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Operator
cheese prices, third quarter North America median unit profits rose to the second highest level that we have seen in several years, surpassed only by the previous quarter. This was great news for our franchisees and for our company-owned stores' contribution to our bottom line. I want to emphasize that from the beginning of the pandemic, we have made investments and taken decisive actions to protect our team members and customers, including quickly reengineering our ordering and delivery processes, and technology to integrate no contact delivery into our channels and customer experience. It was these actions and the perseverance of our team members and franchisees that built trust with our customers and team members and enabled our corporate and franchise stores to stay open and serve our communities. Turning to technology, one of our competitive advantages is that at our core, Papa John's is an e-commerce first business. with approximately 70% of our orders placed over digital channels and mobile ordering being our fastest-growing platform. One key aspect of our growth strategy is our partnerships and technology integrations with three of the four top delivery aggregators. Year-to-date, our sales through aggregators have grown by a factor of over three times, which contributed to our industry outperformance in Q3. Aggregators continue to be a big part of our profitable growth story, and we are excited to be one of the largest QS brands on their platforms. Our loyalty and one-to-one marketing platform is also a growth driver and strategic technology priority for us. And our more active segments in particular, they drive outsized revenue compared to non-loyalty customers. To leverage this, we continue to scale our efforts for greater personalization. all with the goal of unlocking greater customer lifetime value. Next, I would like to discuss unit growth and new store development. Though new store openings were mostly paused in Q3, as expected with permitting still delayed by most local governments, Papa John's improved franchisee investment proposition and a new development team to support it are beginning to bear long-term fruit. Last quarter, we saw an uptick in interest from potential and existing franchisees who are attracted to the branch growth and profitability, resilient delivery model, and the potential for new retail real estate opportunities opening in the months ahead. We have made good progress ramping up our development efforts to match that interest with new leadership and resources, and early results show it. Last quarter, we signed the largest traditional store development agreement in North America in over 20 years. This deal will accelerate our growth in the important Philadelphia and Southern New Jersey market. Under the agreement, HB Restaurant Group, who joined the Papa John's system in 2019 and already owns 43 restaurants in the Mid-Atlantic area, will open 49 new stores between 2021 and 2028. We're thrilled to see such a committed franchisee expanding within the Papa John's system. and look forward to growing with them and many more new and existing franchisees over the coming years. Lastly, I'd like to address the transformation of our organization and brand over the past quarter and year as we build our commitment to diversity, inclusion, and winning. In September, we announced another big step forward against this strategic priority. We announced that we will open a second headquarters in the Atlanta area. to complement our existing headquarters in Louisville and our international headquarters in Milton Keynes, UK, outside of London. Our new hub-based organization, which is the outcome of a process we began in late 2019, is an investment in our long-term growth, as well as in our ability to efficiently deliver on the company's purpose, values, and strategic business priorities. We're excited to be expanding in Atlanta, an energetic, diverse, global city where we already have a significant presence. It is our largest corporate-owned restaurant market and the location of our newest and most sophisticated QCC. Atlanta is the home of a large number of consumer and QSR brands and provides great access for us to a deep talent pool. Atlanta's world-class airport will also connect us to the domestic and international markets that are key to our brand's future. Our Louisville headquarters, home for 36 years, remains essential to our long-term success. Under the new organizational structure, the majority of our corporate staff will continue to be located in Louisville. Their experience and dedication providing essential support and managing key infrastructure for our franchisees and customers will continue to be a bedrock of our business. The third element of our new hub design will be an international headquarters based in our current UK offices. Consolidating our international operations in the UK allows for greater collaboration and best practice sharing, reduces travel overheads, and leverages our significant resources located there across our international portfolio. We expect to open our new office in Atlanta in the summer of 2021. We look forward to providing updates as we move forward with our plans. Now that I have discussed our strong Q3 results and how progress against our strategic priorities contributed to them, Our new CFO, Ann Coggino, will address the quarter's financial results in more detail before I return to discuss our outlook. Ann?
Papa John 's
Thank you, Rob. I'm excited to be here this morning and look forward to partnering with you and the outstanding Papa John's team. It's a unique moment for Papa John's. Through its value-led transformation and innovation, the company is emerging as a leader in its category, opening enormous opportunities not only domestically but around the world. I want to thank Steve Koch and my new colleagues in Papa John's finance team for their warm welcome over the past month, the extra effort they've made during the transition, and most importantly, the high quality work they've been doing over the past nine months, which has allowed the company to reach this point. I am so very proud to be part of this team. In my role as CFO, my top priorities include driving profitable growth, setting a long-term plan to maximize our potential, and managing our balance sheet and capital to create value for the benefit of our shareholders, franchisees, team members, and all stakeholders. Addressing our investors and analysts on this call, I'd like to say that as CFO, I believe it's a unique privilege to be able to engage with investors and analysts in a two-way dialogue. On the one hand, communicating the company's results, strategy, and potential, and on the other hand, listening and learning from your perspectives. In my experience, this active conversation and engagement with shareholders is absolutely essential to a company's long-term success. Working with Rob and the team, I look forward to continuing to build this relationship with you over the coming months. Now let me turn to our financial results, which mirrored our outstanding operational progress during the quarter. There are four highlights I'd like to call out in particular. First, a 22% rise in global restaurant sales last quarter yielded a tenfold increase in adjusted operating income, clearly demonstrating the business's operating leverage, cost discipline, and earnings potential. I note we achieved these superior results in spite of higher commodity prices and the investments we are making to protect and support our team members. Second, we produced $134 million in free cash flow, defined as cash flow from operations less capital expenditures and dividends paid to preferred shareholders through the end of Q3. This is a reflection of the strong cash generation capabilities of our operating model. Third, we ended the third quarter with net debt of only $210 million, down $140 million from a year ago, and a compliance debt to EBITDA leverage ratio of 2.5 times, indicating the strength, optionality, and security provided by our balance sheet. And fourth, Q3 was the last quarter of our We Win Together franchise support program. This $80 million investment, in addition to greatly improved sales and unit economics, has left our franchisees in a better financial position than ever. And equally, the significant cash no longer required by this program, including nearly $55 million invested over the past four quarters, leaves Papa John's even better positioned to drive earnings and free cash flow growth and ultimately shareholder returns. These factors capture, in a nutshell, why I am so excited about Papa John's opportunity. Working with Rob, one of my top priorities is to align our long-term capital allocation and return priorities with the business's growth, cash generation potential, and strong balance sheet to maximize shareholder value. We've taken an initial step today with a new buyback, and I look forward to developing a comprehensive long-term capital allocation strategy for the future. Now I'd like to turn to our Q3 results. I'll then address some specific points around our outlook, including expected one-time costs associated with our corporate realignment. In the third quarter, we reported earnings per diluted share on a gap basis of $0.35 compared to a loss of $0.10 a year ago. Excluding a $0.03 net impact from special charges in the prior year, adjusted earnings per diluted share rose from a loss of $0.07 a year ago to $0.35 this year. The 42-cent year-over-year increase reflects a 44-cent positive benefit from improved operating results, primarily driven by our continuing impressive North America comparable sales. This was slightly offset by a 2-cent negative impact from the allocation of undistributed earnings to participating securities, primarily the Series B preferred shareholders. Per GAAP, we compute earnings per common share using the two-class method. This means that in addition to preferred stock dividends and accretion, a portion of undistributed earnings that would be attributable to participating securities on an as-converted basis is also deducted from net income at the company level to determine earnings per common share. Note, because the company did not have undistributed earnings before Q2 of this year, that is, our net income did not exceed our common and preferred dividend payments, we had not recorded this deduction to common earnings per share. To clear up any potential confusion about this accounting treatment, we have provided an additional table in this morning's earnings press release. Turning now back to Q3 results, In the quarter, we provided $13.5 million of support to franchisees under the We Win Together program, our last quarter as I mentioned, compared to a total of $11.4 million in support a year ago. On a per share basis, this amounted to approximately $0.31 for the quarter compared to $0.28 a year ago. In the third quarter of 2020, pre-tax income on a gap basis was $20.9 million compared compared to approximately 700,000 in 2019. Consolidated third quarter revenues rose 17.1% to 472.9 million. Excluding the impact of re-franchising 46 domestic restaurants in 2019, consolidated revenues increased approximately 20%. The increase was primarily due to strong comparable sales, as we've described, which drove higher North America commissary revenues, sales for domestic company-owned restaurants, North America franchisee royalties, and international revenues. Now, turning to cash. As I previously described, free cash flow was $134 million in the first nine months of 2020 compared to $15.8 million a year ago. The $118 million increase was driven by higher net income as well as favorable changes in working capital items, including the timing of payments associated with our marketing fund. We paid a cash dividend of $10.8 million to our common and preferred shareholders during the third quarter of 2020. Subsequent to the third quarter, on October 30, 2020, our Board of Directors declared fourth quarter cash dividends of approximately 10.8 million to be paid to common and preferred shareholders. The fourth quarter common stock cash dividends will be 22.5 cents per common share. The new 75 million share repurchase authorization is an additional option we are making available on top of our dividend to enhance shareholder value. With this buyback, our intent is to opportunistically repurchase shares in the open market. The buyback is the logical outcome of our healthy cash position and confidence in Papa John's near and longer-term prospects. I want to emphasize, however, that we see the buyback as one piece of a larger, multifaceted, long-term capital allocation and return strategy. I look forward to providing more color in the future. Now, turning to restaurant development. During the third quarter, we opened 14 restaurants in North America and closed 12 restaurants for a net increase of two restaurants. Internationally, we opened 40 restaurants and closed 29 restaurants for an increase of 11 restaurants. These changes in our unit count exclude any temporary closures as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. As you know, we withdrew our 2020 guidance at the start of the pandemic, given the volatility and business uncertainty we have faced and have not replaced it. However, I would like to address three specific items related to our outlook and reporting. First, to reiterate my prior comments, we will continue to record an expense for the allocation of undistributed earnings to participating securities whenever net income exceeds common and preferred dividends. This means that, hypothetically speaking, if fourth quarter net income attributable to the company comes in the same as Q3, we will again incur two cents of expense for the allocation of undistributed earnings to participating securities. Second, we expect to incur approximately 15 to 20 million in one-time severance, relocation, and other expenses through fiscal 2021 related to our corporate realignment and new Atlanta office plans. Of this amount, approximately 4 to 5 million, or 9 to 12 cents per share, of one-time expense is expected during the fourth quarter of 2020. As Rob discussed, we see these expenses as an investment in both the company's innovation and top-line growth, as well as in our efficiencies and commitment to reduce overhead. Third, I'd like to comment on our reporting. As you are probably aware, when the pandemic first triggered shutdowns across North America in March, creating extraordinary conditions for the country and our business, Papa John's began to provide monthly updates on comparable sales in addition to our normal quarterly reporting. We've continued to do so since with the goal of providing investors additional transparency during a period of suddenly higher volatility and uncertainty. Though there remains uncertainty and volatility around the impact of the pandemic going forward, on a relative basis, the sudden increase in uncertainty and volatility that initially led us to institute monthly sales reporting has passed. For that reason, we will return to our quarterly reporting frequency going forward in line with our industry peers. As always, we will continue to evaluate our reporting procedures and disclosures based on business conditions and disclosure best practices. I'll now turn the call back over to Rob to discuss our outlook. Rob?
Operator
Thanks, Anne. Congratulations on your amazing start as our CFO. We're so thankful and happy to have you as part of our team. I'd like to conclude by discussing how Papa John's is positioned for the short and long term. Papa John's is on a growth trajectory, having now achieved positive North America and international comp sales for five and six consecutive quarters, respectively. And so far in 2020, we have delivered record results and outperformed the overall pizza delivery market every quarter this year. As we look to the future, we expect the underlying factors that have contributed to our performance here to date to continue to benefit us in the longer term. We have built a scalable, sustainable innovation process that is producing winning new menu items, backed by a highly effective marketing model that makes our food the hero and has driven new levels of consumer awareness and favorability. We're just beginning to realize the benefits of these changes. Looking ahead at Q4 and into 2021, we have an exciting pipeline of opportunities lined up across pizza, papadias, and new platforms, which we look forward to telling you about in the near future. The growth in our business this year has connected millions of new customers with our brand, including over 8 million across our digital channels alone. These new customers are showing great promise with a higher portion purchasing multiple times shortly after their first purchase, a strong indicator of their stickiness. Additionally, Papa John's franchisee investment proposition and development capabilities are more compelling today than ever. We also have more domestic and international development white space than other top pizza brands. Together, these factors indicate our great potential for long-term unit growth in addition to continued comp sales growth. So to sum up, at Papa John's, we're working hard to take care of our team members and customers, deliver great pizza, and realize our tremendous potential today and in the future. I'd like to thank our shareholders, and everyone on this call for their interest in our company and for their continued support. With that, I'll turn the call over to the operator for Q&A.
Papa John 's
Thank you, sir. As a reminder, to ask a question, you would need to press star 1 on your telephone. To withdraw your question, please press the pound key. Due to the essence of time, we ask that you please limit yourselves to one question and one follow-up. Please stand by while we compile the Q&A roster. I show our first question. It comes from the line of Peter Sally from BTIG. Please go ahead.
Peter Sally
Good morning, and Rob, thanks for making me hungry this morning as well. I just wanted to ask, and I know you guys aren't really providing a ton of detail on the go-forward comps, but any qualitative comments you guys care to make on the momentum in October and maybe just circling back, I think in the past you talked about You know, maybe half of the comp coming from pandemic tailwinds and maybe the other half from some of your initiatives. Do you think that still holds or just any more detail around that would be helpful?
Operator
Hi, Peter. Great to hear from you. Yeah, you know, we are very excited about COVID. forward. You know, as we mentioned, we launched the Double Cheeseburger Papadilla. It's being received extremely well, better than we had even expected. And we've got a whole pipeline of innovation that's ready to roll. And we're kind of back into our operating model. As you know, we kind of pulled back a little bit at the beginning of the pandemic to make sure we could execute our operations seamlessly in the new operating environment. We were able to accomplish that and be able to support the restaurants with 15% transaction growth. But now we've got that nailed and we're ready to move forward with our plan that we put in place The plan hasn't changed. It's just accelerated. We've got a much stronger foundation on which to build. You know, the pandemic definitely provided a tailwind and supported all the initiatives that we had put in place prior to the pandemic. And so, you know, looking forward, as long as we're in this environment, we'll continue to benefit as the industry continues to benefit. But, you know, coming out of this situation, we're hoping like everyone for this to end as soon as possible. we feel like we've got a great foundation to continue to drive outperformance and higher levels of comp sales growth.
Peter Sally
Great. And then on the unit growth going forward into 2021, I know you guys are probably still working through some of the details, but how should we think about and maybe model, you know, company unit growth versus franchise? And maybe if you just look out a couple years ahead, What is that mix going to look like in terms of company ownership versus franchise? Is the franchise mix going to go up, or is it going to stay kind of around the same? Just any details around that would be helpful.
Operator
Yeah, the disproportionate amount of our development will come from franchisees, no question. We're looking forward to getting back to building restaurants internationally. As we called out in the call, it's been a challenge in a lot of markets as local governments have been challenged to support the construction process and the permitting process, but We look to 2021 and really as we come out of the pandemic globally to be able to get back and start building a lot of franchisee restaurants internationally. As you know, our international business is 100% franchised, so those will all be franchised. Domestically, we are looking to build some company restaurants next year. That's really a commitment to the kind of operating margins that we're seeing and And we feel that we can benefit from that and deploy some of our cash flow that Anne highlighted back into the organic growth of our business. But even with that, the disproportionate amount of new builds will come from franchisees. So over time, our system will definitely move more towards the franchise ownership versus company ownership, despite the fact that some company building going on next year.
Papa John 's
Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Alex Slago from Jefferies. Please go ahead.
Alex Slago
Hey, thanks. Good morning. Congrats on the quarter, and welcome aboard. I appreciate if you want to keep this high level at this point, just with the buyback authorization in place, and wonder if you could provide a little more on your your capital allocation priorities heading into 21s between reacceleration and company development, the headquarters changes, some potential debt pay down, and now the buyback. And I also know that you have accelerated – your volumes have really grown significantly this year and plans to accelerate growth next year. So if you could touch on the opportunity – on the processing and distribution centers, if you're in good shape there. And it doesn't seem like you've grown too many of them in the past, but whether that's something in the plans for the next couple of years.
Operator
Hi, Alex. I'll let Anne speak to some of the specifics. I know she's excited about the plans that we're just starting to formulate. But in general, what I can tell you is that this business is transforming right now. After a year and a half of helping franchisees get through some tough times, we're now ready to turn the capital back into our business. We have a lot of opportunities to do that through both new store development as well as technology investments as well as investments in productivity in our restaurants. There's a we're right now vetting out a whole litany of opportunities to drive operating income growth and accelerate operating income growth. But even with those investments, which are plentiful and robust, we still anticipate having a lot of cash from operations and a lot of cash on the balance sheet. So we're looking at ways that we can deploy that capital in the most efficient and productive way and how we can make sure that we're driving shareholder returns as we do that. So with that, I'll turn it over to Ann, and she can talk about the planning process of the capital allocation plans that we're putting in place.
Papa John 's
Yeah. Good morning, Alex. So I'm... so excited about the outlook. We have an incredibly strong balance sheet that provides optionality and security. Rob talked about the business model with the strong fundamental cash flow generation capabilities, and he talked a little bit about not only will the business continue to generate strong cash flows, but the significant cash no longer required for the We Win Together program just leaves Papa John's in an even better position to drive earnings and free cash flow. So clearly there are opportunities to leverage the balance sheet as well to further create value for shareholders. So it's a bit premature to give specifics beyond that, but know that it's something that we are laser focused on as a leadership team. So I look forward to coming back with more details in the future.
Alex Slago
That's great. And just on the margin side, if you could talk about implications of the headquarters changes and reorg on the underlying G&A expense heading into 21, 22, what we should think about there.
Papa John 's
Sure. So, as we talked about going into 21, we do have some one-time expenses in total of about 15 to 20 million, and a portion of that we actually expect to hit here in Q4 of 2020. But what I would reiterate, as you think longer term, this investment is one that positions us to accelerate our long-term growth, and we're absolutely committed to doing that without a long-term increase in G&A.
Operator
Yeah. In fact, I'll build on that. This will make us more efficient from a G&A standpoint, and that was part of the intention around the reorganization. I know the The opening of an additional office in Atlanta is garnering a lot of the news and a lot of the coverage, but this is about restructuring our organization in such a way that will allow us to most productively and efficiently continue to drive shareholder value moving forward. So that's a big driver of these changes. It's not just opening up a new location.
Papa John 's
Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Elton Stump from Longbow Research. Please go ahead.
Elton Stump
Great. Thanks so much. Just wanted to ask, on a Unico front, it's a hard question. Obviously, it's a tough environment to get permits and all that due to COVID. How soon do you think that will ramp up here in the U.S. next year? Is it a first half of story or is it more of a back half 21 story as you say here today?
Operator
You know, I wish I had a definitive answer for you on that. We absolutely thought that, you know, that we were going to be back to building restaurants at scale in early 2021. And now everyone's talking about, you know, the second wave of Corona. And, you know, as you as you know, The UK right now is in a shutdown, and if that moves on to other markets, it's going to delay the development process. The flip side of that is it is going to continue to provide additional tailwind for our business above and beyond organic growth. So we are ready. We are prepared. We have the infrastructure in place. We've already had a lot of the conversations with the franchisees who want to open up these markets and continue to grow these markets. It really is a macroeconomic situation that's impeding the development. So as soon as these governments and these markets are ready, we will be ready to go and build restaurants.
Elton Stump
Great. Very helpful. Thanks, Rob. And then just a quick follow-up to a question earlier. Just specifically, As a capacity standpoint, obviously with the huge growth you've seen, is there any concerns over the next 12 to 18 months of having to build more capacity, particularly here in the U.S.?
Operator
It's a great question. I'm sorry I didn't answer it when Alex asked it. Right now, we're As you know, the last couple of years for the brand, the volumes had slowed down and we had excess capacity and we moved to new manufacturing schedules and new distribution models to try manufacturing situation with enough capacity to support lots of growth in this business. So right now, we don't foresee any significant capital expenditures in the supply chain.
Elton Stump
Great. Thank you.
Papa John 's
Thank you. Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Brian Bittner from Oppenheimer & Co. Please go ahead.
Brian Bittner
Thanks. Good morning, Rob. And congratulations, Ann. Rob, question for you. Investors, they seem to have anxiety that sales trends have decelerated recently from the third quarter. And, you know, we all knew the elevated trends during the pandemic weren't necessarily sustainable. But I guess what this is doing is creating uncertainty regarding 2021 and your ability to hold on to the financial gains from COVID. So do you think that based on all your insights that you are going to be able to hold on to your AUVs in 2021? And what can you say today to help us understand how you expect to fight this lap and retain the business in 2021?
Operator
Great question, Brian, and probably the number one question surrounding our business right now. You know, Brian, every day that we continue to operate within the pandemic, we continue to gain disproportionate number of new customers. And the more new customers we bring in, the greater opportunity we have to serve them and take good care of them and create future customers. So, you know, I think the way we need to frame all this up is that, you know, transactions is what we're really talking about here. Transactions are a function of number of customers and frequency, right? And as other segments open up, as dining capacity expands, as people get more comfortable with going out and eating with 50 people they don't know in close proximity, it would only be logical to assume that there's going to be an impact of frequency, right? So what we need to do is we need to make sure that we are generating the number of new customers that can offset some of that frequency, coupled with ticket growth. And so I'll talk to the new customers. We've added over 8 million new customers this year. That's a huge number for our business. And what we're finding is that a lot of them are coming in through our loyalty channels, and a lot of them have higher frequency and higher ticket averages than the customers prior to the pandemic. So that gives us a lot of confidence that they have come in They are enjoying, you know, their experience, and they're coming back. It's not a one-and-done scenario for the most part. So we think the stickiness of those customers will help us support these AUVs moving forward. The other piece is on the ticket side. On the ticket side, Papadias has been a grand plan. We launched Papadias because we wanted to expand our lunch day park, and we started to see some progress there back in February, and as the pandemic hit and the commuting and what happened was we saw Papadias starting to show up a significant number of our pizza orders. So they become additional items on our current pizza orders, which is actually a bigger value for us as a company, a bigger contributor for us as a company than even the lunch day part. So as we continue to see that and we continue to see the mix on Papadias grow, we continue to see ticket growth. And, you know, programs like Chacaroni, A $12 pizza sounds like a discounted pizza. It's actually higher than our average pizza price on a ticket. So without taking pricing, we're increasing our ticket averages through innovation, and that coupled with the new customer stickiness gives us a ton of confidence that we're going to be able to maintain these types of AUVs moving forward.
Papa John 's
Thank you. Yeah. I show our next question. It comes from the line of Chris O'Call from Stiefel. Please go ahead.
Chris O'Call
Yeah, good morning, Rob, and welcome, Ann. Rob, just as a follow-up to that question, that prior question, I'm wondering what you think are the primary reasons the rate of growth has been slowing the last few periods.
Operator
You know, I think that in the industry in general, people – have gotten a little bit more comfortable leaving their homes. And we all anticipated that, right? We've all expected that to happen. I mean, the rate of growth that we were delivering, you know, our company 28% in Q2 and now 24% in Q3, I mean, it would be crazy for me to tell you that that's going to continue on in perpetuity. It's just not. I mean, so there is at some point going to be a deceleration in – in this business. The question becomes, well, how much of it can we hold onto and how much of it is foundational that we can then build on top of? We have been focused not on any deceleration. In fact, we're very happy, very pleased with the continued growth of our business. But we have been focused on the foundation. We've been focused on the investments we're making in the quality of our core products. We've been focused on the investments we're making in the innovation that's going to continue to bring in new customers and continue to drive frequency. And we've been focused on getting more productive, both corporately with our G&A, as well as at the restaurant level through some of the investments we've made in our infrastructure, both technology as well as process and equipment. to make sure that our operators are making, you know, great profits that they can reinvest back into development. So we are not concerned about the, you know, the industry's deceleration.
Chris O'Call
Okay. That's helpful. And then what do you think is necessary to attract new, large, well-capitalized franchise groups to the domestic system?
Operator
It's, you know, it's all about the money. It's all about the profitability of the restaurants. That's why we have been so focused on that. You know, our margins, our restaurant margins have grown dramatically over the last 12 months. And that gives us the ability to go in and talk with people who have, you know, investors and prospective franchisees who have a lot of alternative uses for their capital and make the case that we're a great place investment opportunity. I mean, you know, our return on investment, our paybacks are as good as pretty much anybody in the industry. We have a lot more development space than most of our primary competitors who have significantly more restaurants already in the ground. So when you're somebody of scale who has capital and wants to come in and have a significant size opportunity, don't just want to come in for 10 or 15 restaurants, want to come in for 100 restaurants, we have more white space opportunity for them to come in and make that type of investment and have that type of scale in our system.
Papa John 's
Thank you. I show our next question comes from the line of Eric Gonzalez from KeyBank Capital Markets. Please go ahead.
Eric Gonzalez
Hey, thanks. Good morning. The recent development deal in the mid-Atlantic, you know, it seems like it was a step in the right direction in terms of unit growth. to what extent should we expect to see more of those types of deals in the months and years ahead? And one thing I was wondering as it relates to that deal and possibly others is what types of franchisee incentives have you put in place to get those types of deals done, whether it be co-investment, royalty relief, marketing fund relief, et cetera?
Operator
Hi, Eric. We've actually gone the opposite direction. We've actually scaled back the incentives. You know,
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