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Good day, and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the first quarter 2026 Steven Madden, Ltd. earnings conference call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. After the speaker's presentation, there will be a question-and-answer session. To ask a question during the session, you will need to press star one one on your telephone, and you will then hear an automated message advising that your hand is raised. To withdraw your question, please press star one one again. Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. We'd now like to hand the conference over to your first speaker today, Danielle McCoy, VP of Corporate Development and Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Thanks, Jill, and good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining our first quarter 2026 earnings call and webcast. Before we begin, I'd like to remind you that our remarks that follow, including answers to your questions, contain statements that we believe to be forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act. These forward-looking statements are subject to risks that could cause actual results to materially differ from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. These risks include, among others, matters that we have described in our press release issued earlier today and filings we make with the SEC. We disclaim any obligation to update these forward-looking statements, which may not be updated until our next quarterly earnings call, if at all. The financial results discussed on today's call are on an adjusted basis, unless otherwise noted.

A reconciliation to the most directly comparable GAAP financial measure and other associated disclosures are contained in our earnings release. Joining me on the call today is Ed Rosenfeld, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, and Zine Mazouzi, Chief Financial Officer and Executive Vice President of Operations. With that, I'll turn the call over to Ed. Ed?

All right. Well, thanks, Danielle, good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us to review Steven Madden's first quarter 2026 results. We got off to a solid start to the year in Q1 with healthy underlying demand across our brands, driven by our team's disciplined execution of our strategy for long-term growth, the foundation of which is deepening connections with consumers through compelling product assortments and effective marketing. Our flagship brand, Steve Madden, continued to gain momentum as the on-trend assortments created by Steve and his design team resonated with consumers. We saw strength across classifications, including casuals, dress shoes, and boots, we capitalized on a variety of trends in style and materials, including split toes, Velcro, hidden wedges, mesh, and ballet-inspired looks.

Our marketing team supported these assortments with rich brand and product storytelling, including our Hello Spring campaign featuring It girl Delilah Belle, and a full-funnel approach that drove strong new customer acquisition and cultural relevance. The combination of trend-right product and targeted marketing investments drove measurable brand heat. Online searches for Steve Madden increased 27% in the quarter, and global DTC comp sales rose 6% or 10% excluding our stores in the Middle East. For the year, we continue to expect mid to high single-digit revenue growth in the Steve Madden brand. Kurt Geiger London also delivered another strong quarter. In handbags, in addition to continued strength in the Kensington collection, new totes and shoulder bags drove strong demand. In shoes, sandals were a standout, including exceptional performance in Meena Eagle slides.

We also made progress on our key growth initiatives, including new store openings in the United States and international expansion into new markets. We now have leases secured for four new full-price stores and one premium outlet in the U.S. in 2026, and we signed a new franchise and distribution agreement with Reliance Brands to bring Kurt Geiger to India beginning in Q4. For the quarter, revenue for the Kurt Geiger brand increased 23% on a pro forma basis. Based on the momentum we are seeing, we have increased our forecast and now expect mid-teens pro forma revenue growth in the Kurt Geiger brand for the year. In Dolce Vita, we delivered a compelling spring assortment with particular strength in jelly, raffia, and woven styles across footwear and handbags that drove robust sell-through with key wholesale customers, including Nordstrom, Dillard's, and Macy's.

We also continued to gain traction with our key growth initiatives of expanding the handbag category and growing in international markets. For 2026, we continue to expect high single-digit revenue growth in Dolce Vita. Despite all this, in the first quarter, we saw, as expected, a decline in organic revenue driven by softness in private label and lower Steve Madden handbag revenue in the U.S. wholesale channel. That, combined with SG&A pressure from the normalization of incentive compensation and increased warehouse expenses, resulted in an earnings decline for the quarter. Looking ahead, based on the strong underlying demand trends across our brand portfolio, we expect to return to earnings growth in the second quarter and deliver strong top and bottom line growth for the full year.

Looking out further, we are confident that our powerful brands, proven business model, and talented team position us to deliver sustainable growth for years to come. Now I'll turn it over to Zine to review our first quarter 2026 financial results in more detail and provide our updated outlook for 2026.

Thanks, Ed, Good morning, everyone. In the first quarter, consolidated revenue was $653.1 million, an 18% increase compared to the first quarter of 2025.

Excluding Kurt Geiger, which we acquired in the second quarter of 2025, consolidated revenue decreased 4.8%. Wholesale revenue was $443.6 million, up 1% compared to the first quarter of 2025, and excluding Kurt Geiger, our wholesale revenue decreased 8.2%. Wholesale footwear revenue was $278.9 million, a 5.8% decrease, or down 12% excluding Kurt Geiger, primarily driven by a steep decline in the private label business. Wholesale accessories and apparel revenue was $164.8 million, up 15.1% compared to the first quarter in the prior year, or down 0.5% excluding Kurt Geiger, as declines in Steve Madden handbags and private label were mostly offset by increases in other branded accessories and apparel.

Our direct-to-consumer segment revenue was $206 million, an 83.8% increase compared to the first quarter of 2025. Excluding Kurt Geiger, our DTC revenue increased 8%, with growth in both brick-and-mortar and e-commerce channels. Steve Madden brand U.S. DTC comp sales increased 17%, driven by an exceptional performance in full-price channels. Outlet comps remained modestly negative but showed significant sequential improvement as we began to anniversary declines in our border stores. International comp sales decreased 5%, but increased 1% excluding our stores in the Middle East. We ended the quarter with 387 company-operated brick-and-mortar stores, including 95 outlets as well as eight e-commerce websites and 162 company-operated concessions in international markets.

Our licensing royalty income was $3.4 million in the quarter compared to $2.2 million in the first quarter of 2025. Consolidated gross margin was 46.3% in the quarter, a 540 basis point improvement compared to the prior year. Wholesale gross margin was 39.2% compared to 35.7% in the first quarter of 2025 due to higher average selling prices as well as mix benefits from the addition of the Kurt Geiger business and a lower penetration of private label. Direct-to-consumer gross margin was 60.8% compared to 60.1% in the comparable period in 2025 as a result of the addition of the Kurt Geiger business and a modest increase in the organic business.

Operating expenses were $256 million, or 39.2% of revenue in the quarter compared to $170.5 million, or 30.8% of revenue in the first quarter of 2025, primarily driven by the addition of Kurt Geiger as well as higher incentive compensation and warehouse expenses. Operating income for the quarter was $46.3 million or 7.1% of revenue compared to $56.1 million or 10.1% of revenue in the prior year. The effective tax rate for the quarter was 25.3% compared to 24% in the first quarter of 2025. Net income attributable to Steven Madden, Ltd for the quarter was $32.1 million or $0.45 per diluted share compared to $42.4 million or $0.60 per diluted share in the prior year. Turning to the balance sheet, our financial foundation remains strong. As of March 31, 2026, we had $286.5 million of debt and $77.2 million in cash and cash equivalents for a net debt of $209.3 million. Inventory was $379.4 million compared to $238.6 million in the prior year. Excluding Kurt Geiger, inventory decreased 2.5%. Our CapEx in the quarter was $5.9 million.

We did not repurchase any shares in the open market, and during the first quarter, we spent $7.4 million on shares acquired through the net settlement of employee stock awards. The company's board of directors approved a quarterly cash dividend of $0.21 per share. The dividend will be payable on June 19, 2026 to stockholders of record as of the close of business on June 8, 2026. Turning to our fiscal 2026 guidance, we are raising our revenue outlook and now expect revenue to increase 10%-12% up from our prior guidance of 9%-11%. We are also introducing EPS guidance for the year and expect earnings per share to be in the range of $2.00-$2.10. Now I would like to turn the call over to the operator for questions. Operator?

Thank you. At this time, we will conduct the question and answer session. As a reminder to ask a question you will need to press star one one on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. To withdraw your question please press star one one again. Please stay standby as we compile the Q&A roster. First question comes from the line of Paul Lejuez with Citi. Please go ahead.

Hey, thanks guys. Curious if you can talk about what's driving the higher revenue guidance for the year. I think you said it was Kurt Geiger, but any detail you can give in the core versus Kurt Geiger in terms of what has changed in your full year outlook. Then can you talk about the conversations you're having with private label customers and if there's been any change in how they're thinking as the tariff picture evolves? Also just curious what you build in for tariffs within your guidance. Thanks.

Sure. Okay. All right. The first question was about the higher revenue guidance, yes, we did raise Kurt Geiger based on the early momentum that we're seeing there. Kurt Geiger brand exceeded our expectations in Q1. We've also modestly raised our expectations for Steve Madden and Dolce Vita based on the strong performance that we're seeing there in spring and the momentum in those brands. A positive picture because we were able to increase our forecast for each of our three largest brands. In terms of the private label conversations, I would say, you know, we're having a lot of conversations. I think they're productive. The tariff picture remains uncertain.

There's no major change to that situation right now, but it's, you know, something we're working hard on. We have taken our forecast up very modestly for the year based on some orders that we got for the tail end of the year, but obviously still looking at a pretty steep decline in 2026 and really targeting 2027 for recovery there. In terms of what we've built into the guidance, we have assumed the 10% Section 122 tariffs remain in effect through about the end of July when those expire. We've built in a 15% tariff thereafter.

Got it. Thank you. Good luck.

Thanks.

Thank you. One moment for our next question. The next question comes from Anna Andreeva with Piper Sandler. Go ahead. Your line is open.

Great. Thank you so much for taking our question and congrats. Really nice to see the momentum. Curious on also what you're hearing from your partners specifically to the off-price channel. Is that channel now back to growth? How do you think about the contribution there? It sounds like department store business is turning very quickly with the reorders. Are you guys able to fulfill that demand? Just any color on that would be great. Secondly, you mentioned the business back to earnings growth starting the second quarter. Just anything you can share how we should think about 2Q. Is the DTC business, which was super strong in 1Q, is that further accelerating from here? Thanks so much.

Sure. Okay. In terms of the off-price channel, yeah, those businesses, we're seeing some nice improvement there. Those conversations have been very productive recently. We are seeing growth in that channel in 2026 versus 2025. Still all, not all the way back to 2024 levels. As opposed to, your second question was about department stores. There we are seeing, you know, strong growth. To your point, we're getting reorders. We are able to chase into goods for them. We do expect that first-tier business to exceed what we achieved in 2024. What was the third one?

Do you expect DTC to accelerate through too?

EPS.

We're not gonna guide quarterly. I will say that we continue to see strong trends in that DTC business. Now, the overall DTC growth, of course, won't be as strong because we'll be anniversarying Kurt Geiger starting in early May. The core business or the organic business should see similar trends to what we saw in Q1.

No, that's great. Thank you so much, guys. Can I just sneak in another one? Just as you think about the uses of cash, with the tariff refund, would paying down debt be your first priority or just any color you can give on that?

Yeah. The first priority would be to accelerate the pay down of the debt. In the back half of the year, we'll start assessing potential repurchases.

All right. Thank you so much. Best of luck.

One moment for our next call. The next question comes from the line of Marni Shapiro with The Retail Tracker. Go ahead. Your line is open.

Hey, guys. Congratulations. The assortments have looked absolutely fantastic. I'm curious if you could just talk a little bit more about the sell-throughs at the department stores. Are you seeing that across footwear and the apparel? The apparel has looked really fantastic as far as I have seen. Could you talk a little bit about, I guess, how big that business can be and what the margin implications are? Are the margins on the apparel equal or better to what you're seeing in footwear and how that could play out over time?

We've been pleased with what we've seen from a sell-through perspective. I would say, in spring, footwear has been stronger because the Steven Madden brand, in particular, has been, you know, quite hot in footwear. Apparel, we had a little bit of a soft start to the year. I don't think we transitioned as well as we could. Once we got into the season, we've been very pleased with what we've seen. The team's done a great job with, you know, obviously dresses has been our biggest category. We've got some very strong dresses, but we've also got some novelty denim that's been selling, some blazers.

You know, we continue to broaden out the strength in that business and very optimistic about what that can be longer term. In terms of how big that business is, it's over a couple $100 million now for us in apparel. As of now, it is lower margin than the shoe and bag business. You know, we've been in investment mode, and we're still building. Over time, we think that should have comparable margins.

Great. Then if I could just ask one more follow-up on the Steve Madden brand. You've I mean, it looks so good in the stores. It looks so good everywhere, and your placement has been excellent. You've had a couple of, you know, semi-viral or viral items. Could you just talk about your investments behind social media and marketing and what that would look like for the rest of the year?

No, first of all, I really appreciate what you say about the product. We're really proud of how the team has executed there. I think it all starts with product, and that's the biggest driver here. We also feel that we've really raised our game on the marketing front. You know, we continue to increase the investment there. As you know, years ago, we were sub Few years ago, we were sub 2% of revenue devoted to marketing, and now this year will be, you know, 5.3%, 5.4%, something like that. Pretty significant increase in investment.

And we've also, I think, done a better job of, you know, balancing that investment because when we first increased it was really very heavily focused at the bottom of the funnel on performance channels, and we now have much more balanced spend throughout the funnel. We're much more balanced by channel, and we're much more consistent about the way we tell the Steve Madden story across channels or on an omni-channel basis. You know, as you, as you mentioned, obviously, you know, given our core customer and the state of the world today, digital and social are paramount, and that's where we, you know, are focusing a lot of our spend.

Great. Thank you. I'm sorry, can I sneak in one more? Dolce Vita, is the sell-through as strong on the Dolce Vita brand at wholesale as it is on the Steve Madden brand?

Yeah. Dolce Vita is having a very strong spring. In fact, you know, their biggest customer, they're even outpacing Steve Madden in terms of sell-through.

Fantastic. Thanks, guys.

One moment for our next question. The next question comes from the line of Dana Telsey with Telsey Advisory Group. Go ahead, your line is open.

Hi, good morning, everyone, and nice to see the progress. With rising energy prices, is there any impact on costs and how you're planning or the contracts all taken care of for it? How do you think of that impact on rising energy prices? Then the cadence of the quarter, was there any difference in demand on the exit of the quarter? We've now seen just lastly on product trends, boots become like a 52-week a year trend. Any updates on product trends or the sneakers, fashion, sandals, boots, to discuss? Thank you.

Sure. Yeah. I'll take the latter two questions and then turn it back to Zine to talk about what we're seeing on freight. In terms of the cadence of the quarter, it bounced around a little bit based on weather and Easter shift and promotion time, et cetera. Basically, I would say that it was pretty strong trends throughout the quarter, and there's nothing super meaningful to call out there. In terms of the product trends, you know, I think the big thing is, you know, we've seen a decrease in penetration in sandals and sneakers, and we've seen super strong performance in casuals and really strong increases in dress shoes as well, and also in boots and booties.

As you correctly pointed out, those continue to be important even in spring. You know, we did a really nice job, for instance, on our DTC, in our DTC with boots for festival season. Zine, you wanna talk about freight?

Sure. On the freight side, obviously the war impact is visible, and we started seeing what they call EBS. These are emergency bunker surcharges that are being imposed by the maritime companies. In our guide, we built in about 30 basis points of pressure from ocean as well as the increase we're seeing on air freight as well. We started seeing air freight as probably as early as April. As far as the ocean side, the emergency bunker surcharges, those started in May, on May 1st, and there's another round potentially that would be coming in July as well. All in all, it's about a 30 basis point impact. From a cost perspective, as far as raw materials, we're not seeing that yet.

If this continues for an extended period of time, we expect that will have an impact in the latter part of the year.

Thank you.

One moment for our next question. The next question comes from the line of Sam Poser with Williams Trading. Go ahead, your line is open.

Thank you for taking my questions. A couple things. When we think about the gross margin more holistically for the balance of the year, how much You discussed the You backed out $55 million of the refunds out of the gross margin. How much of the refunds effective for the goods sold in Q1 were in it? Going forward, I guess the question is, you're not planning to see What kind of increase in gross margin are we planning to see for the full year, taking into account the lower tariffs than what was true, lower than the IEEPA tariffs, also the increase plus that 30 Bips from freight? I mean, how should we think about the gross margin?

I have another question.

Yeah, sure. In the first quarter, obviously, there was a relatively modest negative impact from tariffs because of the reversal of IEEPA and then the institution of the Section 122. As we go forward, obviously, we'll see on a gross basis a bigger impact than we saw in Q1. If you're thinking about gross margin versus the prior year, you know, we still should be seeing nice increases versus the prior year each quarter, although it will narrow a little bit in terms of the delta. You know, part of that is that we anniversary Kurt Geiger in Q2, which has been, you know, which has been a mixed benefit to gross margin.

Even in the organic business, we do expect to see a year-over-year gross margin improvement through the balance of the year.

Thank you. Could you I know it's gonna come out in the queue, but can you give us the adjusted gross margin and SG&A for footwear wholesale, footwear, handbag wholesale, and direct-to-consumer, please?

What do you mean adjusted?

Well, you gave total-

You want the wholesale footwear and gross margin?

Yeah.

Okay, sure.

I mean-

So-

We can get to.

Yeah.

We can build it out to the total. Yeah.

Yeah. Wholesale footwear gross margin was 38.6%. Wholesale accessories was 40%. DTC, I think you have it, but it was 60.8%.

What about SG&A? I mean, give us the adjusted operating income for each one of those sections, however you wanna do it.

No, I mean, I build my models this way.

Okay.

It's important how you break it up, and I'm sorry I'm driving you crazy.

EBIT dollars for wholesale footwear, $52.7. accessories and apparel, $28.8. DTC, loss of $11.4.

The loss in DTC was primarily due because it's a small quarter. You have the fixed cost for Kurt Geiger, with those fixed costs staying in. I assume that is correct.

That's right. We always I mean, even the organic business, we're always loss-making in Q1 in DTC. It's the same goes for Kurt Geiger.

You originally said that Kurt Geiger would do about $600 million. That's up Given the first quarter, it's just up a bit from there. Is that how we should think about it?

Yeah, low $600s.

All right. Thanks very much. Appreciate it.

One moment for our next question. The next question comes from the line of Janine Stichter with BTIG. Go ahead, your line is open.

Hi, good morning. On Kurt Geiger, with the mid-teens growth of the brand, just wanted to clarify, does that include any new distribution? If not, how are you thinking about that? Steve Madden handbags, can you elaborate a little bit more what's going on there? Would you still expect it to turn positive in the second quarter? Thank you.

Yeah. In terms of the Kurt Geiger brand mid-teens growth, we are adding some wholesale distribution in the back half. I think that the most important being that we are planning to we have reached agreement with Macy's to enter Macy's starting in October. We'll be in a beautiful concession in Herald Square as well as 15 other doors with handbag shops and also shoes. We're excited about that. You know, there's also very strong momentum in the DTC business. Digital, new stores continue to perform well. As I mentioned, we're opening some additional stores. Excuse me. The U.S. stores continue to perform very well, and we're opening some additional U.S. stores. A lot of good things happening there.

What was the second one?

Steve Madden.

Yeah, Steve Madden Handbags. Yes. We, as we have indicated, we expect to return to growth, starting in the current quarter. We're pleased to have that headwind behind us.

Great. Maybe just one more on the core Steven Madden business. I think you said, organic gross margins for DTC were up slightly. Maybe just talk about what you're seeing from a promotional standpoint there. It seems like you've been able to pull back a little bit on the promotional lever.

Yeah, we have. We've been pleased. Because of the strength of the product and the demand, you know, we have been able to reduce overall promotion days. That's, you know, we really haven't seen any significant impact to demand, so that's been very positive.

Great. Thanks so much.

One moment for our next question. Last question comes from the line of Aubrey Tianello with BNP Paribas. Go ahead, your line is open.

Hey, good morning. Thanks for taking the questions. Wanted to ask on SG&A and how we should be thinking about the cadence of SG&A growth and into the next quarter and then into the back half of the year when you lap the Kurt Geiger acquisition?

Yeah. Including Kurt Geiger in Q1, SG&A was up 50.2%. We expect that to be probably around, I would say, 25% increase in Q2, and then it should drop to low teens in Q3 and high singles in Q4.

Perfect. Thank you. Maybe just to follow up on the Middle East and how the conflict impacts the business from a direct standpoint, in terms of revenues. You mentioned the impact to store comp in the prepared remarks. Be curious just what's included in the guidance for 2026 from a top-line perspective, for the Middle East?

Yeah, it's about it. We had north of $50 million business there, about 63 stores. I don't have the overall top-line impact that we've built in there. Look, you know, the business in the GCC, for instance, is still trending down close to 40% this month. We built in about a $4 million profit hit, I know, in that region. Yeah, Zine's telling me it's about $9 million-$10 million that we've taken out for the impact there.

For revenue.

For revenue. Excuse me.

Okay. Got it. Thank you. Just last one, wanted to ask about Kurt Geiger from a margin perspective. You mentioned in the past having a runway to getting to double-digit EBIT margins over time. Anything you can share on how EBIT margin's progressing for Kurt Geiger this year, especially in light of the higher revenue guide?

We're expecting about 100 basis points of improvement in 2026 versus 2025. It still doesn't get us back to pre-tariff levels, we need to continue to drive that up in the coming years. And we still continue to believe there's no reason this business shouldn't be in the double digits. And certainly the branded portion, if we exclude the concessions, you know, we think has potential to be, you know, certainly in the teens, if not the mid-teens.

Perfect. Thank you very much.

I am showing no further questions, and I would like to turn it back to Ed Rosenfeld for closing remarks.

Great. Well, thanks so much for joining us today. We hope you have a great day. We look forward to speaking with you on the next call.

Thank you for your participation in today's conference. This does conclude the program. You may now disconnect.