BBB Foods Q1 2025 Earnings Call Transcript

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Provided by Quartr
May 8, 2025

Key Takeaways

  • Positive Sentiment: Strong first-quarter growth: Tiendas Tres B opened 117 net new stores, reaching 2,889 locations, while same-store sales rose 13.5% and revenue increased 35.1% to MXN 17.1 billion.
  • Positive Sentiment: The company’s value-focused assortment continued to outperform the broader Mexican retail market, supporting market-share gains. Management said growth was balanced between traffic and ticket size and expects resilience from demand for basic goods.
  • Positive Sentiment: Operating cash flow rose 49% to MXN 1.1 billion, supported by the company’s negative-working-capital model, while it ended the quarter with approximately MXN 1.6 billion in net cash plus $150 million of cash. Management said expansion remains self-funded over the long term.
  • Negative Sentiment: EBITDA increased 12.7% to MXN 705 million, but the margin contracted from 4.9% to 4.1% as the company accelerated store openings and invested in new distribution centers, headquarters talent, technology, and other capabilities ahead of growth.
  • Negative Sentiment: Share-based compensation is expected to remain elevated at roughly 1.2% of sales for the rest of 2025, and management acknowledged potential temporary cost pressure from overlapping legacy and new technology systems, labor changes, and the gradual reduction of Mexico’s workweek.
AI Generated. May Contain Errors.
Earnings Conference Call
BBB Foods Q1 2025
00:00 / 00:00

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Operator

Good morning, everyone. My name is Leonardo, and I will be your conference operator. Welcome to Tiendas Tres B First Quarter 2025 conference call. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. There will be a question-and-answer session after the speaker's remarks, and instructions will be given at that time. Please ensure that your full name is displayed correctly on Zoom. If not, please take a moment to edit your display name. Also, please note that this call is for investors and analysts only. Questions from the media will not be taken, nor should the call be reported on. Any forward-looking statements made during this conference call are based on information that is currently available to us. Today, we're joined by Tiendas Tres B's Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Anthony Hatoum and Chief Financial Officer Eduardo Pizzuto. I will now turn the call over to Anthony.

Operator

Please go ahead.

Anthony Hatoum
CEO at Tiendas Tres B

Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining Tiendas Tres B's First Quarter 2025 earnings call. I will begin with a review of our operating results for the quarter, and I will be followed by our CFO, Eduardo Pizzuto, who will provide an overview of our financial performance. We will conclude with a Q&A session to answer any questions you may have. We are very pleased with the results of our first quarter, more so in the context of this market environment. Our consistent execution and our attractive value proposition have allowed us to accelerate growth and to increase market share gains. We opened 117 net new stores for a total of 2,889 stores. Same-store sales grew by 13.5%. Total revenues increased by 35% to MXN 17 billion. EBITDA increased by over 12% to reach MXN 705 million.

Anthony Hatoum
CEO at Tiendas Tres B

Cash flow generated by operating activities reached MXN 1.1 billion, a 49% increase year over year. We ended with a net cash position of approximately MXN 1.6 billion. In addition, we have $150 million of cash. We turn to operational performance and look at store openings. We have opened 117 net new stores this quarter, compared to 94 stores for the first quarter of 2024, and we are accelerating our store openings. Another way to look at this is comparing our store openings, the last 12 months first quarter of this year versus last year. For this year, we have 507 stores. For last year, 416 stores. This is an increase of roughly 100 stores. If we look at our revenues and same-store sales, we continue to be one of the fastest-growing retailers globally. Total revenues reached MXN 17.1 billion, an increase of 35.1% year over year.

Anthony Hatoum
CEO at Tiendas Tres B

Very strong same-store sales growth of 13.5%. Our same-store sales numbers continue to be driven by our value proposition to customers, and that value proposition continues to improve. If we look at our same-store sales versus antad, the gap is notable and increasing. I will now pass the microphone to Eduardo.

Eduardo Pizzuto
CFO at Tiendas Tres B

Thank you, Anthony. Good morning, everyone. Sales expenses, as a percentage of revenue, slightly increased from 10.2%-10.3% due to our accelerating store opening pace. As Anthony just mentioned, we increased our pace roughly 100 stores in the last 12 months. On the matter of operating leverage, at the unit level, we continue to see a decreasing trend in cost as a percentage of sales. This is not apparent at the consolidated level, as we continue to accelerate the pace of store openings. It is important to keep in mind that we pay the full cost of new stores in regions before we see the full revenues. Admin expenses, as a percentage of revenue, increased by 60 basis points from 3.5%-4.1%. This includes incremental MXN 84 million on non-cash share-based payments, roughly 50 basis points.

Eduardo Pizzuto
CFO at Tiendas Tres B

We're also investing for current and future growth acceleration, hiring key personnel for the four new regions we're opening in 2025, and increasing talent density at headquarters, particularly in IT, purchasing, controls, and legal. We posted robust growth of 12.7% in our EBITDA that reached MXN 705 million. Margin decreased from 4.9%-4.1% due to the increase in investments to support our accelerating growth. Ours is a business model that generates significant negative working capital. In turn, we generate significant cash flows from changes in negative working capital. We can see, for example, that in March of 2024, we had a negative working capital of MXN 4.8 billion compared to a negative working capital of MXN 6.5 billion in March of 2025. This is roughly 10.5% of total revenue. I'd also like to highlight that our accelerating growth continues to be self-funded.

Eduardo Pizzuto
CFO at Tiendas Tres B

I will now turn the call back over to Anthony for final remarks.

Anthony Hatoum
CEO at Tiendas Tres B

Ours is a robust business model that is very resilient. Our value proposition continues to increase. Our competitive advantages are real and increasing. As a result, we will see continued growth and gain in market share. We will continue to increase our investments for our future growth. It has always been our approach, and it's a proven strategy. We believe that this will pay off in increasing growth rates and the creation of value for our shareholders. We continue to do the same, just faster and better. We can now start our Q&A session, so please go ahead, the Operator.

Operator

Thank you. We will now conduct a Q&A session with Anthony Hatoum and Eduardo Pizzuto. If you would like to ask a question, please press the raise-your-hand button located at the bottom of the screen. If you are connected via telephone, please dial star nine. We remind you that all lines have been placed on mute. When it is your turn to ask a question, you will be given permission to speak. You will then be able to unmute yourself and ask your question. Our first question comes from the line of Bob Ford. Please state your company name and ask your question.

Bob Ford
Bob Ford
Senior Analyst at Merrill Lynch

Good morning, everybody. This is Bob Ford from Bank of America Merrill Lynch. Good morning, Anthony and Eduardo. How should we think about your investments in talent, both in terms of the magnitude of the expense as well as the capabilities and functionality that some of the additions kind of bring about? With respect to the new distribution centers that you're planning for this year, how should we think about the split between increased density in existing trade areas versus entry into new regional markets?

Anthony Hatoum
CEO at Tiendas Tres B

Hi, Bob. Thanks for the question. Look, any investment we make is made with a simple criteria in mind: what's the return on this investment? When we do increase talent density and it does result in an increase in expenses, as we have observed in this quarter, it is definitely because we are planning for our future growth. It's always been our strategy to invest for future growth. There is nothing new in our approach, strong believers here that an increase in talent and density is one of the key competitive advantages that we will have going forward and one of the key drivers, one of the key ingredients if you want to think about it this way, to create opportunities and to create growth going forward. The second question had to do with density of distribution centers. It is, again, the same approach as always.

Anthony Hatoum
CEO at Tiendas Tres B

We are very standard in our approach of opening distribution centers. We like them to be all operating exactly the same. It makes it very easy for us then afterwards to manage this business because they are all equal regions, equal distribution centers, and benchmarking them allows us to be very efficient thereafter. If the question is, does this density impact one another? It is all driven by stores. We open stores, and based on their location, we decide where to open our next generation of distribution centers. If they happen to be close to each other, that could be the case, but it is a very logical outcome because what you are doing is compacting these distances between a distribution center and its stores and therefore increasing your logistics efficiency. That is the only criteria that really matters: how efficient are you logistically?

Anthony Hatoum
CEO at Tiendas Tres B

If you're being more efficient, then that's the right answer.

Bob Ford
Bob Ford
Senior Analyst at Merrill Lynch

You know, my spin is actually very different in the sense that I really believe that you're understored in your core market, right, where you started in Mexico City. I think that the opportunity to drive greater density is massive. I think that because there's familiarity with the brand, your stores are more likely to mature faster. That was where I was coming from.

Anthony Hatoum
CEO at Tiendas Tres B

Oh, absolutely. You're absolutely correct with the statement in that there is still significant runway in the areas in which we're operating. Our strategy has been to spread out, but also to increase the density within the areas in which we operate. We have yet to see, I would be hard-pressed to tell you, "Oh, we've saturated an area. There is no more space to open a store in an area in which we currently operate." You're absolutely right. In the areas in which we currently operate, you have a tremendous leverage because your brand is well-known. People who could be your customers in a new store have probably shopped with you before. Therefore, you do see the improved performance when you do open a new store.

Bob Ford
Bob Ford
Senior Analyst at Merrill Lynch

Makes sense. With respect to the systems investments that you mentioned in the press release, can you foreshadow maybe some of the capabilities you anticipate and some additional, I guess, some incremental redundancy initially as you prepare for transition, but maybe the path to increase functionality, new products and services?

Anthony Hatoum
CEO at Tiendas Tres B

We look at, absolutely, Bob. I mean, here we look at it as we look at any investment. What's the return going to be on investing in tech? I break it down into two parts. One, the new generation of tech is significantly more efficient than the generation on which we built our current tech, which, by the way, works perfectly well and continues to be very scalable. Why not take advantage of something that is more efficient? Yes, there is going to be an overlap between the old tech and the new tech, and probably for a period of time, you will see an increase in expenses during that transition period.

Anthony Hatoum
CEO at Tiendas Tres B

On top of the fact that the new tech is significantly more efficient, it gives you a portfolio of new tools that the old tech simply didn't offer or offered you in a very expensive or cumbersome way. Just think about big data. I mean, this is a business that generates significant amounts of data. The way we take advantage of this data in the old tech versus the new tech has, it's an order of magnitude more efficient, more impactful, more useful in the new technology platform. Just think about AI. With the old tech, we can't use AI with our databases. With the new tech, we absolutely can use AI. It is as simple as that.

Bob Ford
Bob Ford
Senior Analyst at Merrill Lynch

Very helpful. Thank you so much.

Operator

Question comes from the line of Alvaro García. Please state your company name and ask your question.

Alvaro Garcia
Alvaro Garcia
Associate Partner at BTG Pactual

Hey, Anthony, Eduardo. Thanks for the space. Alvaro Garcia from BTG Pactual. My first question is for Eduardo on sales expenses. I was wondering if you could comment on the timing of, I guess, certain growth investments, DCs, new stores throughout the year, and the impact to 1Q specifically. You mentioned in the prepared remarks that it's important to keep in mind that you pay for the full cost of a store and a DC before setting up shop. Just curious as to how we should, I see sales expenses as sort of the primary driver of leverage on the margin front going forward. I was wondering if you can comment on timing of sales expenses. Thank you.

Eduardo Pizzuto
CFO at Tiendas Tres B

Hi, Alvaro. Yes, absolutely. The timing of this is because remember that we're increasing the pace of store openings. Today, we're increasing from 400-500 stores. What we mean by that is that we're paying off the initial investment of the stores, and then revenues will come afterwards. That has been the case pretty much since inception and since we've been continuing to grow. This is what we should expect this year as well because we're increasing that pace of growth. In terms of our distribution centers, it's the same case. As Anthony just explained, we open the stores first, and then we open our regions. What will make us even more efficient once these are open. These regions, these distribution centers will be open through the year within the next three to six months.

Eduardo Pizzuto
CFO at Tiendas Tres B

Once we have them open, again, we will start seeing the benefits on logistics expense mainly. On the unit side, you mentioned also leverage on sales expenses that you're expecting leverage mainly on sales expenses. What we're seeing on a unit level, Alvaro, is that we continue to see leverage as expected. You don't see that because it's on that consolidated basis that you're looking at right now. If you were to look at their older stores, older vintages, we continue to see leverage on those stores. That continues to be the case. Today, by the way, the new stores that we're opening, they're pretty much on track as what we have been expecting as you saw the targets on unit economics. We're pretty much on track based on what we have published. That's what we should expect.

Alvaro Garcia
Alvaro Garcia
Associate Partner at BTG Pactual

Yeah, that's helpful. My second question is on share-based expenses going forward. We saw a significant uptick in the first quarter. I was wondering if you could maybe provide some color on whether this is a new normal or if this is a bulkier than usual quarter. My sense is it's a new normal. You've already sort of announced issuance for this year, but any comments with regards to that line item would be very helpful. Thank you.

Eduardo Pizzuto
CFO at Tiendas Tres B

Yeah, thanks, Álvaro. Yeah, we should think about the number that we have today for the remainder of the year. It's about 1.2% of sales. And it has to do with the options and RSUs that were granted at the end of last year. So it is not a bump in Q1, so think about this as ongoing for the rest of the year.

Anthony Hatoum
CEO at Tiendas Tres B

Again, just a reminder to all. I mean, share-based compensation has been extremely impactful in our case. It has driven the results that you see today. It has driven the entrepreneurial spirit that you see at Tres B today. It has driven the can-do attitude. It has protected us from poaching talent. We will continue to do this because it's an excellent return on investment.

Alvaro Garcia
Alvaro Garcia
Associate Partner at BTG Pactual

Totally. Thank you very much.

Eduardo Pizzuto
CFO at Tiendas Tres B

Thank you, Alvaro.

Operator

Our next question comes from the line of Joseph Giordano. Please state your company name and ask your question.

Joe Giordano
Joe Giordano
Equity Research Analyst at JP Morgan

Good afternoon, everyone. This is Joe Giordano with JP Morgan. Hi, Eduardo, Anthony. Thanks for taking my question. I have three short ones. The first one, when you look at the gross margin, historically, it has been a little bit volatile. We know that the company's focus is to maximize operating leverage here. I just wanted to understand a little bit more the dynamics behind the gross margin into the first quarter since we have been seeing an increased penetration of private label in your base, so basically, and in theory, a gross margin driver for that sake. Having that said, I mean, if you could comment a little bit more on just the weakness of the consumer environment and if you are seeing any kind of more aggressive approach from peers.

Joe Giordano
Joe Giordano
Equity Research Analyst at JP Morgan

Going back to the expense, I mean, last year, you guys did an amazing job in the first quarter to offset the minimal wage. Basically, you mentioned that there were some fat to be cut. I would like you to compare a little bit your abilities here to offset those expense pressures other than growing sales in terms of headcount adjustments and things like that. Thank you very much.

Anthony Hatoum
CEO at Tiendas Tres B

Yeah, I'll break the question down in two parts. We'll talk about gross margin, then we'll talk about personnel expenses. On the gross margin, nothing has changed, Joe. It's the same dynamic driven by scaling up and us taking advantage of the benefits of scale. Whether you're looking at commercial or private label products, both benefit from scaling, and we will see over time a steady improvement in gross margins while we have quarter to quarter, as we've said many times, of changes and volatility. It's normal because of the way we manage pricing, which is on a product-by-product basis. As a result, we get the gross margin that you see here this quarter. Now, if your question had to do with do we see any pressure in dropping prices, the answer is no because we haven't changed anything the way we've done things.

Anthony Hatoum
CEO at Tiendas Tres B

We basically set prices based on elasticity and that we're optimizing for the number of products, items sold, and total revenues and total dollar margin. Nothing has changed since last quarter and last year, and we don't see anything on that front. On the question of personnel, you have to take into account two things. One, because of our accelerated, it's not only the fact that we have an increase, we've seen increases in salaries, but also because when you're looking at growing the rate at which you're opening stores, you need to start training your people ahead of time. You might see that appear in the personnel numbers. In our case, these expenses are highly diluted by the growth in our sales numbers. I'm not sure if I answered your question, but I think this is how I'd look at it.

Joe Giordano
Joe Giordano
Equity Research Analyst at JP Morgan

You really have. Thank you very much, Anthony.

Operator

Our next question comes from the line of Alejandro Fuchs. Please state your company name and ask your question.

Alejandro Fuchs
Equity Research Vice President at Itaú BBA

Thank you for the space for questions. I have two quick ones on my end. I wanted to see maybe if you can give us some color on same-store sales breakdown between traffic and ticket during the quarter. Congratulations on the very impressive and strong print. The second one, in terms of free cash flow generation, I think the quarter was quite strong. I wanted to see if you expect this trend to continue or maybe we could have some cash usage due to more openings throughout the year. Thank you.

Anthony Hatoum
CEO at Tiendas Tres B

The first part, we're seeing solid growth in both tickets and ticket size. I'd say 50/50. On our cash flow generation abilities.

Eduardo Pizzuto
CFO at Tiendas Tres B

I'll take that question, Alejandro. No, I mean, again, this is net working capital, changes in working capital. This is something that we need to look on a not necessarily in a quarter-by-quarter, but on a longer-term range. Yes, we did generate significant cash in this quarter. It is really business as usual because the fundamentals of those key metrics have not changed. Payables and inventories continue to be pretty much the same, although inventories have slightly come down. That's the reason that we generate so much cash. We have always been balancing the cash generated, and we invest that back into CapEx for new stores and more growth. This is something that we should expect. I mean, some quarters will be up, some quarters will be down, but overall, the trend will continue to be upwards as we've seen in the past.

Eduardo Pizzuto
CFO at Tiendas Tres B

That's why we continue to be self-funded since many, many years now.

Alejandro Fuchs
Equity Research Vice President at Itaú BBA

Thank you, Eduardo and Anthony. Very clear.

Operator

The next question comes from the line of Ulises Argote. Please state your company name and ask your question.

Ulises Argote
Ulises Argote
Equity Research Analyst at Santander

Thanks so much for the space for questions. This is Ulises Argote from Santander. I wanted to get your thoughts on potential impacts and also maybe how you could offset the pressure of operating stores under this assumption of the gradual reduction of the working week in Mexico that was announced a couple of days back. Maybe, Anthony, it goes in line with the answer you provided to Joe's earlier question, but it would be interesting to get your thoughts on that. Afterwards, I have another follow-up question.

Eduardo Pizzuto
CFO at Tiendas Tres B

Hi, Ulises. Thank you. Yeah, I mean, as we've explained before, even if it's gradual or a full impact, which they've announced is going to be gradual. As we've explained before, we have some wiggle room in the sense that we have part-times at the store, and we will shuffle those, and we will be able to comply when whatever this is said and done. I think we need to get the clear rules on how that will impact. This is something that we've been looking into and also preparing for whenever that happens. Whenever that happens, it will happen, and we will comply with it. We might see a small bump in the initial stages, but as on our labor cost, as we continue to increase our sales, this is something that will eventually stabilize and actually decrease as a percentage of sales.

Eduardo Pizzuto
CFO at Tiendas Tres B

That's the way we're looking at it, Ulises.

Ulises Argote
Ulises Argote
Equity Research Analyst at Santander

Thank you very much for that, Eduardo. The other question that I had was more on the strategic side of things. I was actually driving by your headquarters the other day and saw that YEMA sign there next to Tres B, right? So I was just wondering what the strategy is with the brand. Should we kind of expect some rollout of standalone YEMA stores on top of the additional current couple of ones that are already out there? Or is kind of the strategy there for this to serve more as a differentiator in some stores there with assortment? i don't know, maybe just to get some sense of where you see this part of the business going. Thank you.

Anthony Hatoum
CEO at Tiendas Tres B

I think YEMA has been a very successful concept, and we will very likely roll it out. The pace of it would be at a different pace than what we roll out at Tiendas Tres B stores, but it will expand.

Ulises Argote
Ulises Argote
Equity Research Analyst at Santander

Perfect. Great. Thanks for that, Anthony.

Operator

Our next question comes from the line of Andrew Ruben. Please state your company name and ask your question.

Andrew Ruben
Andrew Ruben
Equity Research Analyst at Morgan Stanley

Hi, Andrew Ruben at Morgan Stanley. Thanks very much for the question. Maybe just a bit of a broader one, but you showed the chart that essentially implied that your comp spread versus antad widened and widened pretty meaningfully sequentially. I know there's not kind of one single item, but just I'm curious your perspectives, any thoughts of Tiendas Tres B versus the market, what might have changed between 4Q and the even more favorable result in 1Q. Thank you.

Anthony Hatoum
CEO at Tiendas Tres B

Andrew, I mean, I think the only way to answer this is that our clients are choosing us because we are offering a better value proposition. And we know internally that we're continuously improving our portfolio of products and increasing what we offer to our clients. That's the only explanation I can give you to why we see our same-store sales at the level they are versus what antad is experiencing. I mean, the only other maybe fine-tuning to this answer would be we continue to offer basic goods. I mean, these are the things you consume most frequently, and therefore, you're not going to cut down on these when it's time, when you decide you want to cut down on your budget of spending. Our portfolio is the one that is going to be the least affected, if at all.

Anthony Hatoum
CEO at Tiendas Tres B

Again, our business model because of that is extremely resilient. We are also extremely efficient because we have a limited assortment of 800 SKUs. These are real and sustainable competitive advantages that we've always had and that continue to improve over time.

Andrew Ruben
Andrew Ruben
Equity Research Analyst at Morgan Stanley

Great. That all makes sense. I appreciate it.

Operator

Our next question comes from the line of Pablo Valles. Please state your company name and ask your question.

Pablo Valles
Senior Investment Analyst at Summit Management

This is Pablo Valles from Summit Management. Thanks for taking my question. Looking back to fiscal year 2024, we saw a slight uptick in your cash conversion cycle, which seemed partly due to a decrease in day's payable. Now that we are a few months into 2025, do you expect this trend to continue? Could you expand that a bit on how you're seeing your relationship with your suppliers and how that's evolved over the years? Thank you.

Anthony Hatoum
CEO at Tiendas Tres B

Yeah, I think that payables and inventories are stable for the foreseeable future. If you see small variations quarter to quarter, that's completely normal. I wouldn't read more into it. The best assumption is to assume they're stable for the foreseeable future. Our relationship with suppliers has always been extremely strong and only gets stronger as you scale. If your question is, do we try to extract from our suppliers better terms and conditions on this front, the answer is I don't see anything happening there.

Pablo Valles
Senior Investment Analyst at Summit Management

Thank you very much.

Operator

Our next question comes from the line of Jim Luther. Please state your company name and ask your question.

Analyst

Good afternoon, Anthony and team. Thank you for taking our questions. This is Jim Luther. I'm a shareholder representing myself. Here's my question. You mentioned in your release that you're operating in a challenging consumer environment. Can you expand on what you mean by that and expected trends in the future? In addition, if Mexico doesn't work out a trade agreement with the U.S. in the near term, will that have any impact from your perspective on Mexican domestic consumption? Thank you.

Anthony Hatoum
CEO at Tiendas Tres B

Hi, Jim. Good to hear from you. Jim is one of our very early shareholders through his father. It is great to hear from you.

Analyst

Yes. Thank you.

Anthony Hatoum
CEO at Tiendas Tres B

As you've heard, analysts opine Mexican consumers are under pressure and have cut down their spending. As you've heard us say, we haven't seen the impact of that in what we sell. We don't expect that to change much because, again, what we offer to the customer is a very high-value proposition. Therefore, if anything, we benefit in environments where a customer is basically trying to save money. We also sell the basic assortment of goods, which you consume on a very regular basis. Therefore, when you cut, this is the product that you cut the last. It is very unlikely that we see an impact when things get tight. Now, the second part of your question had to do with what happens in our U.S. versus Mexico tariffs, trade relations, etc.

Anthony Hatoum
CEO at Tiendas Tres B

We have looked at all sorts of scenarios of what might happen, and we are usually coming out winning in every single one of the scenarios you can think of. A scenario that increases, for example, inflation because prices of goods become higher. We are a business model that tends to benefit from inflation given that we work with significant negative working capital. If people are feeling tighter and we go into a recession, people tend to, we have tended in previous recessions to gain significant new customers. When things get better, customers are sticky. We don't lose them. Net-net, I think this is the business model that is most resilient and resistant to these kinds of things and actually benefits from these turbulent environments.

Analyst

Great, Anthony. Thank you so much.

Operator

Our next question comes from the line of Héctor Maya. Please state your company name and ask your question.

Héctor Maya
Héctor Maya
Equity Research Director at Scotiabank

Thank you very much, Héctor Maya from Scotiabank. Thank you, Anthony and Eduardo, for taking my questions. Just wanted to know how your conversations have been evolving with suppliers, with the consumer and tariff context that we are seeing, just to understand what kind of scenarios you're maybe discussing with them, if there are some efficiency initiatives being considered or on negotiations with them. What's the view on how to split potential savings, if any, in the case that you find further efficiencies down the road, just to understand how much space or opportunities in margins that there could be for Tiendas Tres B under the current consumer environment from a supplier perspective. Thank you.

Anthony Hatoum
CEO at Tiendas Tres B

Yeah. I'm assuming here, Héctor, and good to talk to you, that we're focusing more on our private label suppliers and not on our commercial brand suppliers. If that's the case, let me step back by giving some context that we work very closely with our suppliers and we work long-term. I mean, honestly, 2025 was planned three years ago. What we do today is thinking with our suppliers and our partners, what are we going to be doing in 2027, 2028. How are we going to ensure that we have supply? How are we going to ensure that the supply is going to be extremely efficient in terms of manufacturing and distribution? The matters that you put on the table about how do we get efficiencies have already been discussed and planned for a long time ago.

Anthony Hatoum
CEO at Tiendas Tres B

When it comes to saying, okay, how do we divide the pie? It's already been divided, and there's nothing new that's happening right now because of the current environment. This builds a lot of trust, and this allows us to operate very closely and together look for win-win solutions. Believe me, there is a lot of benefits to working like this very closely with your supplier. Fundamentally, if you look at it, what's driving the benefits is scaling. As you scale, everything becomes significantly more efficient, and these efficiencies are split fairly between us and our suppliers.

Héctor Maya
Héctor Maya
Equity Research Director at Scotiabank

Thank you. Thank you very much, Anthony. Now that you mention it, is there any change on how you've been talking to your other suppliers?

Anthony Hatoum
CEO at Tiendas Tres B

Our commercial brand suppliers who are very important to us and with whom we have excellent relationships. Again, the benefits of scale come into play here, but perhaps the planning is not as long-term as we do with our private label suppliers.

Héctor Maya
Héctor Maya
Equity Research Director at Scotiabank

Yeah, I understand. I mean, it's particularly important under the current tariff scenario, right?

Anthony Hatoum
CEO at Tiendas Tres B

Yeah. I mean, again, if part of the question is what happens to prices, because if there are tariffs, we can expect that some raw materials might increase in price, etc. Whether it's due to tariffs or devaluation, because when you look at inputs, they're very dollar priced. What we've seen in the past is that they get passed on to the consumer over time. The impact of passing on this increase in price to the consumer has an impact. Elasticity of products depends on the product. We just happen to be offering to the client products where you have to, you will buy them, and you don't necessarily substitute significantly when you see an increase in price. This is just very theoretical and in general, and I can only point to what has happened in the past and what we have observed in the past.

Anthony Hatoum
CEO at Tiendas Tres B

Tres B doesn't get impacted. On the contrary, I see Tres B benefiting from scenarios like this.

Héctor Maya
Héctor Maya
Equity Research Director at Scotiabank

Excellent. Thank you very much, Anthony.

Operator

Our next question comes from the line of Javier Pérez Alvarez. Please state your company name and ask your question.

Analyst

Hi, Anthony, Eduardo, this is Javier Pérez from 1C in Switzerland. Congrats on the strong execution and expansion. I wanted to touch base again on stock-based comp. The way we think about it is in a tough low-margin business like yours, profitability is always a trade-off. Assuming the mature model runs on thin margins, it's quite unusual, or at least for us, to see meaningful stock-based compensation programs in retail companies. Yet in Q1, I think the stock-based comp reached nearly 8% of the gross profit, which surprised us a bit. How should we think about it, not just in the next year, as you have already answered, but over the long term? What I'm asking this is because the case of Tiendas Buenaventura is starting to gain visibility in public forums.

Analyst

Some potential investors have raised some concerns both around the future dilution implied by some old outstanding stock options plans, but also the recent sizable stake that you, Anthony, sold in the secondary offering. It would be helpful to hear your perspective on how you are thinking about this going forward.

Anthony Hatoum
CEO at Tiendas Tres B

Thank you for the questions. I'll try to break them down as there are several embedded in there. Let me start by stock-based compensation. From the get-go, we are firm believers that stock-based compensation is an investment with a very high return. Therefore, we will continue to do that irrespective because this is what has brought us to where we are and explains the phenomenal growth rates that we've been seeing and the fact that we operate faster and more efficiently today than we did yesterday. When you have a company where the entrepreneurial spirit is strong, you do have very strong benefits in being able to maintain very high growth rate paces and no hiccups. This is a company that's been able to grow now for over 10 years at these rates you're seeing with no hiccups.

Anthony Hatoum
CEO at Tiendas Tres B

Part of this is given the spirit of the people that we attract to this company, the talent that we attract, and we attract them with stock-based compensation. Of course, a lot of you are aware that stock-based compensation is non-cash, and it does appear as an expense, but it's a non-cash expense. When you are modeling, you either model this but don't dilute in the share count, or you don't take it into account and dilute in the share count. Doing both would be double counting.

Eduardo Pizzuto
CFO at Tiendas Tres B

Javier, you also asked the question on dilution, etc. What I would encourage you, I'm not sure if you had the chance to look at it, is prior to our follow-on, we publish an example, an illustrative example of dilution, and it's on our website. If not, you can download it from there.

Analyst

Thank you, Eduardo. Yeah, I will do.

Eduardo Pizzuto
CFO at Tiendas Tres B

Okay. It gives you a pretty good idea of what dilution means. It is roughly about 160 million shares, which is already, everything is already accounted for. I just want to touch on the point about the future dilution that you referred to. I think it is pretty clear on that example.

Analyst

Thank you, Alvaro.

Anthony Hatoum
CEO at Tiendas Tres B

There was a question about my selling a stake in the secondary offering of Tres B. I would basically say it's a very small stake in the total. As you know, conservatively, I've been allocated the whole stake of Bolton Partners. The main reason for selling has been fiscal, taking care of fiscal obligations.

Analyst

Okay, guys, thank you for the explanations.

Alvaro Garcia
Alvaro Garcia
Associate Partner at BTG Pactual

Thank you, Javier.

Operator

That's all the time we have for the Q&A session. I would like to hand the call back to Anthony for his closing remarks.

Anthony Hatoum
CEO at Tiendas Tres B

Ours is a robust business model that is very resilient. Our value proposition continues to increase. Our competitive advantages are real and increasing. As a result, we will see continued growth and gain in market share. We'll continue to increase our investments and our future growth. It has always been our approach and is a proven strategy. We believe that this will pay off in increasing growth rates and in the creation of value for our shareholders. We will continue to do the same, just faster and better. Thank you all. Thank you to our investors and to the analysts that are covering us for your continued support and confidence in our strategy. If you have any questions, you can reach us directly, Eduardo and I. We are very happy to talk to you and to answer your questions. Thank you again.

Operator

Thank you. That concludes today's call. You may now disconnect.

Analysts
    • Anthony Hatoum
      CEO at Tiendas Tres B
    • Eduardo Pizzuto
      CFO at Tiendas Tres B
    • Bob Ford
      Senior Analyst at Merrill Lynch
    • Alvaro Garcia
      Associate Partner at BTG Pactual
    • Joe Giordano
      Equity Research Analyst at JP Morgan
    • Alejandro Fuchs
      Equity Research Vice President at Itaú BBA
    • Ulises Argote
      Equity Research Analyst at Santander
    • Andrew Ruben
      Equity Research Analyst at Morgan Stanley
    • Pablo Valles
      Senior Investment Analyst at Summit Management
    • Analyst
    • Héctor Maya
      Equity Research Director at Scotiabank
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