Wolverine World Wide Inc

NYSE:WWW

Earnings Call Transcript 2024-Q1

[Operator]

Good day, and welcome to the Wolverine Worldwide Inc. First Quarter 2024 Earnings Call. [Operator Instructions] Please note, this event is being recorded.

I would now like to turn the conference over to Alex Wiseman, Vice President of Finance. Please go ahead.

[Alex Wiseman, executive]

Good morning, and welcome to our first quarter fiscal 2024 conference call. On the call today are Chris Hufnagel, President and Chief Executive Officer; and Mike Stornant, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. Earlier this morning, we issued our earnings press release and announced our financial results for the first quarter of 2024. The press release is available on many news sites and can be viewed on our corporate website at wolverineworldwide.com.

This morning's earnings press release and comments made during today's earnings call include non-GAAP financial measures. These non-GAAP financial measures were reconciled to the most comparable GAAP financial measures and attached tables within the body of the release. References made regarding financial results and outlook for 2024 and comparable results from 2023 in each case for our ongoing business exclude the impact of Keds, Wolverine Leathers and Sperry.

I'd like to also remind you that statements describing the company's expectations, plans, predictions and projections such as those regarding the company's outlook for fiscal 2024, growth opportunities and trends expected to affect the company's future performance made during today's conference call are forward-looking statements under U.S. securities laws.

As a result, we must caution you that there are a number of factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those described in forward-looking statements. These important risk factors are identified in the company's SEC filings and in our press releases.

With that being said, I'd now like to turn the call over to Chris Hufnagel.

[Christopher Hufnagel, executive]

Thanks, Alex. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us on today's call. I'm pleased to report that we continue to make progress against our aggressive plan to turn around and transform Wolverine World Wide, executing our plan with tremendous pace to first stabilize the company, set a new foundation for a return to growth and ultimately deliver greater returns for our shareholders.

Importantly, we are doing what we said we would do. In the first quarter, we exceeded revenue expectations with a balanced performance across the portfolio, led by beats to our plan for Merrell and Saucony. We exceeded earnings expectations while simultaneously investing more than we initially planned in brand marketing to capitalize the momentum we're seeing in the business today, and to help build brand equity for the future. And we continue to strengthen the company's balance sheet, which we remain intently focused on, by further reducing our debt and inventory levels more than we anticipated going into the quarter. A good start to an important year for the company.

While our transformation efforts have addressed nearly every aspect of our global operations, we've worked particularly hard to rapidly improve our brand's product pipelines and presentation in the marketplace. We've made good progress to date and the product launch calendar for 2024 and into 2025 is especially strong.

We've also worked to cultivate a healthier marketplace. And at retail, we continue to see inventory levels decline and rogue seller activity abate. Because of our efforts, we're beginning to see sequential improvement in our selling trends. This is encouraging and provides the level of confidence that our strategies and tactics are beginning to gain traction.

Average weekly replenishment orders from our wholesale partners accelerated materially from the fourth quarter of 2023 to the first quarter of 2024, and our owned e-commerce demand has improved each month this year, most recently inflecting the growth in March and accelerating further in April.

At the same time, we've delivered a much healthier gross margin across the business, achieving an all-time record gross margin in the first quarter as a company, a testament to the good work we've done on supply chain costs, pricing, inventory and better managing the marketplace. We've said consistently that we believe our turnaround will be led by margin improvement, which we're seeing today, followed by our planned inflection to growth in the second half of the year.

While we're motivated and encouraged by our progress and the proof points we're seeing, we acknowledge it's still very early days in our transformation. We still have a lot of work to do to hit our stride and realize the full potential of the company, and there's no doubt challenges beyond our control exists in the marketplace today.

However, as we move forward, our vision remains the same, to become builders of great global brands, brands that make people's lives and the world better. Our brand building model centered squarely on building awesome products, telling amazing stories and driving the business every day.

To achieve our vision, we continue to invest in the capabilities that are necessary to execute this new model, strengthening our talent, insights, processes and tools. I'd like to spend a few minutes now providing an update on this important work and share some real-time examples of the pause momentum in the business today, our proof points that we believe will ultimately lead to an inflection to growth and the successful turnaround of Wolverine World Wide.

Starting with our #1 priority, designing awesome, style-led trend-right products that are not only innovative, but also priced right and placed right. As always, it begins with the consumer. Our brands are actively incorporating a stronger dose of market and consumer insights into their product development processes and becoming more externally focused, leveraging the collective, our recently established center of excellence, for elevated trend, features and color forecasting as well as enhanced consumer testing.

In addition, we're bolstering our talent and key brand product roles and modernizing our tool set with the rollout of a new best-in-class digital product line management platform, which remains on track to be deployed across our portfolio, after being piloted in Merrell.

Now on to some examples of proof points on product. Saucony has moved quickly to advance and accelerate development in its product pipeline. The brand started to regain traction with the launch of its new Ride and Guide 17 franchises earlier this year, both of which have performed well at retail. These launches were quickly followed by the very successful introduction of new models and the brands that lead performance franchise, the endorphin.

And just last week, the brand launched the new Triumph 22, driving growth of over 80% for the franchise in its first week on saucony.com. At the Boston Marathon a few weeks ago, Saucony was the second-most worn brand and gained share year-over-year. The brand is also gaining momentum on the lifestyle side with its Retro track collections, led by the ProGrid Omni, Shadow and Azure. It's been a good few months for the brand, resulting in upticks in brand heat and demand.

This summer, the brand plans to launch the Hurricane 24 and we're already eager for the next additions of all these key franchises in 2025. The brand is supercharging its innovation pipeline and elevating its design, all while taking a more thoughtful and strategic approach to the many opportunities the brand has in a very attractive and growing category.

The other brands in the portfolio are close behind. For Merrell, the Moab Speed 2, which is recently recognized as an ISPO award for the best new product in the hiking category, modernizes the trial by incorporating the beloved fit and comfort of the Moab into a faster, lighter and more athletic silhouettes. It is the brand's biggest story this year, and is driving strong sell-through today at key wholesale accounts and at merrell.com. This performance is helping generate increased interest in the marketplace and continued market share gains for the category leader.

On the lifestyle front, Merrell's Wrapt collection continues to outpace our expectations, selling out with each delivery of new inventory. Have improving the concept at merrell.com, we now plan to thoughtfully expand its distribution to our wholesale accounts, both in the U.S. and around the world. We're also fast-tracking new styles for Wrapt next year, especially for her, including mules and the trend right mary jane.

Finally, Wolverine brands Trade Wedge, Rancher and ReForce franchises are all performing well today, with both the Trade Wedge and Rancher consistently beating our sell-through forecasts, and the ReForce off to a solid start at wolverine.com. Going forward, the brand has plans to expand their product franchises, most notably introducing significant new innovations to the western category later this year as that is an important consumer trend.

To win in today's market, brands need to do more than just build off on products. They also have to tell amazing stories. And we're focused on telling stories that excite consumers about our brands as well as our products.

As with the product process, the consumer now sits at the center of our marketing approach. Our teams are utilizing consumer insight to the very start of creative development to create more compelling storytelling, and consumer testing is now being leveraged throughout the process, including evaluating creative effectiveness prior to campaigns launch.

To lead our execution here, we've hired new consumer-focused marketing leaders for both Merrell and Sweaty Betty over the last 6 months, with plans to place a new market leader for Saucony shortly. In addition to leveraging the collective to ensure we share best practices and insights across the portfolio.

We're also evolving towards a better full funnel approach to marketing investment and campaign objectives that balance functional product stories with brand building messages. It is vital that we build brand equity and deepen emotional connections with our consumers. We need to compete for both share of closet and share of mind to win in today's competitive marketplace.

A few examples of how we're telling amazing stories in the market today. Sweaty Betty aims to empower women and just last week, the brand launched its second iteration of the Wear the Damn Shorts campaign to encourage its [indiscernible] community to be confident and comfortable with their bodies.

Last year, the t-shirt featuring the campaign tagline was the brand's most requested t-shirt in its history. This year, the campaign has already driven a 63% increase year-over-year in shorts revenue and a 52% sell-through of the t-shirt since launch.

The campaign has delivered over 30 million impressions over 1.5 million video views. In total, Sweaty Betty has driven nearly a 40% increase in paid impressions globally year-to-date, and the brand continues to resonate with its core consumers.

Saucony kicked off the spring with a successful marathons campaign, which encourage consumers to drop their phones and hit the pavement, driving over 1 billion impressions. More recently, the brand engaged its running community at the London Marathon through a host of events and activations, generating well over 1 million impressions and helping fuel all-time record search interest for the brand in the U.K.

Year-to-date, global search interest of Saucony is up over 20% compared to 2023, and this is all ahead of Saucony being named the presenting sponsor for this year's London 10-K, and our many activations planned to coincide with this importance partnership.

And last, Merrell just launched its biggest campaign of the year, Good Things Await, inviting consumers to experience the simple power of being outside. This campaign meets the consumer where and when they want to be engaged, either in their social channels, on connected TV and print or in-store. It's the most comprehensive marketing campaign in the brand's history, generating over 7 billion media impressions so far in helping drive strength and interest in the brand. As the global leader in hike, it's incumbent upon the brand to drive innovation and heat in the category, and I'm encouraged by the progress we're making in Merrell.

Finally, our teams are intent on driving the business each and every day. We have a renewed focus on strengthening our relationships with our global distribution network, both in the U.S. and around the world. We continue to hold strategic top shop meetings with our key domestic retail partners, and in March, 16 of our key international partners visited our campus [indiscernible] in Grand Rapids for Strategic Planning Summit. This was the first of its kind event in our company's history and the first time we've hosted a group like this on campus since the pandemic.

To further support our partners around the world and drive the business, just last week, we announced new license agreements for Merrell and Saucony Kids footwear, along with Merrell apparel and accessories. These new agreements will help us deliver better, fuller assortments and more effectively and efficiently realize the full potential of our brands globally.

In collaboration with our long-time partner in Japan, Merrell opened its first of its kind flagship store last fall in Harajuku in Tokyo, one of the very best and most influential retail districts in the world. The store has outperformed its plan since opening, leading to the opening of a new store in nearby Shibuya Scramble Square at the beginning of March, which successfully captured a younger consumer, driven a more balanced head-to-toe sales mix and is significantly exceeding its plan since opening. The strategy in Japan is helping reposition and modernize and energized Merrell, and we're taking these learnings to other brands and markets in the portfolio.

Here in the U.S., Saucony is expanding into meaningful new lifestyle distribution over the course of the year, as a result of the heat it's generating with trend-right retro tech designs from its archives. The brand is also opening its aperture to capture the broader global running life opportunity, well beyond niche elite offerings.

In February, I said I was bullish on Saucony's future prospects, driven by much improved innovation pipeline and even more excited today on the potential of the brand moving forward.

We're also making important progress cleaning up the marketplace, spearheaded by our newly created brand protection team. To date, we've closed or restricted over 30 customers and partners and shuttered approximately 400 retail accounts. This will continue as we work to be great brand managers, coupled with a stronger focus on sell-through versus sell-in, and our brands better managing supply and demand in the marketplace.

While often products and amazing stories are critical to building great brands, I'm equally focused on aligning and uniting the global teams to drive the business each and every day. Our team's good work is translating into important early proof points and helping to build a new firmer foundation for the future.

Before I turn the call over to Mike, I'd like to comment on our other announcement this morning. After a comprehensive search, I'm pleased to announce that Taryn Miller will succeed Mike Stornant as the company's Chief Financial Officer. Taryn brings over 25 years of global functional and operational experience, along with strategic thought leadership to Wolverine World. I'm excited for her to join the executive team at this important moment in our transformation, and look forward to you all meeting and working with Taryn. She's a tremendous addition to our team.

I'd also like to take this opportunity to personally thank Mike. He's dedicated nearly 3 decades of his life to the company, including the last 9 years as our CFO. Since I stepped into the seat last August, his deep knowledge of the business, drive and undeniable grip have been invaluable to me and the company as we work to stabilize and reimagine the company. No one is more passionate about Wolverine's success and no one works harder than Mike.

Thank you, Mike, for everything you've done and for your commitment to a smooth and seamless transition moving forward over the next several months. I, along with everyone Wolverine Worldwide, wish you and [ Amy ] the very best in your coming retirement. It's well deserved and we'll miss you.

With that, I'm going to hand over to Mike to review our performance in the first quarter and expectations for the year in more detail. Mike?

[Michael Stornant, executive]

Thank you for those comments, Chris, and good morning to everyone on the call. This morning, I'll start with a review of the first quarter, followed by our expectations for fiscal 2024. We are very encouraged by our first quarter results. We delivered or exceeded our key financial objectives and saw improvement across performance metrics that support the stabilization of the business.

First quarter revenue for our ongoing business of $390.8 million was above our outlook of $360 million. Demand trends and selling execution continue to improve. Our wholesale performance in Europe was especially strong, thanks to actions taken by our global supply chain team to mitigate logistics delays related to the Suez Canal. Approximately $8 million of revenue shifted from Q2 into Q1 as a result. As a reminder, Q1 2023 included more than $75 million of revenue that did not repeat in the first quarter of this year, including excessive end-of-life inventory liquidation, the timing shift in international shipments and business model changes.

Adjusted gross margin of 46.5% was better than our outlook of approximately 46%, and improved 540 basis points versus last year. A healthier sales mix, lower e-commerce promotions and the benefit from the supply chain cost initiatives executed last year, all contributed to this record gross margin performance. As a reminder, first quarter gross margin was planned to be the highest of any quarter this year, due mostly to the lower mix of international distributor shipments in the quarter, which carry a lower gross margin.

Adjusted SG&A expense of $162 million was in line with our expectations given the higher revenue, and includes a $3 million year-over-year increase in investments for demand creation and technology. Adjusted operating margin of 5% exceeded our outlook for the quarter and adjusted diluted earnings per share for the quarter were $0.05, and better than expected.

The health of our balance sheet continues to improve, and we exceeded our expectations for inventory, cash flow and net debt for the quarter. Inventory for the ongoing business was $354 million, down 40% from last year, as a result of continued progress on rightsizing inventory, nimble supply chain execution and improved planning. Net debt was $685 million, down approximately $380 million versus last year. Bank defined leverage was 3.1x at the end of the first quarter.

Let me now provide details on our outlook for 2024. Our guidance reflects the expected performance of our ongoing business and now adjust for the recently announced licensing model for our Merrell and Saucony Kids business. This change in business model will further simplify our operations and leverage our newly established global licensing team. This change is expected to reduce 2024 revenue by approximately $20 million, and will have a neutral impact on earnings in 2024 as we transition the business to our new partner.

Fiscal 2024 revenue for our ongoing business is now expected in the range of $1.68 billion to $1.73 billion. This compares to 2023 revenue for our ongoing business of $1.99 billion and represents a decline of 14.4% at the midpoint of the range.

Discrete items in 2023 totaling $165 million in revenue will not recur in 2024. These include approximately $70 million of extraordinary end-of-life inventory liquidation heavenly weighted to the first half of the year, approximately $55 million in revenue prior to certain business model changes including the transition of our China joint venture to a distributor model for Merrell and Saucony and approximately $40 million in a timing shift of international distributor shipments that benefited Q1 in 2023.

We expect the transition to a licensing model for Merrell and Saucony Kids will result in approximately $20 million of 2023 revenue that will not recur in 2024. Excluding these discrete items and licensing business model changes, the midpoint decline in full year revenue will be approximately 5.6%.

Our revenue outlook for our groups and brands remains unchanged. As a reminder, we expect active group revenue to decline mid-teens. Merrell is expected to decline in the low double-digit range, with inflection to growth expected in the second half of the year. Saucony is expected to decline in the low 20% range, with sequential improvement as we move through the back half of the year. And Sweaty Betty is expected to be approximately flat. [ Work ] group revenue is expected to decline high single digits, with Wolverine brand expected to be down mid-single digits.

Turning to gross margin. Adjusted gross margin is expected to be approximately 44.5% at the midpoint of the outlook range, up approximately 460 basis points compared to 2023 and a record for the company. We continue to expect significant reductions in supply chain and product costs, the benefit of healthier inventory and a better mix of full price sales, partially offset by foreign currency headwinds that impact inventory costs.

Adjusted selling and general and administrative expenses are now expected to be approximately $640 million at the midpoint of the outlook range or 37.5% of sales compared to $716 million in 2023 or 36% of sales. The lower operating cost structure includes $95 million of savings from the 2023 restructuring and other profit initiatives, and $10 million from the model change for our Kids business. This is partially offset by incremental investment for demand creation and modern systems, normalized incentive compensation expense and general inflation.

Adjusted operating margin is expected to be approximately 7% at the midpoint of the outlook range compared to 3.9% in 2023. Interest and other expenses are projected to be approximately $40 million, down from $63 million in 2023 and benefiting from the significant debt reduction achieved to date. The effective tax rate is projected to be approximately 18%.

As a result of these key assumptions, adjusted diluted earnings per share is expected to be in the range of $0.65 to $0.85, including a $0.10 negative impact from foreign currency exchange fluctuations. This compares to $0.15 in 2023 for our ongoing business.

Working capital and cash flow optimization remain a priority in 2024. We now expect inventory to decline by at least $75 million during the year as we continue to work through specific areas of excess inventory.

On this topic, as the industry faces new and evolving product regulations related to PFAS, we are taking a proactive approach. In partnership with our key retail partners and our own direct channels, we are responsibly working through this inventory. We expect to be compliant with PFAS restrictions when we're required in the future.

Operating free cash flow is expected in the range of $110 million to $130 million. We now expect net debt to improve by $175 million to $565 million at year-end, with bank-defined leverage below 3x.

Shifting to our outlook for the second quarter. We expect second quarter revenue of approximately $410 million, a decline of approximately 21%. As announced earlier this year, we are closing our Louisville distribution center and currently moving our Saucony inventory to our California distribution center. We expect this transition to result in a shift in revenue and profit from Q2 into Q3.

Second quarter gross margin is expected to be approximately 43%, up 390 basis points from last year. This would result in first half gross margin slightly above 44.5%, which is in line with our outlook for the full year. We expect second quarter adjusted operating margin to be approximately 5% and adjusted diluted earnings per share to be approximately $0.10.

The order book for our global wholesale and distributor businesses has developed as expected when we established our full year guidance in February, and the rate of replenishment orders has continued to improve. In addition, our e-commerce businesses are expected to inflect the growth in the second quarter, with growth also expected in Q3 and Q4.

As a result, we continue to expect sequential revenue improvement through the back half of the year, with year-over-year growth in Q4. We also expect second half gross margin and SG&A expense to be similar to the first half, which will drive positive SG&A and operating margin leverage in the second half of the year.

Let me summarize the key points I hope you'll take away this morning. 2024 is a year of transition for the company as we expect significant gross margin expansion will precede an inflection to growth in the back half of the year, and we set our brands up to accelerate in 2025. We recognize that improved and sustainable gross margin is necessary to create capacity for consistent brand investment into the future.

We are balancing the need for meaningful earnings and cash flow improvement with critical reinvestments required to modernize our systems, drive demand creation and build other important capabilities.

And finally, after a solid performance in Q1, we now have better visibility to future order demand, more stable operating trends and strong consumer reaction to our new product introductions. This progress gives us further confidence in our outlook for the rest of the year.

Before I turn the call back to Chris, I want to personally welcome Taryn Miller to Wolverine as our new CFO. She brings the valuable experience needed to help lead the ongoing transformation of this company, and she is a tremendous addition to our leadership team. I am fully committed to working with her and Chris during this important transition, and I'm excited to support the company in my new role over the coming months.

Now I'll turn the call back to Chris.

[Christopher Hufnagel, executive]

Thanks, Mike. In closing, I'm encouraged by the progress we've made in just a few quarters, and even more excited that we're seeing early proof points that our strategy and execution are beginning to work.

On our last call, I said 2024 would be a pivotal year for the company and that our teams were motivated by both the challenges and opportunities. I believe this is even more true today. There's no doubt we have more work to do, but I believe we've taken the right steps, and we're on the right path to transform Wolverine World Wide, all guided by becoming great brand builders and ultimately delivering greater returns for our shareholders.

Thank you for taking time to be with us this morning.

[Operator]

[Operator Instructions] The first question comes from the line of Mitch Kummetz with Seaport Research.

[Mitchel Kummetz, analyst]

Mike, really enjoyed working with you over the years and wish you the best of luck. So let me start just on the quarter, it looks like you guys beat revenues, beat your plan by maybe $30-plus million. It sounded like maybe there was $8 million of pull forward in Europe. Can you say if there was any pull forward outside of Europe, like in the U.S.? And then what really drove the beat, either by brand or by channel? Any more color there? And then I've got a follow-up.

[Michael Stornant, executive]

Sure. Thanks, Mitch, for the comments. I'll say overperformance really across the board. I think that was an important theme for the first quarter, whether that be at the brand level or the regional level.

The call out on the pull forward or the timing shift for the Europe wholesale business really had to do with how we planned or sort of hedged our bet a little bit on the timing of logistics issues with the Suez Canal. We overcame that, and we called that out as about an $8 million shift, say there maybe $2 million or $3 million more across the business, nothing significant to call out, but a little bit more in terms of timing, just not so much pulling forward shipments, but just the way we were able to move goods through the warehouse. And some of the demand that picked up later in the quarter, which we were able to kind of satisfy with some early shipments. So nothing dramatic outside of that issue.

[Mitchel Kummetz, analyst]

And then on the guide, you adjust for the $20 million in the licensing change on Kids. It looks like the sales guide is unchanged. Given some upside in the first quarter and particularly better replenishment trends, I'm curious why you didn't flow through more of the 1Q beat or kind of raise your outlook on the year based on those improving revenue trends. Can you address that? And also maybe talk about the impact of the -- or quantify the impact of the Saucony shift from 2Q to 3Q.

[Christopher Hufnagel, executive]

Sure. I'll take the first, and then Mike can talk about the timing thing. I think we certainly were encouraged by some acceleration in the trends as we move through the quarter and how we were thinking about how the quarter might play out and certainly how the year may play out. We've talked about increasing improvement in replenishment at wholesale. We've talked about an acceleration in our direct-to-consumer business, which leaves us all sort of encouraged about the work that we're doing is getting traction, and we're working on turning the company back to growth.

At the same time, our year is predicated on a back half inflection, sequential improvement quarter-by-quarter, which we've talked consistently about. And now we're actually in the place now we're beginning to chase inventory. We worked really, really hard. As you know, as part of the turnaround is to really better manage the inventory piece, and we've done a good job at that.

And we've worked to maintain lean just because of where we have been and where we thought we needed to go. Now that we're seeing an inflection in some proof points of growth, we're beginning to chase inventories. We're still taking a conservative approach.

I think hopefully, it came through in my prepared remarks that while the quarter was a beat to expectations, it was a relatively low bar. And we still have work to go do as a company to get back to where we need to be as an organization. But early proof points are encouraging, and we certainly are happy about the traction that we have. At the same time, we have a lot of the year left to go.

[Michael Stornant, executive]

The second part of your question, Mitch, on the distribution center transition, that's just getting underway right now. And so obviously, we're being cautious on how that might impact the quarter.

I would say just -- we didn't quantify it in the remarks, but we are kind of thinking in the range of $5 million to $10 million of potential revenue shifts there. But doing everything we can to mitigate that and the teams are already making great progress on the transition.

But just important to call it out because obviously, as we get through that over the coming 4 or 5 weeks, that could have some impact on the flow of goods and chasing some of the demand that Chris has been talking about. Having said that, really good coordination with our key accounts and planning this transition and good support from our customers in terms of how we're going to refill the goods, too.

The next question comes from Laurent Vasilescu with BNP Paribas.

[Laurent Vasilescu, analyst]

Chris, you and your team have done a lot of heavy lifting over the last year. With divestitures and business model changes like the JV and the license business announced a couple of days ago, curious to know if you're contemplating any more changes over the next 6 months? Or if you've reached, do you think, a steady state point for the business to grow going forward?

[Christopher Hufnagel, executive]

Thank you, Laurent. Appreciate the question. We certainly have done a lot of heavy lifting over the past 9 months or so, really focused on stabilizing the business. And we've take -- we've tried to take sort of a very thoughtful sequential systematic approach to what we thought we needed to go to do to both turnaround and then ultimately transform the business. We have done a tremendous amount of things sort of on the back office side in that effort.

Are we done doing all of those things? I think we certainly have done a lot of them. Will we continue to contemplate other things? I think we will. I think we have to become very active, and it's a very fast-changing dynamic marketplace. And I think we can't afford to get comfortable. And I think we have to keep optimizing the business. And I think we have to keep very focused on what our fewest priorities are and really driving growth behind a handful of our brands and frankly, trying to do fewer things, but just do those things better.

I will tell you it is refreshing now as we've done a lot of those hard activities and whether selling things or divesting things or restructuring the business, the conversations around here really -- have really pivoted towards growth, and where our brands are in the marketplace, how are we chasing inventories, what's working from a demand creation standpoint, how are we doing on DTC. So I don't want to say that all of the stabilization work and all of that is done is behind us because I frankly think great companies are always -- we're working to optimize. At the same time, the conversations here right now are about chasing demand and really becoming awesome brand builders.

[Laurent Vasilescu, analyst]

Very helpful, Chris. And then if I can zero in on Saucony. Saucony, I appreciate the slides, the 2Q guide. If Saucony implies [ 2H ] revenue to be down mid-teens, maybe can you unpack that a bit more? What are you seeing in terms of the order book? How is the one specialty channel doing? Are inventories clean there? Are you seeing growth in some of your retro products? Any color there, Chris, would be very helpful for the [indiscernible].

[Christopher Hufnagel, executive]

Sure. Yes. Thank you, Laurent. Saucony is a fascinating story right now. I remain very encouraged and bullish on the prospects of Saucony. I mentioned that on the last call, and we certainly are seeing early proof points of the work that we've done. Really, first and foremost, really attacking the product pipeline, bringing innovation back, looking at what categories in which we play and thinking about color and materials, and then really using the archive as a growth vehicle.

So there certainly are some really strong signs that we're seeing good momentum, really behind the Ride and Guide 17. The Endorphin collection was an immediate shot in the arm when the brand dropped that a month or so ago. And then just last week, we dropped the Triumph 22, which is an awesome new shoe. So there is chatter in the important run specialty channel, and we are seeing our styles begin to tick up. There is a nice movement in search interest. For those of you that pay attention to Google search interest, I think we're up 23% year-to-date as a brand, which is encouraging.

At the same time, we're working to clean up the business that Saucony is. So there are headwinds there around the close up sales that we're anniversarying. We had a very low margin profile business in some of the family channel accounts that we have to work on that margin business. And we're working to be less promotional at dot-com as well.

So I think the -- I think you have to look under the covers of the Saucony business and not just at the top line, and understand how we're trying to rationalize that business, take a new strategic approach. We're anniversarying some things that are going to go away, but then I would encourage everyone to focus on the new products that we've dropped and the momentum we're driving, both behind performance and lifestyle run and then importantly, the retro tech collection, which is just an amazing gift we have in our archives.

[Operator]

The next question comes from Sam Poser with Williams Trading.

[Samuel Poser, analyst]

I just want to follow up on the lifestyle product or the retro product in Saucony, and then I got a couple of other questions. When you look at sort of the big growth driver over time, is this going to be a more performance running? Or do you see it getting more -- just more scale across of, call it, athlete specialty and so on?

[Christopher Hufnagel, executive]

Yes. Great question, Sam. And that has been sort of the big work that we've done in Saucony around strategy. And I think Saucony has an amazing opportunity in front of it. I think for a long time, the brand was potentially a little bit -- have too much of a myopic focus on the ends of the spectrum.

The really elite run, which is beautiful innovative product, but the market size just isn't big enough. And then on the lifestyle side, really focused on the collaboration piece, the sneakerhead piece that is very cool, but also doesn't have a lot of scale. So as we think about Saucony, we want to maintain great innovative product, which is why the Endorphin 4 collection was so important. And we want to maintain an amazing credibility in sneakerhead culture, which is why we're so glad that we won the collaboration of the year last year with Jae Tips.

At the same time, the big commercial opportunity for Saucony moves a little bit towards the middle. And that's as performance run as a lifestyle opportunity. And I think you have seen that pivot and us specifically in color and materialization and specifically the work around her. At the same time, the broader life opportunity around the original, specifically the Retro tech which currently is in fashion right now.

So I think us opening the aperture on Saucony, thinking about the greater market opportunity, maintaining the high ground in innovation and coolness at the ends of the spectrum. At the same time, having a much stronger focus on the bigger commercial opportunities more towards the middle.

[Samuel Poser, analyst]

And then I have just one other question then a housekeeping. The reduction of $20 million from the from the new licensing businesses. Number one, does that mean that since you only took $4 million out of your revenue that something went up? Like something better than what you thought it was before? And if so, what is it?

[Michael Stornant, executive]

Sam, the guidance adjustment that we made to revenue was exactly the $20 million that we referenced, and it's solely related to the change in the business model. So early May, we announced the change. So we have revenue under the wholesale model in the first 4 months of the year and then a shift in the last 8.

[Samuel Poser, analyst]

Okay. And then the other question is on interest on interest expense. What do you foresee the interest expense being for the year within your guidance?

[Michael Stornant, executive]

About $40 million.

[Samuel Poser, analyst]

As your debt comes down?

[Michael Stornant, executive]

Yes. We had net interest, I think, last year of about $63 million. So coming down to about $40 million in our guidance right now, driven by the ongoing progress we've made in reducing the debt.

[Samuel Poser, analyst]

Got you. Congratulations, Mike.

[Operator]

The next question comes from Jonathan Komp with Baird.

[Jonathan Komp, analyst]

Mike, good luck with the transition. Congratulations on your role change going forward. And Mike, if I could follow up maybe just first with the gross margin drivers in the first quarter. I know you called out some mix tailwind. So could you maybe just talk a little bit more about the drivers of the gross margin expansion? How you see that going forward? And then really just the second half operating margin inflection that you talked to, if you could review some of the drivers there?

[Michael Stornant, executive]

Sure. I think that the good news on the gross margin performance in Q1, which was slightly ahead of our guidance for the quarter, was that we saw the benefit and the crystallization of a lot of the work that has been done over the last year to improve the supply chain performance but also the cost structure. And whether that be the reduction in the transitory costs that we had to contend with for 2023 and slightly previous to that. And obviously, the product cost initiatives that we put into place in the middle of '23.

So those all came to fruition as we expected. The benefit from just a healthier inventory, having worked through a lot of that end-of-life inventory in 2023 as painful as it was, set us up for a much cleaner business this year. And starting in Q1, we saw the benefit of that.

And then I would say, again, as we mentioned on the revenue side, all the elements of our gross margin contribution in the quarter were quite solid. Our full price margins held up to plan. We were able to drive a good amount of e-commerce improvement on our gross margins as well, by being less promotional and driving a healthier business there.

So all the things that we kind of laid out in our original guidance back in February, John, really kind of kind of came together in the first quarter, and we expect that trend and those benefits to continue throughout the balance of the year.

On the H2 operating margin expansion, obviously driven off of a couple of things that are really important to restate. One is just the sequential improvement in some of those profit improvement initiatives that we called out. Those are starting to be more prominent, especially on the gross margin side in Q3 and Q4. So some of those savings that are benefiting our autumn winter assortment is going to start to show up in Q3 and Q4.

The cost reductions and restructuring benefits will be fully in place by the back half of the year. So you're seeing a stabilization on SG&A expense in the back half, while we obviously expect to see sequential improvement in revenue and growth in the fourth quarter. So being able to continue to drive the SG&A efficiency and leverage that to the bottom line as we grow the business.

All in all, a really important part of our model as we kind of think about pivoting into '25, but seeing some real proof points in the latter part of 2024 in terms of how we're a leaner, better structured organization now. So I think it's really those drivers and the healthy mix of revenue that we see sequencing into the third and fourth quarter.

[Jonathan Komp, analyst]

Okay. Great. And Chris, if I could just follow up on Merrell, the outlook to improve and inflect the growth later in the year. Could you just maybe talk about what you're seeing from the outdoor industry supporting that view? And some of the Merrell-specific drivers that you expect to support that inflection?

[Christopher Hufnagel, executive]

Yes, sure. Thanks, John. Yes, for sure and Merrell, I mean, the outdoor category has been under pressure for quite some time. And I'll go back and say it's up to the category leader to -- for either newness and heat and innovation in that category and that falls squarely on the shoulders of Merrell. We're not counting on dramatic improvement in the outdoor category. So we're very much focused on the things that we can do.

Encouragingly, in Merrell, we continue to gain market share, which is great. And there was a period of time here for a company where Merrell was losing share quarter after quarter after quarter. We stem that during COVID, and we continue that today.

I'm encouraged by our efforts to become lighter and faster, more athletic and that's the Moab Speed 2. So early indications of that launch are very positive, extremely positive and sort of how that has been embraced really globally and the sell-throughs that we're seeing and the replenishment that we're seeing and the reaction to the fit and the style and the color. At the same time, the Moab 3 continues to be good. And as we sort of lap some of the very difficult market conditions with over inventoried and the row selling, as those things abate, we're encouraged that Merrell is in a good position to capitalize.

We also -- Merrell have to extend beyond just core hike outdoor. For Merrell to have truly become a great global brand, it really needs to extend beyond just that core height business, which is why we've worked so hard in trail run. We're gaining share in trail run, which is encouraging. And we've got some awesome styles that we didn't talk about in the prepared remarks, whether it's the Agility Peak 5 or the new More Flight. Those are phenomenal products getting great reviews right now online, and we're seeing good sell-throughs.

And we have to extend into lifestyle, specifically for her too. And that's why we're encouraged by the Wrapt collection, which we sort of previewed to all of you back at ICR in January. We've continued to see really strong sell-throughs. Really, every time we deliver it, it sells out extraordinarily quickly with very little marketing support. So our ability to really embrace that franchise and begin to market that franchise and extend beyond just that core silhouette is going to be important. So the Wrapt is a great shoe. It's visually disruptive. It's got a great fit. And it's amazingly versatile, which is where I think the sweet spot is for Merrell, when I think about just beyond core hike.

So I'm encouraged by what the team is doing. We've got a new Chief Marketing Officer in place. We sat, do product meetings with them and demand creation meetings with them. And I like the plan. The Good Things Await campaign just dropped, a lot of impressions, a lot of really positive reaction to that as well. So certainly, Merrell is not out of the woods and there is pressure in outdoor, but I do think we're doing the right things to get that brand stabilized and get that brand growing again.

[Operator]

The next question comes from Mauricio Serna with UBS.

[Mauricio Serna Vega, analyst]

Maybe if you could provide more details about the DTC performance? I see in the release, you mentioned the ongoing DTC revenue was down 6%. How does that compare to the previous quarter?

And maybe on inventory, great progress that we've seen over the last couple of quarters. But it sounds like there's still maybe like some work that -- you're still very focused on that. So maybe could you talk about -- are there like maybe pocket of inventory that you still need to work through? Or what is exactly the state and competition of the inventory?

[Christopher Hufnagel, executive]

Yes. So thanks for the question. I'll let Mike take the last 2. I'll just talk about DTC inflection and -- when we talk about proof points, and we talk about what we're trying to go do, certainly, we look at the DTC business every hour as we get reads and how we're performing day-to-day, week to week.

I would say, first and foremost, we're trying to tell better stories online and trying to present our brands better and be less promotional. And we have seen us be less promotional at dot com, which is important for the health of our brands and how our brands are perceived and consumers' perceptions of our brands and marketplace perceptions of our brand.

So we work to be promotional, which is paying off in the margin piece. And then from an improvement standpoint, we were down mid-teens in the fourth quarter and down, I think, around [ 6% ] in the first quarter, and we've actually sort of inflected the growth -- turned to growth in March and then that continued into April.

So we're encouraged by that. Obviously, newness drives the business and then really compelling engagement with our consumers. And when we drop new products in Saucony, it's the Endorphin 4, the Triumph 22. Merrell, it's either -- it's work around the Moab Speed 2 or the Agility Peak 5 or the Wrapt collection or even some of the [ one TRL ] stuff continues to have momentum. And then Sweaty Betty, which we haven't talked about yet today, really good continued innovation now that Sweaty Betty team, and really telling amazing stories with Wear the Damn Shorts campaign, which I personally love and it's just so on brand for who Sweaty Betty is and the consumers that they talk to.

So I would say we're encouraged by the progress we made in DTC. We're encouraged by how we have sort of stemmed those, stemmed that contraction and now we're beginning to see growth. I'm also proud of how we've done it. Again, less promotional, telling better stories, but really dropping new and innovative products at a consistent drumbeat, which is what we know what works in the marketplace. So again, not declaring victory by any stretch of the imagination, but I do think we are seeing early proof points that our strategy and execution are gaining traction.

[Michael Stornant, executive]

Mauricio, on the inventory question, I would say. Just continued progress. We ended the quarter ahead of where we had hoped and kind of planned for, a combination of really strong selling on high-quality product and just a better kind of more rigorous planning and management process there.

And as we said in our guidance, expect to drive inventories down even further this year, another $75 million year-over-year. As a result of just being able to focus on some specific core areas and be rational about when we're going to sell that off and the phasing of -- but see line of sight to being able to accomplish that, obviously, and updated our guidance to actually improve on that number a little bit here since February.

So we see the quality of the inventory improving across the board. It's not where we need it to be, which is why we're calling out the $75 million of opportunity. But overall, the progress being made so far is ahead of schedule.

[Mauricio Serna Vega, analyst]

Understood. And then just a quick follow-up on SG&A. I think -- I just want to make sure I understood. I think you mentioned SG&A dollars second half should be like fairly similar to first half? Is that right? And so like should that be more like weighted to Q3 or Q4, if I think about that?

[Michael Stornant, executive]

Well, we're not giving quarterly guidance on the back half yet, but just thought it would be helpful to kind of give some perspective on both the margin expectations for the back half of the year. Pretty much in line with what we've experienced so far in the Q1 plus the guidance we gave for Q2. And then similar sort of directional guidance on the SG&A for the full half of the year.

So again, we did call out Mauricio, that we expect sequential improvement in revenue every quarter with growth in the fourth quarter. So that might help your model a little bit.

[Operator]

The next question comes from Dana Telsey with Telsey Group.

[Dana Telsey, analyst]

Mike, best of luck in your next. Wanted to touch on, first of all, as you think about pricing and promotions, how are you thinking about the environment today? How has it changed? And what are you expecting going forward?

On the wholesale order book and channels, the distribution there, seeing anything different from different types of accounts by brand?

And then lastly, Chris, with the transformation work that's been underway, where are you on the progress organizationally in getting it to where you want it to be, whether like in headquarters or what -- how you're thinking about it with efficiencies?

[Christopher Hufnagel, executive]

Yes. Good question. All good questions, Dana. I'll get the last one first, and then we'll come back to the earlier ones. Wolverine has gone through a lot in the last 9 months. Obviously, we had a CEO transition last August. And we really focused very quickly to stabilize the business and restructure the business, which we needed to go do. We have completed a lot of those efforts, but a lot of those efforts are still -- we're still working our way through.

I would say, right now, we're in the middle of moving our distribution center, closing the distribution center in Louisville and moving that product into our California distribution center. That takes a lot of work. We're working on moving our Boston Brace teammates, the Saucony team, to Michigan and having that team sort of reside here.

And we're still looking for some key talent. We're still looking for leadership in Saucony. We're looking for some key brand talent, our product count and some of our brands as well.

So I'm very pleased with the progress that we've made. I think we've taken the right and necessary steps. At the same time, there is work to go do. But I think we're approaching it with great pace and urgency. And also attacking the most important things first. So that's where we are.

So we're not completely done in restructuring. We're not completely done. The dust hasn't all settled yet, but the team has done a phenomenal job sort of reacting to the call to action. And then importantly, posting the results and driving the business each and every day.

The marketplace inventories, I think the market -- the inventories continue to get better, which is good, and so sort of become a little less promotional, especially for us on our dot-com business, which is encouraging. There are still pockets out there that are a little bit having and it also varies a little bit by channel too. So certainly improved, albeit not perfect yet, which is one of the things that we continue to watch and monitor.

And again, wholesalers, our partners just are behaving differently. How they think about truth orders, how they think about replenishment orders is just different from the historical norms to the business. And we, along with probably a lot of brands similar to us, are learning to react and adapt to that.

Encouragingly though, we talked about the uptick in replenishment orders is a positive sign in the business. We're seeing some of the nefarious rope selling activity that is coming down sort of week by week, which we're encouraged by. And then as I already talked about, a little bit of an acceleration in our DTC business.

But I think we're still very cautious. We're still managing the business very tightly on a day-to-day basis. And then where we do see proof points, we are chasing that business as responsibly, as quickly as we can. So I think, by and large, we're pleased with the progress we've made. At the same time, we know that we can do better and everyone should expect us to do better, and that's what everyone here is focused on.

[Dana Telsey, analyst]

Got it. And then pricing and promotions, what are you seeing there? And any shift in third quarter and fourth quarter as you return to growth?

[Michael Stornant, executive]

Well, I can say that the proof points so far this year on pricing and promotions, both in our direct-to-consumer channels and through our wholesale partnerships has been quite positive.

Overall, in the accounts or in the channels where we do get the information we're seeing, inventory coming down nearly 25% year-over-year, not to optimal levels yet, obviously, at retail, but that's an encouraging trend and sign. But at the same time, average selling price is increasing pretty dramatically for our big brands in those channels. So that's a really important proof point.

We talked a little bit about the margin expansion in our e-commerce business and how that's been a very important focus for the teams. And we're seeing that benefit, I think, a combination of a bit more discipline, but most importantly, just new product that's actually resonating with the consumers right now and driving more full-price business.

So I think those are the two most important proof points right now, Dana, as we think about more confidence into the back half of the year. We're not giving guidance on Q3 or Q4 phasing or trends. But just know that some of the early positive wins we're seeing in the e-com side of the business are giving us some confidence points for sure.

[Operator]

We have the next question from the line of Ashley Owens with KeyBanc Capital Markets.

[Ashley Owens, analyst]

Just first, can you talk about your decision to roll off the Merrell, Saucony Kids businesses into license? And then any plans you can share that you have to reallocate some of those resources you were previously using to support those?

[Christopher Hufnagel, executive]

Yes. Good question. Thanks, Ashley. We appreciate that. Certainly, important for decisions that we're making as an organization to how we think about Wolverine World Wide go forward. We created a global licensing group in the latter part of last year, and really are thoughtful about that business and what it can mean. We've got a great seasoned leader running that business. She brings just a great approach sort of daily to both our brands and our partners and how we can profitably grow that business.

So we've created the center of excellence. We've got the right leader running it. And then we also look back on the global potential of our brands and where we know we can be great and where I think we probably know that we can use some help. I still believe in the power of our global head-to-toe opportunities, specifically from Merrell and Saucony and what those brands can be.

And as it relates to Merrell, we've attempted apparel and accessories historically, and we just haven't been great at it. And I think we found a great partner in that. I literally just met with them last week, I'll meet with them in a couple of weeks. Just a really phenomenal partner that has a deep fondness for the Merrell brand. They've already built the team out around it, and are very excited about what they see as the potential for Merrell apparel and accessories to allow us to be a true global head-to-toe business.

And I think we can't miss the fact that Merrell outside of the U.S., and we've got 46 stores in the U.S., we've got a direct consumer business, we have a wholesale business. But outside of the U.S., we have a lot of direct consumer operations. And I think those stores, being able to arm those stores with apparel and accessories and socks and packs and bags, along with the amazing footwear that we design, really creates a really phenomenal opportunity for us and really helps us tell a better story with the consumer. So I'm bullish on that.

And then on the Kids front, too, we've had a Kids group that was very good. At the same time, I think a licensing model with a longtime partner like who we chose was, really made the best sense for us today as we're thinking about the business.

So I think we've picked two great partners for both apparel and accessories for Merrell and then Merrell and Saucony Kids. And we have them underneath a great leader at Wolverine World Wide. So I think we're really working to prioritize the business, eyes wide open about what we know we can be great at. At the same time, looking at other opportunities for our brands with best-in-class partners who can help us continue to grow without having us to do it ourselves.

As we've talked to redeploy resources, we've already done that, and we've redeployed some resources into other parts of the business as well. And it allows us to really have a sharper focus on what we know that we can be great at and what we know we need to be great at. So an important move and just another step in our evolution.

[Ashley Owens, analyst]

Okay. Great. And then just quickly, one, any call-outs you could provide around which brands of products are kind of helping with that replenished rate improvement you're seeing?

And then additionally, the product cadence as we get to the back half of the year and just how it compares to some of the innovation we're seeing now. As resources free up, [indiscernible] cleaner and all the transformation efforts underway as well should be seeing a little bit of acceleration in terms of launches? Or is the inflection of 4Q coming from existing products you released ramping in momentum?

[Christopher Hufnagel, executive]

Yes, great question or questions. There's a lot embedded there. I'll try to answer it. I think certainly, replenishment across the board, we have seen an improvement in. Some parts, it's better than others. But in our weekly meetings with the brand leadership teams and sales teams, we certainly have seen a nice uptick in weaker replenishment orders. Probably stronger in some brands and frankly, strong in some brands where now we're going to go chase inventory.

And I'm thinking about Saucony specifically right now, some of the momentum that Saucony has. We're chasing product because we have managed the inventory very closely to help really work and reposition and reset that brand. We're also seeing it in brands like Merrell and we're chasing Moab Speed 2s now and talking about how we can prioritize orders and feed the regions and channels that are driving that growth.

And then even some places in the work group, which we haven't talked about today. Where product is on trend or new innovation, we're having to chase that, too. So it goes without saying, I mean you all know as well as I do that newness -- consumers crave newness and innovation, and I think when we can bring that in a meaningful way and tell a good story about it, that product checks. And that's why I'm so convinced about our global brand building model and encouraged by the progress we made around the product pipeline.

While we've had some great introductions, there are still more coming this year. And I'm excited about the ReForce which is just dropping in the Boot Group. Certainly, in Saucony, the Hurricane 24 which will drop this summer. We are encouraged by that, that is a disruptive shoe that has people talking. Continuing to chase the Endorphin, the Triumph, those are very positive.

And then there's some really cool new light hikers coming out from Merrell that will drop the latter part of this year into next year. They are probably some of the most disruptive shoes that Merrell has built in a very long period of time. Thinking about the evolution of the trail, lightens fast and things that are visually disruptive at the same time performs.

So I think we worked hard to accelerate the innovation in our product pipeline. I think the teams have responded early proof points of the new innovation working and even some of the sell-in that we're doing with accounts have been very positive. So I'm encouraged by the progress that we've made and every new drop we get excited about.

[Ashley Owens, analyst]

Really appreciate the color there. And best of luck to you, Mike, in your future endeavors.

[Operator]

Ladies and gentlemen, we will now end the question-and-answer session. The conference has now concluded. Thank you for attending today's presentation. You may now disconnect.