NYSE: WMS
ADVANCED DRAINAGE SYSTEMS, INC.CIK 0001604028 · SIC 3086
Unless the context otherwise indicates or requires, as used in this Annual Report on Form 10-K, the terms “we,” “our,” “us,” “ADS” and the “Company” refer to Advanced Drainage Systems, Inc. and its directly- and indirectly-owned subsidiaries as a combined entity, except where it is clear that the… About this business →
ADS completes NDS acquisition, realigns to two segments, refinances debt to 2034
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About ADVANCED DRAINAGE SYSTEMS, INC.
Source: Item 1 (Business) from the 10-K filed May 21, 2026. Description as filed by the company with the SEC.
Item 1. Business
COMPANY OVERVIEW
Unless the context otherwise indicates or requires, as used in this Annual Report on Form 10-K, the terms “we,” “our,” “us,” “ADS” and the “Company” refer to Advanced Drainage Systems, Inc. and its directly- and indirectly-owned subsidiaries as a combined entity, except where it is clear that the terms mean only Advanced Drainage Systems, Inc. exclusive of its subsidiaries. The term “Infiltrator” refers to Infiltrator Water Technologies, LLC, our wholly-owned subsidiary.
ADS is the leading manufacturer of innovative water management solutions in the stormwater and onsite wastewater industries, providing superior drainage solutions to manage the world’s most precious resource: water. Our innovative products are used across a broad range of end markets and applications, including residential, non-residential, infrastructure and agriculture applications. We have established a leading position in many of these end markets by leveraging our national sales and distribution platform, market share model, industry-acclaimed engineering support, overall product breadth and scale plus manufacturing excellence. Our best-in-class product portfolio, go-to-market strategy and material conversion strategy helped drive consistent above market growth.
On February 2, 2026, we completed the acquisition of National Diversified Sales (“NDS”). NDS is a leading designer and manufacturer of residential stormwater and drainage solutions focused on managing surface and subsurface water around homes. NDS develops durable, easy‑to‑install products that help homeowners and contractors control runoff, prevent water damage, and protect landscapes and foundations. This combination brings together complementary water management solutions to expand our offerings. By adding NDS’ expertise in residential water management solutions, access boxes and irrigation to our product portfolio, we further enhance our capabilities as a comprehensive provider of full-scale water management solutions.
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We believe the ADS brand has long been associated with quality products and market-leading performance. Our trademarked green stripe, which is prominently displayed on many of our products, serves as clear identification of our commitment to the customers and markets we serve, and fortifies our brand recognition and presence. Our approach to water management is to manage the lifecycle of a raindrop from the moment water hits the ground until it is released back into the ecosystem. The ADS product portfolio is built around four steps of this lifecycle: Capture, Conveyance, Storage, and Treatment. ADS solutions safely and efficiently manage stormwater with environmentally friendly products. We believe we are the only water management solutions company that manages stormwater from when the rain first hits the ground until the moment it is returned to lakes and streams.
We estimate that the stormwater industry, including landscape irrigation, annually, is an approximately $14 billion industry. We estimate that the onsite wastewater market is a roughly $2 billion industry and that approximately 30% of new North American single-family homes utilize onsite wastewater systems. On a combined basis, we estimate that we have an addressable market opportunity of approximately $16 billion.
SEGMENT INFORMATION
For a discussion of segment and geographic information, see “Note 20. Business Segment Information” to our audited consolidated financial statements included in “Item 8. Financial Statements and Supplementary Data” of this Form 10-K.
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Following the acquisition of NDS, we realigned our reportable segments to align with the manner in which the Chief Operating Decision Maker (“CODM”) assesses performance and makes resource allocation decisions (the “Segment Realignment”). Our revised reportable segments consist of Stormwater and Wastewater (formerly referred to as the “Infiltrator” reportable segment). Further, we changed the measure used to evaluate segment profitability from adjusted gross profit to Adjusted EBITDA.
Segment results for the historical periods presented in these consolidated financial statements have been recast to reflect these changes. The Segment Realignment had no impact on our previously reported consolidated net sales, income from operations, net income attributable to ADS or earnings per share. These segments are described in greater detail in “Note 20. Business Segment Information” to our audited consolidated financial statements included in “Item 8. Financial Statements and Supplementary Data” of this Form 10-K.
As illustrated in the charts below, we provide a broad range of high performance thermoplastic corrugated pipe and related water management products to a highly diversified set of end markets and geographies.
Fiscal 2026 Revenue
OUR PRODUCTS
We design, manufacture and market a complete line of high performance thermoplastic corrugated pipe and related water management products for use in a wide range of end markets. Our product line includes stormwater and wastewater management solution products. Stormwater products are designed as an integrated, end-to-end solution set which provides a comprehensive approach to managing stormwater from the moment it hits the ground until it is cleaned and returned to its natural environment. Stormwater products include single, double and triple wall corrugated polypropylene and polyethylene pipe (“Pipe”); a variety of additional water management products (“Allied Products”), including storm retention/detention and onsite wastewater chambers (“Chambers”); polyvinyl chloride drainage structures (“Structures”); fittings (“Fittings”); water quality filters and separators (“Water Quality”); and NDS channel drains, catch basins and access boxes; and various complementary products distributed through resale agreements, including geotextile products, drainage grates and other products. Wastewater products (formerly referred to as “Infiltrator”) include plastic leachfield
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chambers and systems, onsite wastewater tanks and accessories. The table below summarizes the percentage of Net Sales for Stormwater and Wastewater.
202620252024
Stormwater78.6 % 80.1 %82.2 %
Wastewater21.4 % 19.9 %17.8 %
Our products and engineering project designs have been continuously and frequently recognized by the industry. This includes being honored many times during the past decade as the Plastics Pipe Institute’s Project of the Year. We have won numerous awards from organizations such as the American Society of Testing & Materials (“ASTM”), the American Society of Civil Engineers, and many others.
Stormwater
Dual Wall Corrugated Pipe - Our N-12 pipe is a dual wall high-density polyethylene (“HDPE”) pipe with a corrugated exterior for strength and a smooth interior wall for hydraulics and flow capacity. Our N-12 pipe competes in the storm sewer and drainage markets that are also served by concrete pipe. Our N-12 pipe is available in a wide range of diameters and sections of length. N-12 provides joint integrity, with integral bell and spigot joints for fast push-together installations and is sold either with watertight or soil-tight coupling and fitting systems. Our corrugated polyethylene pipe offers many benefits including ease of installation, job site handling and resistance to corrosion and abrasion. Corrugated pipe can easily be cut or coupled together, providing precise laying lengths while minimizing installation waste and difficulty.
HP Storm Pipe and SaniTite HP Pipe - Our HP Storm pipe utilizes polypropylene (“PP”) resin, which provides: (i) increased pipe stiffness relative to HDPE; (ii) higher Environmental Stress Crack Resistance; and (iii) improved thermal properties, which improves joint performance. These improved physical characteristics result in a reduced need for select backfill, which creates installation savings for customers and expands the range of possible product applications.
Our SaniTite HP pipe utilizes the same polypropylene resins as our HP Storm pipe but includes a smooth third exterior wall in 30” to 60” pipe. The highly engineered polypropylene resin along with the triple wall design enables SaniTite HP to surpass the stiffness requirement for sanitary sewer applications. SaniTite HP offers cost and performance advantages relative to reinforced concrete pipe (such as improved hydraulics and better joint integrity) and polyvinyl chloride (“PVC”) pipe (such as impact resistance).
Single Wall Corrugated Pipe - Our single wall corrugated HDPE pipe is ideal for drainage projects where flexibility, light weight and low cost are important. Single wall HDPE pipe products have been used for decades in agricultural drainage, highway edge drains, onsite wastewater systems and other construction applications. In the agricultural market, improved technology has highlighted the favorable impact of drainage on crop yields. For homeowners, it is an economical and easily installed solution for downspout run-off, foundation drains, driveway culverts and general lawn drainage. Single wall pipe is also used for golf courses, parks and athletic fields to keep surfaces dry by channeling away excess underground moisture. Standard single wall products are available in a wide range of diameters and sold in varying lengths. Pipe can be either perforated or non-perforated depending on the particular drainage application.
Triple Wall Corrugated Pipe and Smoothwall HDPE Pipe - Our ADS-3000 Triple Wall pipe, small diameter triple wall corrugated pipe, consists of a corrugated polyethylene core molded between a smooth white outer wall and a smooth black inner wall. This combination of the three-wall design adds strength and stiffness, while reducing weight as compared to PVC 2729. Triple Wall is produced and sold through our distribution network. We also manufacture smoothwall HDPE pipe sold into the residential drainage and onsite wastewater systems markets.
We additionally produce a range of Allied Products that are complementary to our Pipe products. Our Allied Products offer adjacent technologies to our core Pipe offering, presenting a complete drainage solution for our clients and customers with this combination forming a key strategy in our sales growth, profitability and market share penetration. The practice of selling a drainage system is attractive to both distributors and end users, by providing a broad package of products that can be sold on individual projects and strengthens our competitive advantage in the marketplace. We aggressively seek and evaluate new products, technologies and regulatory changes that impact our customers’ needs for Allied Products.
The underground construction industry has historically been project (not product) driven, creating the impetus for owners, engineers and contractors to seek manufacturers that deliver solution-based product portfolios. Many of the components of underground construction are related and require linear compatibility of function, regulatory approval and technology.
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Storm Chambers - Our StormTech and Cultec chambers are used for stormwater retention, detention and “first flush” underground water storage on residential and non-residential site development along with public projects. These highly engineered chambers are injection molded or thermoformed from HDPE and PP resins into a proprietary design which provides strength, durability, and resistance to corrosion. The chambers allow for the efficient storage of stormwater volume, reducing the underground construction footprint and costs to the contractors, developers, and property owners. The chambers are open bottom, which allows for high density stacking in both storage and shipment. This freight-efficient feature drives favorable cost-competitiveness in serving long-distance export markets. These chamber systems typically incorporate our other product lines such as corrugated pipe, fabricated fittings, water quality units and geotextiles.
Structures - Our Nyloplast PVC drainage structures are used in non-residential, residential and municipal site development, road and highway construction, as well as landscaping, recreational, industrial and mechanical applications. The product family includes inline drains, drain basins, curb inlets and water control structures which move surface-collected stormwater vertically down to pipe conveyance systems. These custom structures are fabricated from sections of PVC pipe using a thermoforming process to achieve exact site-specific hydraulic design requirements. Our Nyloplast products are a preferred alternative to heavier and larger concrete structures, by offering greater design flexibility and improved ease of installation which reduces overall project costs and timelines. The structures incorporate rubber gaskets to ensure watertight connections, preventing soil infiltration which plagues competitive products.
Fittings - We produce fittings and couplings utilizing blow molding, injection molding and custom fabrication on our pipe products. Our innovative coupling and fitting products are highly complementary to our broader product suite and include both soil-tight and water-tight capabilities across the full pipe diameter spectrum. Our fittings are sold in all end markets where we sell our current pipe products.
NDS - The NDS residential product portfolio includes channel drains, catch basins, grates, access boxes, and accessories engineered to capture, convey, and disperse stormwater efficiently. Designed with both performance and aesthetics in mind, NDS products are commonly used in driveways, patios, yards, and landscaped areas to reduce flooding, erosion, and pooling water. With an emphasis on quality materials, code‑compliant designs, and straightforward installation, NDS supports effective stormwater management for everyday residential applications.
NDS channel drains are designed to efficiently capture and redirect surface water away from residential areas, such as driveways, patios, pool decks, and walkways. Featuring a low‑profile, modular design, these drains collect water along their entire length rather than at a single point, helping to prevent pooling and flooding.
NDS catch basins are designed to collect and manage surface water runoff before it can cause flooding, erosion, or damage around residential properties. Installed at low points in landscapes, driveways, or yards, these basins capture rainwater and debris, directing water into underground drainage pipes while trapping sediment to help prevent clogs.
NDS access boxes are designed to provide durable, below‑ground access to a wide range of residential utility components. These boxes are commonly used to protect and organize irrigation valves, water shutoffs, electrical connections, lighting transformers, cleanouts, and other underground service points.
Other Products - Our BioDiffuser, Contactor and Recharger products are chambers that are used in onsite wastewater systems for residential and small volume non-residential wastewater treatment and disposal. The innovative designs of our chambers are generally approved for a footprint reduction, further reducing the cost of the onsite wastewater system. Injection-molded or thermoformed from HDPE or PP, these products are strong, durable, and chemical-resistant. These interconnecting chambers are favored by onsite wastewater contractors because they are lightweight and easy to install.
Our Water Quality product line targets the removal of sediment, debris, oils and suspended solids throughout a stormwater rain event by separating and/or filtering unwanted pollutants.
We purchase and distribute construction fabrics and other geosynthetic products for soil stabilization, reinforcement, filtration, separation, erosion control, and sub-surface drainage. Constructed of woven and non-woven PP, geotextile products provide permanent, cost-efficient site-development solutions. Construction fabrics and geotextiles have applications in all of our end markets.
Our Inserta Tee product line consists of a PVC hub, rubber sleeve and stainless steel band. Inserta Tee is compression fit into the cored wall of a mainline pipe and can be used with all pipe material types and profiles. This product offers an easy tap-in to existing sanitary and storm sewers by limiting the excavation needed for installation compared to competitive products.
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Wastewater
The Wastewater reportable segment (formerly referred to as the “Infiltrator” reportable segment) contains the Company’s wholly-owned subsidiary, Infiltrator Water Technologies, LLC (“Infiltrator”). Infiltrator is the leading designer and manufacturer of highly engineered plastic chambers, synthetic aggregate leachfields, combined treatment and dispersal systems, plastic tanks, advanced treatment systems, and related accessories that are used in onsite wastewater systems and decentralized commercial wastewater treatment systems. In addition to the core Wastewater products discussed below, Orenco Systems, Inc. (“Orenco”) was acquired in October of 2024 and added to the Wastewater segment. The onsite wastewater market is heavily reliant on rural homes and communities that do not have access to centralized sewer and will require an onsite wastewater solution. Onsite wastewater technologies are scalable and can easily meet the needs of churches, schools, light commercial and small community construction projects.
Leachfield Products - Our Quick4, Quick5 and ARC line of onsite wastewater leachfield chambers are injection molded using recycled polyolefin materials. There are Quick4, Quick5 and ARC line chamber models available to meet a wide variety of regulatory and market needs. The Quick4, Quick5 and ARC chambers are engineered for strength and performance, easy to install, and offer the user greater design flexibility, including a smaller footprint, as compared with traditional stone and pipe products. The product advantages are cost savings on labor, materials and time savings on the job.
EZflow - EZflow synthetic aggregate bundles replace stone and pipe leachfields for effluent and drainage applications. The EZflow proprietary products are a modular design that incorporates recycled polystyrene aggregate bundles and corrugated polyethylene pipe that act as a replacement to the traditional materials stone and pipe.
Combined Treatment and Dispersal Products - Combined Treatment and Dispersal Products include our AeroFin, Advanced Enviro-Septic (“AES”), Enviro-Septic (“ES”), and Advanced Treatment Leachfield (“ATL”). Our AES and ES systems are proprietary combined treatment and dispersal systems made with a twelve-inch diameter corrugated extrusion product that is encapsulated in fibrous materials and geotextiles. These systems when installed in a bed of sand provide combined treatment and dispersal in the same small footprint and at a reduced cost with minimal long-term maintenance.
Our ATL product is an alternative combined treatment and dispersal system that provides advanced wastewater treatment. The ATL is a profile of polystyrene aggregates and geotextiles installed in a bed of sand. Our AeroFin product is the newest innovation in combined treatment and dispersal systems designed to provide higher treatment within a small footprint reducing installation time and energy.
Tank Products - Our Infiltrator tanks line, including our IM-Series and CM-Series onsite wastewater tanks, are injection or compression molded polypropylene plastic tanks manufactured from recycled materials. Our Infiltrator tanks are available in various capacities for wastewater storage. Our IM-Series is the only two-piece construction, injection molded onsite wastewater tank design in North America. In comparison to traditional concrete tanks, our Infiltrator tanks are easier to transport to the job site and require less time and energy to install.
Our IM-Series line of potable tanks are injection-molded polypropylene plastic tanks manufactured from virgin materials suitable for water reuse and drinking water storage. IM-Series potable tanks are available in various capacities for water storage. IM-Series potable tanks are commonly used in water cistern applications, such as rainwater harvesting systems.
Residential Advanced Treatment Products - Our Advanced Treatment Systems provide a higher level of wastewater purification through mechanical aeration wastewater for residential systems. Our advanced treatment systems product line for residential applications includes ECOPOD, ENVIRO-AIRE, Whitewater, and Orenco Advantex (AX-20 and AX-RT).
Commercial Advanced Treatment Products - Our Advanced Treatment Systems for decentralized and commercial systems are ideal solutions for treatment needs up to 250,000 gallons per day. Our advanced treatment systems product line for commercial applications includes ECOPOD, ENVIRO-AIRE Package Wastewater Treatment Plants, Whitewater, and Advantex Commercial (AX-100 and AX-MAX).
General Onsite Products - We offer a wide assortment of products for general onsite use. These products include Infiltrator EZsnap and EZset risers and lids and secondary tank-riser safety lids. Also included in this category are pump vaults, control panels, pumps, filters, risers, lids, basins, and miscellaneous products from the Orenco general onsite product catalog.
Orenco Controls - Orenco Controls designs and builds more than 20,000 panels a year for residential, commercial, municipal, and original equipment manufacturing (“OEM”) markets. This product line includes pump controllers for Orenco wastewater systems, pump controllers for commercial systems, and OEM controls applications.
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Orenco Composites - Orenco Composites use filament winding and two types of closed-molding processes, resin transfer molding and vacuum infusion, to produce fiber-reinforced plastic composite parts. This product line includes large composite tanks, composite utility buildings, treatment plant lids, and custom structures.
RAW MATERIALS AND SUPPLIERS
Virgin HDPE and PP resins are derivatives of ethylene and propylene, respectively. Ethylene and propylene are derived from natural gas liquids or crude oil derivatives primarily in the U.S. We currently purchase in excess of 1.0 billion pounds of virgin and recycled resin annually from approximately 450 suppliers. As a high-volume buyer of resin, we achieve economies of scale to negotiate favorable terms and pricing. Our purchasing strategies differ based on the material (virgin resin versus recycled material) ordered for delivery to our production locations. The price movements of the different materials also vary, resulting in the need to use strategies to reduce volatility and successfully pass cost increases on to our customers through timely selling price increases when needed.
We have relationships with most of the North American producers of virgin high-density polyethylene and impact copolymer polypropylene producers that manufacture the grades we need to produce our products. The North American capacity for ethylene derivatives has been expanded primarily as a result of supplies of natural gas liquids being produced through sustained oil and gas exploration and production. We anticipate continued growth in the availability of ethylene and propylene which are used to manufacture HDPE and PP, respectively.
Fiscal 2026 Materials Purchased
We leverage our raw material blending and processing technologies to produce an HDPE pipe that incorporates recycled resin. These products, which meet an ASTM International standard and an American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials standard, replaces a majority of the virgin resin that is used with optimized recycled materials. The manufacturing of onsite wastewater leach field chambers and tanks leverage these same core competencies in the use of recycled polypropylene material streams. ADS Recycling procures and processes recycled raw materials that can be used in products we produce and sell.
We believe that we are well positioned for future growth as we add additional recycled material processing facilities, add capacity to existing facilities, and expand our supplier base for recycled and virgin resin. In fiscal 2025, we broke ground on a facility expansion at our facility in Cordele, GA that will increase the total facility size to over 110,000 square feet. In October 2024, we opened the $65 million ADS Engineering and Technology Center. The 110,000 square foot research and testing facility, located near our company headquarters, is dedicated to innovation across product engineering, material science and manufacturing technology.
We are one of the largest domestic recyclers of HDPE and PP. We maintain relationships with several of the largest environmental companies which provide us with post-consumer HDPE and PP recycled materials. We also maintain relationships with several key post-industrial HDPE and PP suppliers which provide us with materials that cannot otherwise be utilized in their respective production processes. Further, we are focused on a program of continuous sustainability improvement, with approximately 225 million pounds of post-consumer and post-industrial recycled HDPE and 140 million pounds of post-consumer and post-industrial recycled polypropylene converted each year to make our products. This industry-leading program keeps millions of used bottles out of the landfill and puts them to work again for more than a hundred years as part of our infrastructure. This recycling capacity not only contributes to our sustainability
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initiatives through the promotion of a circular economy but also allows us to better and more quickly serve the needs of our customers.
OUR MANUFACTURING AND DISTRIBUTION PLATFORM
We have a leading domestic and international manufacturing and distribution infrastructure, serving customers throughout the United States, Canada, Mexico and other countries worldwide through 64 manufacturing plants and 41 distribution centers, including six manufacturing plants and seven distribution centers owned or leased by our joint ventures.
We manufacture our corrugated pipe products using a continuous extrusion process, where polyethylene or polypropylene is extruded through a die into a moving series of corrugated U-shaped molds. We utilize customized and proprietary production equipment, which we believe produces higher quality final products and is more cost efficient than other pipe making equipment generally available in the market.
Domestically, we can produce more than one billion pounds of pipe annually. Additional capacity is in place to support seasonal production needs and expected growth. Our production equipment is built to accept transportable molds and die tooling over a certain range of sizes, so each plant is not required to house the full range of tooling at any given time. This transportability provides us with the flexibility to optimize our capacity through centrally coordinated production planning, which helps to adapt to shifting sales demand patterns while reducing the capital needed for tooling. With our large manufacturing footprint, we can support rapid seasonal demand growth while focusing on customer service and minimizing transportation costs.
A wide variety of production processes and expertise allow us to provide cost-effective finished goods at competitive prices delivered in a timely fashion to our customers. Our molds and machines have been designed to maximize interchangeability in order to optimize flexibility, maximize efficiency and minimize downtime. The standard fittings products (tees, wyes, elbows, etc.) that we produce and sell to connect our pipe on job sites are blow molded or injection molded at two domestic plants. In addition, customized fabricated fittings (e.g. more complex dual wall pipe reducers, bends or structures) are produced in specific North American plants. We produce storm and onsite wastewater chambers, tanks and accessories using injection molding machines ranging in size.
International Presence - We own manufacturing facilities in Canada to produce our products for sale in the Canadian markets. We serve international markets primarily in Mexico, Central America and South America through joint venture operations with local partners. Our joint venture strategy has provided us with local and regional access to key markets such as Mexico, Brazil, Chile, Argentina, and Peru. Our international joint ventures produce pipe and related products to be sold in their respective regional markets. We also have wholly-owned subsidiaries that distribute our pipe and related products in Europe and the Middle East. Combining local partners’ customer relationships, brand recognition and local management talent, with our world-class manufacturing and process expertise, broad product portfolio and innovation creates a powerful solution driven platform and opportunities for continued profitable international expansion. With the acquisition of NDS, we acquired certain NDS international entities. As discussed in “Note 1. Background and Summary of Significant Accounting Policies,” the NDS International Entities met the held for sale criteria upon acquisition. See “Note 5. Discontinued Operations and Assets and Liabilities Held for Sale” for additional information.
Quality Assurance Control - We have two internal quality assurance control laboratory facilities equipped and staffed to evaluate and confirm incoming raw material and finished goods quality in addition to the quality testing that is done at our manufacturing facilities. We conduct annual safety, product and process quality audits at each of our facilities, using centralized internal resources in combination with external third-party services. In the quality area, various national and international agencies such as Product Evaluation and Audit Solutions, International Association of Plumbing and Mechanical Officials, Bureau de normalisation du Québec, Intertek for Canadian Standards Association, Entidad Mexicana de Acreditacion A.C. and NSF International and several state Departments of Transportation and municipal agencies conduct both scheduled and unscheduled audits/inspections of our plants to verify product quality and compliance to applicable standards.
Fleet - We also operate an in-house fleet of approximately 600 tractors. Our effective shipping radius is approximately 250 miles from one of our manufacturing plants or distribution centers. The combination of a dedicated fleet and team of company drivers allows greater flexibility and responsiveness in meeting dynamic customer job site delivery expectations. We strive to achieve less than three-day lead-time on deliveries and have the added benefit of redeploying fleet and driver assets to respond to short-term regional spikes in sales activity. For deliveries that are outside an economic delivery radius of our truck fleet, common carrier deliveries are tendered to a third-party to ensure that lowest delivered freight costs are achieved while maintaining high levels of customer service. In addition, in line with our commitment to sustainability, we are continuously upgrading our tractors with state-of-the-art safety features, fuel economy, and digital technology to attract the driver of the future, reduce our total emissions and keep our drivers safe on and off the road.
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Our North American truck fleet incorporates approximately 1,100 trailers that are specially designed to haul our lightweight pipe and Allied Products. These designs maximize payload versus conventional over the road trailers and facilitate the loading and unloading of our products at the various customer delivery locations. The trailer design assists in managing the fuel efficiency of our fleet by decreasing total trailer weight and aerodynamic design. The scope of fleet operations also includes backhaul throughout our network to lower our total delivered cost and increase our asset utilization.
Facility Network - Our scale and extensive network of Pipe and Allied Products facilities provide a critical cost advantage versus our competitors, as we are able to more efficiently transport products to our customers and end users and to promote faster product shipments due to our proximity to the delivery location. The optimized design of our onsite wastewater chambers and tanks provides the ability to nest products, enabling us to manufacture products from one location and efficiently ship throughout North America.
SUSTAINABILITY
“Our Reason is Water” and our vision is to advance the quality of life through sustainable solutions to water management challenges. We are dedicated to providing clean water management solutions to communities and delivering unparalleled service to our customers. Our commitment to sustainability was recognized when we were first named on Newsweek’s list of America’s Most Responsible Companies in 2024.
We are focused on bringing highly engineered products to market that are both sustainable and resilient. These products assist our customers in meeting sustainability targets such as LEED or ENVISION certification while also allowing them to make needed repairs to aging infrastructure, plan for and mitigate future impacts from climate change and rapidly recover from catastrophic events when necessary. Our manufacturing facilities have no material process-related by-products released into the atmosphere, waterways, or solid waste discharge. During pipe production start-ups and size changeovers, non-compliant scrap and any damaged finished goods pipe are recycled for internal re-use.
In fiscal 2022, we announced our 10 Year Sustainability Goals, which are available on our website. The goals are a set of targets focused on the “REASON” in “Our Reason is Water” and demonstrate our commitment to leadership in environment, social and governance. The goals include: a commitment to increase our use of recycled plastic, a commitment to operation clean sweep for plastic pellet management, implementing a supplier sustainability program, reducing our total recordable injury rate, implementing closed-loop water usage at all our manufacturing locations, continuing our efforts in culture and employee engagement and maintaining transparency in our sustainability reporting efforts. The goals are not included as part of, or incorporated by reference, into this Annual Report on Form 10-K.
SALES AND MARKETING
We believe we have one of the largest and most experienced sales and engineering forces in the industry. Offering the broadest product line in the industry enables our sales force to source the greatest number of new opportunities and more effectively cross-sell products than any of our competitors. We consistently maintain thousands of touch points with customers, civil engineers and municipal authorities, continuously educating them on new product innovations and their advantages relative to traditional products. We believe we are the industry leader in these efforts, and we view this work as an important part of our marketing strategy, particularly in promoting N-12 and SaniTite HP for storm and sanitary sewer systems, as regulatory approvals are essential to the specification and acceptance of these product lines.
Our sales and marketing strategy is divided into four components: comprehensive market coverage, diverse product offerings, readily-available local inventory and specification efforts. Our goal is to provide the distributor/owner with the most complete, readily available product line in our industry. We strive to use our manufacturing footprint, product portfolio and market expertise to efficiently service our customers.
Our sales and engineering objective is to influence, track and quote all selling opportunities as early in the project life cycle as possible. We strive to be meaningfully involved in all phases of the project cycle, including design, bidding, award and installation. Conceptual project visibility allows sales and engineering professionals the ability to influence design specifications and increase the probability of inclusion of our products in bid documents. The inclusion of our products in bid documents improves the probability of completing the sale. On-demand installation support allows us to maintain customer relationships and ensure positive installation experience. In addition to direct channel customers, we also maintain and develop relationships with federal agencies, municipal agencies, national standard regulators, private consulting engineers and architects. Our consistent interaction with these market participants enables us to continue our market penetration. This ongoing dialogue has positioned us as an industry resource for design guidance and product development and as a respected expert in water management solutions.
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NDS goes to market through a multi‑channel distribution strategy focused on reaching both professionals and homeowners. Its primary customers include landscape contractors, irrigation installers, builders, and engineers, as well as DIY consumers. NDS products are sold through wholesale distribution partners such as landscape supply yards and irrigation distributors, along with national home improvement retailers and online channels. By supporting professional specifiers while also making products accessible at retail, NDS effectively serves a broad residential stormwater market with solutions designed for both trade and consumer use.
CUSTOMERS
We have a large, active customer base of approximately 16,000 customers, with two customers representing 10% or more of fiscal 2026 net sales. Ferguson Enterprises (“Ferguson”) accounted for 13.1% and Core & Main, Inc. (“Core & Main”) accounted for 12.8% of fiscal 2026 net sales. Our customer base is diversified across the range of end markets that we serve.
A majority of our sales are made through distributors, including many of the largest national and independent waterworks distributors, with whom we have long-standing distribution relationships and who sell primarily to the storm sewer and sanitary sewer markets. We also utilize a network of hundreds of small to medium-sized independent distributors across the United States. We have strong relationships with major national retailers that carry drainage products. We offer the most complete line of HDPE products in the industry and are the only national manufacturer that can service the “Big-Box” retailers from coast-to-coast. We also sell to buying groups and co-ops in the United States that serve the plumbing, hardware, irrigation and landscaping markets. Selling to buying groups and co-ops provides us with a further presence on a national, regional and local basis for the distribution of our products. Our preferred vendor status with these groups allows us to reach thousands of locations in an effective manner. Members of these groups and co-ops generally are independent businesses with strong relationships and brand recognition with smaller contractors and homeowners in their local markets. The combination of our large sales force, long-standing retail and contractor customer relationships and extensive network of manufacturing and distribution facilities complements and strengthens our broad customer and market coverage.
Our customer service organization is supplemented by the employees of our manufacturing plants, distribution centers and drivers of our tractor-trailers. In conjunction with our field sales and engineering team, this highly trained and competent staff allows us to maintain more customer touch points and interaction than any of our competitors.
SEASONALITY
Historically, sales of our products have been higher in the first and second quarters of each fiscal year due to favorable weather and longer daylight conditions accelerating construction activity during these periods. Seasonal variations in operating results may also be impacted by inclement weather conditions, such as cold or wet weather, which can delay projects. In the non-residential, residential and infrastructure markets in the northern United States and Canada, construction activity typically begins to increase in late March and is slower in December, January and February. In the southern and western United States, Mexico, Central America and South America, the construction markets are less seasonal. The agricultural drainage market is concentrated in the early spring just prior to planting and in the fall just after crops are harvested prior to freezing of the ground in winter.
COMPETITION
We operate in a highly fragmented industry and hold leading positions in multiple market sectors. Competition, including our competitors and specific competitive factors, varies for each market sector. Our products are generally lighter, more durable, more cost effective and easier to install than comparable alternatives made with traditional materials. Following our entrance into the non-residential construction market with the introduction of N-12 corrugated HDPE pipe in the late 1980s, our pipe has been displacing traditional materials, such as reinforced concrete, corrugated steel and PVC, across an ever-expanding range of end markets, including non-residential, residential, agriculture and infrastructure applications. In the United States, our nationwide footprint combined with our strong local presence and broad product offering make us the leader in an otherwise highly fragmented sector comprised of many smaller competitors.
We believe the principal competitive factors for our market sectors include local selling coverage, product availability, breadth and cost of products, technical knowledge and expertise, customer and supplier relationships, reliability and accuracy of service, effective use of technology, delivery capabilities and timeliness, pricing of products, and the provision of credit. We believe that our competitive strengths and strategy allow us to compete effectively in our market sectors.
The stormwater drainage industry, in particular, is highly fragmented with many smaller specialty and regional competitors providing a variety of product technologies and solutions. We compete against concrete pipe, corrugated steel pipe and PVC pipe producers on a national, regional and local basis. In addition, there are many HDPE pipe producers in the United
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Advanced Drainage Systems, Inc
States. We believe we are the only corrugated HDPE pipe producer with a national footprint, and our competitors operate primarily on a regional and local level.
INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY
We rely upon a combination of patents, trademarks, trade names, licensing arrangements, trade secrets, know-how and proprietary technology in order to secure and protect our intellectual property rights, both in the United States and in foreign countries.
We seek to protect our new technologies with patents and trademarks and defend against patent infringement allegations. We hold a significant amount of intellectual property rights pertaining to product patents, process patents and trademarks. We continually seek to expand and improve our existing product offerings through product development and acquisitions. Although our intellectual property is important to our business operations and in the aggregate constitutes a valuable asset, we do not believe that any single patent, trademark or trade secret is critical to the success of our business as a whole. We cannot be certain that our patent applications will be issued or that any issued patents will provide us with any competitive advantages or will not be challenged by third parties.
In addition, we generally control access to and use of our proprietary and other confidential information through the use of internal and external controls, including contractual protections with employees, distributors and others. See “