For the fiscal first quarter, sales were $5 billion, up 13% year over year.
We delivered consolidated adjusted EBITDA of $680 million, up 2% over the same period and adjusted earnings per share came in at $0.65 per share, up 6.6%.
During the quarter, we also continued to aggressively buyback stock, repurchasing roughly $100 million worth of stock while maintaining net leverage of 2.4 times, well within our desired range of two and a quarter to two and a half times.
corrugated packaging, which includes integrated corrugated converting operations and represented 44% of first quarter sales.
Consumer packaging, which includes integrated consumer converting operations and accounted for 23% of first quarter sales.
Paper, which includes all third-party paper sales and made up 27% of first quarter sales and distribution which includes our distribution business, which is roughly 6% of sales.
Historically, our margins in corrugated have been 18% and 16% in consumer, improving both as a key priority.
As a reminder, in Q4 of 2021 and Q1 of 2022, we have repurchased approximately $223 million of stock as an initial down payment on this strategy.
With our very strong free cash flow generation and our current valuation level, we intend to get more aggressive on our stock buybacks and are targeting repurchases up to $500 million over the next several months.
With over 20 years of experience in corporate strategy, M&A, capital markets, portfolio optimization and broad-based business transformation as well as extensive public company experience, Alex has already proven to be a strong partner.
Fiscal first quarter sales were up 13% to $4.95 billion and consolidated adjusted EBITDA increased 2% year over year to $680 million.
Consolidated adjusted EBITDA margin was 13.7%.
Price and mix positively impacted earnings by $600 million year over year.
This higher pricing was mostly offset by $520 million in higher costs, including higher fiber, transportation and labor as well as the impact of the previously discussed high planned maintenance conducted in the quarter.
Sales in corrugated packaging, excluding white top trade sales were up 11.5% year over year to $2.1 billion.
Adjusted EBITDA declined 17% to $289 million giving the segment an adjusted EBITDA margin of 13.5%, also excluding white top trade sales.
Price drove an additional $277 million in adjusted EBITDA year over year.
However, this was more than offset by $230 million in inflation due to labor challenges with COVID-related absenteeism and logistics issues as well as $63 million of lower productivity and $43 million of lower volume.
During the quarter, our North American box shipments were 3.7% lower year over year, driven by our record mill maintenance levels, COVID-related slowdowns and continued disruptions in the supply chain.
Sales were up 7% year over year to $1.1 billion, though adjusted EBITDA declined 3.4% to $169 million in the quarter.
Adjusted EBITDA margins were 14.9% for the segment.
As in corrugated, better price and mix added $50 million to adjusted EBITDA.
Also, improved productivity and better volume drove $14 million and $6 million of higher adjusted EBITDA, respectively.
However, higher fiber, transportation and labor costs as well as the high maintenance level negatively impacted earnings with total inflation of $76 million, more than offsetting the other improvements.
Revenue for our paper business came in at $1.4 billion, up 24% year over year.
Adjusted EBITDA was $232 million with an adjusted EBITDA margin of 17%.
Adjusted EBITDA was up an impressive 53% year over year due to price and mix improvements with the flow-through of previously published price increases.
Those sales were up 7% to $325 million.
Adjusted EBITDA margins fell to 2% from 5.4% last year, mainly due to supply chain issues and the higher cost to service customers driven by higher fuel and labor costs.
Finally, we had negative impact from the 401(k) match returning to cash payments rather than stock and the required repayment of the deferred payroll tax as part of the CARES Act.
Though the quarter was highly impacted, we still expect to generate cash flows in excess of $1.3 billion as we progress through the year.
Though we are past the highest maintenance quarter due to delays in mill maintenance earlier in fiscal 2021, along with our originally planned outages, we still have approximately 128,000 tons of scheduled downtime across our system in the coming months.
These assumptions result in forecasted consolidated adjusted EBITDA of $780 million to $830 million and adjusted earnings per share of $0.94 to $1.08 per share.
As a note, this guidance does not include any potential benefit from the $70 per ton price increase across our containerboard grades that we have communicated to our customers.
Some additional assumptions behind our outlook include OCC costs down $10 to $15 per ton, natural gas costs down sequentially.
Labor expense up sequentially due to normal Q2 merit increases, continued inflation in freight and logistics expense, a tax rate of 23% to 25% and diluted shares outstanding of approximately 267 million.

Summary:
For the fiscal first quarter, sales were $5 billion, up 13% year over year.
We delivered consolidated adjusted EBITDA of $680 million, up 2% over the same period and adjusted earnings per share came in at $0.65 per share, up 6.6%.