SiteOne CEO Won't Answer Heritage's 'Hundreds And Hundreds' Of Basis Points Claim
Doug Black says rivals are fighting hardest for large customers as demand weakens, and that SiteOne is holding its own.
SiteOne Landscape Supply CEO Doug Black brushed aside a rival's boast of beating peers by "hundreds and hundreds of basis points," telling analysts on the company's third-quarter earnings call Wednesday, "I can't react to that." The landscape-supply distributor reported net sales up 3% to $1.29 billion in the quarter.
Black on the rival's boast
An analyst from Stifel asked Black, who is SiteOne's chairman and CEO, to respond to what Heritage said on an earlier call: that it was outperforming peers by hundreds and hundreds of basis points. Black said, "If they want to disclose their numbers, then that's fine. But we feel like we're holding our own and doing well."
Black said competition intensifies when demand falls and "tends to be focused on the larger customers." He broadened the field beyond Heritage, naming Ewing and Horizon as well. SiteOne, he said, is holding its own with large customers and still gaining share with small and medium ones.
Black said the company's Pro-Trade, Solstice and Portfolio private brands grew a combined 23% in the quarter and more than 35% year to date.
A soft market, a cost cut
SiteOne is a wholesale distributor of landscape supplies, including irrigation, hardscapes, nursery goods and fertilizer. Organic daily sales fell 1% in the quarter as volume dropped about 5%, outweighing 4% price gains. Black said hot, dry weather pushed some fall sales into October, when organic daily sales are up about 2%.
Gross margin rose 80 basis points to 35.5%, and adjusted EBDA, the company's adjusted earnings measure, rose 8% to $138.3 million. Net income attributable to SiteOne was $63.9 million, up from $59.1 million.
Black said SiteOne plans to cut its workforce and consolidate or close branches in the fourth quarter, with a charge to adjusted EBDA of about $6 million to $8 million. Full-year adjusted EBDA is expected at $425 million to $440 million, and the company expects organic daily sales to be flat to down 1%.
Pipe prices and buybacks
On PVC pipe, CFO Eric Elema said price increases went in during the second quarter and that pipe is 3% to 4% of sales, so he would not focus overly on it. Black said that in weak markets pipe makers may compete harder and lower prices; Elema said pressure on pipe pricing could come in early next year, though he called that fairly speculative.
SiteOne repurchased about 646,000 shares for about $62 million in the quarter, at an average $96.29 a share. The board has added $500 million to the repurchase authorization.
SiteOne's market value was about $4.5 billion in Wednesday morning trading.
Sources
- SiteOne Landscape (SITE) Q3 Earnings and Revenues Beat Estimates — Yahoo Finance
- SiteOne Landscape Supply Announces Third Quarter 2026 Earnings – Company Announcement - FT.com — Financial Times
- SiteOne Landscape GAAP EPS of $1.46 beats by $0.06, revenue of $1.29B misses by $10M | Seeking Alpha — seekingalpha.com
- Is SiteOne Landscape Supply (SITE) Undervalued On Future Cash Flow? — Yahoo Finance
