Monro Muffler Brake Q1 Earnings Call Highlights

Monro Muffler Brake NASDAQ: MNRO reported a fiscal first-quarter sales decline as lower customer traffic and consumer caution around higher-ticket repairs weighed on results, though management said its marketing, store operations and merchandising initiatives continued to advance. Sales fell 4.6% to $287.1 million in the quarter, Chief Financial Officer Brian D’Ambrosia said. The decrease reflected a $9 million sales impact from the closure of 145 underperforming stores in the first quarter of fiscal 2026, along with a 1.7% decline in comparable-store sales at continuing locations.

Comparable sales rose 1% in April before declining 2% in May and 3% in June. Preliminary July comparable sales were down approximately 1%, according to President and Chief Executive Officer Peter Fitzsimmons. “This was an undeniably difficult fiscal first quarter for Monro,” Fitzsimmons said, citing geopolitical tensions in the Middle East, higher oil prices and resulting pressure on customer spending and traffic across the company’s store network. Traffic Pressure Offset by Higher Average Repair Orders Management said the quarterly comparable-sales decline was driven by lower traffic, while customers deferred more expensive purchases such as tires and brakes and shifted toward lower-cost tire choices. D’Ambrosia said average ticket increased about 4%, while traffic declined by the mid-single digits. Tire-category sales declined 1%, but tire unit volume was flat year over year. Fitzsimmons said the company believes it gained share in tier-one tires and in its overall tire category, supported by promotional activity and the addition of an opening-price-point tire option in tier four. Monro also reported year-over-year comparable-store sales growth in batteries, alignments and front-end shops. Battery comparable sales rose 8% during the quarter, which management attributed to improvements in store stocking programs, front-of-shop presentations and the use of its ConfiDrive vehicle-inspection process. Fitzsimmons said ConfiDrive, which provides customers with visual documentation of vehicle needs, has helped improve customer understanding and support average repair-order growth. The company also expanded a district-manager toolkit to roughly 340 locations from an initial 150 underperforming stores. The broader program now targets overall store-profit improvement opportunities rather than focusing only on gross margins.

Management said it maintained marketing investment during the quarter, even as sales weakened. Marketing costs increased $4.9 million year over year, while the company continued to refine its use of customer relationship management tools, artificial intelligence and machine learning to tailor cust