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Fortune 500

The 300 companies on this year’s list brought in over $12.5 trillion in revenue for the latest 12 months, with the median revenue figure at $24 billion.

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WMA 2024-Lowe's

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WMAC 2023-Lowes

The corporations on our annual list of the world’s largest companies delivered a record $41 trillion in aggregate revenues.

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F500-2023-039-Lowes

The home improvement retailer reported revenue of $97.1 billion in fiscal 2022, a roughly 1% increase from the prior year, as the COVID-era boom in home repairs eased. 
<ul> 
 	<li>Overall transactions at the company declined 7.4% in 2022 compared with the year prior, another sign of the slowdown in home improvement projects.</li> 
 	<li>In July 2022 Lowe’s adopted a four-day workweek for full-time store staff. Frontline employees had complained for years that Lowe’s old scheduling system was unpredictable and afforded few consecutive days off.</li> 
 	<li>In February 2023 Lowe’s completed the sale of its 450-store Canadian business to private equity firm Sycamore Partners for $400 million.</li> 
 	<li>Lowe’s is led by Marvin Ellison, one of only eight Black CEOs in the Fortune 500.</li> 
</ul>

Just as it dominates our economy, Big Tech now dominates Fortune’s annual ranking of corporate reputation.

WMAC-2022-44-Lowes

Aggregate sales hit $37.8 trillion last year—an increase of 19%, the highest annual growth rate in the list’s history.

This year’s Fortune 500 marks the 68th running of the list.

F500 2022-Lowes

The big-box home-improvement retailer has enjoyed several strong years, as the pandemic and the rise of remote work encouraged many people to either update their existing homes or buy and fix up new ones. The company reported more than $96 billion in sales in 2021, a bump of 6.9% compared with 2020, and an impressive 33% leap from 2019, the last pre-pandemic year. A tight housing market and rising real estate values are expected to continue to fuel new home projects—good news for Lowe’s and its competitors.

After a year in which humanity leaned more heavily than ever on tech giants, see which companies topped Fortune's ranking of corporate reputation.

WMAC 2021-47-Lowe's

Total revenue for the world’s biggest companies fell 4.8% to $31.7 trillion this year—the first decline in half a decade.

G500 80 Lowes

<span data-sheets-value="{&quot;1&quot;:2,&quot;2&quot;:&quot;Housebound Americans lavished billions on their homes last year at stores such as Lowe’s, setting up home offices and getting around to the small projects they suddenly had ample time for. Lowe’s sales rose 24.2% to just under $90 billion on that macro tailwind, narrowing its performance gap with rival Home Depot. The home improvement giant also helped itself with a vastly improved e-commerce site and savvy merchandising moves, such as stocking a wider assortment of holiday season goods like exercise bikes. While the home spending boom could ease this year, Lowe’s is redoubling its efforts to win more business from contractors who do larger projects.&quot;}" data-sheets-userformat="{&quot;2&quot;:12673,&quot;3&quot;:{&quot;1&quot;:0},&quot;10&quot;:2,&quot;11&quot;:4,&quot;15&quot;:&quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;16&quot;:11}">Housebound Americans lavished billions on their homes last year at stores such as Lowe’s, setting up home offices and getting around to the small projects they suddenly had ample time for. Lowe’s sales rose 24.2% to just under $90 billion on that macro tailwind, narrowing its performance gap with rival Home Depot. The home improvement giant also helped itself with a vastly improved e-commerce site and savvy merchandising moves, such as stocking a wider assortment of holiday season goods like exercise bikes. While the home spending boom could ease this year, Lowe’s is redoubling its efforts to win more business from contractors who do larger projects.

This year’s Fortune 500 marks the 67th running of the list.

F500-2021-31-Lowe's

For an astounding 13th straight year, Apple claims the top spot in Fortune’s annual ranking of corporate reputation, based on a survey of almost 3,800 executives, directors, and analysts.

This year's Fortune Global 500 generated $33.3 trillion in revenues and $2.1 trillion in profits.

G500-2020-137-Lowes

Lowe’s has played second fiddle to Home Depot for years now, lagging its bigger rival by sales growth and e-commerce prowess. But Lowe’s is making big strides with its store brands, and it has made major technical changes to rev up its e-commerce site. Additionally, the company's big appliance business is booming. The economic downturn is likely to cool a housing market that has allowed Lowe’s to thrive despite some weaknesses, which include meager online growth. But it seems, for now, Lowe’s has begun to address those competitive disadvantages.

This year's Fortune 500 marks the 66th running of the list.

F500-2020-044-Lowes

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The world's 500 largest companies generated $31.2 trillion in revenues and $1.7 trillion in profits in 2014. Together, this year's Fortune Global 500 employ 65 million people worldwide and are represented by 36 countries.

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Global business is back. After limping through a worldwide financial crisis and economic slowdown, the 500 largest companies ranked by revenues shattered all sorts of performance records in 2013: They racked up combined revenues of $31.1 trillion, up 2.5% from 2012, and profits soared 27% to nearly $2 trillion. China’s 95 companies (up from 89 last year) posted $5.8 trillion in revenues. The U.S. has four fewer companies on the list than last year but remains (for now) the country leader, with 128 corporations on the list—including No. 1 Wal-Mart Stores—reporting $8.6 trillion in revenues. 

Wal-Mart stayed on top as its sales crept closer to half-a-trillion dollars. Apple moved into the top five. And UnitedHealth Group continued its steady climb. 

Sector

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The home improvement retailer Lowe’s was founded in 1921. The brand operates 1,750 home improvement stores and employs approximately 200,000 associates. Its big-box stores, website, and app complete some 16 million customer transactions a week in the United States. Lowe’s sells DIY products, decor, tools, and gardening supplies, as well as raw materials for builders and contractors. It also sells appliances and electrical items, and offers installation services through independent contractors. Founded as a general store, Lowe’s pivoted to focusing entirely on home improvement in the 1940s, ahead of the postwar building boom, and is now the world’s second-largest home improvement retailer. It became a publicly traded company in 1961.

Q2 2027

Q1 2027

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Q2 2026 & Acquisition

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Q3 2025

Lowe's (LOW): Company Profile, Stock Price, News, Rankings

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Lowe's

lowe's

Good morning, everyone, and welcome to Lowe's Company's First Quarter twenty twenty five Earnings Conference Call. My name is Rob, I'll be your operator for today's call. As a reminder, this conference is being recorded. I'll now turn the call over to Kate Perlman, Vice President of Investor Relations and Treasurer.

Thank you, and good morning. Here with me today are Marvin Ellison, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Bill Boltz, our Executive Vice President, Merchandising Joe McFarland, our Executive Vice President, Stores and Brandon Sink, our Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. I would like to remind you that our notice regarding forward looking statements is included in our press release morning, which can be found on Lowe's Investor Relations website. During this call, we will be making comments that are forward looking, including our expectations for fiscal twenty twenty five. Actual results may differ materially from those expressed or implied as a result of various risks, uncertainties and important factors, including those discussed in the Risk Factors, MD and A and other sections of our annual report on Form 10 ks and our other SEC filings.

Additionally, we'll be discussing certain non GAAP financial measures. A reconciliation of these items to U. S. GAAP can be found on the quarterly earnings section of our Investor Relations website. Now I'll turn the call over to Marvin.

Thank you, Kate. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us today. In the first quarter, we delivered sales of $20,900,000,000 with comparable sales down 1.7%, in line with our expectations. Despite ongoing challenges in the housing market, I'm pleased with our team's focus and execution. In the face of significant macro uncertainty, we continued to deliver operational excellence, combined with value and outstanding service to our customers.

This dedication drove an increase in our customer satisfaction scores, and we also earned recognition from J. D. Power, which recently named Lowe's number one in customer satisfaction among home improvement retailers. This recognition demonstrates that our investments in technology and our clean and enjoyable stores, along with our friendly and knowledgeable associates, all reinforce our commitment to being the most helpful brand in home improvement. And although we are pleased with our continued progress in customer service, our financial results also reflect ongoing pressure in DIY bigger ticket discretionary demand and a slower start to spring versus last year with exceptionally unfavorable weather across much of the country in February.

As weather normalized, we were encouraged by our business performance. Customers appreciated our spacious garden centers, great selection of outdoor power equipment and expansive assortment of grills and patio furniture. And they also took advantage of our early spring offers, which included special deals for MyLowe's Rewards members. Later in the call, Bill will provide more detail on our approach to spring and the momentum that we're seeing. Before I discuss our Q1 results in more detail, I'd like to spend time discussing our company's commitment to diversify our global sourcing efforts.

To provide a better perspective about our global sourcing, roughly 60% of our purchases originate in The U. S. Or approximately $30,000,000,000 on an annual basis. Over the past several years, we've been partnering with our private and national brand suppliers to diversify our global sourcing efforts. As a result, approximately 20% of our purchase volume is currently concentrated in China.

Although we are pleased with this reduced dependency, we're not satisfied, and we're working to accelerate our diversification efforts. Our global sourcing team has identified exciting diversification opportunities in The U. S. And around the globe that we're actively pursuing. We're also using our best in class product cost management and sophisticated pricing capabilities while leveraging the strength of our cross functional teams across merchandising, assortment planning, supply chain and finance.

We will combine these capabilities and continue to work with our national and private brand suppliers while using a portfolio approach to ensure we continue to bring value and innovation to our customers. In the meantime, let me tell you how we're planning to drive sales growth by continuing to strengthen two key pillars of our total home strategy: accelerating our pro and online growth. I'll begin with our mid single digit growth in Pro sales this quarter. Since 2018, this leadership team has transformed our Pro product and service offering with a powerful Pro brand lineup, targeted inventory investments and a competitive loyalty program. Now that we've established an effective playbook and a strong foundation of execution to serve the small to medium pro, we're excited to engage a larger pro with their planned spend in a new distribution channel.

To that end, we announced a deal in April to acquire Artisan Design Group, or ADG, which is a leading provider of design, distribution and installation services for interior surface finishes, including flooring, countertops and cabinets. ADG serves national, regional and local homebuilders as well as property managers. We expect this acquisition to increase our penetration of pro plan spend and will position us to gain share in a highly fragmented $50,000,000,000 market. And with an estimated 18,000,000 homes needed in The U. S.

By 02/1933, new home construction is expected to be a major driver of pro plan spend over the next decade. We've been impressed with ADG's strong leadership team and their customer centric operating model, reflected in the best in class customer satisfaction scores that it earned from top builders in The U. S. The transaction is expected to close this quarter, so we'll provide an update on our progress during our next call. Now let's talk about another key pillar of our total home strategy, accelerating online sales.

In the first quarter, online sales were up 6%, driven by increases in both traffic and conversion rates. We're pleased with the technology transformation that's making these gains possible. For example, we're now able to offer an expanded assortment, more value and an even wider extended aisle with our launch last year of D First, online product marketplace home improvement. While we're still in the early days of this initiative, we recently partnered with Miracle, a global leader in marketplace technology, to help us scale even faster. Through Miracle, trusted Marketplace sellers will be able to easily manage their catalogs on lowes.com.

This will add new product categories across the home and offer DIY and Pro customers a full spectrum of value and premium products. We can accomplish all of this without having to carry the inventory or invest in new fulfillment centers. As we scale our new product marketplace and unlock its potential, I look forward to keeping you updated on our continuing efforts to drive online growth. Now allow me to transition to how we're leveraging new AI capabilities to better serve our customers. In collaboration with OpenAI, we launched Milo, the first AI powered home improvement virtual adviser.

Since home improvement is inherently complex, Milo provides step by step instructions for any project with any level of complexity from how to fix a leaky faucet to how to bill a deck and everything in between. And it helps customers find and purchase the right tools and materials for their projects directly on lowes.com or the Lowe's app. We're encouraged by our progress in leveraging AI to streamline the customer experience, and I commend our technology and digital team for their outstanding contributions. Notably, in Q1, Loews' mobile app earned the prestigious Webby Award and was recognized as the best mobile app for 2025. This is another reflection that our investments in technology and innovation are paying off.

Before I wrap, let me update you on our commitment to be a good neighbor in the communities where we do business. Earlier this month, we celebrated our commitments to supporting our communities by announcing our efforts to measure our impact in a new way through our Here to Help initiative with a goal to deliver 10,000,000 square feet of impact nationwide this year. This includes our ongoing efforts to create safe, affordable housing, respond to disasters and revitalize communities like our five year one hundred million dollars commitment to improve hometowns across the country. This new initiative reflects our commitment to improve the communities where our associates live and work, and we look forward to providing you with updates later in the year. In closing, I want to thank our frontline associates for their continued hard work, especially during this key spring selling season.

Thanks, Marvin, and good morning, everyone. We're pleased that our first quarter sales were in line with our expectations, driven by broad based strength in pro and online across multiple merchandising categories. Beginning in hardlines. After a slow start to February, our spring season is off and running.

As the weather improved, we delivered solid growth categories, including patio furniture, fertilizer, grass seed, generators and irrigation. Customers responded to our innovative products and new affordable designs even when it came to some discretionary purchases. For example, our private branded Ashton five piece patio dining set by Style Selections was a big hit at less than $400 We're also continuing to earn DIY customers' loyalty through MyLowe's rewards. We just marked the first anniversary of this program, which has more than 30,000,000 members who spend nearly 50% more than nonmembers. We're cultivating their loyalty and using data driven marketing to engage them with the right message at the right time to convert sales.

For example, during our Spring Fest event, we offered members special deals every two weeks on lawn and garden products, patio furniture, outdoor power equipment and more, plus member only doorbusters in store and online. And new this year, in early April, we launched Mulch Madness. During this event, customers saved on five bags of mulch for $10 and for the first time, members also received five times bonus points and a free gift. We also brought customers industry leading innovation this spring with products like the new Ego Line IQ attachment capable string trimmer. This product makes it easy to load the trimmer line with the push of a button, and its attachment capabilities mean it can convert into eight different tools, including an edger, hedge trimmer and pole saw.

This is one of more than 20 new Ego items that we're launching this year. We're also in stock with the industry's best brands to help customers complete all their projects, like Scotts Fertilizer, Miracle Gro Soils, Toro Lawnmowers, along with products from Craftsman and Cobalt. Now turning to Building Products. We delivered positive comp sales in Building Materials and Rough Plumbing, with strength in roofing, drywall, plumbing repair, water heaters and air circulation categories. And in lumber, we delivered growth in siding, treated lumber and composite decking.

In fact, Lowe's has the largest selection of composite decking brands, including the top two with Trex and TimberTech, along with an improved offering from decorators. Let's talk about home decor. Our continued strength in appliances helped us deliver growth in both transactions and average ticket, and we saw growth across all major categories, including refrigeration, laundry, cooking and dishwashers. As the industry leader in appliances, we have the widest assortment of top brands using our market delivery model, we can deliver these big and bulky products next day to virtually every zip code in The U. S.

And of course, our knowledgeable Red Vest associates are always there to help customers choose the right products and highlight new and innovative items that can meet their needs. For example, we're introducing the next step in all in one laundry with the new Samsung bespoke AI vented all in one combo washer and dryer. This one machine washes and dries clothes in just over an hour without having to transfer loads, and it uses the existing 110 volt outlet and dryer venting found in most homes. Our paint department has become the home center color authority, where we instill color confidence in consumers with trusted Sherwin Williams colors. We're excited to see the new marketing campaign from Sherwin Williams, which uses their iconic color palette to entice customers to shop Lowe's, including the Pro Who paints, where we continue to gain traction with our compelling value and expanded assortment.

And while we're energized by new and innovative products, we're also mindful of the current market dynamics. Bigger ticket project spending remains under pressure in interior categories like flooring and kitchens and bath, with many customers still choosing to delay those larger purchases. I'd like to spend a few minutes discussing our approach to spring. Our teams have never been more in sync as we prepared for this important season. Our stores, supply chain, inventory, vendor and merchant teams have worked hard to make sure that we provide the best service, product, value and innovation to our customers.

For this spring season, we are ready with strong in stocks across our core categories, including our seasonal items, so that we can serve both our DIY and pro customers with great values on items that they are looking for as we head into the upcoming Memorial Day, Father's Day and Fourth of July holidays. Looking ahead, I'm not only pleased with the great deals and innovation that we have for our DIY and Pro customers, I'm also excited to see some of the best in stock positions during my tenure at Lowe's. And when you combine that with the outstanding staffing and customer service in our stores, the result was our recognition as number one in customer satisfaction among home improvement retailers from J. D. Power.

As I wrap up, I want to thank all of these teams as well as our MST associates for their support, partnership and great execution this spring. And now with that, I'll turn the call over to Joe.

Thank you, Bill. Good morning, everyone. Let me start by thanking our frontline associates for their hard work and dedication during the spring season. Their efforts are paying off with customer satisfaction scores up 100 basis points over last year as we leverage better technology and ongoing process improvements to enhance the shopping experience. Turning to Pro.

In our most recent survey, Pros indicated that the project backlogs remain healthy, but they are feeling a little less confident as might be expected given the uncertain macro environment. Although Pros may be a bit cautious right now, our ability to deliver mid single digit growth in Pro sales comp in Q1 is a reflection that our strategy is working. One highlight this quarter, we're really pleased with the successful nationwide relaunch of our Pro loyalty program. The updated program now called My Lowe's Pro Rewards allows pros to earn points from day one and is much more intuitive to use. Just one example, pros only need to provide their phone number at checkout getting them back to the job site faster and joining has never been easier with the addition of our new Spanish language enrollment option.

With a program that's easier to use and understand, we're expecting greater utilization driving repeat purchases and higher spend. Another way we are driving momentum is through our new technology workbench for our pro sales associates. They can use this digital tracking tool to quickly identify their leads and prioritize the quotes to close. This drives both the better customer experience and greater associate productivity. As discussed earlier, our planned acquisition of ADG represents a natural step in driving pro penetration by extending our reach with a new cohort of pro customers, single and multifamily homebuilders.

Turning now to our perpetual productivity improvement or PPI initiatives. In conjunction with the rollout of myLO on lowes.com for customers, we've also released MyLo Companion for our store associates built on the same technology. With immediate access to product details and project advice and inventory information, this AI powered app gives associates the product and project knowledge to sell with confidence regardless of tenure or experience. Associates across all 1,700 plus stores can access Milo Companion on their mobile devices, marking the first time a retailer has successfully implemented this kind of technology at scale. With this knowledge at their fingertips, our associates can quickly feel confident in answering customers' questions even if they've just started in the store or been asked to cover a new department.

We're also driving productivity with our Gig delivery network, which has been an important component of our enhanced omni channel customer experience. We're now using this capability to help us meet spring demand, specifically during the Mulch Madness event that Bill just mentioned. In the past, this high traffic event would take up valuable flatbed distribution capacity, but this spring, we shifted a portion of the volume to gig delivery. This provided an efficient delivery experience for customers buying mulch while freeing up capacity to meet the delivery needs of other pro and DIY customers. We're also pleased to announce that our East Asheville store reopened earlier this month after damage from Hurricane Helene.

During the hurricane, the store was submerged in over 18 feet of water. So we are thrilled that we are now able to reopen it to serve our customers and community. And we're on track to open five to 10 new stores later this year in line with what we shared at our Analyst and Investor Conference. Of course, all of this is only possible because of our hard working associates. As a demonstration of our appreciation, we closed our stores on Easter for the sixth consecutive year, giving associates time on this very special day to rest and recharge with family and friends.

As I wrap up, I want to take a moment to thank our veterans, including our veteran associates who can be identified for their camouflage vests. Lowe's is ranked among the top military friendly brands in The U. S, which speaks to our company's commitment to the military community. As a Marine, I couldn't be more proud of Lowe's efforts to honor those who served, especially as we approached Memorial Day. Looking ahead, with excellent spring staffing levels and ongoing innovation across technology and service, I'm confident that we're offering a best in class omni channel shopping experience for our customers this season.

To close, I want to congratulate our store associates for being recognized by J. D. Power as the number one customer satisfaction among home improvement retailers. This is a testament to their ongoing commitment to serving our customers. With that, I'll turn it over to Brandon.

Thank you, Joe and good morning. Starting with our first quarter results, diluted earnings per share of $2.92 were in line with our expectations. Q1 sales totaled $20,900,000,000 and comparable sales were down 1.7% in line with our expectations as we cycled over an earlier start to spring last year. Comparable average ticket was up 2.1% with continued growth in pro and appliances somewhat offset by ongoing pressure in DIY discretionary project demand. Comparable transactions declined 3.8%, partly driven by unfavorable weather earlier in the quarter that pressured spring traffic, which make up a larger portion of our transactions this time of year.

And given the poor weather early in Q1, comps were down 5.4% in February, up 1.7% in March and down 2.6 in April. As our stores are closed on Easter Sunday, we estimate that the later timing of Easter benefited March comps and pressured April comps by a similar amount. Adjusting for the Easter shift, comp sales were down approximately 0.9% in March and up approximately 0.2% in April. Gross margin was 33.4% of sales in the first quarter, up 19 basis points from last year, driven by multiple PPI initiatives, as well as some modest improvement in shrink and credit revenue. SG and A of 19.3 of sales delevered 56 basis points driven by lower sales volumes, the wrap of incremental wage actions for frontline associates and higher healthcare related costs.

Operating margin rate of 11.9% declined 50 basis points versus prior year and the effective tax rate was 23.9 in line with prior year. Inventory ended Q1 at $18,300,000,000 in line with prior year with strong in stocks across the store including key spring seasonal items. Turning now to capital allocation. In the first quarter, we generated $2,900,000,000 in free cash flow. Capital expenditures totaled $518,000,000 as we continue to invest in our strategic growth priorities, including the construction of new stores expected to open later this year.

In the quarter, we paid $645,000,000 in dividends at 1.15 per share. And in April, we repaid $750,000,000 in debt maturities, helping us deliver adjusted debt to EBITDAR of 2.99 times and a return on invested capital of 31% at the end of Q1. Last month, we announced a definitive agreement to acquire Artisan Design Group for $1,325,000,000 We plan to use cash on hand to finance the transaction, suspend share repurchases this year and repay the remaining $1,750,000,000 in bonds maturing September. The transaction is expected to close in Q2 and it's expected to be accretive to diluted earnings per share in the first full fiscal year after closing. Looking forward to the remainder of the year, today we are affirming our fiscal twenty twenty five outlook.

We continue to expect sales ranging from 83,500,000,000.0 to $84,500,000,000 with comparable sales in a range of flat to up 1%. We expect operating margin in a range of 12.3% to 12.4% and full year diluted earnings per share of approximately $12.15 to $12.4 We also expect capital expenditures of approximately $2,500,000,000 as we invest in our total home strategic priorities and begin to ramp up new store builds. Please note that this outlook does not include any potential impacts related to the acquisition of Artisan Design Group. To assist with your modeling, here are a few items to keep in mind for the second quarter. We continue to expect comp sales in the first half to be roughly flat with approximately $400,000,000 in spring demand shifting into Q2 where we are cycling particularly poor weather.

As Bill mentioned, we also have strong in stocks including in critical seasonal categories as well as visibility up into our supply chain. So we're confident that we can meet customer demand this spring. Taking this into account, we expect second quarter comp sales to be approximately 150 basis above the bottom end of our full year guide. We also expect second quarter operating margin rate to be approximately 10 basis points above the prior year adjusted operating margin rate. And in closing, we remain confident in our team's ability to execute at a high level and manage through this challenging environment, as well as any team in retail.

We continue to invest in our total home strategy and remain focused on delivering value to our customers and our shareholders. And with that, we'll open it up for your questions.

Thank you. We are now ready for questions. Our first question today comes from the line of Simeon Gutman with Morgan Stanley. Please proceed with your question.

Hey, good morning everyone and nice job managing the quarter. My first question is on the relationship of comp to expense leverage or operating leverage for the rest of the year. I guess we don't know each quarter. You gave us a little bit of help with the second quarter. But it looks like that ratio is a little bit higher for the balance of the year, something like 25 basis points of expansion for whatever is left in comp.

Is that right? Are you getting more out of the business? Or is it just the timing because don't know the comp cadence through the year and it's that same I think it was a 10 basis points of leverage relationship? Thanks.

Yes. Hey, Simeon. Good morning. It's Brandon. So, as it relates to the specifics on the comp guide, let me kind of break it down in terms of first half and second half.

The first half mainly a weather story. We're expecting roughly flat comps over the course of the first half and we talked about the shift of the $400,000,000 from spring to play out Q1 into Q2. Q1 played out as expected. So, I referenced, expecting roughly 1.5% Q2. We feel like we have strong inventory levels and we're ready.

We have a lot of confidence in Q2 expectations. And then implied in the second half is roughly a plus one. We expect to continue to see momentum with our total home sales initiatives offsetting hurricane pressure. So, that's kind of the shape of the top line. As it relates to margin, we're expecting gross margins to hold roughly flat for the full year.

The PPI portfolio initiatives continue to offset cost and inflationary pressures. On the SG and A side, team continues to outperform there, managing a number of lines really well. We got $500,000,000 roughly in OpEx offsetting there across a number of pressures that we're seeing. So, that kind of gets you to the guide of 12.3% to 12.4% again Q1 roughly in line with expectations and that's how we're thinking about Q2 to Q4.

Okay. And then shifting gears maybe for Marvin. I wanted to ask about the larger Pro and Artisan Design Group. Is I guess, the deal signaling that you're planning to move quicker here if opportunities present themselves? How do we think about that in relation for Lowe's?

And then can you talk about how quickly the business is growing organically or whatever that growth rate of the business looks like? Thanks.

Yes. We feel really good about the acquisition. We've been really disciplined with how we've managed our capital. And so anytime we decide to make any acquisition, this is well thought out and then we have a lot of confidence in it. I think the best way to answer your question is, as we think about capital allocation, it really remains the same philosophy and that's we're always going to invest in the business.

We're going to always think first about how we can get the healthy return that's going to be long standing and sustainable. Having said that, we also believe that it's important to find ways to grow. And as we look at ADG as an example, we think that they are perfectly positioned for the recovery that has to happen over the next decade in housing. To us, we know we're in a repressed period, but as I mentioned in my prepared comments, you got 18,000,000 new homes needed by 02/1933, and Arsen Design Group is number one in their marketplace from a perspective of service and overall business. And we think that we have some really attractive adjacencies that we can add to that portfolio.

fragmented environment, which means that they have a healthy pipeline themselves of potential targets to continue to grow through acquisition, and we're going to allow them to continue to follow a really best in class process to pursue those potential targets within their pipeline. We're not changing our strategy. We're just being opportunistic. We feel like that we've created a really nice playbook and execution model for the small to medium pro. The data reflects that with mid single digit positive comps this quarter, but this gives us an opportunity to kind of broaden our pro portfolio and to now have the ability to be in a separate channel with a $50,000,000,000 TAM that just gives us additional opportunity to grow when the market continues to recover.

And Simeon, this is Brandon. Just specifics on financials. ADG delivered 1,800,000,000.0 in sales in 'twenty four. As I mentioned, we expect EPS to be accretive in the first full fiscal year. So that would be fiscal 'twenty six and we're going to hold on given anything more specific.

We expect to close in Q2 and we'll hold off and be prepared to talk more in August.

Our next question is from the line of Steve Forbes with Guggenheim Securities. Please proceed with your questions.

Good morning, everyone. Brandon, I think in your commentary you mentioned percentage of transactions being sort of spring transactions more elevated in the first half of the year and maybe potentially right more elevated in the second quarter this year. So any sort of context to help us better understand sort of how reliant, right, or how relevant Spring is in terms of percentage of transactions, first quarter versus second quarter?

I don't know that I'll get into the details, Steve, on Q1, Q2. I'll just say, Q1 average ticket up just over 2% continues to be driven by strength in Pro, also momentum in appliances. We also saw some benefit from storm recovery projects. As you referenced, comp transactions down 3.9%. It is driven by fewer smaller ticket seasonal transactions and ongoing DIY pressures that we're seeing in the business.

Large ticket for us was slightly positive. Again, that's appliances and pro strength and that's a continuation that we saw from Q4. But I would say as you look out at Q2 and for sure over the balance of the year, we continue to expect average ticket to be the primary driver of comps and we would expect to see transactions recover specifically in Q2 as the business starts to get momentum.

That's helpful. And then, Robert, just a quick follow-up. I think one of the initiatives that wasn't mentioned in the prepared remarks is localization discussed during the Analyst Day and so forth. So any updates on sort of the localization strategy? How that's progressing?

How many stores you're touching? How much of the opportunity is still ahead for Lowe's?

Yes, Steve. So I'll speak about it more from the standpoint of space productivity because we've taken localization and just made it really part of a broader initiative on just improving productivity both in our physical space, in our stores and virtually online. So I'll let Bill talk a bit about some of the key initiatives like workwear, pet, that we're really excited about and what our plans are to continue to expand that and how we think that's going to give us an opportunity to just continue to have more productive space in our stores.

Yes. Thanks, Marvin. Steve, we're well underway with all three of those initiatives. We'll have rural completed here kind of end of second quarter, early Q3. Workwear, we're well down the path of having roughly more than 1,000 stores complete by the end of this year and wrapping up early next year for the remainder of those.

And then we continue on the same track with our pet initiative, and we're excited about that, continuing to learn as we go and continuing to adjust as we go as well as we roll out these stores and as we put these products in. But we're real pleased with the results of all three.

Next question? The next questions are from the line of Robbie Ohmes with Bank of America. Please proceed with your question.

Hey, good morning. Thanks for taking my questions. The first question is just I was wondering if we could get a little more on tariffs in terms of pricing impacts that you guys might be expecting and the impact on the private brand

your business versus vendor announced price increases? And just color on how you're managing that there? And then I have a follow-up.

So Robert, I'll take the pricing part, and I'll let Bill just provide a broader perspective on tariffs in general. I think for us, as always, we're going to take a portfolio approach to pricing. We're pleased that we've built best in class tools for price management that's going to help us navigate any environment. And we have great elasticity data across products and geographies. I think the key for us is the merchants have been cultivating and developing just wonderful relationships with suppliers for the last six years, and this is when those relationships start to pay off.

Before I hand it to Bill, I think the key point for us is that we're going to be really price competitive in the home improvement channel, like we always are. We're not in the habit of donating market share to the competition. And so in this environment, we're going to be as keenly focused on competing on price as we are every single day, and we think we can do that and still deliver on the financial commitments that Brandon outlined in his prepared comments. So I'll let Bill talk a little bit more about the overall global sourcing philosophy that we have here.

Yes. Thanks, Marvin. And Robbie, I think it's important that everyone understands how we look at global sourcing. And we look at it really from two lenses, a direct and indirect perspective, direct being where we direct import, where we're the where Lowe's is the importer of record and then indirect, where we purchase from suppliers and then they are the importer of record. And currently, as Brandon said in his remarks and Marvin said in his, roughly 60% of our purchases are out of The U.

S. The next largest is China sitting at roughly 20%. And you can understand where some of those categories fall. A lot of holiday Trimetry ceiling fans, small appliances, tools, etcetera, make up that 20%. But we've been working really hard over the last four or five years to diversify just as everybody has and partnering closely with both private and national brand suppliers to find different sourcing locations and working to do that.

And we're also trying to accelerate that as it relates to our private brand portfolio and doing the same with our national brands. And as Marvin said, it all comes down to relationships. And we're really pleased with the relationships that we've built over the six plus years. And we feel like we have a strong track record of managing our assortments, managing the cost as they come as it comes to us, and we'll continue to run our playbook as it relates to that.

That's really helpful. And just a quick follow-up for Marvin. Marvin, market marketplace, what's dream the dream for us here? Where do you how big could this be? And how important could this be?

Well, I can tell you that we're excited about it. And the partnership with Miracle is important because it's the number one technology platform for large marketplace sellers. And so it's an easier pivot for them to transition to lowes.com and an easier pivot for our digital team to load their catalogs in a very, very efficient way in a very time sensitive way. We have high expectations. As we've looked at the entire retail landscape across the globe and we look at brick and mortar retailers that have demonstrated the most effective omnichannel strategies and sustainable growth, one correlating factor is a marketplace existence.

And we're pleased to be the first product marketplace in home improvement. We have, again, high expectations that not only can we manage core home improvement, which our team does really well now, but we also now, with a marketplace environment, can manage premium and value products, and we can do it without adding capital intensive fulfillment centers and without adding additional inventory to our balance sheet. So early days, but we're excited about the progress, and we're excited about the number of world class sellers that are eager, to join our marketplace, and we look forward to updating you all as this become a more mature initiative.

next question is from the line of Scott Ciccarelli with Truist Securities. Please proceed with your questions.

Good morning, guys. So given the softer trends you continue to see in bigger ticket projects, first, how much of that mix do you think that generally represents? I know it changes quarter to quarter, but kind of on an annualized basis. And then second, what do you think you need to see to unlock greater activity in that segment? Is it improved consumer confidence?

Or is it lower interest rates? Because presumably, are opposed scenarios. Or is it something else entirely? Thanks.

So Scott, I'll take the first part, then I'll let Brandon and Bill join in to add any additional commentary. I think from an overall consumer perspective, we feel like our overall consumer remains healthy from a balance sheet perspective. And as we look at the historic demand drivers of our business, they still remain positive. And I've repeated them in the past, home price appreciation, aging housing stock, personal disposable income is now growing faster than inflation. And overall, we see rising real income and lower debt.

So overall, our consumer is in great shape, but we still, as we said in the prepared comments, have the DIY customer pulling back on large big ticket discretionary. And that is, in essence, the issue that we're dealing with. And we believe that part of that is elevated mortgage rates and mortgage rates not falling as perceived by many in the marketplace. And so we're just managing that as best we can. So I'll let Brandon and Bill provide any additional perspective after just giving you a view of where we see the consumer.

Yes. This is Scott. I would just add, as Marvin mentioned, consumer overall, very healthy. But for us in home improvement, especially big ticket, the affordability challenge remained the primary concern. Inflation rates, as Marvin mentioned, rates still hovering thirty year mortgage around 7%.

We've yet to really see at scale the consumer reengage in larger discretionary categories, still mainly sitting on the sidelines. I think the good news is the trends aren't getting any worse. You referenced the greater than 500 ticket. Sentiment has softened a little bit more recently, but we haven't seen that necessarily translate into consumer behavior yet. So for us, as we look out, we're looking for sustained increase in discretionary projects and DIY traffic for the inflection point.

We don't have that necessarily expected or baked into 25. It's sort of expected it's going to be more of the

And Brandon, I think the only thing I would add is from a positive or a bright spot perspective, our appliance business continues to be, from a big ticket perspective, a good news story for us, and it's really a trend that's been ongoing since really the back half of last year and has trended into Q1. We saw strength across every single major category, which includes refrigeration, laundry, cooking, dishwashers. The team has done a really nice job of introducing new and innovative products. I spoke to some of those in our in my prepared remarks, whether that's all in one laundry, whether that's in cooking, whether that's in refrigeration.

And then you add in what we've done from a delivery perspective and the market leadership position that we have to be able to deliver to really any ZIP code within two days and same day is something that we're really excited about. And again, roughly 100,000 appliances break every day. So you've got to be ready for that in our in stock position. Appliances have never been better. So those are all positives when we look at that part of the big ticket business.

Thank you. The next question is from the line of Seth Sigman with Barclays. Please proceed with your question.

Great. Hey, good morning everyone. It sounded like Q1 was limited by weather. Can you give us a little bit more perspective on what you're seeing in the markets where you've had steadier spring weather conditions? How much of those markets outperformed?

And just related to that, if you look at the April adjusted comp, the positive 0.2%, do you view that as the run rate of the business? And I guess you're kind of guiding to the first half being flat. So is that how you're thinking about it? Thanks.

Well, the simplest way for me to answer the question is when the sun is shining, our business performs a lot better. And so when you look at Q1, the variation by geography was driven exclusively by weather. And as weather continues to moderate, our business continues to get better and that's reflective in the adjusted comp number you reflected for April. I mean, we feel good about the trends in May. May is consistent with the guidance that Brandon provided and consistent with our expectations.

Lowe's (LOW) Q1 2026 Earnings Call Transcript

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