TrueBlue Q2 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

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Provided by Quartr
July 24, 2023

There are 8 speakers on the call.

Operator

Greetings and welcome to the TrueBlue Second Quarter 2023 Earnings Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen only mode. A brief question and answer session will follow the formal presentation. As a reminder, this conference is being recorded. It is now my pleasure to introduce you to your host, Derek Gafford, EVP.

Operator

Thank you, Derek. You can begin.

Speaker 1

Good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for joining today's call. I'm joined by our Chief Executive Officer, Steve Cooper And our President and Chief Operating Officer, Terrence Owen. Before we begin, I want to remind everyone that today's call and slide presentation contain forward looking statements, all of which are subject to risks and uncertainties, and we assume no obligation to update or revise any forward looking statements. These risks and uncertainties, some of which are described in our press release and in our SEC filings, could cause actual results to differ materially from those in our forward looking statements. We use non GAAP measures when presenting our financial results.

Speaker 1

We encourage you to review the non GAAP reconciliations in today's earnings release or attrublue.com under the Investor Relations section for a complete understanding of these terms and their purpose. Any comparisons made today are based on a comparison to the same period in the prior year, unless otherwise stated. Lastly, we will be providing a copy of our prepared remarks on our website at the conclusion of today's call, and a full transcript and audio replay will also be available soon after the call. Okay, let's turn the call over to Steve.

Speaker 2

Thank you, Derek, and welcome everyone to today's call. Revenue for the quarter was $476,000,000 down 16% compared to the prior year. Our results reflect an environment of softening demand. While the broader economy remains mixed with some traditional indicators showing resilience and others highlighting caution, When it comes to the staffing industry, the recessionary sentiment has already taken effect. Economic uncertainty is weighing on our customers and we're seeing that manifest in the demand trends across all three of our segments.

Speaker 2

Given the tight labor market, clients continue to focus on retaining employees, but they're also increasingly focused on reducing costs. As a result, clients are becoming more selective on which jobs they choose to fill. While the number of job openings across the United States remains high at about 10,000,000, the jobs added in recent months have been primarily in professional and permanent roles. For manufacturing, wholesale and retail trade, which involve more blue collar positions and where we play a larger role in the market, as well as with temporary help overall, the number of open jobs has declined year over year. While the challenging macro environment is leading to lower staffing of volumes, clients still need help finding talent to fill critical roles.

Speaker 2

With our decades of experience and breadth of services, we know how to find the right talent for our clients. Even though current demand levels are not what we'd like, the long term outlook for staffing remains positive and really comes down to a matter of timing. We're often viewed as an early indicator for broader trends, being that we're usually first in and first out when it comes to economic cycles. We take pride in helping our customers through these challenging times and are prepared to help them as the macroeconomic environment improves. Now I'll turn the call over to Taryn, who will provide additional detail about the actions we're taking today as well as our growth strategies for the future.

Speaker 3

Thank you, Steve. Staying highly engaged with our clients remains critical as they adjust their workforce needs in response to cost pressures within their businesses. This is a high priority for our sales and service teams. With PeopleReady, we are focused on sales, providing excellent service and being responsive to our customers' needs. We are enhancing our sales training and our on demand business, increasing the velocity of business development efforts by leveraging our centralized teams and have embedded account managers to cover new markets within skilled trades.

Speaker 3

While most of our clients are acting with caution, The renewable energy sector continues to present a strong growth opportunity for us as our portfolio expands and our pipeline remains healthy. We are targeting further expansion in this area as well as other high growth industries. At PeopleScout, we have entered the healthcare sector, which has shown greater resiliency to market pressures. We are targeting further sales efforts in this vertical as well as other recession resistant industries. For clients who remain hesitant to make long term workforce commitments, we are leveraging our short term offerings such as Recruiter on Demand to meet their current needs, while building the relationships that will drive growth in the future.

Speaker 3

We are also expanding our reach with complementary service offerings in the recruitment media and consulting space. With PeopleManagement, We are aligning our go to market messaging around reducing the complexity for our clients. Many businesses are looking to rebalance and consolidate their service provider clients in this challenging macroeconomic environment and ensure that we are ready to scale as they return to growth. These efforts, Combined with our ongoing commitment to employee satisfaction and technology transformation, underpinned by our mission to connect people and work, Help ensure that we will continue to be ready to meet our clients' evolving workforce needs. I'll now pass the call over to Derek, We will share further details around our financial results.

Speaker 1

Thank you, Taryn. Total revenue for Q2 2023 was $476,000,000 a decrease of 16%. We are in a climate of softening demand With revenue for the quarter coming up 4 points short of our midpoint expectation. Clients are certainly becoming more cost conscious With many of our clients making the choice to only fill their most critical job openings, while taking a wait and see approach for other jobs. We posted a net loss of $7,000,000 down from net income of $24,000,000 in Q2 last year.

Speaker 1

Included in our results is a non cash impairment charge of $9,000,000 The impairment charge is mostly tied to a goodwill write down in PeopleScout's MSP business In conjunction with lower demand expectations, adjusted net income was $5,000,000 down from 27,000,000 while adjusted EBITDA declined to $11,000,000 versus $39,000,000 Gross margin of 27.4 percent was down 40 basis points. This was driven by a drop in PeopleScout revenue mix And a mix increase in PeopleReady's Renewable Energy business, which carries a lower gross margin than the blended business in part due to contingent employee travel expenses that do not include a markup. This was partially offset by better workers' compensation results from the favorable development of prior year reserves, As well as disciplined pricing in our PeopleReady business. Our PeopleReady business delivered its 9th consecutive quarter a positive spread between bill rate and pay rate inflation. SG and A decreased $1,000,000 or 1%.

Speaker 1

In the prior year, there was a $3,000,000 benefit in incentive related costs associated with the departure of our CEO. Excluding this event, SG and A was down 3% in Q2 this year. In Q1 this year, actions were taken to reduce cost by about $10,000,000 and similar actions were taken in Q2, bringing the total cost savings for this year to about $20,000,000 We are also seeing additional inflation in our costs, most notably medical benefits, which is a factor in our cost savings netting to about $10,000,000 for the year. Despite our pre tax loss, we incurred $1,000,000 in income tax expense for the quarter, primarily due to the non deductible nature of the goodwill impairment charge. For the year, we expect income tax benefit of Now let's turn to the specific results of our segments.

Speaker 1

PeopleReady is our largest segment, representing 57% of trailing 12 month revenue and 59% of total segment profit. PeopleReady revenue decreased 13%, while segment profit decreased 60% and segment profit margin was down 3.40 basis points. The retail industry is currently our most challenging vertical due to the lower volumes flowing through distribution centers associated with excess inventories. And next in line are clients in the transportation and service industries. Declines in these three industries range from 25% to 40%.

Speaker 1

On the flip side, construction is our most resilient market. Our renewable energy business was up 100%, An acceleration from growth of 50% in Q1 and the rest of our construction business was only down about 10% in Q2. We're maintaining strong pricing discipline to help cover the inflation in our SG and A expenses. The business produced a positive spread between bill and pay rate inflation with bill rates up 8.5% and pay rates up 7.6%. PeopleScout is our highest margin segment representing 13% of trailing 12 month revenue and 30% of total segment profit.

Speaker 1

PeopleScout revenue decreased 33%, while segment profit decreased 57% And segment profit margin was down 8 20 basis points, but still produced a healthy segment profit margin of 15%. Demand was softer across an assortment of industries with some clients initiating hiring freezes and some attempting to use internal resources Demand for our services has also moderated as many of our clients are seeing lower levels of employee turnover in comparison with peak levels in the prior year. PeopleManagement represents 30% of trailing 12 month revenue and 11% of total segment profit. PeopleManagement revenue decreased 13%, While segment profit decreased 47% and segment profit margin was down 100 basis points. Demand declined in both on-site and commercial driving services as economic uncertainty led to lower client volumes.

Speaker 1

Now, let's turn to the balance sheet. The balance sheet is in great shape. We finished the quarter with $50,000,000 in cash, no debt And $200,000,000 of borrowing availability. Before we wrap up, I'd like to take a moment to provide additional color on one of our forward looking items. We expect a revenue decline of 16% to 12% in Q3 2023.

Speaker 1

While the midpoint decline of 14% is an improvement compared to the Q2 decline of 16%, This is driven by a less challenging prior year comparison. For additional details on our outlook, Please see our earnings presentation posted to our website today. I'll add one more thought before we close. Though we are not currently where we want to be from a performance perspective, we are excited about the opportunity ahead of us when the macroeconomic environment improves. We believe the supply of blue collar labor will remain tight for quite some time And we are well equipped to help businesses of all sorts to fill this critical workforce need.

Speaker 1

In the meantime, We are focused on positioning ourselves for a strong recovery by staying highly engaged with our customers, staying true to our service and technology commitments and remaining disciplined on costs. This concludes our prepared remarks. Operator, please open the call for questions.

Operator

Thank you. We will now be conducting a question and answer session. A confirmation tone will indicate your line is in the question queue. You may press star 2, if you would like to remove your question from the queue. For participants using speaker equipment, it may be necessary to pick up your handset before pressing the star Keith.

Operator

One moment please while we poll for questions. Our first question comes from Jeff Seiber With BMO Capital Markets, please proceed with your question.

Speaker 4

Thanks. That's close enough. Let me start first with PeopleSoft. I know you don't give specific guidance by segment, but that was a pretty sharp decline year over year in Scott, was it sudden? Were there some large accounts that left?

Speaker 4

If you can

Speaker 1

give us a little

Speaker 4

bit more color on that speed drop.

Speaker 1

Hi, Jeff. It's Derek here. And I know your last name. I got you here, okay? When it comes to the PeopleScout drop this quarter, It's important for us to also talk about what happened in Q2 last year.

Speaker 1

If you remember in Q2 last year, we talked about that we Had our all time record on quarterly revenue with PeopleScout. So we were already trending at some pretty high levels because of The level of high turnover ensuring that was happening in the employee base of our customers and then we had a really big surge. So not only that created an all time peak for us when it was about from a revenue perspective, it also created a peak for us from a gross An operating margin excuse me, a segment margin perspective. So as we're taking a look at the year over year comps for PeopleScout, It's given an exaggerated revenue decline based on that peak and the same goes with the segment profit margin. So as we look towards our guidance for Q3, we would expect that this would drop down to about a 20% Revenue decline, so more moderate as we get past that comp of Q2 last year.

Speaker 4

All right. Is it possible to get similar color for 3Q for both PeopleReady and PeopleManagement?

Speaker 1

Yes. So for PeopleReady and our guidance, so I'm just going to give you the midpoint of the range versus quoting a range in each segment for some specific purposes. So PeopleReady down around 12%, PeopleScout are down around 22% and PeopleManagement down around 13%.

Speaker 4

Okay. That's really helpful. Appreciate that. In looking at your deck and I'm referring to Slide 7, There seem to be some pretty sizable changes from last quarter. I think last quarter, you had kind of strategy to highlight priority.

Speaker 4

Now you're looking I like the current business priorities with different bullet points. What changed so dramatically? I mean, we were seeing declines in your business last quarter. What happened in the Q2 to kind of update this framework?

Speaker 1

Well, what we decided to do, we have A roadshow deck that also has our big picture strategies in it. And we thought it would be more suitable to just keep that in the roadshow deck. And based on how we're operating right now, what's going on with the industry, what's going on with buying behaviors, that would be more helpful To talk about what some of our current operating priorities are in the field. And so the deck that you see here that we put in aligns really with what you heard in So you get Terence prepared comments and those carryover and summarize form into the deck that you're referring to.

Speaker 4

Got it. So just a change in focus in the presentation, not a change in overall business strategy. I understand. Thanks for that. If I can just sneak in one more.

Speaker 4

We're hearing about this potential massive UPS strike this week. I'm just wondering if UPS is a client And if not, do you serve some of the other logistics companies like FedEx or some of the smaller companies? How do you think this might impact your business?

Speaker 1

Yeah. UPS is not a customer of ours. In the other names that you mentioned in that space, we don't do much business However, we do have a commercial driving practice that you know of a center line that's call it $150,000,000 run rate of revenue. It could have some impact there. And then I think us like many other industries, there could be some ripple impacts To the industries we serve indirectly, but no direct exposure to the business units that you're referring to here.

Speaker 4

Okay. Really appreciate the color. Thanks so much.

Operator

Our next question is from Mark Ribbet with SITA, please proceed with your question.

Speaker 5

Hi, good afternoon. Thank you so much for taking the question.

Speaker 1

So I was wondering if you

Speaker 5

could talk a little bit about I mean, certainly, I appreciate the color as to the details around some of the verticals and some of the things that you're seeing with the verticals. I was wondering if you could talk a little bit about if there were sort of was there any seasonal aspect, for instance, around the retail Concerns or issues or are there sort of more the overall general macroeconomic that we're seeing with some retail, you've certainly seen a lot of Structuring bankruptcies, etcetera. So I was wondering how much of that might be a function of seasonal consumer weakness or anything like that versus just Maybe just a mix of the specific retailers you may end up you may have under your umbrella.

Speaker 1

Yes. You're right, Mark. The retail industry, if we were to pick one where we're seeing the most pressure, it is certainly If we were to pick one where we're seeing the most pressure, it is certainly that industry. We pointed out not from a seasonal perspective, But really kind of from an underlying fundamentals perspective. So if we take a look at where we stand on a year over year basis or how things have moved from the Q1 The Q2 based on where we would expect volume to be based on our historical patterns, retail has shown a weakness In both sets.

Speaker 1

A lot of this comes back to while the fact that there's still So an adequate level of retail spending where our work, it's not in the store, right? It's actually in the distribution operations. And we've still got many customers that are long on inventory And we're seeing less volumes flowing through those centers and that's translating into less volume requirements from our customers that they're using our services.

Speaker 5

Okay. That's certainly helpful. And then one of the things I was sort of thinking about is for all the challenges The industry has seen the bill pay spread has Generally, I was wondering if you could talk a little bit about maybe what your thoughts are there as far as the planning going forward as to whether your level of comfort as So how that might play out through the remainder of the year?

Speaker 1

Well, we have to stay pretty disciplined on our pricing And this is our 9th consecutive quarter having a positive spread between bill and pay rate inflation and we think that's warranted Because down in our SG and A section, we're having to do a lot more work to find people. And we're spending more time and energy to find people and to Screen people to deliver the kind of candidates at the quality level that our clients expect. So As we take a look forward, we're going to still stay disciplined on that pricing. But we also want to be very make sure we continue to stay very in touch Market by market, these dynamics change are different in different markets and in different geographies. And we want to make sure that we also don't get priced out.

Speaker 1

I would expect we'd see the pay rate inflation maybe take a step down a point or so. As we go into the back half of the year, The pay rate inflation diminish a bit, but we would still expect to maintain a positive Spread based on the tightness of the labor pools through the back half of the year. Okay. And then

Speaker 5

I was wondering if you could talk a little about are there any particular areas That you may see maybe seeing some positive activity, whether it's like anything that maybe is a call Maybe we haven't talked about yet something, whether it's an industry vertical or geographic area, anything like that, that we should So to be thinking about that, that sort of might begin to be turning the time.

Speaker 3

Hi, Mark. This is Taryn speaking. Thanks for the question.

Speaker 1

Hi, Dana.

Speaker 3

Hi, there. A bright spot for us from an industry perspective is in our renewable Energy business, particularly around solar farm installation. So we're seeing, some good results there, a healthy pipeline with Just a good opportunity to continue to grow that segment and it's not slowing down. So We've got some positive results there.

Speaker 1

Yes. And just to add on to that Mark, we're really pleased with that Where the country is moving from a renewable energy perspective, we think we've got a lot of opportunity there. There's some legislation passed last year putting some more investment into this industry. You take a look at our energy business, renewable energy business, it's up to High single digit now as a mix of our revenue. We on a year over year basis that business doubled.

Speaker 1

Sequentially, it was up 50%. So that is definitely one of the bright spots, not just here for our earnings this quarter, But going forward, we've got a really great team that knows how to serve this business. We've been serving this business for a while and think that we can Really take advantage of a good opportunity to help a lot of customers in the space.

Speaker 6

Excellent.

Speaker 5

Thank you very much.

Operator

Our next question is from Karriem Mehta with Northcoast Research. Please proceed with your question.

Speaker 7

Hey, Steve and Derek. I think you both have said that TrueBlue has been very price disciplined. I'm wondering If that's because of what you're seeing in the marketplace and competitors being aggressive in their pricing, or you were just Pointing out that you haven't gone down that road.

Speaker 1

Well, The pricing in our industry has always been competitive. It still is competitive. And we have never generally been the cheapest So, we feel like we provide a really good suite of I'm talking about staffing right now versus RPO. In the blue collar space, we think we're really suited to take Good care of customers here where we are now and in the future based on our experience. So we are seeing discipline on the pricing there.

Speaker 1

I think that's both a function of How we are operating and where we're choosing to play and how we're choosing to price in certain markets. And probably the biggest thing over All is where the labor supply is. When the labor supply is this tight, there's a certain amount of pricing power that the market has in general. That is not to say that there are some that aren't out there cutting prices and trying to take market share that way. We're just choosing not to play there.

Speaker 1

And We haven't seen a big change in that dynamic now versus where we were really a year ago.

Speaker 7

And then just for the PeopleReady and PeopleManagement business, I'm wondering what the trends were like Throughout the quarter, if they stayed steady or if you saw an acceleration. And Derek, if you're able to give any kind of Color on how July has performed?

Speaker 1

Yes. So let's just talk about numbers from a revenue So when we came out in April, revenue was down about 14% overall for the company. It's about where we thought it was going to be. It was very consistent with our guidance. As we moved into May is when we started Seeing some additional softening.

Speaker 1

And so revenue on a year over year basis for May was down 18%. We exited the quarter of June at 17% and that has really carried itself into July. We're looking at about I'm kind of normalizing things. Things are a little lumpy with 4th degree 4th July holiday, but about 17%. I believe our last week We reported here internally for the month of July was down 17%.

Speaker 1

So relatively consistent on a year over year basis with where we exited the quarter.

Speaker 7

Perfect. Thank you very much. We really appreciate it.

Operator

Thank you. Our next question comes from Mark McCrone With Baird, please proceed with your question.

Speaker 6

Good afternoon. I was wondering, can you talk a little bit more about PeopleManagement, Just in terms of what you're thinking about for the core holiday season, How are clients thinking about ramping up that business?

Speaker 1

Well, as far as the Q4, it's still a little early for us, Mark. There's been a lot of puts and takes Around what's going on from a retail perspective, as opposed to some other competitors in the industrial staffing space, From a manufacturing perspective, our business there has held up pretty well. I would say, although I can't see Their books, I think that our mix is a little bit more geared towards food and consumer packaged goods than Some of the others that may be reporting here. And so for us manufacturing has really kind of held up in the low teens as far year over year pressure. As far as what we're looking at for the Q4, if we don't See any more softening this quarter.

Speaker 1

We're just basing our internal expectations on an As typical type of ramp up with historical patterns. But a lot of moving parts right now, hard to say.

Speaker 6

Okay. And then I'm wondering if you can give a little more detail with regards to some of the comments that you made on PeopleScout. You did indicate there were certain verticals that were a little bit more challenged. I'm assuming the retail comments were more around PeopleReady, not PeopleScout. So if could you correct me if I'm wrong or what verticals were the most soft with regards to PeopleScout?

Speaker 6

And for July, are you trending in that down 22% range or is that Down 22%, a little bit better than what July is actually showing for PeopleScout.

Speaker 1

Okay. I'm going to do my best to answer some of your questions. I'll have to come back around to that 22%. All of our comments that I may from an industry vertical perspective, we're based at PeopleReady. I think that's the best proxy to talk about what's going on industry wide.

Speaker 1

It's a nice big population set of a lot of customers. I think and so yes, With retail, this was all really directed towards the PeopleReady business. Although, I would say that would also carry over into our other staffing businesses business at PeopleManagement. When it comes to PeopleScout, I don't think that it's productive to talk too much about industry trends, Especially when you get down on a quarterly basis, one customer can really set the whole trend for an industry. So we tend to not get into those Industries much.

Speaker 1

But what I will say is that the pressure that we've seen at PeopleScout, it is pretty broad based across all the industries, Particularly when we're looking at year over year because Q2 last year was such a boom quarter and a record quarter for us. Yes, there are some really tough comps that we're facing.

Speaker 6

So Derek, are you in July, are you still seeing that down 22% or is it is the down 22% a little bit more a function of like Later in the quarter?

Speaker 1

Well, I'm not sure what the down 22% is. I do remember talking about In the month of June being down, total company about 17% and that carrying into the similar trend in July Around 7%.

Speaker 6

I was referring to the guidance that you were giving to Jeff Silber with regards to the midpoint of the guidance Was down 22% for PeopleScout.

Speaker 1

Everything that we've seen so far here is on track to deliver The 22% midpoint that I suggested, I haven't seen anything that would throw that off track.

Speaker 6

Okay, great. And then Can you talk a little bit about what you did in order to preserve the margins there because it was a fairly Sharp down on a sequential basis, but you were able to preserve the margins. How should we think about obviously, you cut certain expenses, But how far along are those and how should we think about further cost cutting On a go forward basis and where what you would hope to achieve from a margin Effective, if things are a little bit worse than what you're expecting.

Speaker 1

Yes, we're talking about PeopleScout right now, Mark.

Speaker 6

PeopleScout and then broadly speaking.

Speaker 1

Got you. Yes. So for PeopleScout, the year over year trends Are a bit distracting. So to put it into perspective, the PeopleScout margin in all of 2022 was 14%. Q2 this year was 15%, so higher than the average of last year and actually took a step up of a couple of points from where we finished the Q1.

Speaker 1

Yes. So there have been a lot of adjustments that have been made. And so, those have mostly been in different staffing levels. Those adjustments were made Throughout the in the Q1, most all of that hit the run rate here in the Q2. So with permanent placement, it's One of the areas that deleverages the most.

Speaker 1

So while this is certainly some tough sledding on where we're at as an industry and as a company at this particular point Through the year, we're really pleased with where PeopleScout is showing, turning a 15% margin. So that's really how we built the structuring in place was Keep this margin in the between 10% and 15%, low to mid teens, let's call it, Throughout the rest of the year, I think we're positioned to do that. If things take another step down, we'll at PeopleScout and talking about the company overall, we'll make some adjustments. That's what our business is about. It's about workforce flexibility for our customers.

Speaker 1

So we're pleased to be helping serve them and as they adjust their Workforce needs down and when that happens, we have to be agile as well and make adjustments. So we've done set of actions in Q1, In Q2, if things continue to soften more, we haven't seen that yet. We'll make some more adjustments.

Speaker 6

Okay, great. And then on the workers' comp Positive accruals. Were those all concentrated in PeopleReady or were those across Board and how should we think about the balance of the year? I would assume that you should continue to see those What's the positive accruals just given the conservatism with the initial accruals?

Speaker 1

Yes. That really all falls And people ready. Really what you've got going is some positive development on reserves put up in prior years. While the dollar amount In Q2 this year versus Q2 last year is in the same ballpark. It's we've also got less revenue.

Speaker 1

So those positive reserve adjustments now as a percentage of revenue are showing up a little bit larger. That's really kind of the main Thanks. And as we look forward to the year, you can take a look at our gross Margin guidance, we're expecting margins to be up in gross margins year over year in Q3 and Q4. So there's a lot of puts and takes in all that, including workers' compensation. I thought it was just easier to go to the main thing and talk about the overall gross margin profile, but we do expect it to be up a bit versus last year.

Speaker 6

Great. Thank you.

Operator

Thank you. There are no further questions at this time. I would like to turn the floor back over to Steve for Closing comments.

Speaker 1

We just like to thank all of you for joining us here today and we look forward to updating you on our Q3 results in October. Thanks everyone.

Operator

This concludes today's teleconference. You may disconnect your lines at this time. Thank you for your participation.

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Earnings Conference Call
TrueBlue Q2 2023
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