streams, we said, "We got to get moving. We got to get this waste into our own landfills, create the maximum amount of cash value." So we started those moves through the summer, the late fall. Coming into 2025, every one of those moves is happening in our guidance.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

There are other opportunities for us to do more, and we're working on that, and we're making sure we're making the right return-based decisions when we do that.

[Tyler Brown, Analyst at Raymond James]

Okay. So then I'll kind of bring it back to the bridge, Brad. So I think let's call it the bridge is $60 million of EBITDA year to year. Did I hear you right? 30-35 of that is M&A. Is that right?

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

Yep.

[Tyler Brown, Analyst at Raymond James]

Okay. And I think you said the other part would represent roughly 7% organic growth. But it seems like you've got some positive idiosyncratic things: Willimantic, internalization, Brookhaven closure, etc. Now, it sounds like you're also spending money on technology, and we'll talk about that in a second. But what are those pieces? Because it feels like that's pretty conservative with those idiosyncratic benefits. Does that make sense?

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

It does. I wouldn't characterize it as conservative. We think our guidance is appropriate. But I think you highlight the fact that we have a number of levers at our disposal to drive results year over year. So obviously, the landfill internalization, which Ned just talked about, notwithstanding our internalization efforts, we would expect the market, at least for C&D volumes, to improve year over year.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

The pricing and collection, operating cost improvements, that obviously is our story year after year. And that's kind of what we're always pursuing. And then the Willimantic MRF, which is, I would say, that falls under the idiosyncratic category, as you said, and as Ned mentioned in his prepared remarks, that'll be about a $4 million benefit year over year in 2025. But there, it's a hard business sometimes, and things don't necessarily always come out the way you plan them.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

So we feel like our guidance is appropriate.

[Tyler Brown, Analyst at Raymond James]

Okay. Perfect. And what is the technology spend, Ned? What's going on there?

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

Yeah. So as we continue to grow, we're always looking to see what types of processes, systems, what do we need to be just as successful in the next year than we were in the previous year. And a part of our business right now that's probably the least scalable are some of our systems, especially with the new acquisitions. And we've continued to invest both in capital and G&A expense.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

Our G&A expense, just on the IT side alone over the last couple of years, is up around 20 basis points. And it'll be up another 10 basis points the next year. And we don't think that's a permanent spend. We just have some redundant spend with acquisitions where we're running old systems and our systems, and we're getting those onto our systems as fast as possible.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

And then we're doing an upgrade of our long-term order-to-cash system that we've used for 30 years called Soft-Pak. And we're in the process of modernizing and upgrading to the latest version. So we're not doing something crazy with a whole new system. This is the technology we've used for years. We're automating more of the connections to other systems.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

And this is millions of dollars of investment, not tens of millions of dollars. And we just need to get more scalable processes, scalable automation through our back office, through our systems, and a lot of focus there right now. So we're over-investing a bit right now on the G&A side and a little bit more in CapEx, but we're excited to get through that.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

Part of it also will be a new customer portal that's out in a pilot market right now, a bit more digitization of the customer experience, which we think will help as well as we continue to scale.

[Tyler Brown, Analyst at Raymond James]

Okay. Perfect. And then my last one. And Brad, you talked about it a little bit. I do get this question from time to time around your NOL position and your cash tax paying position. So did you say that you would be a $5 million cash tax payer in fiscal 2025? But that number could.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

Yes.

[Tyler Brown, Analyst at Raymond James]

Okay. That's right. So that number, though, on the federal side could go up substantially in 2026, or is it just too early and you guys will update it later?

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

Yeah. I mean, it is too early because a lot of this depends upon what happens with tax legislation. And obviously, a lot of the discussion with the new administration is to implement some changes to the tax policy that certainly would be beneficial to us. So the best I can do is comment on all else being equal.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

So the tax law remains as it is today. Given that assumption, we would expect the NOLs to shield us through the rest of this year. And then in 2026, we would begin to pay federal tax more meaningfully.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

But Brad, on that topic, one of the things we've been really successful with acquisitions is either doing asset purchases or structuring stock purchases where we get the asset step-up value. And with that, not every dollar on an income statement will convert to cash taxes, even if we didn't have NOL shielding us. So a lot of the acquisitions give us 15 years of runway of higher tax depreciation that will shield cash taxes into the future. So we'll continue to focus there and try to structure acquisitions in a way that helps us to get tax value as well.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

Yeah. That's a huge point. And I mentioned this in my prepared remarks. All else being equal really refers to two things. One is tax legislation, and the other is deal activity. And so the outlook that I talk about is assuming we do no other deals that are structured from a tax-advantaged way. Surely that isn't our plan going forward.

[Tyler Brown, Analyst at Raymond James]

Okay. Yeah. Deal structure matters. Okay. Cool. Thank you. Appreciate it.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

Thanks, Tyler.

[John Casella, Chairman and CEO at Casella Waste Systems]

Thanks, Tyler.

[Operator]

Please stand by for our next question. Our next question comes from the line of Adam Bubes with Goldman Sachs. Your line is open.

[Adam Bubes, VP of Equity Research at Goldman Sachs]

Hi. Good morning.

[John Casella, Chairman and CEO at Casella Waste Systems]

Good morning.

[Adam Bubes, VP of Equity Research at Goldman Sachs]

Given the acquisitions in the second half of 2024 and year to date, can you just sort of update us on the expanded collection fleet automation opportunity? How much runway is there today now that we've sort of regenerated that opportunity? And I think looking back to 2021, direct labor costs were 150 basis points lower as a % of sales. Is that sort of a good way to contextualize the potential margin opportunity from these initiatives?

[Sean Steves, SVP and COO at Casella Waste Systems]

I'll take that first part, Adam. This is Sean. So in our Mid-Atlantic area, we have a couple hundred opportunities that we're going to automate over the next three years. In our Hudson Valley area, we have opportunity as well. So it's going to keep the ops support team busy for three to five years. That's not counting anything else we acquire this year. So big pipeline of cost of ops reduction for the next few years.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

And on the direct labor point, you hit the nail exactly on the head. When we automate routes, we many times are taking rear-load trucks off the road where we have drivers and helpers. And as an example, this last year, I talked about how we eliminated 22 rear-load trucks from the road. We took 27 headcount out.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

And that's because there are helpers as well. So as we look at automation opportunities, especially in the Mid-Atlantic, our direct labor is running 500 basis points higher than in historical markets that we had. And that really speaks to the story of many rear-load routes that aren't as efficient and many routes that have helpers, which we'd also not like to see from a safety standpoint. We really want everyone to be inside the truck. We'd like automation to occur. And so the big focus is Sean and his team.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

You hit it exactly right. We want to get that direct labor number down.

[Sean Steves, SVP and COO at Casella Waste Systems]

Yeah. Labor is the biggest factor, but not only are we taking helpers off the back of trucks, we're taking trucks off the road. So you really see the benefit up and down the cost stack in terms of fuel, maintenance, etc., all the costs associated with a routed truck.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

Yeah. The rear-load line of business is the oldest from a fleet age perspective as well. So there's a multitude of benefits to automating.

[Adam Bubes, VP of Equity Research at Goldman Sachs]

Terrific. And then revisiting the internalization opportunity, can you just help us think about the economics in terms of incremental travel costs versus tipping fee savings? And what's the magnitude of incremental opportunities that you're looking at for internalization?

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

Yeah. So if a landfill is full, then you're really talking about the difference of what you could internalize that time at versus the third-party time you may be kicking out. We're really looking at sites that did not run full in 2024, and we have excess capacity. So if we can land additional internalized tons, the variable cost of putting another ton into a landfill can be quite small.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

Of course, you got the capital investment of building out that additional capacity. And to your point, the trucking cost to get it there. So each one of these situations we'll look at individually, but these are nice incremental margin decisions, 50%-75% on an incremental ton that's coming into a landfill.

[Adam Bubes, VP of Equity Research at Goldman Sachs]

And then last one for me. Just want to talk about your national accounts business for a moment. It continues to grow really nicely, I think, up high single digits in 2025. Can you just talk about how you think about the growth algorithm in that business going forward and the magnitude of cross-selling efforts on recently acquired assets? Thank you.

[John Casella, Chairman and CEO at Casella Waste Systems]

I think, certainly, great point, Adam. One of the biggest opportunities for us in the Mid-Atlantic is the industrial component from a major accounts standpoint. It's very, very right there. There's a tremendous amount of distribution centers. I think it's the distribution center for the Northeast and that Allentown, Bethlehem area, many, many facilities. So there's a big runway there from a national accounts standpoint with the industrial component. I think that we've been very successful with the municipal team too.

[John Casella, Chairman and CEO at Casella Waste Systems]

I think that we knocked out four, five, six contracts in the Q4 from a municipal standpoint as well, where we were successful from a bidding perspective. So that team is really doing well. We've got some big opportunities in terms of the expanded footprint. So we're looking forward to it. We know how to do that work.

[John Casella, Chairman and CEO at Casella Waste Systems]

The team's been very successful providing those services to large industrial customers where we can put five to 10 people inside the facilities to help them with their waste and recycling component.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

John, one interesting thing is when we talk about price volume, we talk about where the revenue is recognized. Our national accounts team owns the customer relationship in many instances and then has our own trucks service those customers. You look at the growth there. While our volumes are slightly down in the collection line of business, we're actually feeding a lot of intercompany growth when we win those accounts through our national accounts group, whether they be industrial or institutional.

[John Casella, Chairman and CEO at Casella Waste Systems]

Exactly.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

So it's a story that we could probably tell a little better going forward, but it's a great point because that's been a real volume engine for us. When you see some of those small declines in landfill volumes or some of the churn in subscription residential, we're really not focusing enough on that huge amount of wins that we're having with premier customers down in national accounts.

[Adam Bubes, VP of Equity Research at Goldman Sachs]

Thanks so much. Appreciate the color.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

Yeah. Thank you.

[Operator]

Please stand by for our next question. Our next question comes from the line of Brian Butler with Stifel. Your line is open.

[Brian Butler, Analyst at Stifel]

Hey, good morning. Thanks for taking the question.

[John Casella, Chairman and CEO at Casella Waste Systems]

Morning, Brian.

[Brian Butler, Analyst at Stifel]

Just the first one. Just when you look at the price cost spread, it looks positive going into 2025. Maybe we could talk about where internal inflation was in the Q4 and kind of what's built into the 2025 outlook.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

Yeah. Brian, it's Brad. As we finish 2024 and heading into 2025 and our expectations, we broadly expect to be in the area of 4% inflation. So really what we're targeting is 100 basis points of positive spread, at least in the solid waste business. And that's what we tend to target, to be at least 50 or 100 basis points ahead of inflation. It's hard to measure it sometimes precisely, but we feel like we're about 4% right now.

[Brian Butler, Analyst at Stifel]

Okay. Great. And then considering the M&A levels you guys have had, when you think about the flat to down 1% volume outlook for 2025, how much of that is shedding from some of the acquired assets or customers that are just kind of underperforming versus there's any other weakness there?

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

I would say all of it. In the Q4 in the collection line of business, as I mentioned in my prepared remarks, in our legacy footprint, I'll call it, volume was actually flat to up across all the lines of business. So we're seeing real stability there and a modest level of growth depending on the market and the line of business.

[Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO at Casella Waste Systems]

So really that volume decline is concentrated, particularly in the Mid-Atlantic as we, I'm never quite sure what the term intentionally shed means, but we're focused on driving price with some of those customers where we think that pricing isn't appropriate and margins aren't where they need to be.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

Yeah. I'll come back to the point that we talked about a minute ago as well. When you look at multi-site retail, industrial, institutional, municipal, across those segments, we actually have an internal goal to grow those volumes in those segments. And we've got a stretch goal as well. We've organized our sales force and put additional resources on the ground from strategic account managers and specific sales resources to help do that.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

And we've shown a lot of success in that area. So that's, I think, we're going to try and get a little more information out there because those are the types of customers that are very, very sticky. We can create more value for them and do really well margin-wise as well.

[Brian Butler, Analyst at Stifel]

All right. Great. And then one last one. Can you talk maybe about how you're thinking about PFAS at the landfill and kind of in handling that, especially in New England that's very regulatory focused?

[John Casella, Chairman and CEO at Casella Waste Systems]

Sure. I mean, I think that we're out in front of it. We've got two facilities up that are processing PFAS. One's reverse osmosis, and the other one in our Waste USA facility is foam fractionation. Facility is up and operational. We're excited about the results. I think we're doing a pilot program right now with the agency in Vermont. I believe they're excited about the operations and the efficacy of the technology.

[John Casella, Chairman and CEO at Casella Waste Systems]

It separates the PFAS, and then we solidify it and put it back in the landfill, solidify it in concrete and put it back in the landfill. But the technology is there. We know how to do it. Now we're just really kind of tweaking it to see what's the lowest cost technology that can really do the job. And we'll be applying it to our other facilities at this point, Brian.

[John Casella, Chairman and CEO at Casella Waste Systems]

It's likely that we're going to see it at our facilities, and it just gives us more flexibility to be able to take our leachate to many different municipal sewage treatment facilities.

[Brian Butler, Analyst at Stifel]

All right. Great. Thanks for taking my questions.

[John Casella, Chairman and CEO at Casella Waste Systems]

You got it.

[Operator]

Please stand by for our next question. Our next question comes from the line of Tony Bancroft with GAMCO Investors. Your line is open.

[Tony Bancroft, Analyst at GAMCO Investors]

Good morning, Gents. Well done. You guys have just grown rapidly in these last few years, and you've really done a great job of integrating your acquisitions. I guess I've asked this before, but just any thoughts on potential further large, maybe transformational M&A that you could do? Would you want to do? Is there a potential funnel of that out there? Just maybe give us any updated thoughts just based on all of your success recently.

[John Casella, Chairman and CEO at Casella Waste Systems]

I think that we're likely to see a stage where we're knitting in terms of what we have said historically, which is strategically up and down the Eastern Seaboard. But that doesn't mean that there wouldn't be a much larger opportunity that came available that we would take a look at. So I think it's fair to say, Tony, that we'll continue to execute on the tuck-ins over the top of the Mid-Atlantic and the Northeast, and then drive ourselves down the Eastern Seaboard as we've done with the GFL acquisition.

[John Casella, Chairman and CEO at Casella Waste Systems]

And again, you never know what's going to come available and what opportunities are going to be in front of you. So you never say never, but that's not our strategy. It isn't all of a sudden to go and look differently. If those opportunities come to us, then certainly we'll look at it.

[John Casella, Chairman and CEO at Casella Waste Systems]

We can't pick and choose when somebody wants to monetize their business.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

But what we can do is get much better at integrating and have the resources and the ability to scale. So as every acquisition goes by, we gain best practices. We gain better structure, better ways of doing diligence. We really have built a great team there. And many of our business leads across the organization dig in for their night jobs, helping us to successfully acquire businesses and integrate them as well. So it's really become a core competency, I think, for us.

[John Casella, Chairman and CEO at Casella Waste Systems]

I think the other thing that we've done as well, Tony, is training is really important. Maintaining one culture on a go-forward basis is extremely important, and we've made the investment over the last three years in HR. We've made the investment in training facilities. We bought the college a number of years ago. We've revamped that training center. We've got three separate training areas.

[John Casella, Chairman and CEO at Casella Waste Systems]

You can train up to 180 people in one part of the facility. So that's a critical component on a go-forward basis, especially when you're adding the total number of employees, doing core values training, leadership training, helping people understand how we want to run the business, critically important, particularly as we grow the way we've grown. We've added 1,000 people in the last 10 months. So a critical component and something that we've already made the investment in.

[Tony Bancroft, Analyst at GAMCO Investors]

Great job. `Congratulations, John, on the 50. Well done, team.

[John Casella, Chairman and CEO at Casella Waste Systems]

Thank you.

[Ned Coletta, President at Casella Waste Systems]

Thank you, Tony.

[Operator]

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, I'm sure we have no further questions in the queue. I would now like to turn the call back to John for closing remarks.

[John Casella, Chairman and CEO at Casella Waste Systems]

Great. Thank you very much, everyone, for joining us this morning, and we look forward to discussing our Q1 2025 results in April. Thanks, everybody. Have a great day.

[Operator]

Ladies and gentlemen, that concludes today's conference call. Thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect.

Participants

Executives

• Jason Mead, Senior Vice President of Finance and Treasurer
• John Casella, Chairman and CEO
• Brad Helgeson, EVP and CFO
• Ned Coletta, President
• Sean Steves, SVP and COO

Analysts

• Trevor Romeo, Analyst at William Blair
• Tyler Brown, Analyst at Raymond James
• Adam Bubes, VP of Equity Research at Goldman Sachs
• Brian Butler, Analyst at Stifel
• Tony Bancroft, Analyst at GAMCO Investors