Roots Corp

TSX:ROOT

Earnings Call Transcript 2021-Q1

[Operator]

Good morning. My name is Jack, and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the Roots Fiscal 2020 First Quarter Conference Call. [Operator Instructions] On the call today, we have Meghan Roach, Chief Executive Officer; Mona Kelly (sic) [ Mona Kennedy ], Chief Financial Officer; and Kristen Davies, Head of Investor Relations for Roots. Before the call begins, the company would like to remind listeners that the call, including the Q&A portion, may include forward-looking statements about current and future plans, expectations and intentions, results, levels of activities, performance, goals or achievements or any other future events or developments. This information is based on management's reasonable assumption and beliefs in light of information currently available to Roots, and listeners are cautioned not to place undue reliance on such information. Each forward-looking statement is subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those projected. The company refers listeners to its fiscal 2020 first quarter management's discussion and analysis and/or its annual form -- information form dated May 29, 2020, for a summary of the significant assumptions, underlying forward-looking statements and certain risks and factors that could affect the company's future performance and ability to deliver on these statements. Roots undertakes no obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements made on this call. The fiscal 2020 first quarter and year-end earnings release, the related financial statements and the management's discussion and analysis are available on SEDAR as well as on the Roots Investor Relations website at www.investors.roots.com. Finally, please also note that all figures discussed on this conference call are in Canadian dollars unless otherwise stated. Thank you. Ms. Davies, you may begin your conference.

[Kristen Davies, Head of Investor Relations]

Thank you, operator. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us. Meghan Roach, our Chief Executive Officer, will briefly discuss our fiscal 2020 first quarter performance, including the impact of COVID-19 on the Roots business as well as our strategic outlook. Then she will turn the call over to Mona Kennedy, our Chief Financial Officer, who will discuss our financials in greater detail, after which we will open up the call for questions. However, before turning the call to Meghan, I wanted to take a moment to congratulate her on behalf of the entire Roots team on her appointment as CEO.

[Meghan Roach, CEO, President & Director]

Thank you, Kristen, and good morning, everyone. I hope your families are all safe and that you're managing through these difficult times as best you can. I'm excited to be taking on the role of CEO at Roots. In the months that I've spent with the company, it has become increasingly apparent to me that we really have something special. Roots is a strong brand with a great heritage, a loyal customer base and an incredibly creative, passionate and dedicated team. I look forward to continuing to work with everyone to deliver long-term success of the brand. Before I turn to our first quarter results, I felt it was important to speak about the protests we are seeing globally against racism as a result of the recent devastating events. I would like to express our strong support for the black community, our employees, our partners, our customers, our friends and our loved ones. I want you to know that we at Roots stand with you today and always in solidarity against racism, injustice and oppression. I also understand that words are not enough, and we are committed to showing our support through actions. We've already commenced new internal training and education and established new diversity and inclusion programs. And we are learning and listening to those in our community to understand how we can help to build a better future where those amongst us are not judged by the color of their skin. At this time, with the world also facing a global pandemic, we like many brands have been challenged in completely new ways. Across the company, our team has gone above and beyond to support the business, each other and our communities. And I want to express my gratitude to the team for all their hard work. Prior to the onset of COVID-19, we were entering fiscal 2020 with renewed excitement. We introduced new products within our lifestyle category and we're demonstrating strong sell-through, and a relaunch of our archived RBA logo successfully tapped into the nostalgia of our long-term Roots fans, driving good performance of these products in our men's, women's and kids segments. However, we began seeing effects of COVID-19 in our business early on in the quarter. Initially, we saw supply chain disruptions and a slowdown in our partner operations in Asia. However, by mid- to late February, as the COVID-19 virus spread across North America, our in-store traffic and sales turned slow. Subsequently, to protect the health and safety of our team and our customers, we announced the temporary closure of our entire North America store fleet and our leather factory on March 17, only 7 weeks into the 13-week quarter. At the time, we also made a difficult decision to temporarily lay off our store and leather factory employees. In Asia, our partners closed select stores in China and reduced hours across the remainder of its fleet in China, Hong Kong and Taiwan. While all stores will reopen in China during the quarter and our partner operations open a new store in each of China, Taiwan and Hong Kong, retail shopping trends remain below pre-pandemic levels in all 3 regions. With our stores temporarily closed in North America, we swiftly increased our focus in our e-commerce business, supporting our partner operations in Asia and our B2B licensing and wholesale partnerships. Fortunately, Roots is a brand known for comfort and as business has shifted to work-from-home model and individuals changed their habits, we benefited from higher demand for our extensive sweats offering in our online channel. To capitalize on this demand, we created a new sweats-focused section of our website, extended our returns policy and launched an online personal shopping program. We also shifted our brand storytelling towards work-from-home and at-home comfort. Of note, for the 6 weeks our stores were closed in the quarter, normalizing for the impact of non-comp promotions, online sales were up more than 200% year-over-year. To support online order fulfillment, we continue to operate our distribution center on strictly new protocols and social distancing measures in place. Further, now that we are operating with a single inventory for both e-commerce and retail, we've been able to leverage inventory initially intended for our retail stores to meet increasing online demand in key categories, which has helped with inventory management. During the quarter, we also repurposed our leather factory in accordance with appropriate health and safety guidelines to produce non-medical face masks, and we are donating a portion of the proceeds. As Mona will discuss in greater detail shortly, with our retail stores driving the vast majority of our sales, we experienced a meaningful year-over-year decline in top line performance in Q1. However, through cost reduction measures, the benefit of the Canadian government wage subsidy and improved DTC gross margins, we were able to partially mitigate the bottom line impact. As we have started to slowly see provinces reopen, we have begun the gradual reopening of our stores. In each case, when deciding when to reopen, we are focused on government and health authority guidelines, affiliates' readiness and team and employee readiness. As of today, we have 74 of our 160 stores open, all of which are operating under increased health and safety protocols. The health and safety of our Roots community continues to be our #1 priority. As the situation evolves, we will remain agile and ready to modify our processes to provide a safe store environment for everyone. While we have reopened many of our stores as an omnichannel retailer, we have the ability to support our customers however they want to shop with us whether that is online, in-store or a combination of both. We're also now offering curbside pickup at select locations for those interested in this new service. Navigating the past few months has undoubtedly been challenging for the team at Roots. And with the ongoing impact of COVID-19, we will likely continue to operate in a period of uncertainty for some time. However, we believe that we have a brand and product that will continue to resonate with consumers. We also have strong omnichannel capabilities demonstrated by the resilience of our e-commerce business in the first quarter. In addition, we have a highly engaged and loyal customer base. In our most recent survey of 20,000 customers, we garnered a Net Promoter Score of 77, which is the average of most other retail businesses and brands. I'm confident that the hard work of the team and the steps we are taking will enable us to emerge in this period ready to capitalize on all the opportunities in front of us. As we look beyond COVID-19, we are focused on strengthening and building on this fundamental to establish a solid platform on which to drive long-term growth. More specifically, we're focused on 4 key areas. The first is enhancing our understanding and focus on our entire customers. While we have a good picture of our customer today, we need to deepen our understanding of them using the rich data we have on hand from our CRM platform. This will allow us to reshape our customer engagement and focus more precisely on our target segments. The second is creating brand love. Customers today associate with the comfort and quality, with sweats acting as a core product category for the brand. We have an opportunity to refocus on brand building initiatives rather than promotional activity to engage our consumers, such as collaboration, special collections and brand-additive partnerships. The third is making irresistible products. While content and quality will always remain a primary focus at Roots, we have an opportunity to bring more innovation into our products while eliminating unproductive sales. We will be spending more time considering how our customers use our products in the design process and building on our existing leadership position in core category. For example, we see an opportunity to further differentiate our sweats with different silhouettes and fabrication. Similarly, we see an opportunity to use our Canadian leather factory to act with greater agility, operating closer to market to take advantage of near-term trends in that segment. On that note, as you all have seen this morning, we announced the appointment of Karuna Scheinfeld to the role of Chief Product Officer. Karuna comes to us with 20 years of product design and development experience across many global brands and multiple product categories. She's worked in leadership roles with numerous heritage brands and is a passionate and long-time fan of Roots. She's an excellent cultural fit, and we look forward to having her join the team in early July. The final piece we're focused on is enhancing our omnichannel experience. It is apparent that e-commerce will continue to play an increasingly important role in servicing our customers. While we have a robust omnichannel offering today, we need to further improve our customer experience to remain best-in-class amongst our peers. We've also seen opportunity to optimize our retail footprint, including leveraging short-term retail pop-ups to capitalize the demand shift and to build brand awareness. Underpinning all of these efforts is a commitment to operational excellence. In today's environment, it is imperative to make ROI-based investment decisions and to continue enhancing our operational efficiency to improve bottom line results and to increase free cash flow generation. On that note, I will pass it to Mona to discuss the financial results for the quarter in greater detail.

[Mona Kennedy, Chief Financial Officer]

Thanks, Meghan, and good morning, everyone. As Meghan noted, with our temporary store closure, we saw a meaningful decline in our top line results. Total sales were $29.9 million, down approximately 45% from $54.4 million in Q1 2019. Our decline in store sales was slightly offset by stronger e-commerce performance with us recording DTC sales of $24.6 million, down from $46.6 million in Q1 2019. Of note, while we have historically reported comparable sales growth as an additional metric to demonstrate the performance of our DTC business. Given our stores were closed for nearly half of the quarter, we do not believe this is a representative metric at this time. We will continue to evaluate the relevance of comparable sales growth and expect to resume reporting the metric when it provides valuable incremental insights into the business results. On the partners and other front, sales were $5.3 million, down from $7.7 million in Q1 2019 primarily as a result of COVID-19-related declines in our partner-operated Asia business. For the quarter, our DTC gross margin was 58%, up 330 basis points from 54.7% in Q1 2019. Prior to the significant effect of COVID-19, we were executing on a plan to reduce promotional activity and drive more full-price selling, the benefits of which we saw reflected in the quarter. In addition, with the move to a work-from-home model and increasing demand for comfort and sweats specifically, we also saw a shift in mix to our higher-margin core products. However, it remains to be seen how the abrupt store closures across North America will impact overall promotional trends in the industry in the coming quarters. We recorded $27.8 million in selling, general and administrative expenses for Q1 2020, down $10.4 million from $38.2 million last year. Some of our cost reductions are isolated to this quarter, while others we can carry forward to future quarters as ongoing partial offset to the negative top line impact of COVID-19. In the quarter, we realized personnel cost savings related to temporary layoffs associated with the store closures, temporarily reduced Board of Director compensation as well as senior leadership team and head office salaries, froze salary increases and fiscal 2019 bonus payments, and reduced forward inventory purchases, minimized discretionary expenditures and effectively halted capital spending. We also benefited from approximately $1.5 million in wage subsidies provided by the Canadian government. We continue to look for other areas of cost savings or offset beyond what we achieved in the quarter. In terms of rent, while we didn't pay it in April, we recorded it for accounting purposes. We have been in ongoing discussions with our landlords and greatly appreciate the support we have received. At this point, in some cases, we have secured rental abatements and deferrals, and in others, we continue to work towards a mutually agreeable outcome. As we're permitted to open more stores and we reengage our store and leather factory teams back into the business, we will continue to leverage government support programs. And leaving no stone unturned, we will continue to work with our partners, suppliers as well as service and logistics providers to identify further cost reductions. In terms of bottom line results, we recorded an adjusted EBITDA loss for the quarter of $7.5 million. This is compared to a loss of $6.2 million in Q1 2019, as our cost reduction measures in the quarter partially offset by year-over-year sales decline. Included in our Q1 2020 adjusted EBITDA is $2.1 million in losses related to 7 U.S. stores we closed during the quarter, which compares to losses of $1.1 million in Q1 2019. Now turning to inventory. Our inventory balance at the end of the quarter was $40.3 million, down $5 million compared to Q1 2019. This decline in inventory was due to us entering the period with a cleaner overall inventory position and, as I just noted, the closure of our 7 U.S. stores. We have also taken steps to manage our inventory in response to COVID-19. We have reduced inventory buys, prioritizing key collections and product categories and scaling back in others. We have shifted those out into later quarters. We have also packed and are now holding key perennial favorites that we will put back on the floor when they are seasonally relevant again. We continue to carefully manage inventory. While we may face challenges in efficiently moving through certain more seasonally specific products, we believe the steps we have taken help derisk our overall assortment. Managing our liquidity continues to be another important area of focus. At the end of Q1 2020, we have $47 million in our new borrowing capacity on our $75 million revolving credit facility and net cash of $5 million. And we're also in compliance with our covenants. Although the current retail landscape is uncertain, we're identifying opportunities wherever we can and are pulling on the various triggers available to us when appropriate. We believe we're well positioned to continue to successfully navigate the challenges of the current environment and to drive the recovery and beyond. To close, I wanted to echo Meghan's sentiments and commend the team. Their hard work and commitment to the brands have been and continue to be vital to us, successfully navigating this unprecedented retail environment. Operator, that concludes our prepared remarks. Please open the lines to questions.

[Operator]

[Operator Instructions] Stephen MacLeod with BMO Capital Markets.

[Stephen MacLeod, Analyst]

Meghan, congrats on -- congratulations on your appointment.

[Meghan Roach, CEO, President & Director]

Thank you.

[Stephen MacLeod, Analyst]

I just wanted to start off with a couple of things. In terms of the SG&A that was down year-over-year, can you talk a little bit about what proportion of it was you cited as isolated to the quarter versus what proportion of the savings can continue into future quarters?

[Mona Kennedy, Chief Financial Officer]

Sure. I can take that question. In terms of what portion of it is permanent and what's temporary into future quarters, it's going to be dependent on how the customers show up. We're going to do everything that we can to cut cost in future quarters to the extent that's needed and pull on the various strings that we have to manage our costs. And the one thing that we had in the quarter that's one-time is the wage subsidy from the government that will continue into Q2 but obviously not into Q3. Outside of that, our wage savings that we've been realizing in the stores, we're managing to the extent that -- where you've seen sales within the stores. We're managing our discretionary spending, and we'll continue to do so. And we're working with our landlords on rent savings, which we'll continue to do so throughout Q2 and potentially throughout the balance of the year as well.

[Stephen MacLeod, Analyst]

Okay. Okay. And then can you just talk a little bit about kind of what you've seen in your stores that have opened? What kind of trends you've seen in terms of store traffic and sales, if you can provide that.

[Meghan Roach, CEO, President & Director]

Maybe I'll...

[Mona Kennedy, Chief Financial Officer]

Yes, for sure. So we opened up our first stores mid-May. And it is still early days, and we're monitoring the field very closely. We're seeing mixed results. Depending on where the customer is and what province, what city, what location within the city, we're seeing mixed results. We're obviously operating with strict protocols across the network. We're limiting the number of people that are in the store. But like everything we've seen throughout this pandemic, it's affecting everybody differently and everything has been quite unpredictable. So we are continuing to do so as well. And it's quite different by region as well. And the patterns that we're seeing in the early days may not be indicative of what we see in the long term. So we continue to monitor it but mixed results.

[Meghan Roach, CEO, President & Director]

And then one of the...

[Mona Kennedy, Chief Financial Officer]

And what we have been seeing across the board is that the customers that are coming in are coming in with a purchase intent. So our conversion rates are up across the board, which is encouraging.

[Operator]

Brian Morrison with TD Securities.

[Brian Morrison, Research Analyst]

Meghan or Mona, could you please comment on the sustainability of your CapEx at the current levels? And then maybe quantify the amount of deferred rent and the amount that could have been paid subsequent to quarter end, please.

[Mona Kennedy, Chief Financial Officer]

For sure, I'll take that. So in terms of our capital spending, we have cut down our capital spending coming into the year. We had plans of lowering that substantially from prior years as we had materially completed all of the capital spending within our stores and also at the distribution center. So we entered the year with lower plans, and we have actually lowered that throughout the years, and we're only spending capital on what is absolutely necessary for the balance of this year. From a rent perspective, our rent negotiations are still underway and have not been concluded. Our landlords have been great partners throughout this entire process and continue to do so. We didn't pay April rent, as we had mentioned within our press release. But what we'll actually end up with our landlords is going to be concluded over the coming months. We have been getting some deferrals and some abatements so far, but none of our negotiations with the large landlords have been concluded yet.

[Brian Morrison, Research Analyst]

Okay. Maybe if I can just take that one step further. If I look at working capital, which you did a fantastic job in, in the first quarter in terms of managing it, maybe how can we think about that playing out? I'm not sure I really care necessarily by quarter, but I guess with the seasonality. Just how we should think about it Q2, I guess, and then throughout the remainder of the year.

[Mona Kennedy, Chief Financial Officer]

It's going to be a huge area of focus for us. We're going to continue to monitor it closely on a daily, monthly, weekly basis. In terms of how you can look at it into future quarters, I think you can assume that we're going to manage it in similar kind of effective ways as sales are continuing to come in as they are, and we're going to be nimble and agile and to manage that effectively.

[Brian Morrison, Research Analyst]

Okay. Maybe one question for Meghan. So with the increase to e-comm likely to remain a permanent shift, you made some comments on the Q4 call regarding -- or pardon me, reviewing the -- pardon me, you were reviewing the Canadian footprint. And I'm wondering if you can update us with respect to what you think the store count could look like by the end of 2020, or if you don't want to go into specifics, maybe just how you're viewing the Canadian footprint at this point in time.

[Meghan Roach, CEO, President & Director]

Sure, absolutely. So as we're slowly starting to emerge from COVID-19, we're closely tracking the performance of our stores and we're modeling up multiple different growth scenarios. And we do expect e-commerce to remain a higher portion of sales going forward. And so this is going to impact how we think about our retail footprint in Canada longer term. So prior to COVID-19, 90% of our Canadian stores were profitable. So we're taking that into consideration as we assess the store footprint. And just looking forward to figure out, once we model in new different scenarios, what we think is the right store footprint for us to have in Canada and how we balance it off as an omnichannel retailer with our e-commerce business.

[Operator]

Stephen MacLeod with BMO Capital Markets.

[Stephen MacLeod, Analyst]

I just wanted to follow up with one or another question regarding the appointment of your new Chief Product Officer. Do you -- are you able to give any color at this point as to what potential changes you might be making or shifts you might be making in terms of the collection?

[Meghan Roach, CEO, President & Director]

It's a bit -- I think it's a bit early for us to get into exactly that given that she's not started with us quite yet. Obviously, we've had a lot of conversations with her in advance of her appointment, and we are all very aligned in terms of the fact that sweats will continue to be a core portion of our collection. But I'd like to give her a chance to settle herself into the business and get herself in more in growth and the product and the team before we come to the market and give an exact direction in terms of the products.

[Operator]

Janine Stichter with Jefferies.

[Janine M. Stichter, Equity Analyst]

Talk a little about e-commerce. You've had really good growth there as the stores were closed. Wondering if you could comment on what you've seen in May and to June just when some of the stores reopened. It sounds like they're still seeing solid growth, but just curious if you could comment on the sustainability of that trend.

[Meghan Roach, CEO, President & Director]

Absolutely. So as we previously noted -- I know the call was a bit fuzzy before, so just not everyone heard it. In the 6 weeks after the stores closed, normalizing for the non-comp promotions, e-commerce sales were up 200% year-over-year. And we're continuing to see a strong trend in e-commerce sales in May and June, but we're monitoring that, how that trend develops based on the store reopening. So I would say as an omnichannel retailer, we continue to be encouraged by the fact that our customers are shopping in us from whichever channel they feel most comfortable in, whether that's in-store or online. But just given the fact that we still have quite a few stores to reopen, we do anticipate seeing some shift back to the retail footprint once we have more of our store base open in the next coming weeks.

[Janine M. Stichter, Equity Analyst]

Great. That's helpful. And then just on the promotional environment, it sounds like the promotions were very well controlled in the first quarter. I know it's really early to say, but anything you can say just so far as what you're seeing with getting through some of the seasonal inventory and then the broader promotional environment, how that might impact gross margin.

[Mona Kennedy, Chief Financial Officer]

Sure. Yes, I can take that question. Being able to kind of manage this upcoming promotional environment, we just have to be flexible and we need to monitor the industry and the market. We have the opportunity to only have 30% of our product be seasonal product, and the rest of it is perennial favorites and enduring icons. So the seasonal product, we're monitoring closely. The stores have opened up. We're moving through that inventory. But obviously, we've lost a couple of months of sales, and it might take some time to get through it. We're going to stay flexible. And depending on what happens within the industry and how the other retailers react, we're going to change our strategy.

[Operator]

Sabahat Khan with RBC Capital Markets.

[Sabahat Khan, Analyst]

Just a question around the commentary you provided earlier on the rent expense. It seems like you likely expense the kind of a total rent for the quarter. Correct me if I'm wrong. And then as you get some of these rent deferments or, in some cases, kind of just suspension of rent, how should we see that flowing through the financials? Sort of would it be a boost in some future quarters and -- or just understanding how the reversal of some of those -- the expense that you took now might work in future quarters.

[Mona Kennedy, Chief Financial Officer]

For sure. I mean obviously, the reversals, we can do them as soon as we have contracts and negotiations finalized with the landlords. It's difficult for me to forecast when those negotiations will be completed, but you will definitely see some benefits in Q2 and potentially in Q3 and future quarters. At this point, I can't quite quantify it because as I said, the majority of the conversations with the larger landlords have not been finalized.

[Sabahat Khan, Analyst]

That's helpful. I'm just wondering more on the seasonality. So that's helpful. And then on the comment around e-commerce, you mentioned that up 200% year-over-year was on a non-comp promotional basis. Is that excluding kind of the upside from additional promotional activity during that quarter? Or how should we think about that comment?

[Meghan Roach, CEO, President & Director]

Yes. So specifically in the quarter U.S. [ while we were ] in Q1 2019, we had a moving sale. We referred to it on other calls as the warehouse sale. So this is a sale that was held online and in-stores last year when we moved to our new distribution center. So it's a pretty substantial sale that we had in the quarter, including things like additional 50% off a lot of products. And so when we looked at our promotions during the quarter, what we -- actually, we're not as promotional as we were in previous years predominantly because of that one specific event. On the promotions that we did have on, we were relatively comparable with the other promotions that we had on during the quarter. So that's really the specific non-comp that we called out given the magnitude of that last year.

[Sabahat Khan, Analyst]

Okay. That's helpful. And then in terms of your e-commerce fulfillment, I understand some of it used to be done from stores as needed. Kind of how are you doing that now in terms -- obviously, a lot -- obviously, during the closure, there's like the warehouse, but were you able to find that, that was more efficient? Like how did that compare to in-store fulfillment? And how are you thinking about that whole fulfillment aspect going forward?

[Meghan Roach, CEO, President & Director]

Yes. We're clearly happy with the performance of the way our DC function. As you mentioned, when we were -- had our stores closed, all the fulfillment was through our DC. So obviously, the impact of that is that you see a lower number of shipments per order as you're seeing everything come out of one central location as opposed to being split across multiple different locations. What the benefit is of now having our stores open is the fact that with our stores open, we have access to inventory that previously we wouldn't have access toward our DC. There was some inventory that we shipped out to the stores that we did not have in the DC, and therefore, we could not access. So the benefit of now having the stores open is that our customers are able to access some of the products that previously sold through online from our in-store network. And so that has benefited us in different ways.

[Sabahat Khan, Analyst]

Okay. And then the one last one from me just on the mix. I think you indicated earlier that a lot of the -- or some of the sales during the quarter were shifted to some higher-margin product. Obviously, some of the product offering that you have fits well within the current sort of environment with work-from-home and stuff. How are you thinking about the mix that you're seeing sort of now that things are starting to reopen? And what's your expectations -- or in terms of the kind of product that you're selling in comparable period last year, do you still see the mix shift going towards some higher-margin stuff?

[Meghan Roach, CEO, President & Director]

So I'll take that as a starting point and then Mona can add on any further comments that she has. The benefit of being Roots, let's say, today is the fact that we really have a strong position in the comfort segment. And as people have shifted the way they work and shifted work to working from home and shifted towards doing more leisure activities in a casual setting, we've definitely seen a benefit to our sweat category and other products along those lines that have benefited from the shift towards comfort. So as we go forward, we do anticipate a continued trend towards that. And as we shift into the summer months, we're seeing shifts away from things like just sweatpants into shorts, into sweat dresses, which obviously are more suited to the seasonal business. So that's how we think of the shift continuing on a go-forward basis, and we do anticipate the benefit from that. I think -- Mona, do you want to add anything around the different nature of products you mentioned previously?

[Mona Kennedy, Chief Financial Officer]

I think the only thing that I would add to that -- I think your question was also specifically around as the stores have opened, what are we seeing customers buy in-store. The seasonal inventory that we had in the stores while they were shut down, the customers haven't seen. So as they're coming in, we're getting through that inventory as well. So I think that's encouraging.

[Operator]

Patricia Baker with Scotiabank.

[Patricia A. Baker, Analyst]

Meghan, I couldn't -- didn't quite catch everything you mentioned in your opening remarks with respect to the partners business. So can you just walk us through what the partners business looked like, let's say, from February through to June?

[Meghan Roach, CEO, President & Director]

Absolutely. Yes. So when we look at our partners business, they were obviously hit in advance. So the -- our partners business breaks into multiple different segments, as a starting point. We obviously have operations in Asia. We have wholesale. We have B2B. We have licensing. We specifically referenced our operations within Asia. They were obviously hit earlier than us as COVID-19 affected that region in more of the January, February time period and through -- up to March. So what we saw was we got closures in stores in China, sorry. And then we also saw -- we didn't see store closures in Taiwan, but we did see significant reductions in traffic. Within the quarter, we saw all of our stores in China and Hong Kong reopened. And again, the Taiwanese stores were always open during that period, but we did not see traffic levels return to pre-pandemic levels. So we did see sales declines in those specific regions. We're obviously seeing different trends as we come out of the quarter, but again, it's relatively early for us to disclose the overall trending in those 2 markets.

[Patricia A. Baker, Analyst]

Okay. That's helpful. And then just 2 small points here. You did say that you didn't pay the April rent. So does that imply that you paid your May rent?

[Mona Kennedy, Chief Financial Officer]

In terms of May rent, we made it in some place -- we repaid it in some places and we haven't paid it in other places where we have negotiations concluded.

[Patricia A. Baker, Analyst]

Okay. And then the switch in the mix to the sweats, just curious whether you saw any differences in the male or female category or it was pretty even across the board.

[Meghan Roach, CEO, President & Director]

We saw a little bit of a pickup in our men's category. I think there's more men that are working from home. The one thing that they're seeking is comfort below the screen with different pants. And so we did see a big pickup on our sweat pants in the quarter. And as I mentioned, that changed a little bit as we went into the summertime periods, where we shifted to more sweat shorts and those types of things. But pretty much, the split amongst women's and men's is generally consistent year-over-year, but we did see more of a pickup in, as I mentioned, the sweat items, especially when you're thinking about what you can wear for conference calls.

[Operator]

[Operator Instructions] Matthew Lee with Canaccord.

[Matthew James Lee, Associate Analyst of Telecom and Media]

I may have just missed it, but did you highlight the drag from the U.S. segment on EBITDA versus Q1 '19?

[Mona Kennedy, Chief Financial Officer]

Yes. So the losses that were in Q1 of this year related to the stores were $2.1 million, then that compares to $1.1 million last year.

[Matthew James Lee, Associate Analyst of Telecom and Media]

Right. But then I guess going forward, beyond Q1, now that the stores have been closed, that $1.1 million drag per quarter or adjusted for seasonality should kind of come off and be a benefit for the next 3 quarters.

[Mona Kennedy, Chief Financial Officer]

Yes. So we won't have any losses related to the -- to those stores in future quarters, and the total losses for the U.S. stores are about $6 million last year. So you would expect that should go away.

[Operator]

[Operator Instructions] Matt Bank with CIBC.

[Matt Bank, Associate]

Are you able to give a sense of how revenues are tracking since the end of Q1? And if not, can you talk about how sales trended through the month of April?

[Mona Kennedy, Chief Financial Officer]

Definitely. So in terms of the month of April, obviously, the stores were closed. And as Meghan mentioned, we did see a pickup in our e-commerce business of about 200% once you remove the non-comp promo of the warehouse sale. So that's for April. In terms of -- in May and June, it's early days. We've opened our first stores in mid-May, and we're monitoring that and, as I mentioned previously, with mixed results depending on where the customer is at and how they're shopping and where they're showing up. So it's been different in terms of some of the metrics that we're seeing, improvements on our conversion. Obviously, the customers that are showing up in stores are converting customers and they're coming with high intent to buy. So that's encouraging for us.

[Operator]

There are no further questions at this time. I would now like to turn the call back over to the presenters for final remarks.

[Meghan Roach, CEO, President & Director]

Thank you, operator. That concludes today's call. Thank you again for joining us, and we look forward to updating you on our progress when we report our Q2 fiscal 2020 results. Have a great day, and stay safe.

[Operator]

This concludes the Roots Fiscal 2020 Q1 Conference Call. We thank you all for your participation. You may now disconnect.