Limoneira Co Q4 2024 Earnings Call Transcript

The following is excerpted from the question-and-answer section of the transcript.

Question: Ben Klieve - Lake Street Capital Markets - Analyst : All right, thanks for taking my questions and congratulations on a really good year here. First, I have a couple of questions around the water monetization efforts. First of all, you characterized the events that you anticipate coming in fiscal '25 as being meaningful. And I'm wondering relative to the following events which were certainly appropriate and a creative. Would you characterize those following events to have been meaningful as well? I'm just trying to get kind of a relative scale of what we can expect here in fiscal '25.

Question: Ben Klieve - Lake Street Capital Markets - Analyst : Got it. Thank you. And Harold, can you remind us what the relative value of an acre foot of water in the Colorado River versus Santa Paula Basin is? REFINITIV STREETEVENTS | www.refinitiv.com | Contact Us consent of Refinitiv. 'Refinitiv' and the Refinitiv logo are registered trademarks of Refinitiv and its affiliated companies. DECEMBER 23, 2024 / 9:30PM, LMNR.OQ - Q4 2024 Limoneira Co Earnings Call

Question: Ben Klieve - Lake Street Capital Markets - Analyst : Right. Okay. Very good. Thank you. We'll stay tuned for more information there. And then kind of a big picture question this dynamic is, is the, I'm wondering kind of the status of the regulatory environment as it pertains to these water assets? I mean, is the, are there any barriers in place today or events coming soon that, you think maybe a catalyst for a monetization effort either, via the Colorado River Compact or some other regulatory agency or state or local, any anything like that, that we should have have our ears open to.

Question: Ben Klieve - Lake Street Capital Markets - Analyst : Got it. Very good. A lot of going on here. We'll stay tuned for more news there. One question for me on the agribusiness front and then we'll get back in queue is around the fresh lemon targets here for '25. So you're targeting 5 million to 5.5 million cartons which, nice, 10% or so step up from where you were this year. But I think that was on lower utilization. So can you talk about what is embedded in that 5 million to 5.5 million in terms of the, an improvement in the utilization rate, more volume coming in from third party growers. Any other big drivers here to get to that, that 5 million to 5.5 million excuse me, a million carton figure.

Question: Ben Klieve - Lake Street Capital Markets - Analyst : Got it. Very good. Alright, well, I appreciate you guys taking my questions. That does it for me. I'll get back in queue.

Question: Gerard Sweeney - Roth Capital Partners - Analyst : Harold and Mark, thanks for taking my call. Ben asked a couple of my questions, which was great, but I wanted to touch on avocados, right? So obviously, the underlying theme here is, shift from more lemons, less lemons, more avocados and you highlight, I think 1,000 additional acres. Could you give us a little bit more details? I know that this is going to be a multi year process, but how those avocados come into play and maybe if you're in a position to do so, sort of the economics behind that shift.

Question: Gerard Sweeney - Roth Capital Partners - Analyst : Got it. And just a lot of numbers there. This year, 2025 not much change in avocado pounds, one because what Harold talked about the rain, but the non bearing acres should start to come into play a little bit in '26, more than '27 and more than '28. Is that sort of?

Question: Gerard Sweeney - Roth Capital Partners - Analyst : And 30 million pounds, got it. And I mean, but it was, did you say $15,000 an acre for avocados, it on average. REFINITIV STREETEVENTS | www.refinitiv.com | Contact Us consent of Refinitiv. 'Refinitiv' and the Refinitiv logo are registered trademarks of Refinitiv and its affiliated companies. DECEMBER 23, 2024 / 9:30PM, LMNR.OQ - Q4 2024 Limoneira Co Earnings Call

Question: Gerard Sweeney - Roth Capital Partners - Analyst : Very, very compelling. How does that compare to lemon?

Question: Gerard Sweeney - Roth Capital Partners - Analyst : Got it. Shifting gears, real estate JV, I think the last distribution was in June of this past year. Two questions on, one, do you know when the next distribution will be? I mean, is it generally speaking, June, the time frame they look at it. And two, I know you said there's 30 some million in there no debt, but what about the CapEx side or inflows, outflows on that number. I know it's going to go over time, but I'm just curious.

Question: Gerard Sweeney - Roth Capital Partners - Analyst : Is that the Harold Edwards Bridge?

Question: Gerard Sweeney - Roth Capital Partners - Analyst : Got it. Okay. I appreciate it. Thanks. I'll jump back in line.

Question: Ben Klieve - Lake Street Capital Markets - Analyst : Yeah, thanks for taking my follow up. Mark, you were talking about avocado yield per acre. And I had a follow up on this. So your rough math is that this year in the down year in the alternating cycle that your 800 acres is going to yield something like GBP9,000 an acre. And you said that over the next few years that you think that 15,000 even in, on the downside is going to be possible via, how you guys are constructing the orders and the different technologies to support this. That's a huge increase. I want to make sure one that I heard that right. And then second, if you can elaborate a bit on this to talk about the real drivers here between current yield and, and where you think you'll be a few years from now?

Question: Ben Klieve - Lake Street Capital Markets - Analyst : Very interesting. Well, congratulations to the Avocado Congress and (inaudible) for agtech. So great to hear all that. Thanks for taking my my follow up again.