Thank you, Bill. And good morning, everyone. Moving to our consolidated results on slide 4.
In the first quarter, we achieved net sales of $662 million and adjusted EBITA of $99 million. Our tax rate in the first quarter was 21%, an increase from 17.5% in the prior year. As a reminder, the tax rate in the first quarter of last year had benefits from previously granted stock compensation. These outsized benefits contributed to our stronger than anticipated EPS performance in the first quarter of fiscal '24.
Turning to slide 5 and our consolidated bridges.
Organic volumes were down 5% compared to double-digit growth in the first quarter of fiscal '24 when volume was up over 13%. Our average selling prices declined 12% during the quarter, most of which came from our PVC Conduit and Steel Conduit products.
Moving to slide 6.
Our volume decline during the first quarter was across most product categories. As we mentioned earlier, volume in the first quarter last year was atypical for what is traditionally our slowest quarter. However, our metal framing, table management and construction services businesses grew mid-single digits in the first quarter of fiscal '25 after being up high-single digits in the prior year. This growth is driven by both an increase in our construction services support of global mega projects as well as the high density of metal framing products required for this type of construction.
We anticipate additional growth from these businesses throughout our fiscal year in part to the addition of new capacity for metal framing to support large construction projects such as data centers and chip fab manufacturing.
Our Plastic Pipe and Conduit product category declined mid-single digits during the quarter. This category grew high single digits in the prior year as the channel was adding back inventory after a period of destocking in 2023.
Separately, as bill mentioned earlier, we are also seeing an increase in imported products coming from multiple locations including Central and South America. The combination of imports remains below 10% of the overall market, but we are continuing to monitor the situation closely. In addition, we are examining the product quality characteristics of these imported materials versus the standards and specifications.
Our volume decline for Steel Conduit was also impacted by year-over-year foreign competition. We believe that imports represent between approximately 20% to 25% of the overall market.
As we look beyond Q1, we continue to expect growth across much of the portfolio including contributions from our Plastic Pipe category driven by growth in our water related products. Overall, we continue to expect volume growth between low- to mid-single digits for the full year.
Turning to slide 7.
Adjusted EBITDA margins compressed in our electrical segment due to previously mentioned pricing and volume declines. The adjusted EBITDA margins also declined in our S&I segment primarily due to lower volume.
The S&I segment margins, however, did improve sequentially from the fourth-quarter 2024. And we are pleased with the operational performance and improvements being made in our key facilities such as Hobart.
Turning to slide 8.
We continue to execute our balanced capital deployment model with an emphasis on returning cash to shareholders along with capital investments to progress our growth initiatives. Our balance sheet remains in a strong position with no maturity repayments required until 2028.
Next on slide 9.
We expect low- to mid-single digit percentage volume growth for the full year. We expect our Q2 net sales in the range of $685 million and $715 million. Our adjusted EBITDA is expected to be in the range of $85 million to $95 million. Our adjusted EPS is expected to be in the range of $1.30 and $1.50.
Historically, we are accustomed to anticipating some amount of seasonality. We generally build in an expectation that the back half of the year will be stronger than the first half. We believe this will be the case this year for two main reasons. First, our overall business is generally stronger in the spring and summer construction season versus the fall and winter. Second, as we continue to ramp up our initiatives, our volume should steadily increase throughout the year. Therefore, we expected adjusted EBITDA to improve sequentially from Q2 into the second half of the year.
As Bill shared, we are also updating our full year 2025 outlook. We now expect full year adjusted EBITDA in the range of $375 million to $425 million and adjusted EPS in the range of $5.75 to $6.85.
With that, I'll turn it back to Bill.
Thanks, John. Moving to slide 10.
As I and the entire management team focus on executing our growth initiatives and creating greater value for our customers and shareholders, we remain confident that the electrical industry is a great place to be. Atkore’s strong balance sheet, breadth of products, service capabilities and goal of being the customer's first choice positions us well to benefit from the strong electrical trends projected across numerous and market categories.
We remain committed to returning cash to shareholders through a combination of share repurchases and quarterly cash dividends and look forward to sharing more about our progress against our growth initiatives related to global construction services and water related products later in the year. Through it all, we are guided by our strategy, our process and our people, the three fundamentals of the Atkore business system.
One recent demonstration of the Atkore business system at work is our announcement of our new Chief Operating Officer held by John Pregenzer. John's multidisciplinary career, combined with his experience holding various roles at Atkore since joining in 2015 makes him a tremendous asset. And I'm excited by the additional value he will hold back or achieve for our customers and our shareholders.
With that, we'll turn it over to the operator to open the line for questions.
Operator
(Operator Instructions)
Andy Kaplowitz, Citigroup.
Good morning, everyone.
Good morning.
Bill, can you elaborate on the commentary that import competition is gaining momentum in PVC? Maybe what has changed with PVC imports versus the past that you've seen a pretty big move from this Latin American competition. And then Metal Conduit volume looks like a reverse course and declined in Q1. Is that just tough comps, project delays or new capacity starting to come in?
Yeah, so let's go through PVC and I'll go and take your question and give a bunch of details here, Andy.
Imports have grown now there's still single digit numbers, but they've grown over 20% year over year. So I just -- whether it's, hey, is it starts working or they get customers, therefore they increase their shipments and that's probably the primary thing. Again, single digits overall market volume but driving down price and our competition with slower markets, matching price, all those different things.
So now, the one thing I want to jump ahead on is in our guide, what we've done this year just because I'm frank -- quite frankly, for anybody frustrated with not having numbers that we hit and exceed is that we put it out. We have it literally going down to pre-COVID levels by the time we exit the year.
Now, is it our intention to add value and see if we can push price up and see what Trump does and everything else there? But for now, and saying, oh, we didn't expect it. We've taken a very aggressive view quite frankly, a view for price declines in our forecast again, not what we're internally managing to, that this would be the worst year for year-over-year declines in PVC.
So Andy, I both answered kind of the imports. I also think, now again, I don't know anybody's cost base. If you get to that point where it's pre-COVID, I don't think they can make money with the additional freight even if they have lower levels. From our analysis, the resin costs in these countries are the same as ours. There's a proportion that labor is just small compared to everything else that I don't think it would make economic sense anymore. So hopefully, you get a feel for that.
Steel, I think, I look over my team and so forth, but it's mostly just year-over-year comps. Imports are still a challenge there, but literally imports have grown like 4%. So, I think it's moderating with that. It's just we had a tough comp.
But again, Andy, one of the things we did with this thing is to go, you know what we talked in previous courts, we did not expect much bump from Trump and tariffs versus like, hey, somewhere at the end of the year, things have to steady out. It's like, no, guys, just take a linear or do not expect any price increase anywhere.
So again, I think you have not changed our guide to get on a call, but I think we've taken out all variables. And now, it's just for us to perform any Trump tariff, any quota, anything else is upside to these numbers.
So, that's helpful. And then just on the volume side, I just want to make sure of this. So volume was down 5%, it looks like that is just tough comps. You're not forecasting any season, any cyclical improvement in construction markets? It's just seasonal improvement, is that right? And maybe any sort of commentary on the health of the markets that you see?
Yeah, exactly, Andy. So, no bounce back in industries, no bounce back in residential or anything else there. So, it's literally, as I think in John's prepared remarks, I think we will finally get back to normal pre-COVID things that there is that 7%, 10%, just the summer months and so forth that will have that. Otherwise, even most of our niches, like I'm sure somebody will ask about beats and GDPE, we really have going into ‘26 and so forth.
Okay. And just one more for me, can you give more color into your comments regarding looking at your cost structure and getting value? I think it's a value for strategic assets. Might we see bigger activities on these fronts this year and what could that look like?
I'll start and turn it over to John Deitzer. There's so many things, but I'll steal some of John's just talking this morning. Sorry, John. But give you things we've already done. We had a facility in Tempe, Arizona. And again, we do drive a lien, we were able to close that operation so keep the business activity, but move it into Phoenix, move it up into Massachusetts. So, that's one example.
We did also -- as we look forward strategically, look and go, hey, we can produce in some areas. I don't want to get what specific line. but to go, hey, we can actually produce, and we don't need this asset. So, we sold two or three production lines. Again, we will still meet our customer demand without that. We are cutting back on, I say personnel, but head count freeze for attrition.
We're looking at lines back to, let's say PVC Conduit and water making trade-offs depending on the economic return, making the economic return on how much mechanical product versus conduit products and the list goes on. We have and I think we'll hit this, the most aggressive or the highest year-over-year productivity that I'm aware of in Atkore’s history.
So Andy, it's a bunch of things we're looking at. And could we spin off small businesses that like you bought with an acquisition that weren't strategic. All those things are either have happened or in place as we go.
I agree with everything Bill mentioned there. I would just add to his point that we did have some positive productivity, and we are going through almost at every line item asset by asset, what makes the most sense. So, I think we are actively trying to understand what leverage we have to pull.
And it's -- Andy, sense for you. I know you appreciate. But again, it's a forecast. We have two weeks of backlog, all those other things. But I do think this is a point where I'm just frustrated with the unexpected and it's like, okay, guys, let's not assume good things. They will raise forecasts and let's work like hell to get these numbers moving forward.
Appreciate the color and good luck, guys.
Thanks, Andy.
Thanks, Andy.
Operator
Deane Dray, RBC.
Thank you. Good morning, everyone.
So just if I step back and look at the first quarter, price and volume both came in largely in line with our expectations. So, the cut here is all prospective and how you think the dynamics change for the balance of the year. And maybe if it would be helpful, if you could just in broad strokes, kind of break out for us on that guidance cut. How much is the PVC? How much is Steel Conduit? Just the size kind of the severity? And you hadn't, unless I missed it, talked about the new competitor and PVC, maybe it hasn't really become all that volume online, but if you could address that.
Yeah, I'll hit the beginning, and I'll turn over to my financial partner just on what level of precision the breakout between two groups.
But, Deane, to the earlier comments I made to Andy, yes, he's out there. Others are there. I think it's mostly the imports at this stage that are driving it. And then just market reaction I would say and this has been consistent for 10 years that for Atkore is supplying to is the biggest challenge. And now, December was light. We answer that with the previous set of questions is mostly comp. And then obviously, January was light. What I hate to talk about like storms, fires on California and freezing temperatures down south that us looking, saying, hey, how is January pricing going? And what happens if this trend continues? I just don't want the optimism; this won't continue to happen. So, let's literally extrapolate that.
Now, I'm not changing to go the first week of February, whether the concern of tariffs have actually, if we keep this up, it'd be another number, but that's one week. So, I think we're going through those things and just saying, hey, let's not hit with what we would like to have happen, but what could happen and work our way back up from there. And then John, if you just --
I'll jump in here and kind of help you dimension it, Deane. So from a price versus cost standpoint, we roughly had an outlook of down $300 million previously. Now, we're at the midpoint, roughly down $400 million. So, it's $100 million delta from a price versus cost standpoint versus where we were at back in November. I'd say roughly $75 million or three quarters of that is on the PVC side and probably 25% that is on the Steel Conduit side. So overwhelmingly driven by the changes in expectations from a PVC Conduit, I'd say that market is changing as we've talked about. And I'll probably kick it over to John Pregenzer, who can kind of give some context on what we're seeing from an import perspective, where it's coming from because I don't think it's just about the domestic competition as well.
Thanks, John, and good morning, Dean. So we look at the PVC market, there's been a number of new entrants from all different sources, whether it's imports from Latin America, from China. We've seen domestic producers diversify out of the water work business to get into the electrical space and obviously, there's new entrants that are coming in out of nowhere. So it's, my career, probably the most disruptive period we've ever seen in regards to a number of new entrants. And that's just creating a lot of pressure on price and spread that we're experiencing. And there's been a significant acceleration here as we've been tracking this price normalization over the past couple of years, the last quarter to two quarters has really accelerated. So, I think what we're trying to do is to capture that going out for the rest of the year.
That's the only thing I'd ask.
That's great color to be able to size, you know, what those are and to hear John's comments about the how many other entrants are in the PVC side. We were thinking just it was Venezuela and Dominican Republic, but it's much more than that. So, that's very helpful.
And Bill, I cut you off.
Oh, yeah. No. And the only thing I would then put a pin is like, hey, we have factors, you never know. But literally, as I mentioned earlier, to go, okay, let's have -- let's bring it back to pre-COVID levels. And Deane, back to, again, I can't commit to this, Deane or anybody else, but you've been around for the decades plus or even before that as you know. But the PVC rule of the 500 miles that like the margins aren't there to substantiate. So, we actually think before we get to that number, some of this would shut off, but I'd rather have it as best as we can in the forecast.
Yeah, that's a great last point there. And just one question and I'll hand it off. Was -- are you suggesting that some of these imports and is it both PVC and Steel might not be meeting specs?
Yeah, I would say without getting too specific and looking over my attorney here because there's not a 32nd rewind. We've communicated in the past there's two, there's several things occurring. One, there's products that don't have all the specs. So for example, you can use it in this application, but you can't use it in that. So then a contractor has to decide are they meeting as they input this? And quite frankly, they're not looking to go, it doesn't need a temperature of 90 °C.
Two, we are working with authorities on products coming in, even for example, but I won't call what specific customers and so forth. But where they have to pass like an impact test of 7 out of 10, you have to drop away from a certain thing and not crack. And we've recently tested one significant importer and they're passing 1 out of 10. So, from authorities to customers to our government relations, these also are things that just for the safety of society need to be fixed.
Thanks for sharing that. Appreciate it. Thank you.
Thanks, Deane.
Operator
David Tarantino, KeyBanc Capital Markets.
Hi, everyone. Maybe just to put a finer point on PVC. Is the revision entirely from the imports or is there also additional capacity domestically? Then could you maybe give us an updated view on the degree of incremental capacity being added from the market as a whole?
Yeah, I think, David, it's a little above to what John Pregenzer said. What we don't know because, again, we don't talk to our competition. I don't know how much is additional lines coming on board versus just the mix of some of the people that go hey, I'm municipal just like we're moving into like, we generically call it the water market. You got plumbing municipal within there.
But how much of these others saying let's expand some, I say expand, but sign up an agent and so forth. So, is the capacity versus expanding their market presence? That's a little bit tougher, but it is imports is a large part. Well, I'm saying large, again, I'm trying to mention it so less than 10% but it was up over 20% year over year. And then it's expanding out with some of the US manufacturing companies.
And just to confirm this quarter's revision was mostly just the imports?
Well, I think it's pricing. The one problem with this even I've talked in the past whether it's Steel Conduit or whatever else, it's like I'll brag for Atkore and then I'll try to answer your question. I still think we're the market leader out there. We have the full breadth of products. We have regional service centers, we have national footprint. Because of our spend, we have relationships with all these companies and we're kind of the first choice and last look.
But people trying to enter the market trying to grow will leverage price. It's hard to say to go well, hold it. Who was the one that dropped their price or now that somebody dropped their price? Even a well-known recognized competitor of ours called a tier one person that's been around for a century or something. The PVC hasn't been that long, but you get it. Hey, now they're matching or now they think that's the market price. So David, it's just so hard to say. Here is the one causing it. Well, I think it's more the imports, but I just can't say or you can't point it down to one specific one. Does that make sense, hopefully?
Yeah. Yeah, that's helpful. And then on the volume growth, is there a way to break it out between kind of end market expectations and the internal initiatives? And maybe on that, could you give us an update on the progress around the growth initiatives particularly between solar and water?
Yeah, absolutely, David. Thank you.
So, I would just think about the framework we laid out on page 6 is a good way to start. That metal framing cable management construction services business did very well in the first quarter, mid-single digit growth after high-single digit growth in the previous year. This is where we have really good exposure to some of the strongest growing end markets like data centers and some of the large manufacturing projects. And then we have the capability that we've talked about from construction services as well as we have some new equipment related to the metal framing product line that we think will really help us here drive a significant portion of that growth. That product category continue to grow in the back half of the year. Probably that that would be a key driver for us.
As you mentioned, the other key driver, the Plastic Pipe Conduit product category, we think with the new water related products that we'll have, that's the next biggest growth driver in the back half of the year, especially as we manage through some of these comps. We talked about the first quarter, we had a difficult comparison around last year with the restocking, things like that. But now we have that equipment and benefiting. So that's probably the next biggest driver.
And then, we expect the metal Conduit electrical cable, there should be that kind of market level growth of low-single digits for the overall non-residential market. But we do have the competitive factors, especially thinking about the steel Conduit dynamics.
And then the mechanical tube area, we were soft here in the first quarter. We do anticipate that getting better in the back end of the year. But there is challenges with the solar market in general. We are performing well as we mentioned, but there are some dynamics that I think some people are trying to sort through.
So that's kind of the construct and the framework on how to still get to that low-single digit volume growth for the back end of the year. I think it's the -- there are some positives. We've talked about a lot of unfavorable items. Here we are positive here, this metal framing construction services is doing well. And I think not just this year but as we look in the future, this is a really key area for us to combine a few different offerings. So, I think it can be really good for years to come.
Okay, great. Thank you.
Thanks David.
Operator
Chris Dankert, Loop Capital.
Hey, good morning, guys. Thanks for taking the questions.
Forgive me if I'm misunderstanding, But the expectation around profitability is now that we're kind of reset the ore-COVID levels on the PVC side. However, we've seen more imports come in, we've seen more domestic production. So, how do we get confident that that is actually the right level and not something lower than pre-COVID?
Okay. So, I'll go through that. There's no guarantee. But what I would say, Chris, to my earlier remarks, that first off, I'll even clarify a little bit. What we have in here is our pricing down to that level. And then the nuance to that is I think everybody would agree that labor costs going through COVID, double-digit inflation for a couple of years, transportation going up that the margins we have at the end are even lower than pre-COVID. You know, like what we're thinking for industry level. And then to answer I gave earlier, again, I don't know other's cost position. But at some point, our quick analysis, she says is just no longer effective because of the freight back in the day.
And I'm seeing pre-COVID, we used to have this general rule that you didn't ship more than 500 miles, 700 miles, 800 miles. Because back then, freight was around 7% to 8% of revenue. It's a big bulky light item, it cubes out, it doesn't wait out for the pricing. Therefore, at some point, imports coming from across the globe no longer, in our opinion, from our analysis at the moment, make economic sense. So, I can't guarantee the future there.
But I just think at some point, you start getting down to your cost position. And from that standpoint, I feel good with Atkore because we are one of the largest resin buyers. We've talked in previous -- it has been that over the last couple of years for the pricing. But, we have automated factories where people have things, we automatically bundle our products and the 20 other things that mix things that people do manually that I think we have a good efficient process. And as I mentioned earlier, even this year alone, including PVC, should be our best year for productivity that I'm aware of pre or post IPO.
That's extremely helpful. Thank you for the color there. And then I guess just on Hobart, I mean, maybe can you tell us what production levels are kind of at versus target? And then to my understanding if the IRA or those incentives are narrow, changed, whatever, that doesn't particularly shift the profit pool for Hobart, right. Like most of those incentives are passed along to customers, correct?
Yeah. So a couple of things, operations is doing well now, I think even to the point of where I was on a call with the operations teams last week saying, hey, like in a different plant, what are you going to do? And there was a little bit of bravado, I think, I wish I had it a year before, but the team going well. What we did at Hobart, we're going to now come do that. My point there is operations are fitting speeds, productivity, all the different things that we're expecting at the time. So it's now back in our -- one of our top sales teams to go. Okay, now that we got this in addition to solar customers or everything else, go fill the mills, expand beyond and so forth. So, we're in a good spot there in general again. Now, let's go get volume.
As for the IRA and so forth, Our expectations, whether it's that or no one's asked me about beads and HDPE, that I think these are all bipartisan acts that is spending, that hit most states, therefore, whether you're red or blue. So I don't see things changing and or if there's less, back to our current President, if there's less incentives, you would think there's a tariffs offset that he has spoken to how he would rather run things. So short term when you get to solar.
And I think in the prepared remarks we talked about there is some hooking up to the grid. I'm well beyond my skis here. But if anything, as President Trump talks about deregulation, over time, that could be an enabler that we get things moving quicker as we add more solar capacity. One of -- I'd like to reference other people, in other words, this is just for one of the largest solar trackers I think already had their earnings announcement and they talked about record backlog and so forth.
So again, I'm not getting into the quarter but longer term, I still think this is a great market to be in. And by the way, we started the [Solar Torque Twos] before there ever was like an IRA tax credit. So, we're prepared to grow this market with or without incentives.
Got it. Well, thank you so much for the call there, and best of luck, guys.
Thanks, Chris.
Operator
Your next question comes from the line of Chris Moore with cjs Securities. Please go ahead.
Chris Moore
Hey, good morning, guys. Yeah, most of an answer maybe -- good morning. Can you provide me perhaps the puts and takes as to why fiscal '25 will be the bottom from a revenue and an adjusted EBITDA standpoint?
So, here's the puts and takes. We do expect, as I mentioned earlier and I'll give you some caveats that things with models, Chris and everybody else, that like the PVC and so forth. They asked to go. Okay, let's just take it down. It's not going to drop in January again or February right now. The first week of February is pretty damn good.
But over time, let's just bring it down. As I already answered, that's on price and there's more cost than there was five years ago in the industry. So, we think it's a natural number and then it's our productivity, our growth in global mega projects and so forth that will actually be upsides.
Now, the one thing in the model that people have to think about is going into next fiscal year, there would be some -- if pricing levels out the end of the year, there would be some decline in 2026. Because if you just think about comps to think about October of '26 versus October of '25 pricing dropping this year will make it tougher comp at the beginning of next year. So now, we're not here to give guidance on '26 yet. I want to show and perform over the next three quarters in Atkore and drive these initiatives. But do we have enough productivity? I really think and I look forward in future earnings, talk about global mega projects and what we have accomplished there in various things, you know, the puts and takes, but that's, Chris, our thought on '26 going forward.
Chris Moore
Fair enough. I will leave it there. Thanks, guys.
Thank you, sir.
Operator
This concludes the question-and-answer session. I would now like to turn the call back over to Will Waltz for closing remarks.
Thank you. Let me take a moment to summarize my three takeaways from today's discussion. First, Atkore continues to evolve as we expand our products and services portfolio through our niches, which we believe are natural extensions of what we've built over many years. Second, we continue to monitor the overall market dynamics and competitive landscape and believe several factors could have a positive impact for us as we move throughout the year. Finally, we remain committed to our capital deployment strategy to create shareholder value over the long term.
With that, thank you for your support and interest in our company. We look forward to speaking with you during our next quarterly call. This concludes the call for today.
Operator
That includes today's conference call. You may now disconnect.
