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Academy Sports and Outdoors, Inc. (ASO)

Q4 2025 Earnings Call· Tue, Mar 17, 2026

$54.62

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Good morning, and welcome to the Academy Sports and Outdoors, Inc. Fourth Quarter Fiscal 2025 Results Conference Call. The call is being recorded, and all participants are in a listen-only mode. Following the prepared remarks, there will be a brief question-and-answer session. Questions will be limited to analysts and investors, with one follow-up. Please press 0 on your telephone keypad. I would now like to turn the call over to Dan Aldridge, Vice President, Investor Relations for Academy Sports and Outdoors, Inc.

Dan Aldridge

Management

Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining the Academy Sports and Outdoors, Inc. Fourth Quarter and Fiscal Year 2025 Financial Results Call. Participating on today's call are Steve Lawrence, Chief Executive Officer, and Carl Ford, Chief Financial Officer. As a reminder, today's earnings release and the comments made by management during this call include forward-looking statements. These statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause our actual results to differ materially from our expectations and projections. These risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to, the factors identified in the earnings release and in our most recent 10-Ks and 10-Q filings. The company undertakes no obligation to revise any forward-looking statements. Today's remarks also refer to certain non-GAAP financial measures. Reconciliations to the most comparable GAAP measures are included in today's earnings release, which is available at investors.academy.com. This morning, we will review our financial results for the fourth quarter of 2025 and the full year, provide an update on strategic initiatives, discuss outlook for the year, and share guidance for the full year fiscal 2026. After we conclude prepared remarks, there will be time for questions. With that, I will turn the call over to CEO, Steve Lawrence.

Steve Lawrence

Management

Thanks, Dan, and good morning to everyone on the line today. On our call this morning, we plan to cover our fourth quarter and full year results for 2025, along with providing initial guidance for 2026. I will remind you that we also have an Analyst Day planned for April 7 in New York City that will also be webcast. We will go into more detail on our long-range plan and how the investments we have been making in 2025 and 2026 play into our multiyear strategy. I will start with the fourth quarter, which played out largely as we forecast, with sales coming in at $1,700,000,000, which is a 2.5% increase versus last year and translated into a negative 1.6% comp decrease. These results were within our implied guidance range for the quarter. As we shared on our last call, sales were strong over the Thanksgiving and Cyber Week time periods. Similar to prior years, we saw customer spending patterns soften in December and then surge during the week leading into Christmas, which continued into the last week of the month. January was softer than we anticipated, primarily driven by the large winter storms in the last ten days of the month, which caused roughly half of our stores to be partially or fully shut down for two to three days. We saw the business rebound once our stores reopened. As we discussed on prior calls, the big unknown for us this holiday was how the customer was going to react to the inflationary pressures on pricing for goods that were imported from overseas. Our forecast was for average unit retails to be up low double digits for the quarter. We delivered against that by raising our average unit retails up 10% through a combination of promotional optimization, growing…

Carl Ford

Management

Thank you, Steve. Fourth quarter net sales were $1,700,000,000, up 2.5%, and comparable sales were down 1.6%. Breaking down the comp, transactions were down 6.4% while ticket was up 5.1%. In the fourth quarter, Academy Sports and Outdoors, Inc. generated net income of $133,700,000 and diluted earnings per share of $1.98. Fourth quarter adjusted net income was $132,900,000, or $1.97 in adjusted diluted earnings per share. Gross margin of 33.6% in the fourth quarter was up 140 basis points versus last year and exceeded our implied guidance. The majority of the expansion was driven by efficiency gains in our supply chain and the lapping of costs incurred for port disruption from the prior year. Merch margin, inclusive of tariffs, was flat as we managed prices while maintaining alignment with our value pricing strategy. SG&A expenses came in at 23.7% of sales for the fourth quarter, an increase of approximately $21,000,000, or 70 basis points. The increase was driven by growth initiatives totaling approximately 135 basis points, comprised of 115 basis points of new store growth, as we have opened 24 new stores in the last twelve months, and 20 basis points of technology investments to fuel our omnichannel growth. The acceleration in new store growth from 2022 to 2025 has had an outsized impact on SG&A expense growth, but as we move through 2026, the number of new stores at 20 to 25 will be similar to FY25. Looking at the balance sheet, we ended the quarter with $330,000,000 in cash, which was a 14% increase from the prior year. Our inventory balance was $1,500,000,000, an increase of 15% compared to last year. On a per-store basis, inventory dollars were up 6.3% while inventory units were flat. For the full year, we generated $435,000,000 in cash from operations, of which…

Operator

Operator

Thank you. At this time, we will be conducting a question-and-answer session. You may press 2 if you would like to remove your question from the queue. As a reminder, we ask that you please limit to one question and one follow-up. For participants using speaker equipment, it may be necessary to pick up your handset before pressing the star key. One moment, please, while we poll for questions. Our first question comes from Christopher Horvers with JPMorgan. Your line is now live.

Christopher Horvers

Analyst

Thanks. Good morning, guys. So my first question is on sales. You mentioned a large number of store closures in January. Can you quantify how much of a headwind that was to your overall performance in the fourth quarter? And then as we try to parse out what the right underlying trend in the business is, where are you any specificity on where you are running quarter to date? You did have weather headwinds that you lapped last year in February, and then March was not that much better. And then you have had the war recently, which I think historically when these events happen, it does drive some sort of run on the ammo business. So how do you think about the puts and takes of what the right underlying trend is? And have you seen any of that impact from what is going on around?

Steve Lawrence

Management

Yes, sure. I will start. So, Chris, we saw trends coming through Christmas pretty strong in the last week leading up to Christmas and even the week after Christmas. January was actually running positive for us. We had roughly half of our stores closed for about three days. It was over a weekend this year versus last year where we had some weather; it was during the week. If you took those three days out where we had roughly half of our stores shut down, we were running a positive comp in the mid-single-digit range. We estimate that was probably worth about 100 basis points in comp of a headwind for us within Q4. We were pleased to see, though, that once the stores reopened, as we said, the business resumed. February was strong. We were happy with the positive comps. We had positive comps across every division. That has continued into early March, so it feels pretty broad-based. I would tell you that ammo, the category you just mentioned, got better during the quarter in Q4. We talked on the previous call about how we were up against the run-up part of the election in Q3, and we saw that business start to stabilize in Q4. It started off running down high single digits; by the end of the quarter it was running down low single digits. It was running positive comp in February before the war kicked off a couple of weeks ago, and then since then, it has obviously accelerated a little bit. But it has also been a solid business for us. It probably was aided a little bit by current events.

Christopher Horvers

Analyst

Understood. And then my follow-up question, Carl, is on the SG&A side. You mentioned that you are going to annualize; you will have two back-to-back years of similar unit growth. As you look at what has happened, you know, ex the lapping, you will lap Jordan, the Jordan rollout, and some of the costs that you put in on the advertising and the updates there. But you have been running 6%, 7%. It looks like we were thinking that was the right trend here in 2026, but the guidance seems to imply about 2% to 3% SG&A growth this year. Is there anything, like how much of that is the annualization of a similar number of store opens? Is there some investments that are being dialed back, or anything unique to get down to that math? I know you mentioned the cadence of the year and how the stores are going to be weighted. So any additional detail on that would be helpful as well. Thanks so much.

Carl Ford

Management

Yes. So the main driver of our SG&A growth has been the store increases, and so as we move from 16 in 2024 to 24 in FY25, that had an outsized impact. We are guiding 20 to 25. We think that is the right number for us next year. We feel good about all of the openings. Simply not having the growth in the number of units—it will be about 8% unit growth for us—provides a good level of leverage. As it relates to next year’s guidance, at the midpoint, what is implied is modest leverage from an SG&A standpoint. I will remind you that in 2025, we had $7,500,000 in the Jordan launch cost that was associated with primarily the 145 shop doors. That is going to be less this year, and it will be in Q2, not Q1. And then overall, we are looking for ways to leverage in the business, doing things smarter and more efficiently. We found some automation opportunities—that is helpful—and we are going to have modest leverage next year at the midpoint.

Christopher Horvers

Analyst

Thanks very much. Have a great spring.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Simeon Gutman with Morgan Stanley. Your line is now live.

Simeon Gutman

Analyst · Morgan Stanley. Your line is now live.

Good morning, guys. So if you look at 2025 in the rearview mirror, discretionary spend was fairly light across the board for most end markets, but you were lapping easier compares and you did add a few initiatives, which are working, still seem promising. So looking at the following year—and I appreciate the range, and it is early, and there is a lot of geopolitical things brewing—but, big picture, the return to positive comps, why do you think it is taking as long as it is given initiatives and the drivers and the confidence of landing maybe in the higher end of that range for this year?

Steve Lawrence

Management

Yes. I think when we talked about guidance, Simeon, we were looking at the puts and the takes. I would say from a headwind perspective, I think that the consumer was under pressure, as you noted, last year. I think that persisted throughout most of the year, and I think that was probably the one thing that stopped us from getting all the way across the line to get a positive comp. I will note that we actually grew the top line last year, which is the first time since 2021 that we have grown the top line, so that is a good starting point, but we know delivering consecutive positive comps is the key moving forward. That is why we really talked about some of the growth initiatives we have, both self-help as well as some external. You look at our .com business; that has been surging and was up almost 14% last year. I think we have a really good foundational base there. We are going to continue to lean into that. I think some of the moves the team is making and leaning into AI are really going to help out there. The new stores continue to get stronger. We mentioned that our new stores that opened from '22 to '24 ran a mid-single-digit positive comp, and we had roughly 25, 26 that we were feeling that last year. That number doubles this year as more stores fill in the comp base. That becomes an increasing tailwind. I cannot underestimate the impact of this loyalty credit card relaunch and integration. That is a big, big deal for us. It was two separate programs based off when we launched them. I think integrating it is really going to allow us to start delivering value to the consumer. Then you think about other things. We have got some outsized growth in some categories we are carrying, like work and westernwear—those are trending lifestyle initiatives out there that we are really doubling down on this year. We will continue to lean into newness with all the things we have mentioned on the call. Then you have the external tailwinds like the tax refunds, World Cup, and then obviously the 250th anniversary of the United States. So we feel like we have got a really good point of view around what we think the headwinds are. We think we have got a lot of self-help as well as external tailwinds that allow us to get back to positive comps. We think this is the year that happens.

Simeon Gutman

Analyst · Morgan Stanley. Your line is now live.

Thanks. And a follow-up, the store economic model—if you step back, how is the profitability ramp of the newer stores? And then given the lighter comp backdrop, how do you think of the year-two, year-three stores, or the economic model with the returns producing the way you thought?

Carl Ford

Management

Yes, thanks for asking. Our stores in year one are a little bit better than what we anticipated. And with mid-single-digit comps for those that are in the comp set—and that is after the fourteenth month that they enter the comp set—they are performing well. So we are pretty pleased with it. We have seen some opportunities to infill in legacy and existing markets. Those typically perform a little bit better than those in our newer markets where we are establishing brand awareness. From an economic model standpoint, from a CapEx standpoint, it is $2.5 to $3.5 million of net CapEx, and then we invest some incremental inventory there too. We expect a 20% ROIC. From a multiyear standpoint, from a growth trajectory, what we are seeing is that they continue to grow. In the legacy markets, it is pretty steady growth, and then in the new markets, when you look at those that are in the comp set, they are growing well into years two and three as well. Again, we like what we are seeing. We have learned a ton over time since we started launching in 2022. We feel really good about the 2026 cohort.

Simeon Gutman

Analyst · Morgan Stanley. Your line is now live.

Thanks. Good luck. See you in a couple weeks.

Steve Lawrence

Management

Thanks.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from John Heinbockel with Guggenheim Securities. Your line is now live.

John Heinbockel

Analyst · Guggenheim Securities. Your line is now live.

Hey, guys. I wanted to start with this year, the waterfall effect of new stores. Looks like that could be, I do not know, 60 or 70 basis points or something like that at a mid-single digit. Is that fair? Does that sort of suggest mature stores you think will be flattish? And then the impact of loyalty and Mastercard launch, could that be as impactful as the waterfall? How would you sort of compare the two?

Steve Lawrence

Management

I think you are in the right range, John. I think that we saw mid-single-digit growth last year in the 2022 through 2024 vintage stores, and you multiply that times the percentage they contribute, it is probably about a 30 basis point tailwind last year that will probably come close to doubling this year. I think you can assume a very similar sort of lift for the loyalty relaunch. And I will remind you, that is for about a half a year because we are really kicking the full relaunch off heading into Father’s Day. So we will also get the benefit of that as we lap the first half of next year as well. So we are really excited about both those initiatives.

John Heinbockel

Analyst · Guggenheim Securities. Your line is now live.

And then maybe as a follow-up, I know there has been a lot of opportunity with regard to supply chain, which I guess has been pushed out a little bit. What is the current update on all of the initiatives? Some of it is technology. Some of it is throughput. Where are we on that? Where are we tracking?

Carl Ford

Management

Yes. From a supply chain standpoint, I will get to the future-facing in a second, but we did see the majority of our gross margin gains in the fourth quarter through the supply chain. Some was from lapping—I do not even know if people remember this, but in Q3 and Q4, there were proposed East Coast port strikes. We took some mitigating activities. We were up against those. The efficiencies that we saw in 2025 were more than just the lapping, and I think Rob Howell, our Chief Supply Chain Officer, is doing a great job as it relates to driving efficiencies out of transportation as well as DC efficiency. Moving forward, I would like to couch the majority of the ongoing benefit because we are going to contextualize that in the Analyst Day on April 7, but we have rolled out one of our distribution centers on the Manhattan Active warehouse management program. We are looking to slate the Katy distribution center and the Cookeville distribution center later. It will not be in 2026. We have got some pretty good efficiencies that are going on there right now based off the unitary management there, and that is implied within the guidance. As it relates to beyond that, I still feel really good about the supply chain efficiencies that we spoke about previously, but I would like to give you more color—if you do not mind, I would like to wait until April 7 to speak to beyond 2026.

John Heinbockel

Analyst · Guggenheim Securities. Your line is now live.

Sure. Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Brian Nagel with Oppenheimer. Your line is now live.

Brian Nagel

Analyst · Oppenheimer. Your line is now live.

Hi, good morning. Thank you for taking my question. I want to—look, a lot of questions and a lot of focus on just this path towards consistent positive comps at Academy. The way I want to frame the question is, today we are hearing, and over the last few quarters, it seems as though the tools to get there are taking shape. You have the new stores and the new product launches, e-commerce effort, etcetera. But we are still not there yet. The question is, is there something in the business, maybe aside from a more difficult macro backdrop, that is offsetting all those positives that are taking shape, that is becoming a bigger headwind for Academy and its push towards positive comps?

Steve Lawrence

Management

I would say if you go back and look at 2025 in a vacuum, probably one of the bigger headwinds we faced was ammo. That is a big business for us. It does move the needle, and there were a lot of events that drove that business in 2024 that were not there in 2025. But outside of that, I would say there is nothing I would point to outside of just getting these initiatives and strategies really mature and starting to contribute fully. I think that is the thing that is going to allow us to break through and post a positive comp, and that is why we are excited about all the different initiatives we put together. We are seeing really good green shoots beneath the surface on all the initiatives we talked about, and we think this is the year where all those things culminate and pull together and get us across the line. So we are seeing momentum in the business coming out of Christmas into the first part of this year. We want to be very muted about what we see from a consumer backdrop out there, but we are encouraged by what we are seeing, and we think that the culmination of all those initiatives is what it is going to take to get us there.

Carl Ford

Management

I agree with everything Steve said. The primary headwind is the economic health—the financial health—of the American consumer. That is what is moving against e-com being up 13.6%, new stores mid-single-digit comps, Nike and Jordan taken together—because we did not have Jordan the previous year—up high single digits. That headwind, except for the category of ammo that Steve spoke to, is the financial health of the American consumer. And that is embedded within our guidance. We feel great about the initiatives moving forward. But I am seeing credit card delinquencies at double what they were in 2024. I feel job growth in America is not going to be strong in 2026. I think that gas staying high—we are just really conscious of a headwind associated with financial health.

Brian Nagel

Analyst · Oppenheimer. Your line is now live.

That is very helpful. And, Carl, I guess my follow-up will be—just to—you made the comment just a second ago about gas prices. So obviously a very big focus right now for the market. A lot of questions of how high and the duration. But given the nature of your business and your consumer and given where your stores are generally located, historically have you seen higher or elevated oil or gas prices more of a friend or foe for your consumers?

Steve Lawrence

Management

Yes. I will jump in here, Brian. I would tell you that, obviously, gas prices being high is not good for discretionary spending in America. That is not a good thing for us or for any of our competitors because it just takes more share of wallet from the consumer. On the flip side, to the point I think you are alluding to, we have a big base of stores in Texas, and higher oil prices lead to higher rig count. Higher rig count leads to higher employment in the oil patch, and that sometimes can be a tailwind for us. We are not going to prognosticate on how long this is going to take or how long this is going to play out. But there are definitely puts and takes with what is going on in the world today. We got a question earlier about the impact on some of our categories. Ammo tends to be one of those categories that reacts positively when we have events like this happen. So we are watching it closely. We are not trying to prognosticate about what is going to happen in the war, but we think we have a really good balanced approach based off of the backdrop that Carl mentioned, as well as the self-help initiatives that we have internally to help us overcome those headwinds.

Brian Nagel

Analyst · Oppenheimer. Your line is now live.

Very helpful. I appreciate all the color. Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Michael Lasser with UBS. Your line is now live.

Michael Lasser

Analyst · UBS. Your line is now live.

Good morning. Thank you so much for taking my question. I wanted to mention some of the puts and takes on your sales outlook for this year. Carl, in your remarks, you talked about a 200 to 300 basis point swing from the low end to the high end of the guide based on macro factors, and yet you are also pointing to some good guys from the macro, whether it is tax refunds, the World Cup, or the 250th anniversary celebration. So are you factoring in around 200 to 300 basis points of a contribution from those factors? Because a year from now, when we are having this conversation, we are going to have to dimension how much of your performance in 2026 is based on what Academy is doing versus how much was based on macro, and it will be very helpful to understand what you assumed within your outlook. Thank you.

Carl Ford

Management

Yes. So we started with what our plan is, and it is not a range. It is what we think we are going to deliver. Our self-help initiatives—the things that we are talking to you about: new stores, e-commerce (aided by all the things that Steve said), the loyalty program—these things that we are launching and, in some cases, building upon, get us to the midpoint of that 2% to 5% guidance range. At the low end, we anticipate that macroeconomic factors stay the same and that the tailwinds associated with those three big events you just mentioned—World Cup, 250th, and elevated tax refunds—are completely negated by macro headwinds. At the top end, the 5%, those macro events, those three things, outweigh the headwind associated with financial pressure on the consumer and give us a little bit of a net tailwind, if you will. So our self-help initiatives get us to the midpoint. The three things that are macro drivers are either going to be overwhelmed by financial pressure of the consumer or will give us some benefit, and that was really what differentiated the 2% to 5% low-high guidance. I will tag on this question, Michael, thanks. The other thing I would say is that when you think about the value of the external tailwinds versus the self-help, the self-help are much greater than the external. We think the World Cup is probably worth about 30 basis points for the year. That being said, we think that just the loyalty credit card alone is equal to that this year with having a half year next year. So that should mute or overcome whatever we would be up against from a World Cup perspective. Tax refunds will be repeated; I do not think those are going to be lower next year. And so then you come back to the 250th anniversary of the United States. Helpful—it certainly can drive a surge in patriotism and help us with red, white, and blue. But it is not as big as the impact of the new store comp waterfall, the impact of .com in our business. So I would say that the majority of what gives us confidence this year about being able to bend the curve and get back to a positive comp is the self-help initiatives that are going to drive it.

Michael Lasser

Analyst · UBS. Your line is now live.

Got you. Very, very helpful. My follow-up question is the changing nature of the Academy model pivoting to maybe a slightly higher income and a slightly higher vendor base that might have a higher expectation for how you showcase their product. So as a result, is that driving an increase in your operating expenses? Because if we look at your results in the fourth quarter, your gross profit dollars actually exceeded the consensus forecast, but operating income was a bit short, and it really all came down to SG&A. And the question is, are you seeing less visibility in your SG&A dollars as you pivot to maybe a higher operating cost model as a result of these changes?

Carl Ford

Management

Yes. I do not think there is an elevated operating cost model. Again, there are some launch costs, which I walked through for Jordan associated with rolling out the shops, and then we do have a Jordan enthusiast that staffs on key time periods for that. But I really would not point to elevated operating costs as the issue. I think, in looking at the consensus for the fourth quarter on an SG&A rate standpoint, we do still pay people when we close our stores. So if that was a 100 basis point headwind to the fourth quarter comp, we still incur some of those costs without having the sales that they provide. But the majority—almost twice as much—of the deleverage, 135 basis points in the fourth quarter, was because of our growth initiatives that we are pretty committed to. Those will normalize as it relates to the number of stores year-over-year in 2026, which is why we are guiding to modest leverage in SG&A in 2026.

Steve Lawrence

Management

The thing I would add on to Carl’s points—I agree with everything he said—is that at our core, we are a value retailer. We are not getting away from that. I want to make sure we do not leave any doubt in anybody’s mind that we are losing focus on that. I think we are in an environment where the lower-end consumer under $50k is really under pressure, is opting out or trading down. We still actively market to them and want them to shop with us. I think we see them come back during times of deep value, like when we run clearance events or when we are in a key time period; we see them come back and shop with us. We see this layering on of better/best brands as the way to somewhat diversify and de-risk our assortment a little bit. From twofold: number one, it helps customers who maybe could not find those brands in our stores previously stay with us and shop when they had to leave. And on the other side of it, I think it is helping us bring in a new customer. So we are still a value-based retailer. We think these new brands help us diversify and de-risk our customer and bring in a slightly more elevated customer, but we do not want you to think in any way, shape, or form that we are losing focus on the value-based customer as well.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Kate McShane with Goldman Sachs. Your line is now live.

Kate McShane

Analyst · Goldman Sachs. Your line is now live.

Hi, thanks for taking our question. We are just curious if we could get a little bit more detail about how each business segment performed during the quarter? And then just as a second unrelated follow-up question, when you are thinking about the loyalty program or this new iteration of the loyalty program, what is being incorporated into the margin implications of that in 2026?

Steve Lawrence

Management

Yes. So from how the different categories worked out in Q4, we saw strength across a lot of our core businesses. Bikes, fishing, outdoor cooking, apparel, electronics, and athletic footwear were all strong. Some of the softer businesses for us during the quarter were more seasonal in nature. So seasonal footwear—think boots—and outerwear. I already mentioned ammo was a little soft. I would say Drinkware was a little soft, primarily driven by lapping some really big numbers from the year before, and Ride Ons was a little tougher for us this holiday. When we went back and looked at it, we had to kind of cobble together an assortment there based off of the tariff environment, trying to find the right goods out there. What is exciting is as we have crossed over into spring and moved to a positive comp, all the businesses are performing pretty well right now. We are seeing pretty broad-based solid business across all the different businesses. Could you repeat the second part of your question, Kate? I was writing something down, and I missed the second part.

Kate McShane

Analyst · Goldman Sachs. Your line is now live.

Oh, yes—just any kind of cost implications from the launch.

Steve Lawrence

Management

Yes. So on the loyalty, what we did is we went back—you know, we always have done different, sometimes targeted, discounts through various loyalty programs that we have. We basically pulled those all together and are bundling them in from a rewards perspective. So we do not expect it to really impact the overall gross margins. It is going to be more repurposing of discounts that we were using in the past for other purposes that we are going to repurpose via loyalty and be much more targeted. So rather than kind of broadly giving out coupons on certain events or certain time periods, it is going to be really targeted at loyalty members, which we think is going to really help us accelerate against them.

Kate McShane

Analyst · Goldman Sachs. Your line is now live.

Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Jonathan, are you muted?

Jonathan Richard Matuszewski

Analyst

Oh, good morning. Can you hear me okay?

Operator

Operator

Yes, now we can.

Jonathan Richard Matuszewski

Analyst

Oh, great. Carl, you mentioned plans for traffic to improve in 2026 versus 2025. So maybe just at the midpoint of your comp range, what is embedded for traffic versus ticket? And how does that change at the lower end and upper bounds of the range?

Carl Ford

Management

We do not really guide based off of traffic, so I do not think I can directly answer your question. But I will say, as it relates to all of the context that we have given around sales growth, all of those are traffic drivers. So new stores, positive comping existing stores, launching and annualizing, gross traffic. E-commerce—we look at a couple of different ways to understand share. We look at Similarweb information associated with session growth, and we see that we are taking share there. We think that some of the agent search—and I do not know if you have looked at our website at Scout, the little assistant that helps you with large language searches—that is going to get better, quicker, faster, stronger. The additional Jordan shops—those are traffic drivers. So we have not overtly guided towards the basket or traffic, but I know that traffic will be improved from what we saw in 2025.

Jonathan Richard Matuszewski

Analyst

Okay. Thank you. And then just a quick follow-up. Just looking for more color in terms of the traffic decline this quarter. I do not know if you can share any details in terms of by income cohort, and understand how the lower-income quintiles are reacting to the AURs versus the other cohorts? Thanks so much.

Steve Lawrence

Management

Yes. So the traffic trends we saw by cohort mirror what we saw all year that we talked about on previous calls. At the high end, we continue to see a double-digit increase in traffic count—low double-digit increase—from customers in households making over $100,000 a year. At the lower end, we continue to see probably a high single-digit decline in those lower-income consumers, and the middle kind of is holding its own. That is the behavior we have seen all year, and it continued into Q4. Once again, I do not think that the AUR increases and the assortment mix are what is really driving the traffic declines in the lower income. I think they are just under pressure and are opting out or trading down. As I mentioned earlier, we do have some different time periods and strategies and tactics we have to try to engage with them. We were pretty pleased with some of the reaction we saw during February around our clearance event. I think that was a lower-income consumer coming back in and really taking advantage of the values there. And once again, as we run other promotional windows later in the year or clearance events, we are going to get that customer to come back, but they are definitely under pressure.

Jonathan Richard Matuszewski

Analyst

Understood. Best of luck. Thanks.

Operator

Operator

Our final question is from Anthony Chukumba with Loop Capital Markets. Your line is now live.

Anthony Chukumba

Analyst

Thank you so much for squeezing me in. I guess I just have one question, two parts. It is on the Jordan brand. Just in terms of how has the brand—you know, it has been, I guess, six or seven months now—how has it performed relative to your initial expectations? And then also, do you think that is going to help with bringing some other high-profile brands that you currently do not have in your merchandise assortment? And, Steve, I think you know which brands I am referring to.

Steve Lawrence

Management

I do, Anthony. Thank you for the question. We are very pleased with the relationship that we have with Nike and the Jordan brand. We do not have a last year for Jordan, so what we can cite is that if you combine Nike and Jordan together, they grew high single digits, which we were very pleased with. And we are going to continue to expand and grow Nike and Jordan. We are getting more access to premium footwear that we are pushing deeper into the chain. You take a performance running shoe like Vomero, and last year we got it at launch. You are going to see that probably go out to roughly 150 doors as we head into back to school. I think how we brought the Jordan brand to life really showed the Nike team, as well as vendors across the spectrum, what we can do when we launch a new brand. And we certainly use that as a proof point as we are talking to new brands. We will share some information around some new brands in the April 7 update, and obviously, if we get to a place where we are ready to announce, we can announce some of the brands you have asked about in the past. Trust me, you will not have to ask us a question. We will probably tell you before you ask us.

Anthony Chukumba

Analyst

Fair enough. I will see you guys in New York.

Steve Lawrence

Management

Okay. Thanks, Anthony.

Operator

Operator

We have reached the end of the question and answer. I would now like to turn the call back over to Steve Lawrence for closing comments.

Steve Lawrence

Management

Thanks. In closing, we made a lot of progress across numerous fronts in 2025, which allowed us to both grow top line sales for the first time in a couple of years as well as continue to gain market share. We believe that we have the strategies and tactics in place to continue this growth in 2026 and move back to comp store growth as well. As always, I would like to thank our 22,000-plus team members for their hard work and efforts, which are helping make Academy the best sports and outdoor retailer in the country. We look forward to meeting with most of you on April 7 and sharing how we plan to build on the initiatives we outlined today in 2026 and beyond. Thank you all for joining our call today, and have a great rest of your day, and happy Saint Patrick’s Day.

Operator

Operator

This concludes today’s conference. You may disconnect your lines at this time, and we thank you for your participation.