UFP Industries, Inc. Common Stock 2026 Q3 Earnings Call

Thank you for joining us to discuss UFP Industries' third quarter 2026 results. Joining me on our call today are Will Schwartz, our President and Chief Executive Officer, and Mike Cole, our Chief Financial Officer. Following our prepared remarks, we will open the call for questions. Before I turn the call over, let me remind you that yesterday's press release and presentation include forward-looking statements as defined in the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from expectations. These risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to, the factors identified in this release, in our most recent annual report on Form 10-K, and in our other filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Today's presentation will also include certain non-GAAP measures.

For reconciliation of these non-GAAP measures to the corresponding GAAP measures, please refer to our earnings press release and our website, ufpi.com. Now I will turn the call over to Will.

Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us to discuss our third quarter 2026 results. On recent calls, we've talked about signs of demand stabilizing across much of our portfolio, and that trend continued this quarter. Net sales grew 11% year-over-year, and organic unit volume increased 4%. Mike will walk you through the full financial bridge in a moment. This marks our second consecutive quarter of year-over-year volume growth, and it comes while our end markets remain challenging and uneven. Throughout this cycle, we have stayed focused on what we can control, and we've continued to invest to strengthen our core businesses. That discipline positions our diversified portfolio to deliver above-market growth and returns over the long term. Our results this quarter reflect that strategy, including the strength of our new product pipeline and the balance of the portfolio.

Our priorities for reaching our long-term margin and return goals are unchanged: invest in our highest-margin core businesses, build brand awareness, introduce new and innovative products that improve our value-added mix, and drive operational excellence across the enterprise. We continue to make solid progress on these priorities. I would like to highlight a few examples. Earlier this week, we announced our plans to acquire Apache Products, a leading wood pallet manufacturer in the strategically important Texas and Louisiana Gulf region. Like John Rock and Berry Pallets earlier this year, Apache will join our industry-leading PalletOne platform, and we are pleased to welcome their team. This acquisition strengthens our ability to serve regional and national customers in one of the country's largest industrial and petrochemical markets.

It also complements the national account strategy in our Structural Packaging business, where we continue to expand our footprint and capabilities to solve our customers' problems. Both are foundational to our long-term growth plans. Even after a busy start to the year, our M&A teams remain very active, and our pipeline is full. With the strength of our balance sheet, we have ample financial flexibility to pursue opportunities of any size that strengthen our core businesses, and we are doing so at a time when many of our peers are pulling back. As always, every investment must meet our long-term return requirements. Innovation remains a critical engine for growth and long-term margin improvement. New product sales grew more than 40% year over year this quarter, with contributions from all three of our segments. We also continue to execute on cost reduction and productivity.

We are rightsizing and optimizing capacity while investing in automation, operational technology, and machine learning to strengthen our low-cost manufacturing position. In addition, we have made targeted greenfield investments in our retail and packaging businesses. These facilities take time to ramp up, but because they were designed around automation from the start, we see a meaningful profit improvement opportunity as they mature. Transportation costs were a new challenge across our industry in 2026, and we expect rates to remain elevated for the foreseeable future. Driver shortages and carrier capacity exiting the market under a tougher regulatory environment have pushed rates, excluding fuel, up 30% year over year. We have had some success offsetting higher diesel costs through fuel surcharges and selective pricing, and we are taking action on the rest.

Our transportation team is executing strategies to reduce these costs in 2027, and our sales teams are focused on recovering the impact through pricing. Mike will quantify the impact on our results, and we are confident our teams will deliver considerable improvement next year. Now, turning to our segments. In retail, ProWood sales reflected a softer repair and remodel market and our decision to exit certain lower-margin commodity sales. Positively, we continue to see share gain opportunities thanks to our expanded manufacturing capacity, the strength of the Deckorators brand, and the breadth of our distribution capabilities, including our ProWood network. Deckorators continues to be very well-received in the marketplace. Our proprietary Surestone technology is driving strong pull-through from both contractors and consumers.

Demand for our Deckorators decking products still exceeds our production capacity, but we are closing that gap with our capacity expansion at Selma and our new greenfield facility in Buffalo. This added capacity allows us to expand our distribution network more aggressively, and we look forward to announcing a new agreement with a leading two-step distributor in the very near future. Together, our internal network and external partners give us national scale to serve the market and achieve our growth objectives. Our $30 million advertising program featuring Surestone technology continues to build customer awareness and consideration. Website traffic, sample orders, and event activity continue to grow at strong rates, and we are rapidly expanding our certified pro network. With a strong product portfolio in place, we will keep investing in our brand and product development to drive above-market growth.

We are pleased with the integration of MoistureShield, which adds important manufacturing capacity and brings its proprietary CoolDeck technology under the Deckorators brand. Looking ahead, you can expect us to continue introducing new and innovative products. TrueFrame, our new deck joist product offered through ProWood, remains another attractive growth opportunity. It's a differentiated, value-added product that leverages our existing manufacturing footprint, and customer response remains strong because of the value and time savings it delivers to contractors. ProWood also continues to enhance its online platform, making browsing, ordering, tracking, and special orders a more seamless experience. Finally, customer feedback on Arris, our new premium trim product featuring Surestone technology, has been very favorable since its recent launch. Our Packaging segment continues to outperform the broader market despite soft demand, thanks to the investments we've made to scale with large multi-location customers.

With our national footprint and leading design and engineering capabilities, our Structural Packaging team is winning share with new and existing customers across multiple industrial verticals. Our ability to provide mixed material solutions at a national scale is a key competitive advantage. Quoting activity remains strong, and we are encouraged by recent contract wins and the strength of our pipeline. As in prior quarters, the market and pricing environment in our PalletOne business remains competitive. Even so, we continue to execute our long-term strategy, investing at an opportune point in the cycle to expand our geographic footprint and build on our low-cost manufacturing position. In Protective Packaging, our two recent greenfield operations in Indiana and Nevada continue to increase production, positioning us for share gains and improved profitability in 2027.

We're also excited to have launched All Boxed Up, a dedicated brand for our growing corrugated business that reflects the breadth of its products and capabilities. Closing with our Construction segment. Market conditions have been consistent for the past several quarters. Affordability continues to weigh on new residential construction. However, our multifamily backlog is higher than a year ago, which gives us reason for cautious optimism. In Site-Built, our Frame Forward system solution selling approach continues to deliver favorable results. By bundling our engineered wood and light gauge metal components under one brand, we help customers see how our systems save them both time and money on the job site. Since we introduced this approach at the IBS show earlier this year, it has continued to gain momentum and open doors. Similarly, in Factory-Built, our strategy to deliver more value-added content is gaining traction.

Our recently launched BRAWN brand continues to build awareness among OEMs and end consumers of the quality of our products. Across both Site-Built and Factory-Built, our off-site manufacturing solutions help customers address labor and efficiency challenges on the job site. Likewise, our concrete forming business continues to expand its products and service to meet customer needs wherever concrete is poured. Our goal is to capture a larger share of our customers' business with solutions that help them address labor challenges on the job site. Finally, our commercial business continues to deliver strong results as we gain market share, expand the end markets we serve, and benefit from prior restructuring actions that improve productivity and capacity utilization. Overall, I'm pleased with how our balanced portfolio has performed in a difficult environment.

Conditions remain challenging, but we are focused on strategies that will allow us to emerge from this cycle a stronger company, well-positioned to create shareholder value as demand normalizes. To put our progress in perspective, it's helpful to compare today's results with 2019, before our management structure changed. Today, our trailing 12-month adjusted EBITDA margin is 50 basis points higher than in 2019. Excluding freight, our margins are over 200 basis points higher. Even with the headwinds we faced, we have structurally improved our business, and we plan to continue on this path. As we finish 2026 and look ahead to 2027, we remain focused on operational efficiency, disciplined growth, and higher returns on invested capital as we advance toward our long-term goals. With that, I'll turn the call over to our Chief Financial Officer, Mike Cole. I look forward to taking your questions afterward.