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The company sells beauty and personal care products. L Brands recently spun off Victoria’s Secret into its own publicly traded business and changed name to Bath &amp; Body Works.

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Bath & Body Works (BBWI): Company Profile, Stock Price, News, Rankings

legacy

Bath & Body Works

bath & body works

Good morning. My name is Melissa, and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I'd like to welcome everyone to the Bath and Body Works First Quarter twenty twenty five Earnings Conference Call. Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. I'll now turn the call over to Luke Long, Vice President of Investor Relations.

Good morning, and welcome to Bath and Body Works' first quarter twenty twenty five earnings conference call. Joining me on the call today are Daniel Heath, Chief Executive Officer and Eva Boratto, Chief Financial Officer. In addition to this call and this morning's press release, we've posted a slide presentation on our website that summarizes the information in these prepared remarks in addition to providing some related facts and figures regarding our operating performance and guidance. As a reminder, some of the comments today may include forward looking statements related to future events and expectations. For factors that could cause the actual results to differ materially from these forward looking statements, please refer to the risk factors in Bath and Body Works' twenty twenty four Form 10 ks.

Today's call also contains certain non GAAP financial measures. Please refer to this morning's press release and supplemental materials for important disclosures regarding such measures, including reconciliations to the most comparable GAAP financial measure. With that, I'll turn the call over to Daniel.

Hello everyone and thank you for joining us. I'm excited to be with you today for my first Bath and Body Works earnings call. I want to begin by thanking the Board for their trust and confidence in me. I'd also like to thank Eva and the leadership team and the thousands of associates who have warmly welcomed me over the last few days. It is truly a privilege to lead a brand as beloved as Bath and Body Works, One that has an incredibly strong foundation and has a meaningful place in homes and in our customers' daily lives.

With more than 50,000 dedicated associates working in our 1,900 vibrant North American stores, a vertically integrated predominantly U. S. Based supply chain and a loyalty program with approximately 39,000,000 members, we are well positioned for growth. But today's consumers are dynamic. We must meet them where they are, positioning ourselves as the leading global brand in home fragrance and beauty.

With this backdrop, we see a clear opportunity to transform Bath and Body Works to accelerate our growth, deepen our customer connection and continue evolving for the future. In my first ten days, I have been incredibly energized by what I've seen. Our customers are passionate and loyal. Many of our highly engaged customers shop with us 10 or more times a year. And our strong innovation ensures that we always have something new for them.

That is an extraordinary strength. We also have a significant opportunity to grow the brand by attracting new consumers, especially younger audiences and men. When I joined, I spoke to many of you about my philosophy. We will accelerate growth by putting the consumer at the center of everything we do. We'll execute that philosophy by listening to our consumers to gather insights, using those insights to create innovative and coveted products, telling bold and emotional brand and product stories, and bring it all to life in an integrated and elevated omni channel marketplace globally.

And the good news, this philosophy is already in motion here at Bath and Body Works. Our Disney collaboration and everyday luxuries are great examples of what happens when we listen to our customers, build coverless products, tell emotional stories, and deliver it all seamlessly across all our channels. But there is an opportunity to execute that philosophy more consistently and with greater focus, to connect more intentionally with consumers across multiple touch points and to be less reliant on promotions to drive growth. Over the next few months, I'll work closely with the leadership team to identify the short and medium term levers we can pull to deliver quick wins and define the long term strategy, which we will communicate in the coming quarters. Some of the levers we are exploring are digital.

There is an opportunity with our current site to better deliver what customers expect. Enhanced functionality, improved aesthetics, and a compelling storytelling is the standard that consumers expect. There is a fast path to improvement that boosts conversion, brand equity and engagement. Second, packaging and labeling. We've made real strides in formula quality, but our packaging doesn't emphasize it.

We can do more to signal better for you ingredients, especially to health conscious and younger consumers. Thirdly, distribution. To attract new consumers, we must be in their path. That means exploring new forms of distribution beyond our own channels, strategically and thoughtfully. And finally, expansion.

Today international represents about 5% of our business, but from my experience at both Nike and Burberry, I know that international growth is an incremental. It can define an era. In the coming weeks, I'll be on the ground with our partners and customers internationally to explore how we scale effectively. As I mentioned, we'll be sharing a clear strategy in the coming quarters, one that puts the consumer at the center and commits to fewer bolder priorities. Our strategy will address opportunities to accelerate growth through consistent, repeatable and durable drivers.

Thank you, Daniel, and good morning everyone. Last week, we welcomed Daniel at our town hall with associates from across the company. Daniel shared his consumer centric philosophy, his personal journey, and engaged directly with associates across the company. The energy level here at BBW is high, and associates are eager to accelerate growth under his leadership. I look forward to partnering with Daniel and the rest of the leadership team as we plan for Bath and Body Works future and work to unlock value.

With that, let's turn to the quarter. I'll begin with a high level summary of our first quarter results and key business drivers. I'll then share more detail on our Q1 financial performance and provide an update on our Q2 and fiscal year twenty twenty five guidance, building on the preliminary results we shared last Monday. As shared last week, we delivered another strong quarter with net sales up 3% coming in at the high end of our guidance range, and earnings per diluted share of $0.49 exceeding the high end of our range. Amid a challenging macro backdrop, we've remained disciplined and decisive in our actions and our Q1 performance is evidence of that.

As a reminder, we have been focused on three priority areas. First, accelerating top line growth across our core, while also extending our reach through adjacencies and international expansion. Second, enhancing operational excellence and efficiency through cost discipline and a continuous improvement mindset, which is particularly critical in this current environment. And third, consistently deploying our strong cash flow to invest in growth opportunities and return value to shareholders through dividends and share repurchases. Let's take a closer look at our top line performance and key growth drivers in the quarter.

In the first quarter, we delivered our strongest underlying sales growth since 2021, and we drove positive dual channel traffic exceeding third party benchmarks we track. We brought innovation again this quarter, giving customers a reason to visit our stores and reinforcing our industry leadership. Customers have always trusted us for our high quality products at accessible price points. And even in this environment, they continue to have a strong appetite for compelling newness. In Q1, consumer excitement around fragrance innovation drove growth across all three core categories.

Our Disney collaboration was an undeniable success and exceeded our expectations. Customers lined up outside our stores to be the first to purchase one of our six Disney Princess fragrances. This was our largest collab to date, featuring 85 SKUs across categories. Consumers also actively engaged with us online, driving a record 1,800,000,000 impressions. Consumers also responded positively to our thoughtful gift assortments in the quarter, as they celebrated meaningful moments during Valentine's Day, Easter and the start to Mother's Day, proving that gifting isn't just a Q4 driver.

Moving to our performance across our key categories in the quarter. Body care grew low single digits, driven by success in our Disney Princess line, strength in everyday luxuries, and our single fragrance launch Sweetest Song. We expanded our everyday luxuries line to body cream and body wash in the quarter, creating new fragrance layering opportunities for our customers. Home fragrance grew low single digits, driven by our single wick candles, wallflowers and home sprays as consumers sought to diverse and elevate ways to infuse their spaces with fragrance. Soaps and sanitizers grew mid single digits, driven by our convenient on the go assortment, including our one ounce sanitizer spray and pocket back.

Our innovation and collaboration pipeline is strong, and we're excited about the fragrance experiences we're bringing to customers this summer, including our cross category coast to coast collection inspired by iconic coastal destinations. We've launched on trend fragrances like Off the Vine, and we brought back our True Blue Spa collection due to strong demand from our customers. This is one of the most customer requested collections. We're also relaunching some of our original fragrances with updated efficacious formulas that are made without sulfates, parabens, phthalates and artificial dyes. Beyond product innovation, we continue to improve our customer experience, both in store and online.

We are building on the success of our brick and mortar strategy with the introduction of new in store innovations. Our newer stores feature elevated design, a more open layout, interactive fragrance bars, and integrated technology, creating a more immersive, elevated, and seamless shopping experience, which meets the expectations of today's consumer. Our talented store design team has cost engineered the new stores to match the build cost of our traditional model, achieving similar payback periods and driving higher sales. Our loyalty program is performing well and driving increased spend, trip frequency, cross channel purchases and retention. In Q1, we had approximately 39,000,000 active loyalty customers, up 4% compared to the prior year.

We are now in the third year following the full U. S. Rollout of the loyalty program, and we continue to make enhancements to elevate the customers' experience. Most recently, we increased our loyalty reward redemption options, giving members greater access to our most loved body care business, which we expect will drive higher engagement and redemption. With our large loyalty base in place, the greatest opportunity now lies in deepening engagement and increasing value from existing members.

Increasing reward redemption drives higher trip frequency, stronger sales and deeper brand engagement. We see an opportunity to grow sales with our most loyal customers, while also increasing loyalty among more casual shoppers. Finally, we extended our reach this quarter through adjacent category growth. Our adjacent categories, men's, lip, hair and laundry, continue to represent approximately 10% of total sales. Our men's category, which is included in body care, remains a compelling avenue to expand our customer base, and we are also hyper focused on increasing awareness.

To increase visibility and engagement for our men's assortment, we're elevating Father's Day this year with an enhanced marketing strategy, store positioning, and an expanded product lineup, including a new men's single fragrance launch and an exclusive purchase with purchase set. This builds on insights from the 2024 holiday season, where we saw strong results from our first men's purchase with purchase offer. International expansion remains an important pillar of our long term strategy, as Daniel mentioned earlier, with significant opportunity for long term growth. International retail sales grew approximately 10% this quarter. Turning to margins, we remain steadfast in our disciplined approach to cost management, leveraging a continuous improvement mindset and operational efficiencies to drive sustained financial strength.

Our predominantly U. S.-based supply chain is a source of competitive advantage, allowing us to respond quickly and remain agile as the landscape evolves. While our exposure in China is limited to approximately 10% of global spend, we are taking proactive measures to mitigate global trade policy shifts and offset our tariff exposure over time. Now I will transition to details on our financial performance and guidance. We delivered net sales of $1,400,000,000 up 2.9% to the prior year at the high end of our guidance range, again, our strongest underlying sales performance since 2021, fueled by our Disney collaboration.

In U. S. And Canadian stores, net sales totaled $1,100,000,000 an increase of 4.3% versus the prior year. Direct net sales were $250,000,000 a decrease of 4.3% compared to last year. However, when adjusted for Buy Online Pickup in Store, which is reported as store sales, Direct outperformed stores.

BOPIS demand increased by 29% in the quarter versus last year and represented approximately 30% of total digital demand. International, which represents approximately 5% of total net sales, generated $64,000,000 of net sales in the first quarter, an increase of 10.1% versus the prior year due to timing of ship sales and was in line with expectations. Our first quarter gross profit rate of 45.4% exceeded expectations and increased 160 basis points compared to the prior year. Gross profit rate expansion versus the prior year was driven by 100 basis point improvement in merchandise margin, primarily driven by low single digit mix adjusted AUR increases. We also drove favorable buying and occupancy leverage due to net sales growth this quarter as B and O expenses were flat.

SG and A as a percentage of net sales was 30.7%, slightly higher than our expectations, primarily driven by incremental investments in marketing and store associate training. First quarter operating income was $2.00 $9,000,000 14 point 7 percent of net sales, an improvement of 120 basis points versus prior year. With respect to inventory, we ended the first quarter with total inventory up 7% to prior year. This was slightly above our initial plan due to tariffs on purchases as well as strategic pull forwards to help mitigate tariff impacts. However, our underlying inventory levels remain healthy.

Turning to real estate, our portfolio remains healthy with 57% of our fleet in off mall locations. In the first quarter, we opened 13 new North American stores, all in off mall locations, and permanently closed eight stores, all in malls. Internationally, our partners opened 14 new stores and closed 19 stores during the quarter, and we ended the quarter with five twenty four stores. The net closures in the first quarter were planned and were predominantly in low performing stores in The Middle East. Our international expansion plans for 2025 remain on track with at least 30 planned net new store openings.

Turning now to our 2025 financial guidance. Our full year and second quarter guidance includes the anticipated impact of all tariff rates currently in effect and levied by the U. S. Government and other countries and excludes the anticipated financial impact of the CEO transition. For the full year 2025, we are maintaining both our net sales guidance of 1% to 3% growth and our earnings per share guidance range of $3.25 to $3.6 Building on our Q1 outperformance, our current projections of the business, proactive tariff mitigation strategies, and our strong predominantly U.

S. Supply chain, we believe we are well positioned to absorb the tariffs at current levels. If there are material changes in future tariffs, we will revisit our guidance. For the full year, you can find additional commentary on the details of our guidance in our slide presentation. Turning now to the second quarter, we expect Q2 net sales of flat to 2% growth to prior year, reflecting the current trends in our business, and we are lapping some accounting items in the prior year, largely loyalty.

We expect Q2 system wide international retail sales to be up high single digits with reported net sales decline of mid single digits due to ship sales timing in Q1 this year. We expect second quarter gross profit rate to be approximately 41%, flat to prior year, including the impact of tariffs. We expect our second quarter SG and A rate to be approximately 30%, reflecting wage rate inflation and investments in technology. Our second quarter outlook includes net non operating expense of approximately $65,000,000 and a tax rate of approximately 29% and weighted average diluted shares outstanding of approximately $212,000,000 Considering these inputs, we are forecasting second quarter earnings per diluted share of $0.33 to $0.38 We expect inventory to remain elevated in the first half, up about 10%. This is above our initial expectations due to tariff related costs impacting inventory.

As a reminder, first half inventory levels reflect additional holiday related inventory builds to support our growth goals. Now for a quick update on capital allocation. We are a strong cash flow generating business. Our top priority remains driving sustainable long term profitable growth through strategic investments in the business. To support this, we continue to plan capital expenditures of $250,000,000 to $270,000,000 during the year, with a focus on real estate and technology.

In the first quarter, our total capital expenditures were $37,000,000 Our full year free cash flow expectations remain in the range of $750,000,000 to $850,000,000 and reflects working capital improvement driven by our Fuel for Growth initiative. In Q1, we returned $43,000,000 to shareholders through dividends and repurchased 4,300,000.0 shares of common stock for $135,000,000 at an average price of $31.24 per share. We continue to assume $300,000,000 in share repurchases for the year. Though as we've demonstrated, we will be opportunistic, Our business generates strong key free cash flow and we view our shares and an attractive investment at current levels. In summary, I'm proud of our Q1 performance and energized by the opportunity to accelerate our growth in the future.

Our agile business model positions us well to compete effectively in today's dynamic environment. The teams continues to execute with discipline, focusing on what we can control, and we're excited about the strength of our innovative pipeline for the second half of the year. I'd like to extend my gratitude to our teams across the company for their hard work and strong execution. Now let's open it up for Q and A.

Thank you. At this time, we'll be conducting a question and answer session. Our first question comes from the line of Simeon Siegel with BMO Capital Markets. Please proceed with your question.

Good morning. Hi, everyone. Daniel, welcome to the company and the wonderful world of analyst Q and A. Glad to have you. Maybe to start, could you share a bit more about what brought you to Bath and Body Works a bit different than your prior company?

I know you literally just started, but this was a very encouraging quarter. So perhaps any early looks you have at what you think is going right versus many any high level areas of opportunity that you're excited by. And then Eva, obviously great to see the return to this level of growth. Can you just elaborate a little bit more on the go forward top line commentary? Maybe just specifically, you mentioned current trends within the guide, so maybe elaborate there, sorry.

And then on just the loyalty accounting comment. Thanks guys.

Good morning everyone and thank you Simeon, it's great to be on this call. Let me break that question down a little bit. So, first let me talk about what attracted me to Bath and Body Works. And as you can tell from the accent, you know, I haven't grown up with the brand in the way that many of our consumers have, but as I went through the selection process with the board I really, really, you know, researched the company and I love what I discovered. Let me first speak from the heart, you know, I believe that the best businesses connect product with purpose and at Bath and Body Works we empower our consumers to express themselves whether that's through self care or home or beauty, you know, bring the power of fragrance into people's lives, you know, helping them feel more confident, more joyful and more authentically themselves.

That's a meaningful mission and it's one I'm really, really proud to be a part of. And then the emotional connection is matched by the strength of our business. You know, this is what I found when I really dug into the company 1,900 North American stores, 39,000,000 or so loyalty members, a passionate and knowledgeable team of 50,000 store associates, you know, and vertically integrated domestic supply chain. And that is an amazing foundation to accelerate growth, you know, by reaching new consumers, elevating our products and experiences, telling compelling brand stories and doing that in new ways. And now when it comes to like what's going right, you know, obviously it's a quality quarter, you know, it's great to see the growth, but what I find really encouraging is that my philosophy for growth, which is about putting the consumer at the center, making sure that we listen to those insights, we create coveted and innovative products that meet those needs, that we tell bold brand and emotional product stories and we bring it to life in an omni channel integrated marketplace globally.

I can see where that is working here. Know, as I said in my opening remarks, Disney is a good example of where that works. But I do see opportunity to do that more consistently, more frequently and more focused on bringing new consumers to the sticky platform that we've built.

Great. And good morning, Simeon. Thanks for the question. So in terms of the drivers of sales go forward, let me start with Q1. We were really pleased with the 3% growth that we drove while also expanding margins.

And as you dissect Q1, Disney was the key driver of the quarter. And I would say the balance of the quarter really performed more consistently with the growth we were seeing in Q4. So besides Disney, other products that stood out was EDL, particularly for women and our gifting that grew double digit. So as we enter Q2, right, we're entering in trends of more the Q4 as we exited Q1. Q2 is also our lowest quarter of innovation, given the prominence of SaaS, but we're confident in the outlook.

In Q2, we're going to amplify Father's Day. We've created space in the quarter to really amplify, reposition it in the SHOP, enhanced marketing. We're focused on SaaS execution. As you know, last year, we had some challenges, and we also had the start of Halloween. So we feel good about the outlook that we provided for Q2.

And overall for the year, maybe just jumping, as you look at the back half, we also continue to have innovation. Halloween is important both starts in Q2, but also continues into Q3. We're launching an elevated ceramic candle, and we have more co labs coming in the back half of the year. So there's plenty of innovation that gives us confidence in really maintaining our top line of 1% to 3% growth for the year.

Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Matthew Boss with JPMorgan. Please proceed with your question. Mr. Boss, your line is live.

Great, thanks and welcome, Daniel. So maybe, Daniel, with your clear focus on accelerating growth, could you walk through the building blocks of opportunity relative to the company's recent return to low single digit growth? Maybe just areas you see for market share opportunity and any investments that you see required to accomplish your plan?

Hi Matt and thanks for the question. I'm going to start with the caveat that it's still early days. You know, I'm ten days in and my focus right now is continuing to listen and learn. And frankly, don't know what I don't know yet. I'm listening to the leadership team, listening to our employees, our store associates, of course, listening to our consumers and you our investors.

As I said in my opening remarks, we will come back and share a clear strategy in the coming quarters and that strategy will have some key components. You know, we'll be guided by a clear and compelling vision. It will put the consumer at the center of everything that we do. We will focus on fewer bolder priorities and we will target opportunities to accelerate the growth through consistent and repeatable growth drivers. We will provide a clear roadmap and consistent KPIs, so you can track our progress and we can hold ourselves accountable for that growth.

In my opening remarks, you know, I mentioned a few things that we're getting underway now. You know, we're not sitting around and waiting to pen a strategy and then start work. There are clear opportunities as far as I see them in the short and medium term. Our digital refresh, packaging and labeling, alternative distribution and international. So, I think that's all I'm going to say really about our strategy at this point.

And then to your second point on financials and investments required to accomplish the plan, you know, I'm super aware that a successful consumer good companies need to grow the top and the bottom line, you know, simultaneously. It's not an eitheror and as I said, you know, we're going to be doing fewer things. So edit to amplify is important. Less breadth, more depth, fewer priorities and so I'm not, asking for more investment. I'm making sure that the investment that we have today is aimed at the greatest opportunities to drive growth.

And if I could just add Daniel, good morning that We're always looking for efficiencies to offset new investment areas. I think we've done that over the last couple of years with our Fuel for Growth program. And we're diligent about that. And just to give you an example, during Q1, we exited one of our third party fulfillment centers. We expect this can drive two improvements: one, improved costs that's reflected in the outlook we provided today as well as improved customer satisfaction.

So we're going to consistently mine for those areas to help offset investments.

Thank you. Our next question comes from Lorraine Hutchinson with Bank of America. Please proceed with your question.

Thank you. Good morning. Danielle, it sounds like that one of the first things you can impact is marketing. Can you talk about plans there? And then over the longer term, I was just curious to hear about any early work you've done on the potential to accelerate growth globally and also what those new forms of distribution beyond your own channels might look like?

Hi and thanks for the question. When comes to adjusting marketing, I do think that the business has made progress in marketing. You know, as we mentioned, traffic is up and exceeded benchmarks in the first quarter. But I do believe that there is much, much more we can do to connect emotionally with our consumers and we can do that online and offline in that part of the work that I mentioned in terms of the digital refresh that's getting underway now. And I also believe our marketing has to be less about price and promotions.

You know, we need to give our consumers compelling stories and reasons to buy that are not linked to price. And then finally, do think that there is an opportunity to focus more of our marketing dollars on the innovation that we have and that we have coming. You know, I do believe that we have made meaningful strides in improving the ingredients of our products and we have not taken advantage of that by telling that story in a compelling way consistently to our consumers and we know that that is something that's important to them. So, the next part of your question really relating to international. Of course, you know, I've said before I do see international as a significant opportunity.

I'm still learning about the international business, what's working, what's not working, what are the impediments to accelerating growth. And I'm going to spend some time this summer on the ground with our international partners, with our international consumers really getting under the hood. But I'm pretty sure that our strategy will pick priority markets, the areas where we believe that there are the most, the largest opportunities to accelerate growth and we must match that opportunity with the right business model. So, more to come in that way, but it is something that I'm going to be spending a lot of time on in the coming months. And then finally on third party distribution, I'm sure you're going hear me say this frequently, we put the consumer at the center of everything that we do and consumers see brands not channels.

I do believe one of the greatest opportunities that this company has is to plug in new consumers to our ecosystem and our new consumers not necessarily in their part. So, we'll think about this strategically and thoughtfully, but reaching new consumers through new platforms definitely something that we're looking at right away.

next question comes from the line of Alex Stratton with Morgan Stanley. Please proceed with your question.

Great. Thank you. Maybe for Eva first. Both Home Fragrance and Body Care grew low single digits in the first quarter and kind of hovered in that range for a few quarters. What do you view as the right long term growth rates for those categories?

Should they be better than low single digits? Or is this where they should kind of hover? And then secondly, just could you go through your plan for the semiannual sale? Maybe just remind us the time frame last year and walk through any change in approach year over year that you might be using? Thanks a lot.

Sure. Good morning, Alex. Thanks. I'll take your second question first around the semiannual sale. As I said previously, last year, we all know it didn't perform to our expectations.

So we've taken some core learnings to drive stronger performance this year. First, we're going to start semiannual sale a couple of weeks later than prior year. And really, this is to do two things: one, to give a space to amplify Father's Day and elevate men's that critically important adjacency as well as our timing will be more consistent with the general market and when summer sales occur. Second, we're amplifying our marketing to ensure customers know of the change in timing and also about the exciting products that we'll have to offer. And importantly, we believe we have a great product offering that consumers are going to love.

Overall, there's not really any material changes to the duration. It's going be a couple of days shorter, but overall, the duration generally consistent. As look at the categories, body care and home have been great categories. You see the market growing, you see fragrance go growing. So we would expect particularly body care, you would get more than low single digit growth over time, growing with the market.

On the home, as you know, the candle market has been pressured. We haven't seen the candle market return to growth yet. We did this quarter increase our market share modestly in our strategies. But overall, we're pleased in this market where there is pressure on candles, we're overall growing home fragrance. But we're going to look for ways to innovate to continue to drive growth there.

And while gifting is small, right, that is an area that grew really nicely. It was up double digits this quarter and just reinforces that we can be a gifting destination no matter what time of the year it is. Customers will come to us, whether it's Valentine's Day, Easter, Mother's Day, and hopefully Father's Day.

Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Ike Boruchow with Wells Fargo. Please proceed with your question.

Good morning. Eva, two questions for you, if that's okay. Just curious, would you have raised guidance excluding tariffs when you looked at the full year view that you're issuing? And then I guess just simply just kind of what gives you the confidence in the back half for 1% to 3% revenue growth? Obviously, the compares are a little bit tougher.

So I'm just kind of curious where the confidence comes from there. Thank you.

Yes, Ike, thanks for the question and good morning. On the back half of the year, I'll say what gives us confidence is the innovation that we have planned. I mentioned a couple of things earlier. We're launching a new and elevated ceramic candle in the back part of the year. We have additional collaborations coming off of the Disney Princess, and we know how well those have performed for us.

And Halloween is an important time of the year for us. And we have some new and exciting products with elevated storytelling and new fragrances to bring there. So that's what really gives us the confidence. As we've said quarter after quarter, our customers respond when we have great innovation. Now on your question on the tariff front, overall, let me give a little context before I answer your specific question if we would have raised guidance.

The guidance that we provided includes all of the tariffs that had been announced prior to last night's court ruling, which has already been appealed. And if you think about the guidance and absorbing that, it was our delivery of margin expansion and our opportunities to mitigate some of those tariffs through the levers we're pulling. If tariffs were to continue at current levels for the remainder of the year, we'd probably be at the lower half of the guidance range. And if they were to moderate or be reduced, we would be at the upper half. And what I would say is, to your real question, all else equal, if tariffs hadn't changed from the initial 10%, yes, we would have been increasing our guidance today.

And it's a dynamic time for us. I'm really pleased with our position, our agile model, and we'll compete in any environment.

Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Paul Lejuez with Citi. Please proceed with your question.

Lee on for Paul. Thanks for taking our question. Just wondering if you could elaborate on the strength of the merch margins and AURs in the first quarter. How much do you attribute, that to the Disney collab versus sort of the underlying core business and any benefits, that carry forward? And then just secondly, could you just, give more detail on the counting of these collabs?

Where do you see the licensing revenue to your partners? Where did that show up in the P and L? Just any color there would be helpful. Thank you.

Thanks for the question. We're really pleased with our gross margin performance in the first quarter. We expanded gross margins 160 basis. We exceeded our guidance of two ten basis points. So as you dissect that, first, merch margin was up about 100 basis points.

This is primarily driven by we had mix adjusted AURs up low single digits as well as our cost savings work where we were able to improve some of our product costs through our value engineering as well as our transportation costs. B and O dollars were flat. Leverage was also favorable 50 basis points. And I'd say there were a couple of things driving that. First, as I mentioned previously, we exited from a fulfillment center that's driving improvements that will, of course, continue for the remainder of the year.

We also had some lower store asset depreciation expense as we evaluated our useful lives. So as you look at that performance, there are those opportunities that enabled us to really be able to offset the tariffs and hold our guidance for the remainder of the year. And the royalty payment hits merch margin.

Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Mark Altschwager with Baird. Please proceed with your question.

Good morning. This is Amy Teske on the line for Mark. Thank you for taking our question. The strong performance on the Disney collaboration is exciting. Could you provide any commentary about the potential size of the opportunities you have in the pipeline on the collaboration side compared to Disney?

And how we should think about the pace and timing of those collaborations through the rest of the year and in the second half? Thank you.

Yes, thanks for the question. I think the timing, as I referenced, will be in the back half of the year. We'll have more to say in due time. Listen, each of the collabs are different sizes. The Disney princesses was our most expansive with six princesses over 82 SKUs.

In the back half of the year, we have more than one co lab plan. And what I would say, they're meaningful enough that they're going to be a contributor to our back half growth at our full year, up 1% to three percent. Thanks for the question.

Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Jonah Kim with TD Cowen. Please proceed with your question.

Thank you for taking my question. Curious about your pricing strategy. I would imagine some competitors are taking pricing due to tariffs. What is your take on pricing throughout the year? And then also any early learnings from the Disney partnerships?

Were you able to bring in new customers? And how are what are some strategies you're trying to retain those customers that come through the partnership? Thank you very much.

Yes. So overall, as you look at our tariff mitigation strategies, AUR was a lever and we're going to stay flexible.

We're going to ensure that we're meeting the customer where their mindset is. The customer continues to be value seeking. We're pleased in the first quarter that our AUR mix adjusted were up low single digits and it just speaks to the ability of our agile model to respond to customers.

Great. And then I'll just follow-up with the second part of that question around new consumers. So, I think we should be pleased with the results that we got from Disney. We should be pleased with that philosophy around growth model that when we bring the right product, when we listen to consumers bring the right products, tell emotive brand stories, we definitely drive traffic to the brand. But at the same time, I'd say we do see trends in the sector with younger people and we know that that's a big part of our opportunity to accelerate growth.

I believe that when we do bring them to the brand, they join this platform that's remarkably sticky. We've seen the effect effect of our loyalty program in driving repeat purchase, repeat visit, increased spend. So it remains a big opportunity to bring new consumers to the brand whether that's through collaborations or through other products and growth levers that we have.

Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Kate McShane with Goldman Sachs. Please proceed with your question.

Hi, good morning. Thanks for taking our question. We just wanted to ask about the new store format that you mentioned on the call today and if this is the same initiative as the Gingham Plus that you had mentioned several quarters ago.

Bath & Body Works (BBWI) Q1 2026 Earnings Call Transcript

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