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DATE
Friday, Oct. 30, 2026
CALL PARTICIPANTS
- Senior Director of Investor Relations - Chris McGinnis
- President and Chief Executive Officer - Tom Tedford
- Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer - Deb O'Connor
TAKEAWAYS
- Net Sales -- $380.3 million, down 0.9% on a reported basis and 6.2% on a comparable basis, reflecting industry-wide softness in technology peripherals and timing shifts in back-to-school shipments.
- Adjusted EPS -- $0.28, inclusive of a $0.11 per share benefit from net tariff refunds, compared with $0.21 in the prior-year period.
- Adjusted Gross Margin -- 35.9%, increasing 290 basis points as a 520-basis-point benefit from net tariff refunds offset unfavorable product and customer mix.
- Tariff Refunds -- $21.3 million, received in cash during the third quarter, with management reporting an additional $5 million received in October that was not included in the company's full-year outlook.
- Technology Peripherals Performance -- down low double digits globally, driven by a 20% decline in global laptop sales and muted consumer demand for gaming consoles.
- Trust Acquisition -- generating approximately $100 million in annual revenue, with the transaction closing on Oct. 1 and expected to be modestly accretive to adjusted EPS within the first 12 months.
- Back-to-School Performance -- increasing mid-single digits in North America and approximately 20% in Mexico, with the company reporting market share gains in the note-taking category.
- Cost Savings Program -- targeting $100 million in multiyear reductions, with more than $10 million in savings realized during the quarter and over $30 million year to date.
- Workspace Solutions -- representing approximately 40% of pro forma annualized sales, with global revenue declines moderating to low single digits.
- Free Cash Flow -- $89 million year to date, representing an increase of $63 million over the prior-year period due to improved working capital and the receipt of tariff refunds.
- Full-Year Sales Outlook -- 4% to 6% growth, raised to incorporate one quarter of contribution from the acquired Trust business and the impact of tariff refunds.
- Full-Year Adjusted EPS Outlook -- $0.98 to $1.02, which includes a total $0.12 benefit from net tariff refunds.
- Consolidated Leverage Ratio -- 3.6x at quarter end, remaining below the debt covenant of 4.25x, with management targeting approximately 3.5x by the end of the year.
- Trust Synergies -- $5 million to $8 million, expected to be fully realized within the first 18 months of ownership.
- EPOS Cost Synergies -- $6 million in annualized savings expected for 2026, with a target of approximately $15 million in total savings by the end of 2027.
- Americas Segment Revenue -- $219.8 million, down 3.4% as lower demand for technology peripherals was partially offset by a 1% benefit from favorable foreign exchange and growth in Latin America.
- International Segment Revenue -- $160.5 million, up 2.8% due to a 9.2% contribution from the EPOS acquisition despite a 6% decline in comparable sales.
- Technology Peripherals Scale -- pro forma annual sales approaching $500 million, or about 30% of total company revenue following the acquisitions of EPOS and Trust.
- Cash Balance -- $174.7 million at quarter end, which included funds reserved for the completion of the Trust acquisition on Oct. 1.
- Capital Allocation -- $20.8 million in dividends paid year to date, with a quarterly dividend of $0.075 per common share declared for payment in December.
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RISKS
- Tedford stated, "We believe that, particularly in the U.S., the consumer environment is constrained," noting that lower discretionary spending has negatively impacted sales of gaming accessories.
- Tedford warned that console demand has been "muted pretty significantly this year," with the Switch 2 platform underperforming market expectations.
- O'Connor noted that organic volume declines resulted in fixed cost deleveraging during the quarter, which partially offset the benefits of cost savings initiatives.
SUMMARY
ACCO Brands Corporation (NYSE:ACCO) reported third-quarter results that reflected stabilization in its established categories alongside the continued scaling of its technology peripherals platform. Management reported that the company completed the acquisition of Trust on Oct. 1, which expands its tech peripherals portfolio to approximately $500 million in pro forma annual sales across consumer and enterprise channels. The company stated it is maintaining its focus on integrating the EPOS and Trust brands while executing a multiyear cost reduction program intended to expand earnings power and cash flow. Despite industry-wide challenges in computer and gaming hardware, management reported that established brands in the Learning & Creative and Workspace Solutions categories remain foundational for generating free cash flow and supporting debt reduction efforts.
- The company reported that its North America back-to-school brands took market share, with retailers exiting the season with inventory positions in line with their expectations.
- Management stated that the Technology Peripherals business is being impacted by limited memory availability and hardware costs, though it expects market trends to improve throughout 2027.
- CEO Tedford noted that the fourth-quarter release of Grand Theft Auto VI is expected to serve as a near-term catalyst for the gaming accessory portfolio.
- The company indicated that its computer accessories business is heavily tied to laptop deployments, which have declined 20% globally during the current year.
- Management noted that the International segment benefited from pricing and cost reductions, with the Leitz brand performing essentially flat year to date.
- The company used tariff refund proceeds to reduce debt and intended to maintain a leverage-neutral approach to future near-term strategic transactions.
- O'Connor indicated that strategic pricing actions implemented during the quarter are expected to provide benefits to margin rates in future periods.
INDUSTRY GLOSSARY
- Bargain Purchase Gain: An accounting gain recorded when the purchase price of an acquisition is less than the fair market value of the identifiable net assets acquired.
- EPOS: A premium audio brand acquired by the company to round out its enterprise technology assortment.
- GTA VI: Grand Theft Auto VI, a major video game title whose release influences demand for gaming peripherals.
- POS: Point of Sale, referring to actual sales data collected at the retail level.
- SKU Rationalization: The process of evaluating and reducing the number of products offered to improve operational efficiency and profitability.
- Switch 2: A next-generation gaming console platform.
- Trust: A European-centric technology peripherals company acquired by ACCO Brands in October 2026.
Full Conference Call Transcript
Operator: Hello, everyone. Thank you for joining us, and welcome to the ACCO Brands Third Quarter 2026 Earnings Call. After today's prepared remarks, we will host a question-and-answer session. If you would like to ask a question, press star one to raise your hand. To withdraw your question, press star one again. I will now hand the conference over to Chris McGinnis, Senior Director of Investor Relations. Chris, please go ahead.
Chris McGinnis: Thank you. Good morning, and welcome to ACCO Brands Conference Call to review our third quarter results. Speaking on the call today is Tom Tedford, President, Chief Executive Officer of ACCO Brands, and Deb O'Connor, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. Slides that accompany this call have been posted to the Investor Relations section of accobrands.com. When speaking about our results, we may refer to adjusted results. Adjusted results exclude amortization and restructuring costs, non-cash goodwill and intangible asset impairment charges, bargain purchase gain, unusual tax items, and other non-recurring items, and include adjustments to reflect the estimated annual tax rate on quarterly earnings.
Schedules of adjusted results and other Non-GAAP financial measures, and a reconciliation of these measures to the most directly comparable GAAP measures are in the earnings release and slides that accompany this call. Due to the inherent difficulty in forecasting and quantifying certain amounts, we do not reconcile our forward-looking Non-GAAP financial measures. Forward-looking statements made during the call are based on the beliefs and assumptions of management based on the information we have at the time the statements are made. Our forward-looking statements are subject to risks and uncertainties, and our actual results could differ materially. Please refer to our earnings release and SEC filings for an explanation of certain risk factors and assumptions.
Our forward-looking statements are made as of today, and we assume no obligation to update them going forward. Now, I'll turn the call over to Tom Tedford.
Tom Tedford: Thank you, Chris. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us today for the ACCO Brands Third Quarter Earnings Call. Our third quarter results demonstrate continued progress against our strategic priorities. Sales were in line with our outlook, underlying operating performance met our expectations, and adjusted EPS benefited from net tariff refunds. Back-to-school performance was solid in North America and Mexico. Workspace Solutions trends continue to stabilize, and we remain disciplined in navigating cautious enterprise and consumer spending in Technology Peripherals. Importantly, we used tariff refund proceeds to reduce debt, and on October 1, completed the acquisition of Trust, our second Technology Peripherals acquisition of the year.
Deb will provide additional financial details on the transaction later in the call. We are executing a clear strategy built around three priorities: scaling Technology Peripherals as a growth platform, stabilizing our Learning & Creative and Workspace Solutions categories, and expanding earnings and cash flow through disciplined cost management and debt reduction. We made meaningful progress on each priority this quarter, and I will address them in turn. The first of our near-term strategic priorities is to scale Technology Peripherals to improve the long-term growth profile of the company. The acquisition of Trust marks another important step in building this growth platform.
Trust is a 40-year-old brand that designs and markets computer and gaming peripherals across Europe and Latin America through retail, e-commerce, and B2B channels. The Trust acquisition broadens our portfolio, strengthens our position in consumer channels, and creates attractive cross-selling opportunities across our global platform. Our Technology Peripherals portfolio now includes Kensington, EPOS, PowerA, and Trust. Together, pro forma sales from these categories will approach $500 million annually, or about 30% of our future sales. We now offer a complete range of computer and gaming accessories with greater scale across both B2B and consumer channels. This provides a strong foundation for organic growth through innovation, broader distribution, market share gains, cross-selling, and disciplined strategic expansion.
Over the longer term, we expect Technology Peripherals to deliver mid-single-digit growth. The near-term operating environment remains challenging, and we are managing it with focus and discipline. Higher hardware cost and limited memory availability are affecting computer accessory purchases, while enterprise budgets are shifting towards AI priorities. Gaming accessories are also experiencing pressure from higher console prices and cautious consumer discretionary spending. These conditions do not change our conviction in the long-term growth opportunity. We compete in large technology categories with durable growth drivers. In computer accessories, hybrid work and duplicate setups, multi-monitor workstations, ergonomics and wellness, and security and privacy continue to support demand.
In gaming accessories, the expanding player base, new console launches, technology upgrades, and major AAA game releases provide compelling avenues for growth. As hardware costs normalize and category demand improves, we believe ACCO Brands will be well-positioned to capture the recovery through new product innovation, expanded distribution, and cross-selling across our global channels. We are expecting several positive near-term catalysts, such as the fourth quarter release of "Grand Theft Auto VI" and continued Switch 2 adoption, as well as our own new product introductions. EPOS, our premium audio offering, continues to perform in line with expectations. The integration is progressing well.
EPOS is now being sold alongside Kensington in both the U.S. and EMEA, and we are already seeing early cross-selling wins. Our recent acquisitions have added exceptional industry talent and deep category expertise. We retained key leaders from EPOS and Trust to lead our technology platform, bringing proven knowledge of the markets, consumers, and channels we serve. The platform serves retail and enterprise customers, each with a tailored go-to-market approach, innovation roadmap, and service model. With the right leadership, portfolio, and operating structure now in place, we are confident in our ability to execute with greater focus and speed to unlock the full potential of these businesses and to return the categories to sustainable growth.
Our second priority is to stabilize Learning & Creative and Workspace Solutions. In these categories, we are established category leaders with trusted brands, resilient market positions, and strong cash flow generation that supports investment and growth and debt reduction. Learning & Creative represents approximately 30% of pro forma annualized sales. This back-to-school season, the categories grew in North America and Mexico, with early improvement emerging in Brazil. Over the longer term, we expect the category to remain stable or grow modestly through innovation, market share gains, and pricing actions. In Workspace Solutions, the rate of decline moderated in 2026, and the category now represents approximately 40% of annualized pro forma sales.
We are managing the categories for value through SKU rationalization, disciplined cost control, pricing, and a greater emphasis on attractive adjacent categories such as ergonomics and wellness. Our third priority is to improve earnings and cash flow. We remain on track to deliver $100 million multi-year cost reduction target. This program is simplifying our operating platform and strengthening profitability, cash generation, and earnings power. Additionally, we are realizing EPOS cost synergies, with $6 million of annualized savings expected in 2026 and approximately $15 million expected by the end of 2027. For Trust, we have identified $5 million-$8 million of cost synergies to be realized during the first 18 months of ownership.
Our capital allocation priorities remain debt reduction in support of the dividend. We will maintain a disciplined approach to leverage. Any near-term transaction must meet rigorous financial and strategic criteria and be leverage neutral. Let me close with three key takeaways. First, our established categories are stabilizing and generating meaningful cash flow, providing a strong foundation for the company. Second, our cost actions are expanding earnings power and cash flow, making ACCO Brands leaner, more resilient, and better positioned for the future. Third, we are building a scaled Technology Peripherals platform across Kensington, EPOS, PowerA, and Trust in categories with significant long-term growth and earnings potential.
As market conditions improve and hardware costs normalize, we believe we are well-positioned to accelerate performance. I am confident in our strategy, encouraged by our progress, and energized by the opportunities ahead. With that, let me turn the call over to Deb, our Chief Financial Officer, who will review the financial results and our outlook.
Deb O'Connor: Thank you, Tom, and good morning, everyone. We delivered third-quarter sales in line with outlook. EPS was greater than our outlook due to the tariff refund, as underlying adjusted EPS was at the low end of our guidance. Soft market conditions in several of our categories continued, with the timing and mix of sales negatively impacting our margin in the quarter. Our cost management initiatives remain in place with good controls on our spend. During the quarter, we received $21 million in cash tariff refunds. These refunds increased our gross margin rate by 520 basis points, improved adjusted operating income by $15 million, and EPS by $0.11.
This week, we received almost $5 million in additional tariff refunds, but have not included them in our outlook. In the fourth quarter, we acquired Trust, a European-centric Technology Peripherals company, which generates approximately $100 million in annual revenue. Trust has a broad assortment in computer and gaming accessories. We expect the acquisition to be modestly accretive to EPS in the first 12 months, with a seasonally strong fourth quarter. We also expect to realize $5 million-$8 million in synergies within the first 18 months of closing. Turning to our third-quarter results, reported sales declined 1%, while comparable sales decreased nearly 6%.
The decline in the quarter was primarily driven by industry headwinds across Technology Peripherals, which were partially offset by growth from the EPOS acquisition and favorable foreign exchange. Adjusted gross profit increased 8% to $136 million, and adjusted gross margin expanded 290 basis points to 35.9%. The tariff refunds increased the margin rate, which more than offset unfavorable product and customer mix. Our quarterly margin rate was impacted by the disruption from last year's tariff and the timing of other associated costs, as well as the lag in our pricing initiatives. Our rate on a year-to-date basis is more in line with our historical trends, and we anticipate an improved rate in the fourth quarter.
Adjusted SG&A expense was $89 million, a modest increase to the prior year, reflecting the addition of EPOS and higher incentive compensation expense. Importantly, our disciplined cost management has offset inflationary pressures. Our cost savings program delivered more than $10 million of savings in the quarter, bringing our year-to-date savings to over $30 million. Adjusted operating income increased to $48 million as tariff refunds and cost savings more than offset the impact of a lower gross margin rate, as well as fixed cost deleveraging from organic volumes. I'll now turn to our third quarter segment performance. In the Americas, reported sales declined 3% and comparable sales decreased 6%.
The comparable sales decline reflects lower demand for Technology Peripherals, as well as customer timing and product mix. A highlight is that North America back-to-school sales increased mid-single digits for the full season, and we gained share in the note-taking category. Americas adjusted operating income increased to $38 million, and the adjusted operating margin rate expanded 290 basis points to 17.3%. This includes the benefit from tariff refunds. As mentioned previously, the decline in the underlying margin rate reflects timing and mix issues. Strategic pricing actions have been implemented, which will benefit future quarters. We maintained rigorous cost controls throughout the segment. In the international segment, reported sales increased 3% while comparable sales declined 6%.
The EPOS acquisition drove reported growth, while the comparable sales decline reflected lower Technology Peripheral sales and an improved rate of decline in Workspace Solutions. International adjusted operating income was $17 million, with a margin rate at 10.6%. Both increased versus the prior year, driven by pricing and cost reductions. Consistent with our normal seasonality, we generally use cash in the first half of the year and generate significant cash flow in the second half of the year. Year-to-date free cash flow was $89 million, an increase of $63 million from the prior year, which includes the $21 million benefit from tariff refunds. The remaining increase reflects improved working capital and disciplined spending.
We ended the quarter with an unusually high cash balance of $175 million, which included the funds to purchase Trust on October 1st. During the quarter, we returned $7 million to shareholders through dividends. We ended the quarter with approximately $254 million of available borrowing capacity under our revolver and a consolidated leverage ratio of 3.6x, below our debt covenant of 4.25x. Turning to our outlook, our underlying operations continue to perform in line with our expectations. We are raising our 2026 full-year outlook to reflect the impact of tariff refunds and the Trust acquisition. We now expect reported sales growth of 4%-6% and adjusted EPS of $0.98-$1.02.
We expect free cash flow to be approximately $100 million and to end the year with a consolidated leverage ratio of approximately 3.5x. While the near-term demand environment remains constrained in parts of our portfolio, we remain confident in our long-term outlook. With our established brands, broader global channels, and a more efficient operating platform, we believe ACCO Brands is well-positioned to capitalize as markets improve. Now, let's move on to Q&A, where Tom and I will be happy to answer your questions. Operator?
Operator: We will now begin the question-and-answer session. If you would like to ask a question, please press star one to raise your hand. To withdraw your question, press star one again. We ask that you pick up your handset when asking a question to allow for optimum sound quality. If you are muted locally, please remember to unmute your device. Please stand by while we compile the Q&A roster. Your first question is from the line of Joe Gomes with Noble Capital. Joe, your line is open.
Joe Gomes: Good morning. Thanks for taking my questions.
Tom Tedford: Good morning, Joe.
Deb O'Connor: Hi, Joe.
Joe Gomes: I want to start off with the holiday season here for the Technology Peripherals and gaming products. I was just wondering, what kind of gives you confidence there? What are your concerns there? At what point here, we're already through October, do you get a clear idea of how that season is going to actually play out?
Tom Tedford: Yeah, Joe. Good question. First, let me just talk a little bit about our concerns, which we mentioned in our prepared remarks. We believe that, particularly in the U.S., the consumer environment is constrained, right? Discretionary spending is down, and obviously gaming accessories are discretionary. As we go into holiday, there are some macro trends that are favorable for us, including some nice game releases, most notably the GTA VI release that is anticipated in November. So it's early in terms of sellout. Our position is about as we anticipated in terms of retail with the number of peg positions that we've earned with our new product releases.
So we're cautiously optimistic that it's going to perform to our expectations, but it's still early, and a lot of it will depend on sell-through and POS, and we really won't know that until after the quarter ends.
Joe Gomes: Okay. Thanks. With the back-to-school, it sounded a little, maybe a little better than originally anticipated. Where were the ending inventory levels at retailers? Would you say that they are kind of where you expected, lower or better, or higher than expected? We have a little idea of what things might look like as we start to turn the page into 2027.
Tom Tedford: Sure. Let me comment on back-to-school first, and then we will talk a little bit about inventory. Really pleased with the season overall. Mexico was our shining star. Their back-to-school season, our business was up almost 20%. Both in the U.S. and Canada, our businesses performed well, up mid-single digits. All of our back-to-school brands grew this year, and our brands took market share. So, we had what we would determine as an exceptional back-to-school season. Our inventory positions that we get visibility to with the large retailers here in the U.S., they exited the season essentially in line with their expectations.
We are in the season in which we present our assortments for 2027 here in the U.S., so we are getting feedback now. It is a bit early for us to talk about what positions we have earned, what positions are potentially at risk, but we feel really good about our season. We feel good about the retailers' inventory positions in our categories, and we are optimistic about next year.
Joe Gomes: Great. One more, if I may. Fourth quarter free cash flow, you talked about year-to-date, it has been adding $89 million, and the goal is $100 million. It seems like that is a little muted. Maybe you could remind us. I know, obviously, it is a second-half story every year for free cash flow. This fourth quarter, is it a little bit less than historically when you look at the overall for the year, or is that more in line?
Deb O'Connor: Yeah. No, good question, Joe. I think we looked at the fourth quarter this year with a conservative view, quite frankly, just given the integrations that we are doing and some of the restructurings, and the uncertainty on some of our working capital items. But, generally, it is a little bit lower. It is a little more muted than what we have seen historically, but like I said, I think we went into it with a pretty conservative view.
Joe Gomes: Okay, great. Thanks for that. Appreciate it. I will get back in queue.
Tom Tedford: Thank you, Joe.
Operator: Your next question is from the line of Greg Burns with Sidoti & Company. Greg, your line is now open.
Greg Burns: Morning. You mentioned the rate of decline in the Workspace Solutions improving. How much was it down this quarter?
Tom Tedford: Yeah. First, we have seen moderation from Workspace Solutions, and that wasn't just by accident, right? Our team has done a really nice job of protecting market shares, gaining listings, introducing new products, really across the globe. Really pleased in particular with our European colleagues and the new product development work that they've done over the last couple years, and its contributions to revenue. In fact, in Europe, our largest brand, Leitz, is essentially flat year-to-date, which is almost exclusively in our Workspace Solutions categories. We're doing a really nice job organically of the work that needed to take place and to ensure that our business performed better than it has historically.
It's down low single digits, really across the globe. It's different by market, and different by category. We have some categories that are actually up this year in Workspace Solutions. It's really a good trend to see, and I'm excited about the future.
Greg Burns: Could you just maybe give us more detail on that? So, like, how much the declining categories, what percent of that business of that 40% is in declining categories, and what percent of that business is in those more defensible categories like Leitz or maybe some of these others that are actually growing? Just trying to get a sense of the trajectory of the overall segment.
Tom Tedford: Yeah. That's a little bit more of a difficult question to answer. I would anticipate next year, as we think about looking ahead, the work that we're doing to continue to add new products into the portfolio in key categories like wellness and ergonomics are going to offset some of the headwinds that we see in some of our paper-based product categories. But even those this year, Greg, performed quite well. We saw, for example, stapling is roughly flat year-to-date in sales across the globe. So, it depends on the year, it depends on our market position, it depends on our listings, it depends on what we've gained in category reviews.
It's a little bit of a difficult answer to give you, but I can tell you the work that we're doing is shifting more of our focus to categories like ergonomics and wellness, and lamination, all of which are showing good signs of growth, not only internally at ACCO Brands, but in the market.
Greg Burns: Okay. The Technology Peripherals category, could you give us how much that was down this quarter, and then by category, by gaming and by computer?
Tom Tedford: Sure. Yeah, it was down. Unfortunately, it was down kind of low double digits in the global business, and they were about down the same. Gaming and enterprise products were down about the same, but they have very different drivers. Our business in gaming is largely dependent on consoles. Console demand has been muted pretty significantly this year. Switch 2 has underperformed expectations in the market. We're optimistic as we look ahead that the adoption of Switch 2 will improve. Got new console releases scheduled for the next two years, and we have much better gaming titles that are being introduced this holiday season. We're optimistic that the rate of decline will improve in Q4 and 2027 in gaming.
In Technology Peripherals for computer accessories, it's really a story of laptops, right? Global laptop sales are down 20%. We tend to attach more to new laptop deployments than perhaps others, and that has really been an issue all year for us. It has muted demand for our products. As that improves, obviously demand for our products should follow.
Greg Burns: Okay, great. Well, thank you.
Tom Tedford: You are welcome. Thank you.
Operator: Your next question is from the line of Kevin Steinke with Barrington Research Associates. Kevin, your line is open. Please go ahead.
Kevin Steinke: Hey, good morning. Wanted to start out by asking just about the Technology Peripherals acquisitions you have made. You have done EPOS and Trust now. In your earnings release, you mentioned that you now have a scaled platform, and that your focus is on integrating the brand. Do you feel like you have the footprint you need now in the Technology Peripherals space, or are you going to still be looking to add potentially through more acquisitions?
Tom Tedford: Yeah, Kevin, first, good morning, and thank you for the question. We are excited to add EPOS and Trust into the portfolio. They addressed a couple of strategic weaknesses in our legacy product assortment. First, EPOS is premium audio, which the Kensington portfolio just did not offer, and we thought that was an important product category to round out our enterprise assortment. So that was the strategic rationale behind EPOS. As we look at Trust, that enables us to really broaden our channel approach in gaming and computer accessories. Our computer accessories is predominantly in enterprise deployments, and our gaming assortment is predominantly in the U.S. and predominantly through mass retail. So it is a channel diversity play for us.
We think with the additional categories and the additional channels that we have acquired, and the additional concentration of sales in different markets outside of the U.S., we think it gives us a scalable platform that is balanced from a product and a channel perspective globally. That was really the intent. As it relates to future acquisitions, I think we will be opportunistic. We will look at those, but they do have to meet very rigorous, both strategic and financial rationale. Candidly, we have some work to do to finalize the integration of EPOS and then complete the integration of Trust.
So we have got plenty of work sitting in front of us, but we will look if there is something that is available, and it is hard to commit to if there will be or when it might present itself, but we will certainly look opportunistically in the future.
Kevin Steinke: Okay. Great. That makes sense. You kind of touched on it, but when you think about Technology Peripherals and potentially hardware costs normalizing, do you kind of have a line of sight into that or any thoughts on kind of when the market starts to normalize a bit?
Tom Tedford: Yeah. We get data from external sources that we trust and we feel confident in, and the future-looking data suggests that the trends improve throughout 2027. While that is encouraging, that is not going to be our only source of growth opportunities. We are working hard to leverage the additional capabilities that we have acquired through the two companies in 2026. We think there are some significant growth synergy opportunities ahead as we look at the expansion of Trust globally, the co-selling of EPOS and Kensington to enterprise customers. We are going to leverage things that we can control to drive growth in 2027, and hopefully the market backdrop will improve.
Kevin Steinke: Okay. Thanks. I wanted to just maybe delve a little bit more into the gross margin, excluding the tariff refund. I think you said tariff refund was a benefit of 520 basis points. You had mentioned unfavorable product and customer mix, so just any more color on that? I think you mentioned you expect improvement in the fourth quarter.
Deb O'Connor: That is right. I think with the tariffs last year and all the disruptions in the second and third quarters, we have had some ups and downs, I guess I would say. If you look at the year-to-date, it is much better than what the quarter was. The single biggest issue really was kind of our customer and product mix, which we do see improving in the fourth quarter, which should raise that margin rate. We are also still seeing some fixed cost deleveraging because our organic volumes are down. It has been a bit of a promotional environment for some of our categories in the quarter. So, we are expecting it to get better.
Year-to-date was better than the quarter, and kind of get back to more historical rates.
Kevin Steinke: Okay. Thanks. Thanks for taking the questions. I will turn it back over.
Tom Tedford: Okay, Kevin. Thank you.
Operator: Your next question is from the line of William Reuter with Bank of America. William, your line is now open.
William Reuter: Good morning. My first question, I think there continue to be challenges with chip shortages. Are you experiencing this? I guess, do you anticipate potentially having any supply chain disruption if demand surrounding Grand Theft Auto VI's launch is robust?
Tom Tedford: It's a good question, Bill. Our supply chain teams and commercial teams have aligned to forecast, and we think that the good work that they've done and our work with our suppliers have put us in a really good position, better than competitive position in terms of chip availability. We don't anticipate any issues, even with potential increased demand, really through the next few quarters. We're in a good position.
William Reuter: Good to hear. Deb, you had mentioned some deleveraging of fixed costs due to volume declines. I know that there is such a breadth of products that trying to look at volume versus price is a little bit challenging, but is there any context you can provide for what price did to your revenue in the quarter?
Deb O'Connor: Yeah. I think we had a couple points of price. As we look out, we're continuing to look at the cost environment and just what's happening, because I think, as you know better than me, all companies are struggling with where costs are going to go in the near term. But we have priced appropriately. We still have some to go, and I'd say it's a couple percent.
William Reuter: Got it. A couple percent in total, if I were to look at the benefit to the quarter?
Deb O'Connor: Yeah, and throughout the year-to-date, more or less.
William Reuter: Got it. I guess just lastly, and this is kind of a counterpoint to my first question, but GTA VI has been delayed multiple times. If that were to be delayed into very close to the holiday season, do you think that your earnings would be at significant risk?
Tom Tedford: I don't. We've got pretty good line of sight into October. There's certainly some revenue risk, but I think the revenue that we are expecting from the GTA VI launch is back half of the quarter dependent based on what we don't see, meaning we have to have strong POS, and we're talking weeks, Bill, not months. We've sold in a big portion of what the initial sets will be, and it'll be a POS-driven last few weeks of the year. While we're excited about it, while we think it's important, particularly to build momentum into 2027, I don't see material risk to the quarter if it's delayed or if it under-indexes expectations.
William Reuter: Got it. Good news. Okay, that's all for me. Thank you.
Tom Tedford: Okay, Bill. Thank you.
Operator: This concludes our Q&A. I will now turn the call back to Tom Tedford for closing remarks.
Tom Tedford: Thank you, everyone, for joining us. Our third quarter results were in line with our outlook, and our priorities remain clear. Integrate EPOS and Trust, deliver our cost and synergy commitments, and reduce debt. Continued cost discipline and productivity improvements position us to deliver improved profits and cash flow. With a streamlined operating structure and leading brands, we have a strong platform to generate free cash flow while repositioning ACCO Brands toward faster-growing Technology Peripherals categories. I want to thank the ACCO Brands team for its dedication and good work. We appreciate your interest in ACCO Brands, and I look forward to speaking with you when we report our fourth quarter results in February.
Operator: This concludes today's call. Thank you for attending. You may now disconnect.
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