BUILD-A-BEAR WORKSHOP INC (BBW)

Item 2. Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations

Cautionary Notice Regarding Forward-Looking Statements

The following Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations contains forward-looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties, and we undertake no obligation to update these statements except as required by the federal securities laws. Our actual results may differ materially from the results discussed in the forward-looking statements. These risks and uncertainties include, without limitation, those detailed under the caption “Risk Factors” in our Annual Report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended January 31, 2026, as amended by Amendment No. 1, as filed with the SEC, and include the following:

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Business Overview

Build-A-Bear Workshop, Inc., a Delaware corporation, was formed in 1997 as a mall-based, experiential specialty retailer for children. Build‑A‑Bear has evolved to become a leading global "retailtainment" brand on a mission to add a little more heart to life. At Build-A-Bear, guests are invited to create personalized furry friends through a unique stuffing, dressing, accessorizing and naming process, accentuated by a memorable Heart Ceremony that creates moments of connection for people of all ages. Over the years, Build‑A‑Bear has grown into a multi‑generational phenomenon, positioned at the intersection of pop‑culture trends. Beyond its signature retail experience, our brand also offers pre‑stuffed plush, gifting, partnerships with best‑in‑class licensed and collectible characters, and original storytelling through Build‑A‑Bear Entertainment, LLC.  Build‑A‑Bear’s current brand platform and message, “The Stuff You Love,” crosses ages and cultures while celebrating nearly 30 years of helping people mark life’s meaningful moments.

The Build-A-Bear brand has high consumer awareness and positive affinity, and we leverage our brand strength to expand the footprint of our retail experience locations through a range of store sizes, formats, and locations, including tourist destinations. In addition to growing our corporately-managed store footprint, we are also growing through partner-operated and franchise locations, particularly for our international expansion. Our ongoing digital transformation, which touches our e-commerce business, consumer loyalty program, and digital content, has led to omnichannel growth over the past several years. Build-A-Bear's pop-culture appeal plays a key role in expanding our total addressable market beyond children to teens and adults with sports licensing, collectible and gifting offerings, as well as to categories beyond plush.

As of May 2, 2026, the Company had 669 global locations through a combination of its corporately-managed, partner-operated, and franchise models. This reflects 376 corporately-managed locations,  including 334 stores in the United States (“U.S.”) and Canada and 42 stores in the United Kingdom ("U.K.") and the Republic of Ireland, 181 partner-operated locations in which we sell our products on a wholesale basis to other companies that then, in turn, execute our retail experience, and 112 international franchise locations , all under the Build-A-Bear Workshop brand. In addition to these stores, we sell products on our company-owned e-commerce sites and third-party marketplace sites, our franchisees sell products through sites that they manage as well as other third-party marketplace sites and other parties sell products on their sites under wholesale agreements. For the 2026 fiscal year to date, the Company had net new unit growth of 7 experience locations, comprised of one corporately managed location, 3 partner-operated locations, and 3 international franchise locations.

We operate in three segments that share the same infrastructure, including management, systems, merchandising and marketing, and generate revenues as follows:

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ITEM 7. MANAGEMENT’S DISCUSSION AND ANALYSIS OF FINANCIAL CONDITION AND RESULTS OF OPERATIONS

The following Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations contains forward-looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties. Our actual results may differ materially from the results discussed in the forward-looking statements. Factors that might cause such a difference include, but are not limited to, those discussed in “Risk Factors” and elsewhere in this Annual Report on Form 10-K. The following section is qualified in its entirety by the more detailed information, including our financial statements and the notes thereto, which appears elsewhere in this Annual Report on Form 10-K.

Business Overview

Build-A-Bear Workshop, Inc., a Delaware corporation, was formed in 1997 as a mall-based, experiential specialty retailer for children. Build‑A‑Bear has evolved to become a leading global "retailtainment" brand on a mission to add a little more heart to life. At Build-A-Bear, guests are invited to create personalized furry friends through a unique stuffing, dressing, accessorizing and naming process, accentuated by a memorable Heart Ceremony that creates moments of connection for people of all ages. Over the years, Build‑A‑Bear has grown into a multi‑generational phenomenon, positioned at the intersection of pop‑culture trends. Beyond its signature retail experience, our brand also offers pre‑stuffed plush, gifting, partnerships with best‑in‑class licensed and collectible characters, and original storytelling through Build‑A‑Bear Entertainment, LLC.  Build‑A‑Bear’s current brand platform and message, “The Stuff You Love,” crosses ages and cultures while celebrating nearly 30 years of helping people mark life’s meaningful moments.

The Build-A-Bear brand has high consumer awareness and positive affinity, and we leverage our brand strength to expand the footprint of our retail experience locations through a range of store sizes, formats, and locations, including tourist destinations. In addition to growing our corporately-managed store footprint, we are also growing through partner-operated and franchise locations, particularly for our international expansion. Our ongoing digital transformation, which touches our e-commerce business, consumer loyalty program, and digital content, has led to omnichannel growth over the past several years. Build-A-Bear's pop-culture appeal plays a key role in expanding our total addressable market beyond children to teens and adults with sports licensing, collectible and gifting offerings, as well as to categories beyond plush.

As of January 31, 2026, the Company had 662 global locations through a combination of its corporately-managed, partner-operated, and franchise models. This reflects 375 corporately-managed locations, including 333 stores in the United States (“U.S.”) and Canada and 42 stores in the United Kingdom (“U.K.”) and the Republic of Ireland, 178 partner-operated locations in which we sell our products on a wholesale basis to other companies that then, in turn, execute our retail experience, and 109 franchise locations operating internationally, all under the Build-A-Bear Workshop brand. In addition to these stores, we sell products on our company-owned e-commerce sites and third-party marketplace sites, our franchisees sell products through sites that they manage as well as other third-party marketplace sites and other parties sell products on their sites under wholesale agreements. For the 2025 fiscal year, the Company had net new unit growth of 64 experience locations, comprised of seven corporately managed locations, 40 partner-operated locations, and 17 international franchise locations.

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We operate in three segments that share the same infrastructure, including management, systems, merchandising and marketing, and generate revenues as follows:

Selected financial data attributable to each segment for fiscal 2025, 2024 and 2023 are presented in Note 15 — Segment Information to our consolidated financial statements included elsewhere in this Annual Report on Form 10-K.

Our year-over-year results discussed below are impacted by fiscal 2025 and fiscal 2024 being 52-week periods compared to fiscal 2023 which had an additional week because it was a 53-week period.

Our consolidated net income was $52.2 million in fiscal 2025 compared to net income of $51.8 million in fiscal 2024 and $52.8 million in fiscal 2023. We believe that we have a concept that has broad demographic appeal which, for North American stores open for the entire year, averaged net retail sales per store of $1.2 million in fiscal 2025, 2024 and 2023.

We ended fiscal 2025 with no borrowings under our credit agreement and with $26.8 million in cash, cash equivalents and restricted cash after investing $25.5 million in capital projects throughout the year. In fiscal 2025 the company utilized $27.5 million in cash to repurchase 508,945 shares under the share repurchase program that was authorized by the Board of Directors on September 11, 2024 (the “September 2024 Stock Repurchase Program”). The September 2024 Stock Repurchase Program terminated the August 2022 Stock Repurchase Program and authorized a new share repurchase program of up to $100 million.  From the end of fiscal 2025 through April 14, 2026, the Company utilized $10.7 million to repurchase 231,153 shares under the stock buyback program, leaving $51.0 million available under the September 2024 Stock Repurchase Program.

On March 12, 2025, our Board of Directors approved a quarterly dividend program of $0.22 per share representing an increase of 10%, to evolve its strategic use of capital. During fiscal 2025, the company declared and paid quarterly dividends totaling $ 11.5 million to shareholders. Additionally, on March 11, 2026, the Board of Directors declared a quarterly cash dividend of $0.23 per share of issued and outstanding common stock, representing an increase of 4.5%.  The dividend will be paid on April 9, 2026, to all stockholders of record as of March 26, 2026.

Recent Events and Trends Regarding Tariffs and International Trade

Global trade policy continues to evolve and the ultimate impact of recent developments with respect to U.S. tariffs is unclear. On February 20, 2026, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a ruling striking down certain tariffs previously imposed under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act ("IEEPA"). The ultimate availability, timing, and amount of any potential refunds of such tariffs remain uncertain and are subject to further legal, regulatory, and administrative developments. Following the Supreme Court’s decision, the U.S. presidential administration announced its intention to invoke other laws to collect tariffs and announced new tariffs on imports from all countries, in addition to any existing non-IEEPA tariffs. There remains substantial uncertainty regarding the duration of existing and newly announced tariffs, potential changes or pauses to such tariffs, tariff levels, and whether further additional tariffs or other retaliatory actions may be imposed, modified, or suspended, and the impacts of such actions on the Company's business. The Company continues to monitor and evaluate these developments and assess their potential impact on its business, financial condition, and results of operations.

Since we import the vast majority of our products from vendors outside the U.S., we face uncertainty and risks related to tariffs and other trade policies that could negatively impact our Company.  Tariffs and other non-tariff trade practices can adversely affect our business in multiple ways including increased costs of our products. While we have taken steps in recent years to diversify our supply chain and reduce China sourcing by shifting primarily to Vietnam, we remain subject to substantial potential exposure to tariffs. Specifically, the latest tariffs implemented by the U.S. would have significant impact on our cost structure and product margins. Additionally, the uncertainty about trade policy, tariff rates, and other changes in practices affecting international trade, including whether such tariffs or other measures will be withdrawn, or modified in the future, makes it difficult for us to operate optimally. Depending on the level and longevity of the tariff disruption, we will continue to adjust our pricing while monitoring the impact of inflation and consumer confidence, on both a micro and macro basis.

Following is a description and discussion of the major components of our statement of operations:

Revenues

Net retail sales, commercial revenue and international franchising: See Note 3 — "Revenue" to the consolidated financial statements for additional accounting information.

We use net retail sales per square foot as a performance measure for our business. The following table details net retail sales per square foot for stores open throughout the fiscal year for the periods presented:

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Costs and Expenses

Cost of merchandise sold: Cost of merchandise sold is driven primarily by our retail segment. Cost of merchandise sold – retail includes the cost of the merchandise, including royalties paid to licensors of third party branded merchandise, tariff costs, store occupancy cost, including store depreciation and store asset impairment charges (if not disclosed separately due to materiality) (See Note 6 — "Property and Equipment, net" to the consolidated financial statements for additional accounting information regarding store asset impairment), cost of warehousing and distribution, packaging, stuffing, damages and shortages, and shipping and handling costs incurred in shipment to customers. Retail gross profit is defined as net retail sales less the cost of merchandise sold - retail. For the commercial segment, cost of merchandise includes the cost of merchandise sold to third-party retailers on a wholesale basis for sale within their stores. For the franchise segment, cost of merchandise includes the sale of furniture, fixtures, and supplies to our franchise partners.

Selling, general and administrative expense (“SGA”): These expenses include store payroll and benefits, advertising, credit card fees, store supplies and normal store pre-opening and closing expenses as well as central office general and administrative expenses, i

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