Celsius Q2 2026 Results: The CEO Just Admitted the SKU Cuts Went Too Deep

August 06, 2026

Celsius missed Q2 2026 estimates as CELSIUS brand sales fell 11.7%. Alani Nu keeps carrying the portfolio, and the CEO admits the SKU cuts went too far.

Celsius Holdings just had a rough reaction to an earnings print, and the worsening stock chart isn't even the interesting part. The real interesting part is that the excuse behind the miss is one we already gave the company credit for fixing... so let's dig in and see what's going on:

Second quarter 2026 revenue came in at $817.9 million, up 11% year over year but short of what analysts had been modeling.^[1] Adjusted diluted EPS of $0.36 also missed expectations, and shares sold off hard the morning of the print ($CELH). The three-brand portfolio's combined U.S. energy category dollar share has climbed from roughly 8% in early 2023 to just over 20% today, and that climb hasn't reversed.^[4] What's changed is which brand is doing the climbing. In our 2026 Q1 Celsius coverage, we called the CELSIUS brand "stabilized". Q2 says otherwise.

celsius holdings 2026q2 key messages graphic

CELSIUS Revenue Drops 11.7%

celsius holdings 2026q2 revenue growth graphic

CELSIUS brand revenue fell to $387.0 million, down 11.7% year over year.^[1,2] That's worse than the 8% dip the brand took in the fourth quarter of 2025, the one management blamed on shipment timing tied to the Alani Nu distribution transition and the one we gave the benefit of the doubt on at the time because retail sell-through data backed it up.

This quarter, the same defense came back, but it's a harder sell the second time.

CFO Jarrod Langhans told analysts on the call that CELSIUS net sales were down about 12% while retail scan sales, meaning what actually left stores, were down only 2%.^[3] The gap is shipment timing tied to inventory rebalancing, heavier trade and promotional spending, and softness in the club channel.^[1,3] Translated: shoppers are barely pulling back. Instead, the company's own supply chain and SKU decisions are doing most of the damage to the reported number.

Too many SKU cuts

Celsius Energy Drink Electric Vibe Tropical Freeze Featured — Sounds like Celsius Needed to Keep MORE SKUs, Not Less

That's still a problem, because the SKU cuts were the company's own call. CEO John Fieldly said as much on the call. "We went too deep on the Celsius rationalization," he told analysts, adding he wouldn't have cut as many SKUs given the choice again.^[3] The company pulled slow-moving items to make room for better retail space, cold coolers and end caps instead of just more shelf tags, but those space gains are landing slower than the cuts did. Dollars per point of distribution are up 16% quarter over quarter even with roughly 7% fewer distribution points, so what's left on shelf is working harder.^[1,3]

The Fizz Free sub-line grew more than 20% in tracked channels versus the first quarter,^[3] something we'll need to cover here on Bevlab. Guidance is blunt about the timeline: management told analysts to expect the third quarter to look a lot like the second for CELSIUS, with a real return to growth arriving as the brand exits the year into 2027.^[3] International revenue for the brand held up fine at $27.2 million, up 10% year over year, with the Nordic markets still doing the heavy lifting.^[1,2]

Alani Nu: The Real "Rock Star"

Alani Nu is still the brand keeping this story alive. This has got to be the best acquisition the space has ever seen.

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Reported revenue hit $364.4 million, up 21% year over year, while retail sales in tracked channels grew an insane 56%.^[1,3] That's a wide gap between what shoppers bought and what shows up on the income statement, and it comes down to the same mechanics as last quarter: a heavier mix of Pepsi's direct-store-delivery system versus direct sales, which carries more trade spend and billbacks, plus the exit of some non-ready-to-drink SKUs and a non-cash accounting entry tied to the Pepsi distribution deal.^[3] Strip out Canada and the discontinued lines and gross revenue growth was closer to 39%, before the accounting brings it back down to the reported 21%.^[3]

However you slice it, Alani Nu crossed $1 billion in first-half 2026 retail sales, a real milestone for a brand Celsius has owned for barely a year.^[3] Purple Cotton Candy was the quarter's top-selling new flavor, and management is already teasing this year's "Witch's Brew" as the biggest limited-time release in the brand's history for the fourth quarter.^[3]

One number worth watching: Alani's U.S. energy dollar share came in around 8.7% for the quarter, a touch below where it sat in the first quarter, a reminder that the category itself is growing fast enough that even a brand adding revenue can tread water on share.^[1] It's a wild category when you can crush it as well as Alani and still lose marketshare.

Rockstar: What Should We Do With You?

Rockstar Energy is smaller and simpler. Revenue came in at $66.5 million for the quarter, with no year-ago comparison since Celsius only closed on the brand in August 2025.^[1] Retail sales fell 13% year over year, and the language on the call has shifted from integrating the brand to stabilizing it. The integration itself wrapped in June, on the nine-month timeline management set at the deal's close, and the plan now is to reconnect the brand with its motorsports, gaming, and music roots rather than chase growth.^[3] A packaging refresh and an updated logo are starting to roll out. For now, Rockstar is what it was bought to be: shelf space and Pepsi leverage, not a growth engine.

Celsius Holdings 2026q2 Investor Presentation

Profitability tells its own story. Gross margin held at 48.1%, roughly flat with the first quarter and down from 51.5% a year ago, with aluminum costs still the main drag.^[1,2] Adjusted EBITDA fell to $184.2 million, or 22.5% of revenue, compared with $210.3 million and 28.4% a year ago.^[1] GAAP net income dropped 45% to $55.3 million, though that number needs a footnote: $80.9 million of the quarter's expenses were distributor termination fees tied to shifting more of Alani Nu's territory to Pepsi, and Pepsi reimbursed the company for the bulk of that cost separately.^[2] The cash picture is healthier than the GAAP line makes it look.

Capital return kept going regardless. Celsius bought back roughly $100.4 million of stock in the quarter and $124.5 million for the first half, with $135.9 million left on the $300 million authorization.^[1,2] The company also shaved 0.25 percentage points off its term loan rate in July, with room for another quarter point if its credit ratings improve.^[2]

Legal Issues Ongoing...

Celsius Holdings 2026q2 Industry Numbers

A few legal items are worth flagging. A Florida trial court entered a $101.1 million judgment against Celsius in April in the long-running Strong Arm Productions royalty dispute, now under appeal, with $85 million accrued against it.^[2] In April, a wrongful-death product liability suit was filed in Texas against a former Alani Nu distributor, alleging a death linked to caffeine consumption and marketing toward minors. Celsius isn't named as a defendant but has an indemnification obligation tied to the claim.^[2]

The company also received a civil investigative demand from the Texas Attorney General in June over its product representations, and the securities class action first filed in 2024 is still working through the courts.^[2] None of these are resolved yet, and together they're a legal bill and looming black (or at least gray) cloud that keeps growing alongside the business.

Apparently this flavor just crushed it

Put together, the picture is consistent even if it isn't comfortable. CELSIUS isn't losing shoppers anywhere near as fast as the income statement suggests, but the company's own supply chain and SKU decisions turned a mild slowdown into a double-digit miss, and the CEO admitted as much on the record. Alani Nu remains the best acquisition in the portfolio by a wide margin, and Rockstar is exactly the stabilize-and-hold asset it was bought to be. We're excited for some new branding, but we really think the formula should be "revitalized". Management already told analysts not to expect a fix in the third quarter.

The real test is the fourth quarter. That's when Celsius either proves this was a supply chain problem of its own making, or admits CELSIUS has a demand problem it can't out-execute. At that point, we'll really see how this year's Witch's Brew does. You know you can follow us on @Bevlabmedia on TikTok and Instagram to catch that review.