Reynolds Consumer Products Inc. (REYN) September 2026 Conference Transcript

We're going to get started. So next up this afternoon, we are pleased to welcome Reynolds Consumer Products. We're joined by the company's president and CEO, Scott Huckins, and the company's CFO, Nathan Lowe. So, guys, thanks so much for being here again this year. Get right into it. So, Scott, when you first stepped into the CEO role, you outlined a number of initiatives aimed at building a stronger and more resilient Reynolds, including innovation, RGM, productivity, and talent. As we sit here today, what have you learned, what has exceeded your expectations, and where are you seeing the biggest opportunities still ahead?

First of all, good to see you. Thanks for having us. So I think the way we recap it is three pillars of priorities we've been working against since early 25. People and talent, one, volume growth-related initiatives and work, two, and then supply chain productivity across the enterprise, three. Then I'll unpack a little bit of each of them. So on people and talent, we've been making investments across the executive team. You see some new leaders, including our head of sales, as an example. But we've also been making investments on the front end of the business below that level, whether it's sales, marketing, RGM, you've got that in your question. Second large area of talent emphasis has been in operations and supply chain, which feeds sort of the next two pillars. So in volume growth, under Carlin Hooker's direction, our new head of sales, we're really complementing two topics, which is we go through our entire book of business, look at our categories, look at our customers. and just imagine very targeted share gap selling efforts with a complement of a much more robust RGM capability. That's the first piece. Second piece on innovation would be really a philosophical approach of fewer, bigger, better, meaning we're adamant about making sure we're aligning our people in financial resources against what we think are the best ideas, and I think we've had some demonstration of progress there. Then we go to the third pillar, probably the most robust or most elements across supply chain productivity. The first element is we've been implementing and installing lean principles across the entire set of our manufacturing plants. Number two, we've invested in technology in the plants, meaning specifically having measurement tools at the line level in our plants, which is where action really gets taken. And that's sort of the harbinger of productivity. Across supply chain, we have a 17-plant network distribution centers constantly looking for efficiencies on inbound materials and then outbound shipments to customers or customers who pick up. So that's sort of the portfolio of work that you asked about. And I'd say that's what the why is. What we're after is driving a more fundamentally profitable business that, at least in part, that unlocks further investment back into the business for growth. In terms of expectations and where we are, I'd say we're about where I thought we would be. These things take time. But we certainly have demonstrated this year progress against each of the initiatives flowing through the financial statements. But I think there's still a lot left to do. I think we've got more opportunity to have more persistent volume growth opportunities ahead of us from the work we talked about. And I think there's still a long runway of both productivity and then cost-out work we can do from an automation capital investment standpoint. So that's a fairly long answer to your short question.

So, Nathan, how would you say those initiatives are showing up in the financial performance of the company currently? Because despite an inflationary cost environment, continued pressure on the consumer, you guys have sustained productivity, expanded margins, and continued to grow earnings. So what do you think is different about the business that's allowing you to deliver those results? Why are these improvements sustainable? And, again, how are we seeing all this in the financial performance?

I think there's a couple of questions. I'm going to go one by one.

I matched his long answer with a long question.

That's fair. So I think as you try to trace those initiatives into the P&L, probably the most prominent one would be the productivity initiatives by some measure. Within that, where we've made the most progress would be on manufacturing and there's a number of things within that too, but also supply chain, logistics, distribution, other efficiencies through that entire network. And our sourcing team continues to deliver value both in the P&L and from a cash flow perspective. So how does that actually show up in the result? 9% increase in gross profit in the 2026 year-to-date result despite volumes being slightly down. So when you put that together, It just means the profitability of the business is considerably improved. It shows up as 130 basis points of margin expansion, but there's a lot of dilutive impact to that math, given the quantum of pricing that's come through, which the aim, of course, is just to offset the commodity pressure there. You say what's different. I think probably what's different is in this inflationary environment stacking three quarters of consecutive earnings growth. A lot of it has to do, sure, the productivity helps, but the RGM capabilities, really leveraging those and being very agile and precise in how we're pricing, also trade efficacy and any other number of price pack architecture adjustments. I think that's really been a benefit this time around in this inflationary cycle. And probably importantly, we're still delivering very strong cash flow. So while we're delivering strong cash flow and profit, but we keep investing back in the business for growth. As Scott mentioned, growth is certainly evidenced in the results too in that we've taken share across the categories taken as a whole. But importantly, a lot of the investments we're making now are about growth in the future, so moving beyond share gains, moving towards growing the category and taking the brand into adjacent categories.

Okay, great. I'd love to get a high-level view of category. health as you guys see it today, consumers have been under meaningful pressure, tariff-driven inflation, bifurcation by income cohort, et cetera. So how are your categories performing, and do you feel like the worst is behind you from a consumer category standpoint?

I think the place to start is, my one-word answer would be stable. As we think about that question, Lauren, whether we look year-to-date, we look quarter-to-date, and we just focus on track channel data or scanner data, generally across our categories, a few exceptions I'll cover, we actually see retail dollar takeaway growth despite all the factors that you mentioned. So I think what that tells us is the consumer in our categories is validating that these categories are everyday use items. Our brands and store brand offerings are certainly resonating. The couple of exceptions I think are interesting is These are low single-digit declines on dollar takeaway would be in the food storage category, down one or two points year-to-date, and then in the tableware category, just to spend a second on that. We would have expected the tableware category to be a bit more under pressure because generally that is much more of a convenience discretionary purchase relative to the everyday use of the other offerings. But having said all of that, in each of food storage and in table, we've taken shares. So that would be my attempt to recap it. But I think that the bottom line is the consumer has demonstrated resilience with their wallet, seeing retail takeaway dollar growth across the set broadly, despite the factors you mentioned.

Let's talk a little bit about the role of innovation and marketing in keeping category engagement strong and maybe update us also on how your innovation process has evolved?

So I guess on innovation, I think, as we said a few minutes ago, I'd start with very, very committed to fewer, bigger, better, just to create that discipline, structure, and alignment of resources against the opportunities. We've actually done a lot of work this year on the consumer. So I'm not surprised that when you think about innovation, it's consumer-back. And I think that the work schemes have been twofold. The first is a complete update refresh of consumer segmentation, timely in this sort of an environment. Number two is the evolution of consumer trends and center store staples. So that's the raw material, if you like, that then creates the incubator for ideation in innovation, building those then out across each of our major categories and trying to convert that into a pipeline for years to come. I think, if anything, innovation is even more important today than in good economic times because of the differentiation capability. So I think that's been the take on innovation. On marketing, I think the approach is the same, meaning what we're all after is make sure the brands are healthy, they're vibrant, and increasingly importantly that they resonate with different economic cohorts and different age cohorts. All shoppers are different. I think that what we've discovered as we've gone through that work this year is the importance of making sure we're being thoughtful about marketing and promotion in two dimensions. One, the obvious, which is a brick-and-mortar mindset, but two, from a digital mindset, there certainly is evidence that that consumer continues to use more and more digital capability in the shopping journey. So what we continue to think about is are we allocating the resources to the right part of the funnel, whether we're talking about conversion-oriented marketing, top-of-funnel awareness marketing, again, balancing digital and brick-and-mortar. That's been the evolution of our thought process.

Okay. Anything new in the portfolio innovation-wise that's worth highlighting or that's coming out?

I wouldn't say anything new. I think we continue to see good success just kind of a tour through the portfolio. When we think about the waste bag business, we continue to find that colors and scents resonate with a healthy portion of the consumer and certainly has been relevant to our journey gaining share there. I think innovation is probably deceptively prominent in the food bag business. I think as we printed the second quarter, we had significant volume growth, but it was the complement of both the branded business but also some innovation in the store brand category. So just think about value concepts for the consumer, value engineering-related concepts. I think in the Reynolds business, we've talked a lot about really trying to invest behind just the evolution of cooking. most recent launch out would have been a countertop prep paper, which is still very, very new in market, but essentially a new occasion, which is relevant because we think more and more about occasion-based product assortment and innovation. And then lastly, I think in tableware, we've talked a lot about the evolution of sustainability and those concepts in investing behind more sustainable materials, balancing that with what consumers want and resonate. So that's sort of a recap of what we've had in play for this year.

Okay. You've mentioned online, you've mentioned younger consumer cohorts. So let's just talk for a second about e-com, which is an increasingly important channel for you guys. You've discussed in the past the emerging dynamic of agentic shopping, AI-driven purchasing decisions. So tell us a little bit, like, how you position yourself in this environment. Do you see it as a brand advantage or a risk? And what are the things you're doing to make sure, if you are doing, that you show up in those searches and in those ways of shopping?

Great question. I think something we've been studying a lot, just for folks who might be new to the company, is we've been poring over a bunch of research that's just trying to get our arms around how relevant is sort of AI agentic in shopping. And most of the sources we see suggest that the majority of the U.S. consumer, somewhere along the journey, so it could be researching, it could be awareness of categories or offerings, are using AI. So I just started with that as an opening point. From a sort of fit with opportunity, I think that the Staples category broadly where we play is very adaptive to the digital shelf. And I say that, Lauren, because we're generally talking about high loyalty, high repeat purchase, which lends itself, we think, very, very well to auto replenishment or subscription-based models. We shared a few proof points of our progress there on the Q2 call. I think we highlighted that one of our waste bag offerings was actually a top five, you know, prime day offering. And number two, I think we had 30 points or so of growth in our branded storage bag business relative to the category. So, you know, these aren't evergreen proof points, but it demonstrates that I think we're on the right footing. On your resource question, which is a good one, two things. One, we actually brought into the organization recently a new chief digital officer, specifically titled that way, so that we're migrating our resource investment, again, people and dollars, to be very intentional about how we're investing in that digital relevance. And I think your part about the brands is very important, because at least as we think about it, it's making sure that the brand is prominent along the early part of the journey, right? So as a consumer is thinking about an occasion or a need state, the brand is the pull mechanism that's attracting that consumer, not just at the occasion, the need state, the solution, but specifically, depending on the item, you know, a hefty or a Reynolds item. So that's a bit about how we've thought about it and gone about it, but it's clear that there's an escalation, we think, in the consumer's usage of those tools.

Okay, great. Let's talk a little bit about competition. So in waste bags, you've had a long track record of share gains, but there's been some recent pressure. So maybe let's just start there, and then we can talk about food bags separately. So just a current read on the competitive environment there and how that's been evolving.

Well, I guess I would say, Lauren, the irony is that both waste and food actually have pretty similar dynamics as we would assess them. So it's a similar story, so I'll maybe do it that way. But what we've seen really from the beginning of the year throughout the year has been a relatively noticeable step change in the level of competition from premium brands. And for those of you who don't know our company, we play in what we call a performance brand mindset and strategy. But back to the question, so we've seen significantly more competition from premium brands. I think it's important for folks who don't know the company, we're generally number one or two in our categories just to set the stage for the discussion. And so we think about this is an environment where the consumer is under pressure. I don't think there's a debate about that. We've seen increased competition. And then lastly, we've had all of this variety of commodity inflation deal with in pricing. And so I think as we reflect on performance, we're actually pretty pleased with where we are in that we've stayed true to the performance brand philosophy, price-back architecture. And if we look at, say, the first half results, we either held or gained share. When we assess a two-year stack, we gained share materially across both of those categories. So it's like you would expect. We continue to look every day, every week at making sure the price-back architecture is landing, be prepared to make surgical adjustments if needed. But that's the dynamic, and I think we feel so far has validated our approach.

Okay. There's pricing going in and coming through, right? So are you seeing any change yet in the competitive environment and waste bags? Do you think that's going to come as everybody puts that price increase through?

I think the short answer is it's evolving. You know, I think we shared on the Q2 call, the quantum of resin-related input costs is pretty substantial. So our operating but an expectation would be that folks would generally price, just given the magnitude. But as it always is, how that gets deployed and when it gets deployed, price-back architecture is fluid. So I would say no major shocks or surprises of what we've seen. But I think eight weeks in, if you like, in terms of looking at track channel, I don't think we would have a firm and final point of view. If anything, we'd say we're glad that we took the approach, as we philosophically do, being number one or two in the category. We believe that we have a responsibility to provide some price leadership, and I think we've demonstrated that so that at least now we can say, okay, our price is on shelf. It's in the marketplace. Let's spend our time analyzing the performance against the opportunity set, and if we need to make surgical adjustments, we will. But you'll probably have a more informed view of the third quarter call because, like I said, we're eight weeks in. Yeah, okay.

You've spoken to commodity-based pricing also in Reynolds Cooking and Kitchen. Aluminum costs have been moving around. Can you just explain how your commodity pricing mechanism works, where aluminum stands today, and when should we expect that to flow through to the P&L, some of the aluminum inflation? And I guess also are there other parts of the cost basket beyond aluminum that we should be watching for that business?

Well, to start with, we've had a lot of practice in aluminum. If you go back to the beginning of 25, generally it's climbed straight up for six consecutive quarters. I'd say it's plateaued, leveled recently. I think a couple of things are important. One of the consumer insights that we think is relevant to this question is that the consumer generally will recall the last one or two purchase cycles. And that's important because what that suggests then is, more persistent measured increases are more likely to meet with success than a wait, wait, wait, a big bang approach. And that's very much what we've done in the FOIL categories, I'm sure you know. And I think the proof's in the pudding that certainly it creates a level of elasticity. But if we looked over the last couple of months, retail dollar takeaways in FOIL are actually up double digits. So again, there has been elasticity, but the net effect by definition has been such that there's actually been growth in the category from a retail dollar standpoint.

Okay, okay. I think there's additional pricing coming through in the second half, is that right, for this business?

July specifically. We had, to your question about other costs, so the macro would be, you know, we saw sequential quarterly escalation in aluminum in Q2, pretty much early Q2 at that same time. We saw resident prices we spoke about a moment ago also escalating. Essentially, we had pricing implemented across the entire company, materially the entire business, and we had that pricing executed in early July. So we are now eight weeks deep in seeing, as you asked about a few minutes ago, how is all that going? And I said, so far we see consumer stability in the categories with, on balance, retail dollar takeaway growth. But this is an evolving thing. We have to continue to look very, very closely to be sure we're making those surgical adjustments as and where needed, as you would expect.

And as it stands today, elasticity has generally been in line with what you'd expect. So, Nathan, in July, you held the full year EBITDA guidance, even after acknowledging meaningful commodity cost pressure at the mid-year point. Can you just help people understand how that works mechanically? Like, what are the levers? How much visibility do you actually have into the back half? We've just talked about some of the pricing. I think that's been an open question we've been getting, is that visibility into the second half.

It's very worth just even grounding on what the guide entailed at the start of the year, and then what's changed and evolved as we've gone on. So when we came into the year, we saw roughly $100 million commodity headwind that we carried in, which was largely aluminum. The consumer was under pressure, so we knew we'd have top-line pressure, we said SG&A would be up a little bit because we're going to continue to invest in the business. So you unpack all of that, and it just says the middle of the P&L there, profitability is getting better. We expected a lot of productivity embedded in the initial guide. So fast forward to the Q2 call and what changed. Add $400 million from an annualised basis, at least, from a commodity headwind. I think half of that starting to hit the P&L in July would be a good rule of thumb. So that came in. We took our revenue guide up to reflect the higher pricing to recover those commodity costs. And by definition, taking the revenue guide up, we did not see the elasticity being as great as the pricing. But nonetheless, that is some incremental pressure as well. So how did we maintain our earnings guide But as we moved through the year, we identified additional productivity initiatives and we were able to accelerate some of the ones that were already in the works, and that's provided the ability to continue to invest and offset that pressure and maintain our earnings guide.

Okay. Let me ask you a crazy question. One day when inflation subsides, maybe we even get deflation.

Keep going.

I'm being crazy here. But just the amount of productivity that you've generated in the business, and I think, and this is where I want you to correct me where I'm wrong, when I think about the pricing that you've taken, there's been a lot that you've achieved through RGM, and then there's also big straight list increases. But do you think, I mean, the structural profitability of the business has probably improved significantly. Yes, it has, yeah. So the risk of dreaming the dream, I don't even know how to ask for the last thing, but do you think there's a cap to where margins could go if we're in an environment where some of, let's even say the 2026 inflation reversed? Let's even just keep it isolated to the last, you know, six to 12 months of inflation.

You know, I guess maybe I'll start, and please do add, but, you know, I think there's a bunch of value I think we're creating that's being shown in the P&L, but we're playing uphill, so to speak, because we're constantly taking price increases, which, of course, challenge volumes, et cetera. It would be interesting to see on the shoulder side of it because no one would root for high prices just conceptually, especially in this economic climate. So you would expect then a lower absolute price to stimulate more demand and you'd have a more virtuous cycle than the climate that all of us are working on today. But I think that the bottom line is instead of having volume as a headwind, because by definition, supply chain productivity is a volume game industrial economics, you'd have that as an ally, you know, as potentially commodities crest and decline. That then creates price reinvestment and stabilizing demand. But that'd be how I'd think about it. Please, Ed.

I think you covered it well. But to your point, what does it look like on the other side? The reality is we're putting in business processes and systems to drive sustained productivity initiatives that are repeatable. So if we get a tailwind, that's just sort of stacking on top of the work that we're going to do regardless of whether we get that assist.

Okay. So back to closer in, sorry. So Nathan, you had mentioned on the second quarter call that gross margin, or you just mentioned earlier, that gross margins expanded 200 basis points in the second quarter. How are you thinking about the margin trajectory from here to gross margin in particular?

I'll build on what I just started to say. The whole design here is not about sort of one-time cost savings initiatives. It really is about putting in a process and system to sustain that. So for us, that means everything from learning and development in the plants. Scott talked about putting technology in the plants. For us, that's red zone. where we've got line-level KPIs in the hands of the front-line operator, so they need those tools to drive productivity. And then Lean principles and processes. So that's, I mean, what you would expect. Lean is just taking waste out of our processes, but then we're putting the structure around that through daily management, weekly management systems, et cetera, to make sure it sticks. And then capital is the assist. We've talked about that a little bit in the past where there's automation and other cost-out capital that we're just continuing to pull forward and that has meaningful returns that add on to that. Probably importantly, we need this productivity because at the end of the day, it's the fuel for, one, growth, and secondarily, additional productivity initiatives.

I want to talk a little bit about capital allocation and specifically M&A. So where does M&A stand in terms of priorities Back in 2024, you guys had outlined an opportunity to expand your TAM via M&A, alongside organic growth, of course. But there hasn't really been much activity since then. I know there's a comma, but that's small. So what are the criteria? How should investors think about potential M&A?

Yeah, I think we've been very consistent in our capital allocation priorities. M&A is still a part of it, but I'll actually do it in reverse. so to talk about the capital pipeline there's a ton of opportunities to invest in the business that are right in front of us that are things frankly we've done in some plants and we can take to other plants so they're guaranteed known return profiles so I like the risk profile of those sort of investments so we're working against those vigorously we're committed to our dividend and we still think that some debt reduction is another guaranteed return on capital, albeit we're getting down towards the bottom of our target leverage range. So now to hit M&A specifically, it's still a priority, and that could be making inroads through acquiring an asset that gets us into that extended TAM that you referenced. But we can go there organically too. We know the brand can travel, so there's certainly more than one way to get there.

And as we think about M&A for us, it could even be acquiring capabilities that allow us to drive productivity or growth in another way just the same as we did with the Atacama acquisition a few years ago Okay, alright great So Scott, as we close what is the one thing that you want investors sitting in this room and listening on the webcast to leave with about Reynolds that they may not have fully appreciated coming into this conversation an hour ago Glad to get a chance to answer that question I think probably two simple thoughts, Lauren, is one, we're playing leadership roles in well-developed categories that are highly stable.

So I think that's an important framing. I think as we talked about through this conversation, we've been very consistent following three really basic priorities. We've been working on them for 18 months plus. And I think we have certainly demonstrated a bit of the bend in the curve, no victories being declared. But I think in this climate, with this amount of consumer pressure, this level of commodity escalation, I think we've done a decent job demonstrating the value of the initiatives that we've been working on are in a proof state. So, you know, and there's more of that to come. I think that's the core takeaway is if I were giving someone the short story on the company. But thank you for asking.

Okay, great. All right, so we're going to leave it there. I'm going to thank you so much for your time. Thanks for joining us. Please join me in thanking Reynolds for being at the conference again this year.

Thanks for having us.