MGP Ingredients Q2 2025 Earnings Call Transcript

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Provided by Quartr
July 31, 2025

Key Takeaways

  • Positive Sentiment: Premium Plus portfolio grew 1% in Q2 and is now expected to deliver low single-digit growth for 2025, led by brands like Penelope, one of the fastest-growing premium plus American whiskey labels.
  • Neutral Sentiment: All Distilling Solutions contracts were confirmed or amended, with sales still projected to decline 50% in 2025 but management citing improved stability and visibility in customer commitments.
  • Neutral Sentiment: Ingredient Solutions sales rebounded 5% in Q2 as production issues eased, and the new biofuel plant that went online in July is expected to mitigate waste starch disposal costs over time.
  • Positive Sentiment: The company reaffirmed 2025 guidance for $520–$540 million in net sales, $105–$115 million in adjusted EBITDA and $2.45–$2.75 adjusted EPS, while cutting full-year capex to $32.5 million and maintaining net debt leverage under 2×.
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Earnings Conference Call
MGP Ingredients Q2 2025
00:00 / 00:00

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Operator

Good morning and welcome to the MGP Ingredients Second Quarter Earnings Call. All participants will be in listen only mode. After today's remarks, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. Please note this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Amit Sharma, Vice President, Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Amit Sharma
Amit Sharma
VP - IR at MGP Ingredients

Thank you. Good morning and welcome to MVP's second quarter earnings conference call. I'm Amit Sharma, Vice President of Investor Relations. And this morning, I'm joined on the call by Julie Francis, our new Chief Executive Officer and President, who will introduce herself and make some initial observations Brendan Gahl, our Chief Financial Officer and Mark Davidson, our VP, Corporate Controller and Head of Treasury. They will provide an overview of our quarterly results and outlook.

Amit Sharma
Amit Sharma
VP - IR at MGP Ingredients

As customary, we will begin the call with management's prepared remarks before opening the call to analysts' questions. Before we begin, this call may involve certain forward looking statements. The company's actual results could differ materially from any forward looking statements due to a number of factors, including the risk factors described in the company's quarterly and annual reports filed with the SEC. The company assumes no obligation to update any forward looking statements made during the call, except as required by the law. Additionally, this call will contain references to certain non GAAP measures, which we believe are useful in evaluating the company's performance.

Amit Sharma
Amit Sharma
VP - IR at MGP Ingredients

A reconciliation of these measures to the most directly comparable GAAP measures is included in today's earnings release, which was issued this morning before the market opened and is available on our website, www.mgpingredients.com. At this time, I would like to turn the call over to Brandon for opening remarks.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

Thank you, Amit. Good morning, everyone. As we announced last week, after a thorough search, our Board of Directors appointed Julie Francis as our next President and CEO. I strongly believe that Julie is the right person to lead us forward during this important time for the company.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

She brings a strong strategic lens, deep commercial expertise and a proven ability to build and lead teams. Her fresh perspectives and track record of success at global industry leading CPG companies, particularly in the beverage segment will be critical as we advance our long term vision of becoming a premier branded spirits company. Julie has taken the reins during a challenging time for our industry and she's wasting no time diving into all aspects of our business. There is no doubt she's the right person for the job and I look forward to partnering with her during this next chapter. Julie, welcome aboard.

Julie Francis
Julie Francis
President & CEO at MGP Ingredients

Thanks, Brandon, and hello, everyone. I'm thrilled to be joining the MGP team. Let me first thank Brandon and the executive team and our entire MGP family for their hard work, collaboration and dedication in delivering solid second quarter results. I've had the opportunity to attend our leadership and business meetings and to also meet individually with our broader teams last week. And what I've learned has only reinforced what drew me to this opportunity.

Julie Francis
Julie Francis
President & CEO at MGP Ingredients

First and foremost, MGP's culture. There's something unique about working in the type of culture where everyone is deeply passionate and takes great pride in our business, in their teams and our people. MGP has an integrated partnership approach to customers and suppliers as well as a deep commitment to the communities we serve. There's a certain responsibility we have when we're a part of these teams and I'm and I really like and thrive in that type of culture. Second, a growth mindset.

Julie Francis
Julie Francis
President & CEO at MGP Ingredients

MGP's unique capabilities, impeccable reputation and product offerings give us the right to win in each of the industries in which we compete. More importantly, I believe that all three businesses have a significant growth runway, which can be unlocked as we operate with clarity, operational and executional excellence with integrity, tough mindedness and agility across all of our platforms and functions. I'm energized by the opportunity ahead, confident in our ability to build on our progress and look forward to working with all of you in the investor community. With that, I will turn the call back to Brandon for the business update.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

Thanks, Julie. Our second quarter twenty twenty five performance demonstrated the strength of the foundation Julie mentioned as all three of our segments showed sequential improvements relative to the 2025. Overall, second quarter results came in largely as expected, driven by the continued strength in our Premium Plus branded spirits portfolio and improved year over year performance in Ingredient Solutions. Distilling Solutions also progressed in line with our expectations with improving stability and visibility. At a high level, we believe all three business segments are on solid trajectory.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

We're seeing progress against the priorities we laid out earlier in the year and I'm excited to build on that momentum as we move into the second half of the year. Specifically for the 2025, as expected consolidated sales and adjusted EBITDA decreased 2438% respectively from the prior year period, primarily due to the anticipated decline in distilling solutions performance. Branded Spirits segment sales declined by 5%, but our Premium Plus portfolio posted positive growth. Adjusted earnings per common share declined to $0.97 per share, while year to date operating cash flows increased to $56,400,000 versus $29,600,000 in the same period last year. With another quarter of solid execution, we remain on track to achieve our full year 2025 sales and adjusted earnings guidance.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

Mark will provide greater detail on our quarterly results shortly. Let me take the next few minutes to highlight the current operating environment and the progress we're making against each of our key initiatives. The external environment remains challenging and fluid. Overall economic uncertainty, persistent inflation and higher interest rates continue to weigh on consumer sentiment, which fell into a multi year low during the quarter. While sentiment improved a bit last month, consumer confidence in this backdrop continues to pressure discretionary spending leading to more cautious purchasing behaviors.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

Despite this setting, we continue to execute with discipline and make progress on our key initiatives. Starting with the Branded Spirits segment. Our key initiative for the Branded Spirits segment is focus. We believe our decision to focus on fewer but more attractive growth opportunities is working as our Premium Plus portfolio again outperformed the broader category with 1% growth for the second quarter compared to the year ago period. Our key brands Penelope, El Mejor and Rebel 100 are particularly well positioned to benefit from our focus initiative as we continue to prioritize investments behind these brands.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

For the full year, we expect a healthy double digit percentage increase in the A and P spending for these brands collectively even as our overall A and P spend will be down as we've mentioned on the last calls. While our focus brands delivered positive dollar sales growth in the latest thirteen week period ending on July 12 as reported by Nielsen, let me briefly talk about the terrific growth trajectory of Penelope, the key driver of our continued Premium Plus performance. Penelope is our flagship Premium Plus offering in the American whiskey category with a brand identity that's built on innovation, craftsmanship, authenticity and accessible price points, attributes that resonate strongly with today's bourbon drinkers. Penelope is expanding the brand's strong foundation by capitalizing on consumer demand for more approachable bourbon with softer smoother taste profile. Penelope Wheated continues to build on its strong start with continued expansion into new markets.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

Penelope is also expanding its ready to pour offerings to tap into the faster growing cocktail segment. Penelope Peach Old Fashion is already among the top fifteen seven fifty ml Premium Plus RTP offerings in Nielsen and we plan to further expand Penelope's RTP offerings with the introduction of Penelope Black Walnut Old Fashioned in the third quarter. This continued momentum has made Penelope one of the fastest growing premium plus American whiskey brands based on the retail dollar sales growth reported by Nielsen for the past four, thirteen and fifty two week periods ending on July 12, Penelope has been the second fastest growing of the top 30 premium plus American whiskey brands. With a full pipeline of planned innovation, we expect this broad based momentum to continue through the rest of the year. Given year to date trends, we now expect our Premium Plus segment to grow by low single digits for the full year compared to 2024, an improvement from our initial projections.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

At the same time, as expected, sales of our mid and value tier brands remained softer in the second quarter due to heightened price competition in select pockets. As I mentioned last quarter, we are taking appropriate actions including greater price support to make these offerings more appealing. Although the rate of decline for sales in these price tiers improved sequentially in the second quarter, we believe the impact of these actions on shipments is still taking effect. While we remain encouraged, we now expect the mid and value price tier to be down low double digits for 2025 compared to 2024 versus our initial expectations of mid to high single digit declines. Earlier this week, we announced our decision to partner with Breakthrough Beverage Group for distribution of our products in California.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

Breakthrough is one of the leading beverage distributors in the country and their proven track record and deep expertise in the premium plus categories made them the ideal choice to drive growth for us in this market. Our NDC continues to be our distributor in many states and they remain a valuable partner. We're currently working with both companies in an effort to minimize any potential disruptions during the transition and do not expect this transition to have a material financial impact on our 2025 results. For the Distilling Solutions segment, our key initiative to strengthen partnership with key customers continues to show positive results. While brown goods volume and pricing were down during the quarter compared to the second quarter twenty twenty four, they were consistent with our expectations and more importantly continued to show signs of stabilization. The brown goods industry is navigating a challenging environment, one that we expect to persist in 2026. We're responding by listening carefully to our customers' needs, offering them tailored solutions and demonstrating flexibility with respect to quantities, pricing and timing. As expected, a number of our large strategic customers after completing their existing contracts have expressed the need to temporarily pause their whiskey purchases, which continues to be reflected in our full year guidance. In most cases, these brands are well established with a taste profile that we are uniquely positioned to support. But importantly, these customers remain engaged with our team pertaining to their future needs for brown goods as well as other products we're able to offer including premium gin and neutral grain spirits.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

As a result, we continue to expect distilling solutions first half sales and profits to be stronger than the second half. We are complementing our refreshed commercial outreach by taking a disciplined approach to our brown goods production levels and optimizing our cost structure by collaborating with our suppliers and adjusting our distillery downtimes. As I mentioned last quarter, we're also significantly reducing our whiskey put away to manage our aging whiskey inventory levels and our cash flows. More broadly, overall American whiskey production appears to be responding to the current environment. The year over year decline in total industry whiskey production, which began late last year has picked up pace.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

The latest available TTV data through April 2025 shows even deeper production cuts with total whiskey production in The U. S. Now down 14% for the last twelve months, down 24% the last six months and down 28% in the last three months. While challenges remain including excess whiskey inventories and soft demand, the actions being taken across the industry are constructive and we believe that increasing industry discipline and rational behavior combined with our decisive actions position us to emerge with a stronger competitive position. I'd like to take a moment to acknowledge the entire Distilling Solutions team for their bold actions to make difficult but necessary adjustments over the course of the year.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

Since our Q4 twenty twenty four earnings call, not only have no customers canceled their contracts, but substantially all have either confirmed or amended their purchases in a way that prioritizes the needs of their brands and business. As a result of the commitment we have shown our customers, we're encouraged by the commitment they have shown us in return and now have higher confidence in the remainder of 2025 and increasingly 2026. Turning to our Ingredient Solutions segment. The sequential performance improvements in the second quarter give me confidence that our key initiative to achieve operational and commercial executional excellence in our Ingredient Solutions segment is on track. Although still present in the second quarter, supply challenges that impacted segment results in the first quarter moderated as our team focused on increasing manufacturing reliability, simplifying processes and aligning resources.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

We're increasing our capital investments in the Acheson plant with the goal of further streamlining operations, unlocking additional growth capabilities and improving operational consistency. Our commercial execution also improved during the quarter. Strong consumer demand for higher protein and fiber in their diets is a powerful driver for our specialty starch and protein offerings. Our Fibersen branded specialty starch continues to gain traction across a growing number of food categories, while our sales team continue to gain North American based customers for our RISE branded specialty protein offerings. As expected, our new biofuel plant came online in July.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

The new plant is a key component of our efforts to mitigate costs associated with the disposal of the waste starch stream, which is a byproduct of our ingredients facility. While we continue to expect the new plan to mitigate these costs in the long term, realizing the full extent of these cost savings will take time as we ramp up production and fully commercialize our end product. Overall, despite the soft start to the year, we believe the Ingredient Solutions segment remains well positioned to post higher sales and profitability in the second half of the full year 2025 compared to the first half. Across the organization, our productivity initiatives remain on track and are expected to make substantial contribution to our full year outlook. Our balance sheet remains a key strength, particularly given the higher liquidity and flexibility following the upsizing of our credit facility and the extension of our private placement shelf in the first half of the year.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

Our net debt leverage remains under two times and we continue to generate cash to support our capital allocation priorities. Given the solid results in the quarter, we are reaffirming our 2025 guidance and we continue to expect net sales in the $520,000,000 to $540,000,000 range, adjusted EBITDA in the 105,000,000 to $115,000,000 range and adjusted basic earnings per share in the $2.45 to $2.75 range. We now expect average shares outstanding of approximately $21,400,000 for the full year and capital expenditures of approximately $32,500,000 Our full year effective tax rate remains unchanged at approximately 25%. Within our Branded Spirits segment, we now expect Premium Plus sales to be up low single digits for the year. However, we expect sales of our mid and value priced portfolio and other to be below our initial expectations leading to a modest decline in Branded Spirits segment sales for the full year 2025 as compared to 2024.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

We continue to expect Branded Spirits segment gross margins to be in the upper 40% range. Turning to tariffs. Similar to our industry peers, we're not completely immune to tariff impacts and continue to closely monitor the tariff environment, particularly related to exemptions for goods compliant with The U. S.-Mexico Canada agreement and the potential impact of tariffs on consumer purchasing behavior. Given the evolving situation regarding the implementation and timing of tariffs, their potential financial impacts are not included in our current outlook and we continue to look across our supply chain for additional opportunities to mitigate any potential headwinds.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

Let me now hand it over to Mark for a review of the second quarter results.

Mark Davidson
Mark Davidson
VP - Corporate Controller & Head - Treasury at MGP Ingredients

Thank you, Brandon. For the 2025, consolidated sales decreased 24% to $145,500,000 compared to the year ago period. Within our segments, branded spirits sales decreased by 5% due to the expected double digit decline in our mid and value priced brands driven by lower volumes of certain tequila, liqueur and cordial brands. Our Premium Plus sales increased by 1% reflecting continued momentum in our focused brands in particular Penelope. Distilling Solutions segment sales declined by 46%, primarily driven by 54% decline in brown goods sales.

Mark Davidson
Mark Davidson
VP - Corporate Controller & Head - Treasury at MGP Ingredients

Second quarter warehouse service sales decreased by 5%, while white goods sales declined by 27% due to the phasing out of a number of white goods customer contracts in the wake of the Atchison Distillery closure as well as reduced production volumes of co products, primarily dried distillers grains. Ingredient Solutions sales increased by 5% during the second quarter, driven by a strong rebound in our specialty wheat protein sales. Following a 26% decline in the first quarter, specialty protein sales increased by 13% in the second quarter as we successfully commercialized new customers for these product offerings. Our fiber some branded specialty wheat starch sales declined 4% below year ago levels. Consolidated gross profit decreased 30% to $58,400,000 primarily due to lower gross profits in the Distilling Solutions and Branded Spirits segments.

Mark Davidson
Mark Davidson
VP - Corporate Controller & Head - Treasury at MGP Ingredients

Gross margin declined by three fifty basis points to 40.1%. First quarter SG and A expenses increased 2% compared to the prior year period. However, excluding the impact of a higher incentive compensation accrual in 2025 as we rebuild incentives, SG and A expense decreased by 8% driven primarily by our cost savings initiatives. Advertising and promotion expenses declined 41% compared to the prior year as we lapped elevated spend for certain advertising campaigns during the year ago quarter, as well as continued realignment of our spend behind our most attractive growth opportunities. Although we continue to expect branded spirits A and P spend to be approximately 12% of segment sales for the full year 2025, it represented 10% of Branded Spirits sales in the second quarter, largely due to the timing of certain advertising campaigns within the year.

Mark Davidson
Mark Davidson
VP - Corporate Controller & Head - Treasury at MGP Ingredients

Second quarter adjusted EBITDA decreased 38% to $35,900,000 due primarily to lower gross profits as previously discussed. Net income for the second quarter declined to $14,400,000 primarily due to a lower operating performance and an $8,000,000 increase in the fair value of the contingent consideration liability related to the continued improved performance of the Penelope brand. On an adjusted basis, net income decreased 45% to $20,900,000 Basic earnings per common share decreased to $0.67 per share, while adjusted basic EPS decreased 43% to $0.97 per share. We continue to prioritize strong cash generation by managing our working capital and reducing our barrel inventory put away. Our year to date cash flow from operations was $56,400,000 up $26,800,000 compared to the prior year period, driven primarily by favorable working capital changes.

Mark Davidson
Mark Davidson
VP - Corporate Controller & Head - Treasury at MGP Ingredients

Our year to date net barrel inventory put away of $14,700,000 was down 28% versus the prior year period and we continue to expect net put away of $15,000,000 to $20,000,000 for the full year. Capital expenditures were $10,600,000 during the second quarter and $18,700,000 year to date. We now expect full year 2025 capital expenditures of approximately $32,500,000 a reduction of more than 50% compared to 2024 and down from our previous expectations of $36,000,000 due to decreased investment in certain barrel warehouse projects to better align our warehouse investment with customer demand. Our balance sheet remains healthy and we remain well capitalized with debt totaling $297,100,000 as of the end of the second quarter, leaving us with more than $600,000,000 in availability under our debt facilities. We ended the quarter with a cash position of $17,300,000 and our net debt leverage ratio remains largely stable at approximately 1.8 times as of 06/30/2025.

Mark Davidson
Mark Davidson
VP - Corporate Controller & Head - Treasury at MGP Ingredients

With that, let me hand it over to Brandon before opening for questions.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

To close, given the sequential improved results in the second quarter, we remain on track to deliver our full year outlook. Our teams are executing with purposeful focus, agility and a targeted approach, leading to continued momentum across key branded segments, improved execution in the ingredients business and greater visibility and stability in the distilling solutions business.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

We are excited to have Julie on the team to lead us forward on our journey in becoming a premier branded spirits company. That concludes our prepared remarks. Operator, we're ready to begin the question and answer portion of the call.

Operator

Thank you. We will now begin the question and answer session. And our first question comes from Bill Chappell from Truist Securities. Please go ahead.

Amit Sharma
Amit Sharma
VP - IR at MGP Ingredients

Morning, Bill. Hey, Bill.

Bill Chappell
Bill Chappell
Managing Director at Truist Securities

Morning.

Bill Chappell
Bill Chappell
Managing Director at Truist Securities

And welcome, Julie. Nice welcome aboard. Wanted to, I guess, first talk a little bit more about the new distillate contracts and kind of where we are and visibility from that standpoint. I mean, I guess, one, are you now through all or a high majority of the contract kind of negotiations, discussions? Two, can you see assuming that they hold in place kind of where we will hit a low watermark in terms of revenue over the next few quarters?

Bill Chappell
Bill Chappell
Managing Director at Truist Securities

And three, what's your sense that these are conservative enough or overly conservative in terms of kind of what they're ordering? I mean historically, manufacturer or brands are overly conservative until they run out and then they add more. Just trying to understand maybe a little more color on that whole process.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

Yes. Thanks, Bill. So as we shared in the prepared remarks, well, firstly, we just couldn't be any more proud of our Distilling Solutions team. Their outreach and partnership first approach, is really resonating with our customers and with our business. And as of today, no contracts that we have with customers in February, have been canceled.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

In fact, all bill have been either confirmed or amended. The little we have remaining are progressing well. And, a lot of, you know, maybe the holdup, if you want to describe it as that, maybe have to do with, possibly extending, the agreement, in some cases. So very, very encouraged, you know, by the team's progress there. As far as the visibility goes, this gives us really, really great visibility for the remainder of 2025.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

We can talk about this more in a moment, but the back half is going to be relatively lighter than the first half due to some contracts that were reset. But even with that, that was expected and that was contemplated in our guide at the beginning of the year and in our current guide. So we feel that things are coming in as had projected, in some cases slightly better. So that's through 2025. We've also stated consistently that this dynamic is going to persist in 2026.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

And, while some of our customers are taking temporary pauses in their purchasing as they want to balance out and work down their inventory. We're confident that we're going to remain their long term partner and supplier. We just don't know exactly when that's going to resume and at what type of volumes. So we need a little bit more time there in this dynamic environment to work that out with them. And then as far as conservatism goes, Bill, the quarter came in really pretty much in line with our expectations.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

Again, of the renegotiations that we've had have come in slightly better collectively. And we've had a little bit better performance in H than expected at the beginning of the year. But other than that, things are playing out as we had thought. We still continue to expect, Distilling Solutions sales, excuse me, to be down 50% on the year. And we earlier stated that gross profit dollars for the segment are going be down 65%.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

That latter number may come in a little bit better for the reasons we described. But other than that, we feel like we're right down the middle in terms of our projections and we're very, very confident in the way things have come in and are playing out so far.

Bill Chappell
Bill Chappell
Managing Director at Truist Securities

And so just to make sure back to the age, I mean, original expectations were little to no age sales this year. So maybe you can talk a little bit of why it's better other than just being conservative, like where you're seeing the orders and how you manage, I mean, I imagine everybody wants a discount. Somebody could come and buy some discounted product in the back half of the year? Or are you just saying holding off because it's we're not going to give it away, it's not going to go bad?

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

Yes. Great question. So we're really seeing it in a couple of pockets. Firstly, our again, going back to our partnership approach, our increased outreach to our craft and regional customers is resonating. And you know, it's almost always their preference to deal directly with, MGP and our team than to than to go through a third party broker.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

In in almost all these cases, they're already using our liquid. And so the ability to go to them directly has been, a great step forward in our relationship there. So that's part of the improvement we're seeing this year. But additionally, if there are in some instances customers that are coming to market for the first time for a number of reasons. And, they want to buy they want to buy aged, but they they view this as a long term, plan and program for what they're trying to do.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

So they also want someone who can provide a new distillate. As we've said a number of times, we're unique in that we can offer both in both breadth and scale. And so we're starting to see some traction there as well, Bill.

Bill Chappell
Bill Chappell
Managing Director at Truist Securities

Okay, great. Thanks so much.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

You bet. Thank you, Bill.

Operator

The next question comes from Mark Torrent from Wells Fargo. Please go ahead.

Marc Torrente
Marc Torrente
VP - Equity Research at Wells Fargo

Hey, good Thanks for the question. Julie, congratulations. We look forward to working with you.

Julie Francis
Julie Francis
President & CEO at MGP Ingredients

Thanks, Mark. Appreciate it.

Marc Torrente
Marc Torrente
VP - Equity Research at Wells Fargo

Yes. First question, branded margins stood out, I think highest GMs and EBITDA since the acquisition. Any additional color on gross margin phasing from here? And then advertising came down materially, perhaps some timing, but we know the strategy for this year is to be more targeted around central brands. There seems to be success.

Marc Torrente
Marc Torrente
VP - Equity Research at Wells Fargo

What's been working? What else do you need to adjust? And any other changes in branded to consider with price and positioning or distribution as we go forward?

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

All I think I got most of that Mark. You may have to help me fill out some pieces I missed. But, yeah, Branded Spirits margins are very strong in the quarter. Know, that's really reflective of our performance of our Premium Plus portfolio and the proportionate mix we're seeing over time there. We do think in the back half of the year, margins may be relatively lighter than that, as we expect value to continue to be under pressure And, the gross profit dollars associated with that, you know, are going to continue to be a bit of a headwind.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

A and P was down quite a bit in the quarter, but it sticks out more only because q two of last year was very high due to some programming we did around college basketball that we didn't redo again this year. We're still expecting for the year A and P for our branded spirits to be roughly 12%, of net sales, which is down from the, you know, roughly 15% we've been seeing. However, when you take that A and P investment and do it as a percentage of our premium plus brands, is where all that money is going, that number is actually closer to 25%, which is, as we all know, above the industry averages. What's working? Focus.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

The key initiative here is focus. We've got a lot of great we've got a lot of great brands. And sometimes, we don't know where to where to where to begin and where to where to focus. So we've really tried to improve that this year in both our sales and our marketing execution. And, Penelope, El Meor and Rebel are all reacting to that in a positive way.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

And so that's what we're seeing. That's what's working. As far as further pricing in mid and value, I think was your last question, Mark. Look, value especially is somewhere that's getting increasingly competitive, whether it's in promotions, taking down line pricing or even rebates. It seems like everything's on the table.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

And there are just so many things we can or want to do there. And so we'd rather use our marketing dollars in support for the higher margin Premium Plus brands in our portfolio. But we aren't afraid to adjust our line pricing to adjust to our competitive set and what they're doing.

Marc Torrente
Marc Torrente
VP - Equity Research at Wells Fargo

Okay. Thanks for that color. And then I guess more on distilling, sales and earnings were a bit better than at least we were thinking, but seem more in line with your own expectations. Maybe just any more on how you're thinking about the phasing front half versus back half in the context of the full year? I guess any upside in the front half could seem to imply more or a deeper impact into the back half and perhaps even in the front half of 2026.

Marc Torrente
Marc Torrente
VP - Equity Research at Wells Fargo

So if margins were to hold in better than expected as they seem to be, is that coming from more cost control? Is that where just pricing is falling in on these contract resets? Is that mix or a combination of all of the above? Thanks.

Mark Davidson
Mark Davidson
VP - Corporate Controller & Head - Treasury at MGP Ingredients

Yes, Mark, I'll start with that one. Yes, as we've mentioned, there is some phasing of contracts and as a result with the 50% decline in sales for the full year that would imply a big decrease in H2 from H1. On the gross profit standpoint, as Brandon mentioned, we expect that 65% decline that we previously guided to be a little bit better. And where we're seeing that benefit is in pricing. Pricing negotiations have gone well.

Mark Davidson
Mark Davidson
VP - Corporate Controller & Head - Treasury at MGP Ingredients

And so we've seen some favorability there, again, as we've been able to successfully partner with our Distilling Solutions customers. And so we're encouraged by that. We see that show through in pricing and that's where we see that margin and gross profit benefit coming through in the back half.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

Yes. The only thing I'd add to that is just due to the lower sales and lower production volume in the second half, The team is doing a phenomenal job in doing what they can to mitigate costs and especially fixed cost absorption levels. But we do expect some margin pressure, gross margin pressure in the back half. And as such, we're still expecting roughly 30% margins for the segment, which would imply that the back half is going to be probably closer to the mid-20s levels.

Operator

The next question comes from Robert Moskow from TD Cowen. Please go ahead.

Seamus Cassidy
VP - Equity Research at TD Cowen

Hi, this is Seamus Cassidy on for Rob Moskow. Thanks for the question and welcome Julie as well. So my question is on distilling solutions. You cited the TTP data, which has pretty notable production cuts. In light of that, could you sort of help frame where we are in terms of inventory rationalization at the industry level?

Seamus Cassidy
VP - Equity Research at TD Cowen

And then secondly, would you describe the competitive environment as sensible still, especially in the context of your proactive engagement on pricing negotiations?

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

Yes. So on the TTB, yes, encouraging signs. And from an overall inventory dynamic perspective, we still have a ways to go Seamus. This is not going to be an overnight fix. However, as we said, this is going to go into 2026 and we still feel that way.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

But what we are seeing is in tough environments like these, we keep coming back to it, but partnerships matter. Customers and suppliers want to line up with those that they see a long term relationship with. And the commitment that the team is showing out in the market is demonstrating that commitment. And I feel that our customers are responding, both current customers and new. We are actually adding customers in this environment.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

And so we're very encouraged by all that. So definitely this dynamic is going to persist, but we do feel that as a leading contract distiller for American whiskey, We were positioned well coming into this and we feel like we're doing all the right things and we're controlling the controllables, to be better positioned coming out of it.

Seamus Cassidy
VP - Equity Research at TD Cowen

Great. Thank you.

Operator

The next question comes from Sean McGowan from ROTH Capital Partners. Please go ahead.

Sean McGowan
MD & Senior Research Analyst at Roth Capital Partners, LLC

Thank you. Good to talk again. Thanks, Tom.

Sean McGowan
MD & Senior Research Analyst at Roth Capital Partners, LLC

Welcome to your commentary. Julie, thanks. My question is on could you give us some color on the difference in your mind between a paused purchase and a canceled contract? Like how solid are those contracts if they've been paused? And is that pause like indefinite?

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

Yes. Their purchasing has been paused. The contract came to an end. And typically, these come up for renewal and they're negotiated as all contracts are. But we got the sense when we really began our outreach at the beginning of the year that there may be a pause coming.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

We have we can see inventory and pull rates on our customers with barrels in our warehouse. So we were able to have that open dialogue. And look, like I said, Sean, these are, especially in the cases I mentioned and we're talking about very large multinational customers, with well established very large brands. And historically, is very little customer churning in instances like these. Our relationship with these customers in a lot of cases goes back years and years and years and years.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

And, the uniqueness of our product and taste profile, you know, we think is, a very strong positive for that rep as it represents their brand with with their consumers. So, you know, we we do view it that way as a temporary pause. And it we're also confident that it will resume. It may not resume at the same volumes it left off at when they when it does pick back up, But that's okay. We'll work back into it with them.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

And in the meantime, we're gonna look to partner in different ways, whether it's through other off product offerings like gin and GNS for for vodka, or in helping them, you know, find homes for their inventory or other creative solutions for them to benefit their business.

Sean McGowan
MD & Senior Research Analyst at Roth Capital Partners, LLC

Thanks for that clarity. And one little other clarification question. On SG and A in the quarter, I think you mentioned that there were some items there related to incentive comp that if you exclude that the SG and A was down a little bit more. Should we expect that elevated level of incentive comp to continue in the subsequent quarters or was that kind of a one time thing?

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

Yes. No, we expect SG and A as a percentage of sales in Q2 to persist in the back half of the year. And additionally, this is a reinstatement of the incentive comp. So it is year over year going to stick out a little bit more. But the important thing there is going back to controlling what we can control our cost savings initiatives and productivity initiatives at the beginning of the year.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

If you peel that out is actually showing an 8% decline in adjusted SG and A. So very proud of the team for coming together and driving those savings. And yes, we look forward to finding more as the year goes on.

Sean McGowan
MD & Senior Research Analyst at Roth Capital Partners, LLC

Okay. All right. Thank you very much.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

Thank you, Sean.

Operator

And the next question comes from Mitch Pinheiro from Sturtevant and Company. Please go ahead.

Mitchell Pinheiro
SVP & Director - Research at Sturdivant & Co

Hey, good morning and welcome Julie. I just had a couple of questions for you.

Amit Sharma
Amit Sharma
VP - IR at MGP Ingredients

Okay.

Mitchell Pinheiro
SVP & Director - Research at Sturdivant & Co

So you talk about visibility, you've talked to your customers, you have good visibility, but we do see visibility, think we're going to have significant downward pressure in sales for a while on the distilling side. Like what does the visibility do for you? I mean, we seeing it is that visibility enabling you to maintain a 30% gross margin? Or do you think the visibility is more advantageous than that? And maybe it will help you to improve the margins from these current levels?

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

Yeah. So, you know, what the visibility gives us more than anything is is confidence. We can see the proverbial bottom of the pool, a little bit more clearly. And what it also allows us to do is set ourselves up for operational success. So we know how many shifts to run.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

You know, we know what campaigns to run product wise. We know how many, operators we need on-site and so on. So it it it's visibility in the numbers, but also the visibility in being able to operate efficiently. And this pullback in the overall market happened pretty fast. And the team has done a very, very nice job of reacting.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

But to your gross margin question, if we're going to be in the mid-20s, in the back 2025, We're doing what we can to chip away at that and get those numbers up and whether it's through finding greater efficiencies, or doing what makes us unique. So one of those examples is we're one of the only contract distillers of American whiskey that can also distill GNS and premium gin for our customers. And, while it's not necessarily as higher price as brown goods, it's an excellent way to gain efficiencies and scale in our facility. So and also it's an excellent way to further partner with our customers in these hard times. So, there's even proactive commercial activities that can actually improve the margin profile.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

We're hopeful, Mitch, to answer your question in a long way, that we're going to keep chipping away and we're going get those margins up over time.

Mitchell Pinheiro
SVP & Director - Research at Sturdivant & Co

Okay. And then how so I think I heard you say that you expect put away net put away for 2025 to be in the 15,000,000 to $20,000,000 range. Is that correct?

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

That's right. That's correct.

Mitchell Pinheiro
SVP & Director - Research at Sturdivant & Co

So I mean is that I mean how does that fit with just the overall slowdown? Is this 15,000,000 to $20,000,000 of net put away sort of specific juice for certain customers that you need to do and chunk of your inventory that's sitting there sort of just unaccounted for?

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

Yes. Most of it, most of our put away is for our own brands. Okay. So those are brands like, Penelope, Rebel and so on. So that's where most of our 15,000,000 to $20,000,000 is going.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

And then the pockets of Put Away that we are doing for distilling solutions, have more to do with long term, agreements, to supply age in the future for potential customers and for current customers. So there's some of that contemplated in there as well. But what we're also in a really unique position to do in any quarter or any month is find good opportunities in the market. Okay. So we've got as good of a feel as anyone as to value.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

And so if there are barrels out there, that we know are not only unique and rare, but we can also monetize in a better way, we'll go out and buy those in the open market. And we can then resell them. We could also dump them and bottle them in our own brands. So that's also factoring into that 15,000,000 to $20,000,000 niche. So that's just a little bit of context around what that consists of and how we approach it.

Mitchell Pinheiro
SVP & Director - Research at Sturdivant & Co

Yes, that's helpful. And then with sort of the ready to drink segment sort of really helping the spirits industry, at least in terms of volume. Are you doing or are you participating in any of that growth through obviously through third party brands?

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

Yes, absolutely. And we've participated in that in white goods and G and S too, but also, you know, to your point, in American whiskey. So, a lot of that, you know, tends to go out the door. It's always aged for very long, if at all. But, yeah, no, you can imagine that a lot of our customers who buy traditional bourbon for traditional brands, would also lean on us for that capability as well.

Mitchell Pinheiro
SVP & Director - Research at Sturdivant & Co

Okay. And then I guess, finally just on the branded spirits side. So Penelope obviously has been you see SKUs increasing, your distribution is increasing. Is I mean what's the rest portfolio like? I mean, if Penelope is doing really well, that would obviously imply some weakness there.

Mitchell Pinheiro
SVP & Director - Research at Sturdivant & Co

Is there any particular brands that have been weaker than normal or also are shining besides your you've called out Rebel and, well, Elmer, you're on the tequila side. So anything happening within the Premium Plus that's weaker than it should be or love to hear that?

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

Yes. So Penelope, like you said, is continuing just with tremendous momentum. The lifeblood of that brand is innovation and coming out with offerings and items that are that resonate with consumers and meet them exactly where they are. Penelope Wheated is a great example of that, but even our recently introduced ready to serve line or ready to pour line of Penelope Peach Old Fashioned and Black Walnut Old Fashioned are great examples of doing exactly that. So very, very proud and pleased with the progress of Penelope.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

El Meur II, strong volumes in the quarter. We came out with new packaging and some new sides offerings, so we're excited for that. And Rebel two showed sales growth in the quarter. But there are offsets, Mitch, primarily in a couple of larger volume American whiskey brands. And there are those are actually, you know, declines that we've been, you know, we've been dealing with in in recent quarters as well.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

But we're not just sitting on our hands there. We are making, adjustments whether it's with line pricing to better position it with their respective competitive sets, but also with innovation as well. And so there's additional ready to serve products coming out possibly across other parts of our portfolio, albeit at different price points than Penelope. So that may round out our premium plus price there for you better Mitch.

Mitchell Pinheiro
SVP & Director - Research at Sturdivant & Co

All right. Well, I appreciate the insight. Thank you.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

Thank you, Mitch.

Operator

And the next question comes from Ben Klieve from Lake Street Capital Markets. Please go ahead.

Ben Klieve
Senior Equity Research Analyst at Lake Street Capital Markets

All right. Thanks for taking my questions. Good morning, And Julie, congratulations on the new role. A couple of questions on the Ingredients segment. It's great to see year over year growth both on the top line and on earnings here.

Ben Klieve
Senior Equity Research Analyst at Lake Street Capital Markets

I have two questions. First one is, Brandon, I'm wondering if you can give us an update on the challenges in the export market specific to this segment and both on a kind of sequential basis and year over year basis what that impact was in the second quarter? And then kind of if you have any insights regarding the export opportunity in the back half of the year? Yes.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

As it relates to export with ingredient solutions, what we're really talking about there is our specialty protein product line, specifically our Arise specialty protein. And as you'll recall, most of that for a long time, has been sold with a long term partner into into Japan. And, and as we've discussed last year, they started, they began really slowing down their purchases. And so, it was a little bit, little bit of a surprise at the time, but the team has done a great job in re you know, re commercializing that Arise line in North America, with new and existing customers. And you know, the demand from Japan is still there, not at the same volumes that we've seen historically.

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

But interestingly enough, as, we look into next year, they're looking to possibly increase their orders. But the, you know, the important thing is is that, we've been able to find a home for that. Not quite at the same pricing that we may have been getting prior, but still at very profitable pricing. So, very proud of the team and their ability to react to what's going on internationally.

Mark Davidson
Mark Davidson
VP - Corporate Controller & Head - Treasury at MGP Ingredients

And just to add to that, Ben, to the point, that's the key component of the driver of the increase versus Q2 of last year. Specialty protein sales increased 13% due to our ability to replace that export volume with domestic customers. And then you mentioned sequential increase, the ingredients segment increased significantly sequentially from Q1 sales are up 32%. The biggest driver of that increase is our specialty wheat protein offerings, which increased $5,300,000 versus Q1 due to our ability to commercialize that lost export business domestically as we messaged earlier this year.

Ben Klieve
Senior Equity Research Analyst at Lake Street Capital Markets

Great, great. That's helpful from both of you. Thank you. And then my second question on this segment and then get back in queue is around there's a lot of things moving in the right direction here. The biofuel plants coming online for some cost savings.

Ben Klieve
Senior Equity Research Analyst at Lake Street Capital Markets

You've got this dynamic with the export pressure starting to maybe wane that you just talked about, new customers onboarding and you expect second half to be better both in revenue and profit than the first. I'm wondering if you can maybe help us isolate that new customer contribution element of this. Talked about a couple of new customers coming online here at some point within the second quarter. Wondering, one, if they came online as in the magnitude that you expected? And then kind of where they stand today from a revenue perspective versus where you think they'll be at a run rate basis here in the quarters to come?

Brandon Gall
Brandon Gall
CFO at MGP Ingredients

Yes. So a lot of the new customers that we've been getting as Mark just said

Executives
    • Amit Sharma
      Amit Sharma
      VP - IR
    • Brandon Gall
      Brandon Gall
      CFO
    • Julie Francis
      Julie Francis
      President & CEO
    • Mark Davidson
      Mark Davidson
      VP - Corporate Controller & Head - Treasury
Analysts
    • Bill Chappell
      Managing Director at Truist Securities
    • Marc Torrente
      VP - Equity Research at Wells Fargo
    • Seamus Cassidy
      VP - Equity Research at TD Cowen
    • Sean McGowan
      MD & Senior Research Analyst at Roth Capital Partners, LLC
    • Mitchell Pinheiro
      SVP & Director - Research at Sturdivant & Co
    • Ben Klieve
      Senior Equity Research Analyst at Lake Street Capital Markets
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