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spk11: Good morning and welcome to the Carroll's Restaurant Group Inc. Third Quarter 2021 Earnings Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. Following the presentation, we will conduct a question and answer session and instructions will be given at that time. If anyone should require operator assistance during the call, please press star zero on your telephone keypad. I would like to remind everyone that this conference call is being recorded today, Wednesday, November 10th, 2021 at 8 a.m. Eastern Time and will be available for replay. I'll now turn the conference over to Ms. Greta Miles, Controller for Carol's Restaurant Group. Please go ahead.
spk02: Thank you, Melissa, and good morning, everyone. By now, you should have access to our earnings announcement released earlier this morning and an earnings presentation that are both available on our website at www.carols.com under the Investor Relations section. Before we begin our remarks, I would like to remind everyone that our discussion, including answers to questions posed to management, may include forward-looking statements or comments with respect to our strategies, intentions, or plan, and the future direction of revenues, input costs, or other aspects pertaining to our businesses. These statements are not guarantees of future performance, and therefore, undue reliance should not be placed on them. We also refer you to our filings with the SEC for more details. both with respect to forward-looking statements as well as risks that could impact our business and results, including, among other things, the impact of COVID-19. During today's call, we will discuss certain non-GAAP measures that we believe can be useful in evaluating our performance. The presentation of this additional information should not be considered in isolation or as a substitute for results prepared in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles. A reconciliation to comparable gap measures is available with our earnings release. With that, I will now turn the call over to our Chairman and CEO, Dan Accardino. Dan?
spk07: Thanks, Greta, and good morning, everyone. Before I discuss our third quarter 2021 top line, let me address the elevated labor and commodity cost headwinds that we and the restaurant industry generally are experiencing. They both hit our adjusted EBITDA and margins hard in the quarter. From a labor standpoint, in the third quarter, we worked to keep our restaurants open from at least 6 a.m. until 11 p.m. in order to take advantage of the economy reopening. Given the competition to recruit and retain workers, we were required to increase average hourly wages of our team members by 13.3% and pay shift premiums and overtime in order to meet customer demands. In addition, the Delta variant further challenged our ability to keep our restaurant staff during the quarter, given sporadic location-specific closures. At least for now, that challenge has abated so far this quarter. We believe we will continue to experience labor headwinds for at least the next six to nine months. Our supply chain was constrained on numerous levels. We use a combination of frozen beef from overseas suppliers and fresh beef from domestic suppliers. Beef represents about a quarter of our commodity basket, Container ships carrying frozen beef were stranded off the coast of California, unable to unload their product in a timely manner during the third quarter. This supply constraint contributed to our beef costs increasing 15.5% compared to last year. Domestic food and paper producers and distributors supplying most of our commodity requirements face labor constraints along with higher fuel costs, and many pass those increases on to us. The questions we are struggling to answer are, What portion of the higher labor costs are transitory, and will commodity costs follow their traditional cyclical patterns and revert to the mean? We don't have these answers, but we do know that the inflationary cost pressures we experienced during the third quarter were not expected to the degree that they impacted our industry. The economic conditions stemming from the pandemic and its effect on the labor force, supply chains, and consumer habits continue to be challenging to to navigate and difficult to predict. Turning to our sales in the third quarter of 2021, comparable Burger King restaurant sales rose 2.7% during the quarter with a sequential improvement in trends from July through September as year-ago comparisons eased and we rolled out pricing increases in late July and in August. We estimate that we lost about 1% of same-store sales growth through the COVID and staffing-related challenges that reduced operating hours in the quarter. During the third quarter, the eat-in and take-out channels combined contributed about 14% to total sales at our Burger King restaurants, while drive-through was approximately 80%. We also benefited from a 4.7% mix in delivery sales, which compared favorably to a 2.9% mix in the third quarter of last year. The average check size for delivery held at $17.53 compared to $17.56 in the second quarter of 2021. Our overall third quarter average check for Burger King rose to $9.23, including delivery, compared to $9 in the second quarter. Overall, our Burger King average check increased 7.8% year over year as a result of higher menu prices and reduced promotional discounting. To further mitigate input pressures, we have taken an additional eight-tenths of a percent in pricing in early October at our Burger King restaurants. We believe that the impact of price increases on customer demand in the current environment is small. Based on the price actions we have taken so far this year, lower promotional discounts, and possible further price action expected next year, we believe that our Burger King average check will increase in the mid to high single-digit percent range in the first half of next year. In terms of the trends in our Burger King sales by day part, most remain steady. The breakfast and evening late night day parts, however, continued to recover in the third quarter of 2021 compared to the same quarter of 2020. Breakfast increased 9% and contributed 12% of our sales in the quarter, and evening late night improved 10% and contributed 13% of our sales in the quarter. We once again outpaced the overall Burger King system as we have done for 21 out of the past 23 quarters. Our third quarter 2021 comparable Burger King restaurant sales increase exceeded the U.S. Burger King system by 430 basis points. We believe we were able to drive positive comparable sales and outperform the system during the quarter through a combination of menu price actions and actively reinstating restaurant hours. As an update, in October 2021, comparable sales at our Burger King restaurants increased 5% compared to October last year, continuing the sequential improvement we have been seeing since July of 2021. Popeye's comparable restaurant sales in October increased nine-tenths of a percent. Only in place a short time, Burger King's Royal Perks loyalty program is already beginning to have a positive impact on increasing the level of one-on-one engagement with our customers, and reducing the use of paper coupons. This platform, which is currently accessible in our restaurants only through the BK mobile app, will also be available to our dining room and drive-thru guests beginning next month. To conclude, today we are facing our cost challenges head-on with more aggressive pricing, which we believe will help alleviate the margin pressure that we are currently facing. Looking ahead, we believe we will be able to begin recapturing a portion of the margin erosion we are seeing this year as the benefits from menu pricing actions and lower promotional discounts continue to improve comparable sales and cost comparisons potentially ease on a relative basis. Finally, as we announced in September, I will be retiring as chairman, CEO, and president by June 30th of next year. I have been with the company for 50 years, a long tenure by any measure. I believe that now is the right time, both for me and for Carol's, to begin the transition to the next generation of leadership My intention over the coming months will be to work with our board of directors and management team to identify my successor and help that person succeed in their new role. And with that, let me turn the call over to Tony to review our quarterly financials.
spk06: Thank you, Dan. Total restaurant sales for the third quarter increased 3.6% to $421.7 million compared to the prior year period of $407 million. Our Burger King compo restaurant sales increased 2.7% during the quarter with an average weekly sales for Burger King Restaurant of $30,186. This is an improvement of 3.1% from 2020 levels, and more importantly, exceeded 2019 levels by 4.9%. The primary difference between overall sales growth in the quarter to comparable Burger King Restaurant sales growth was due to the contributions from the 19 restaurants acquired during the second quarter of 2021 and three newly opened Burger King Restaurants. offset by the closure of 17 Burger King restaurants since the end of the third quarter of 2020. Let me give you our Burger King performance by region as we operated 1,027 restaurants as of the end of the Q3 across 23 states. In the Northeast, representing 21% of our Burger King restaurants, comparable sales were up 5.7%. In the Midwest, representing 29% of our Burger King restaurants, comparable sales were up 3.2%. In the South Central region, representing 24% of our Burger King restaurants, comparable sales were up 1.7%. And finally, in our southeast region, representing 26% of our Burger King restaurants, comparable sales decreased 0.9%. With respect to our Popeyes restaurants, which represented less than 5% of our total revenues in the third quarter of 2021, comparable restaurant sales decreased 3.2% versus a positive 5.5% during the same period the previous year. Staffing challenges during the evening hours of operation this past quarter were particularly impactful to Popeye's comparable sales. However, our results still represented a 3.8% increase on a two-year basis. We outperformed the Popeye's U.S. system by 140 basis points in the latest quarter. As a result of the inflation challenges experienced in the third quarter, adjusted EBITDA decreased $15.5 million to $18.6 million last while adjusted EBITDA margin decreased 400 basis points to 4.4% of restaurant sales. Cost of food, beverage, and packaging as a percentage of net sales increased 130 basis points, primarily because of higher beef, pork, and other commodity costs. Commodity inflation in the quarter was 9.2%. Recall that last quarter we stated that our food supplier forecasted beef costs would be between $2.40 and $2.45 a pound from September to December of 2021. At least as far as September is concerned, this did not come to pass, as it was $2.68 per pound in the quarter overall. Although we have seen modest reduction in beef costs in the last two weeks, we now believe that commodity costs will remain elevated through the remainder of the year. Restaurant labor expense increased 250 basis points as a percentage of restaurant sales in the third quarter of 2021, compared to the same quarter a year ago. Again, the dramatic contrast between the restrained operating environment we experienced in the third quarter of 2020 and the impact on labor costs of the economy reopening was unprecedented. On an absolute basis, labor costs increased $15 million, or 12.1%, from $126 million to $143 million. The imbalance between the supply and demand for workers required us to quickly increase hourly wages to remain competitive and operational with adequate staffing levels. While the base numbers of hours worked by team members were about even with the same period last year, The dollar impact of the higher average hourly wages increased our labor costs by $6 million in the quarter. Paying team members premiums to take on additional responsibilities, such as opening and closing our restaurants in overtime, added $4.8 million to the overall increase in labor. The need for overtime hours for our assistant managers that were restricted last year in response to the pandemic, along with salary increases for retention, cost us an additional $3.7 million in the quarter. Other restaurant operating expenses increased 90 basis points due to a number of factors, including higher recruiting spend and other employee-related incentives, utility rate increases, and rising insurance costs. We also installed smart safes in a majority of our working locations that provide for faster cash collection and greater security, which also added to operating expenses. Restaurant rent expense in the third quarter decreased 30 basis points as a percentage of sales compared to the prior year period, primarily due to sales leverage. General and administrative expenses fell to $19.2 million in the third quarter of 2021 from $20.4 million last year and declined 40 basis points to 4.6 of restaurant sales. The decrease in dollar terms was due to lower incentive compensation accruals this year and was partially offset by higher regional administrative costs. Our net loss was $9.9 million in the third quarter of 2021, or 20 cents per diluted share, On an adjusted basis, excluding certain non-operating items, third quarter adjusted net loss was $7.8 million or 16 cents per diluted share. In the prior year period, adjusted net income was $5.7 million or 9 cents per diluted share. The cash flow for the third quarter of 2021 was $13.5 million compared to $23.8 million in the prior year period. The difference is primarily due to the reduction in adjusted EBITDA this year. We ended the third quarter with cash and cash equivalents of $89.4 million and long-term debt, including the current portion and finance lease liabilities of $523.3 million. We had $47.1 million drawn on our $215 million revolving credit facility and had $9 million of letters of credit issued under such facility. This left $158.9 million of unused availability under our credit facility and when added to our cash balance, provided us with $248.3 million of liquidity at the end of the third quarter. We funded the special cash dividend of $24.9 million on October 5th, 2021. As a reminder, our ability to utilize our revolver capacity requires compliance with one senior secured leverage ratio and is only in effect when more than 35% of the available capacity is being used. At this point, we are below that threshold and have no maintenance covenant requirement. When in effect, we need to stay under 5.75 times senior secured net debt to covenant EBITDA. Our senior secured ratio was at 1.24 times at the end of the quarter, so we have considerable headroom to use our current available revolver capacity. Our total net debt compared to covenant EBITDA as defined in the senior credit facility stood at 4.03 times at the end of the third quarter, in line with the ratio at the end of the third quarter of 2020. We did not repurchase any shares of our common stock during the third quarter. We now believe that our net capital expenditures will be below our earlier $60 million target as construction delays have pushed some new builds and remodeling projects to next year. Our current 2021 capital expenditure forecast is $50 million and will include the remodel of 28 restaurants, half of which will be completed this year and the remainder in 2022. This plan includes nine Popeyes remodels that will mostly be completed next year. We are also building eight Burger King restaurants in 2021, of which six will go online this year. The $10 million reduction in 2021 spend will move into our 2022 capital expenditure plan. On the M&A front, we do not currently have any multi-restaurant transactions in the pipeline. To conclude, while the near-term cost headwinds affecting our business are certainly clear, As we move into next year, we believe that we will be able to claw back a portion of the margin erosion we are now experiencing. We believe this will be achieved through menu price actions taken to date and in the future, combined with potentially easing cost pressures on a year-over-year basis, particularly in the back half of 2022. In the meantime, our liquidity is ample, as is our ability to generate meaningful EBITDA. And with that, operator, let's go ahead and open the lines for questions.
spk11: Thank you. At this time, we'll be conducting a question-and-answer session. If you'd like to ask a question, please press star 1 on your telephone keypad. A confirmation tone will indicate your line is in the question queue. You may press star 2 if you'd like to remove your question from the queue. For participants using speaker equipment, it may be necessary to pick up your handset before pressing the star keys. Our first question comes from the line of Fred Whiteman with Wolf Research. Please proceed with your question.
spk05: Hey, guys. I just wanted to follow up on sort of the margin outlook here. And I understand that there's an inherent degree of unpredictability here. But when you guys are talking about clawing back a portion of the margin loss in the back half of next year, how should we think about sort of the structural revisions to the margin performance of the business going forward?
spk06: I think it's going to be a combination. First of all, we totally agree with it's unpredictable. But, you know, we know... the menu price increases that we put in place today and how they'll carry over to next year, we plan on doing at least one early year menu price increase next year. In terms of margins, that'll be helpful to margins. The traffic direction is almost out of our hands because it's really reliant on some RBI activities. you know, we feel good about the menu price increases and that they're holding, you know, that we're not, they're not affecting traffic at this day. And then, you know, I just don't, you know, we don't see the kind of hourly wage, you know, there will, there will be, there will likely be hourly wage increase next year and certainly in the back half, but, you know, we don't believe it could possibly be as strong as we, you know, as high as it's been this year, given that it's, you know, we probably got three or four years of wage increases in one quarter, you know, of this year. So, you know, our view is it's unlikely that it will be that, you know, that dramatic next year. So we'll get some sales leverage based on that. So that's, again, it's totally unpredictable. We have no idea what the labor situation will be like a year from now, but it just seems reasonable. And then the other thing is, you know, we're seeing stabilization in commodity costs. And even though, you know, even though we think that the labor, you know, the production and distribution aspects of, Our commodities will not see a lot of relief. You know, you could see some, you know, raw materials relief, you know, next year. So that could mean that the cost of sales are going up, you know, less robustly than they did in the third quarter this year.
spk05: Makes sense. And if we just think about the October trends that you touched on, it looks like the two-year trend decelerated versus what you guys did in the third quarter. So could you sort of touch on what you're seeing on the top line and when we should sort of expect that to get moving in the right direction again?
spk06: You know, we saw 5% in October, and, you know, it consisted of, you know, average ticket was up in the low teens range. And traffic was down consistent with what was down in the third quarter, about, you know, 5%, 6%. So, you know, that's what we're seeing. I think the big driver, you know, we probably think that's, you know, the price is probably good. You know, the price aspect of it is probably good through the quarter. But, you know, again, the traffic piece is a little bit uncertain.
spk05: Great. Thanks, guys.
spk11: Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of James Rutherford with Stevens Inc. Please proceed with your question.
spk10: Great. Thanks very much. Dan, congrats on the announced retirement and on a very incredible career in the industry. We have you for another six months or so, but we'll certainly miss you on these calls once that transition happens. So congratulations. I'll have another call anyway. Sorry, what was that?
spk07: I said I'll still have another call anyway.
spk10: Yeah, well, we're glad. We're certainly glad. I want to start off on the staffing levels versus 2019 levels. I'm curious how those trended through the quarter. And as a second part to that question, do you think the wage increases that you've put in place are sufficient to make your stores competitive enough? Or do you expect to need to increase wages again at any meaningful level in the fourth quarter to get those staffing levels back to 2019 levels?
spk07: The staffing levels through the quarter actually were pretty consistent. We're ending up with a fair number of applications. The application flow has picked up in the past month. The challenge continues to be with retention. I think the core average hourly rate is fine. Where we're seeing the biggest part of the inflation and labor is we're paying premium wages to keep the stores open past 9 o'clock at night. That's where we seem to be struggling the most, and that's true for the whole industry. We really don't want our restaurants to close prior to 11 and 12 o'clock at night, and consequently, rather than increase the base wage, we pay a premium wage of 50 cents or a dollar to get employees to work beyond that period of time. So in terms of a percent increase in wages in 2022, my sense is it should be much more – it'll be much less of an increase than what we're experiencing currently.
spk10: Okay. And, Tony, was that 13.3% wage growth inclusive of the overtime and shift premiums, or is that additional to that?
spk06: No, it was just the base wage.
spk10: Okay, that's just the base wage.
spk06: Okay.
spk10: Thank you. And then – Just one more question for me, and I'll turn it back to the queue, but can you give a sense of how menu price trended throughout the quarter? I don't know if you want to give it necessarily by month or whatever, but with the different increases put in place and overall, where are you running today with the 80 bps you added in October?
spk06: It went up during the quarter because the first increase was at the end of July, and that was on the backs of a late March increase of 2%. And then we did a pretty sizable one in August. So I think it ended up for the quarter being about 5 plus or minus percent of the check increase was due to menu price increases. And right now we're sitting at about 7.5% from menu price increases. Okay.
spk10: Okay. And then there's also, I think, a little bit less discounting in there as well, which is not included in the 7.5. Is that a fair way to think about total sort of net check? Okay.
spk06: It's pretty significant, though. It's not a small – I mean, our discounting is like 300 basis – 300, 400 basis points less this year, this quarter, than it was a year ago, period. So it's just an interesting trend that we're seeing that, you know – A, you know, we're raising the prices on some of the promotional items, and it's sticking, and there are fewer guests who are sort of spending very few dollars in the restaurant. The more the guests are spending more, which helped drive the average ticket price up and reduce the promos and discounts.
spk10: Certainly, it's a very interesting dynamic. Okay, thanks for the help.
spk11: Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Jake Bartlett with True Securities. Please proceed with your question.
spk01: Great. Thank you very much. Thanks for the question. And Dan, congratulations on a long and fruitful career. It's been great working with you over these years. My first question was just on the sales trajectory. And I know that RBI has communicated a plan to Really take a look at the strategy, work with franchisees, communicate that strategy, and then put it into place in 2022 to try to regain market share. But the question is, in the meantime, how confident are you that there's measures in place or strategies in place to really start to move the needle in the near term? So rather than waiting for the long-term strategy shift or approach, How confident are you that in the near term that Burger King can regain some of this market share that it's been losing?
spk07: I think it's going to be a challenge for the next six months. The marketing plan for the balance of this year, we know what it is, and it was pretty much put in place some while ago. The new plan and the new strategy will be provided to the franchise community at the convention in December. but it'll take a while for that to take effect and implement. So I think the market share challenges will continue for at least the, until the mid part of 2022. Got it. Okay.
spk00: That's helpful.
spk01: And then, you know, the, the, the less discounting, I believe maybe through less, you know, paper couponing seems good support for margins, probably impacting sales a bit, but you know, As you shift over to the digital channel, is there is this an interim period where you have we have less of the paper, you know, coupons, but don't have the digital channel quite up to speed because it hasn't been your loyalty hasn't been launched in store yet. So, you know, the question is, once that does happen, would we just expect the discounting to kind of go back to a more normal level? just in the form of on the digital channel, or do you think that there's a kind of a real permanent shift here in less discounting for the brand?
spk07: Well, it's not just the couponing and the digital. There's been changes in the menu. We had the dollar menu on the value items. Those caps were all lifted, so we're charging more now for those items on a regular basis. and a year ago we had a two-for-five as opposed to currently we're running a two-for-six and two-for-ten kind of things. So I think those changes are probably more relevant than whatever's going on with the couponing, Jake. And more sustainable.
spk01: Got it. Great. And then the last question is really on free cash flow. Tony, maybe if you can just remind us if there's anything lumpy in terms of – you know, payment, you know, ins and outs, you know, in working capital, just so we can kind of make sure we understand that. And then, you know, as we look to 2022 for CapEx, you know, some of the CapEx has been, you mentioned, pushed into 22. You know, any indication on whether you'd expect to maybe open fewer stores than previously planned, you know, given the environment and the cost pressures or, you know, also whether there's, you know, how likely it is that there's going to be a, a capital kind of requirement from whatever measure Burger King puts in place to turn sales around. Any indication on what 2022 CapEx could be and then just making sure we know the ins and outs on working capital for free cash flow?
spk07: I'll deal with the CapEx and Tony can deal with the working capital. In terms of opening restaurants in 2022, My sense, Jake, is that we've got some that are already in the works, and they'll open in the first part of next year. Beyond that, my guess is it's probably going to be later in the year, simply because we're having problems getting equipment and so forth. There's about a three-and-a-half, four-month lead time now to get kitchen equipment. So even if we wanted to open the restaurants, it's going to occur later in the year. So I think new store development could be less next year than what we had originally planned. Remodeling, again, we've got some carryovers on remodel. We've got some that we hope to get completed by the first part of next year. And then we'll see, again, what the supply chain looks like in terms of our ability to get the equipment. In terms of both equipment mandates for both Burger King and Popeye's, The digital menu board rollout will be completed by second quarter of 2022 in both brands. And the required kitchen equipment for Burger King will be in place by the end of Q1. It's already been ordered. And the required kitchen equipment for Popeyes will be in the second half of 2022, again, because of supply constraints.
spk01: Got it. And then, Tony, just the question on the working capital. But, Dan, in terms of the equipment for the Burger King and the Popeyes, is that a significant investment to boost up? Should we expect that to boost the 22 CapEx significantly?
spk07: I don't think it's going to boost the 22 CapEx significantly. I mean, the major CapEx dollars are remodels and whatever new construction we may do. So that will be, as I said, that's going to be somewhat fluid based upon our ability to get the supplies to open or remodel restaurants. The CapEx requirements for both Popeyes and Burger King are quite a relatively small percentage of our overall CapEx budget.
spk06: Yeah, and they're lapping what we did this year, so it shouldn't change that much. You know, I'd say the... Couple things that are impacting working capital this year are, first of all, we have to repay 10 million plus of the FICA deferment that we received in 2020. So it's half of the total. So that'll hit on December 31st. And then, so that's a bad guy to working capital. The biggest good guy to working capital is our interest on our Our interest expense, our cash outflow for interest expense is going to be a lot less than last year because the interest on the bonds actually is payable in, you know, the first couple days of next year. Actually the first day of, you know, our calendar, you know, our fiscal 2022. So it'll be a benefit to cash flow this year. And then the payment we have in 20, you know, the second payment we have in 2022 will actually also be paid in the first day or so of 2023. So just that's sort of a new thing now that we have the bonds outstanding.
spk01: Great. Thanks a lot. Appreciate it.
spk11: Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Jeremy Hamblin with Craig Hound Capital Group. Please proceed with your questions.
spk09: Thanks, and I'll add my congratulations to you, Dan. It's been a pleasure working with you, and again, you're demonstrating some pretty impressive execution in a really tough environment. I wanted to, Tony, just start actually with the commodity cost, beef price. I think the math on that's, what, $2.67 a pound in Q3. I wanted to... get an update on where things have kind of trended here to start Q4. And also, I know some of the other commodity costs, whether protein costs, whether it's chicken or pork, have also remained elevated. How is that trended here in Q4 and kind of your expectations over the next several months?
spk06: I would say that the The general view on commodities right now is that they have stabilized, and we're seeing a little bit of recovery there, a little bit of decline, not huge declines. But the current price for beef is a little bit above the average for the third quarter, and it's heading in a good direction, but really slowly. And I'd say the same with all the other markets. You know, I'd say the same with all the other commodities. They seem to have plateaued and they're, you know, slowly, you know, pork's slowly coming down. Chicken is slowly coming down. You know, so some of the, you know, French fries are steady but seem to be coming down. We have hedges in for some bakery items and from some other items. So we don't have it, but RSIR, our food distributor, does. So I'd say holding steady and maybe starting to definitely stabilize, but maybe starting to see some light at the end of the tunnel on that coming down a little bit, but not a lot. I mean, the inflation in the fourth quarter, just because of the comparison to really low commodity costs in the fourth quarter of last year, is going to probably be in the low to mid-single teens. So it's still... It's still a headwind versus last year, and it's probably going to be the biggest headwind of the fourth quarter that we've seen all year, mostly because the base was so low last year.
spk09: So cost of sales probably trends up slightly from the run rate that you saw in Q3. Is that a fair assumption? I think it might be a little bit.
spk06: I think it might be steady because... of leverage, you know, sales leverage and lower promotion and stuff like that. You got a lot more pricing. And yeah, we got a lot more pricing on that.
spk09: Okay.
spk06: So, you know, actually it, you know, I think the net of it is, it may be, you know, it may be a little favorable to Q3 just because of the leverage.
spk09: Okay. Got it. And then, you know, again, kind of extraordinary environment here on labor. You know, as we look out, you know, typically you have, well, you have, you know, some days, you know, in Q4 around the holiday period that you staff and are kind of lower volume, you know, labor. Presumably, it sounds like you're getting people, you know, in, you know, there's an improvement in terms of having staff there, but is the near-term expectation that labor costs are going to continue to be a challenge despite the kind of menu pricing offsetting some of that impact?
spk07: Again, I think for the balance of this year, I think we're in pretty good shape, Jeremy, because things have stabilized recently. Starting with next year, there's a few states that have some minimum wage movement, but generally the minimum wage just doesn't have much effect on us at all because we're paying more than that currently. So I really, I think, again, there may be some movement next year, but it's not going to be anywhere near the magnitude of what we're currently experiencing.
spk06: I think that one other thing we're starting to take a really hard look at, just because we're able to catch our breath, after what happened in the third quarter, is we're really looking restaurant by restaurant at is staying open until 11 o'clock profitable? And if we find, because the labor costs are where they are, and, you know, a year ago and two years ago it was kind of a no-brainer on that, but now we're doing analytics to, and it's not really, you know, it's not any like AI special whiz-bang stuff, but, you know, we're starting to look at... it doesn't make sense to close at 10 instead of 11 because the traffic we saw over the last six weeks in that last hour was not worth staying open given the labor costs. So I think that's something, if we don't get it going in the fourth quarter, we'll definitely start being much more diligent about that in in the first quarter. And the same goes for the, you know, it doesn't make sense to open at 6 versus 7 a.m. in the morning. So we're just taking a lot harder to look at that than I think has been done in the past. I haven't been there that long, but it seems like it's just a, given where wages have gone, it's kind of front and center for us to be, you know, optimize things a little more than we've had to do in the past on that front, just because it's more of a question than it was in the past before it was kind of a no-brainer to stay open. So, I think that'll help. The other point I want to make, Jeremy, is that we're going to start lapping. The only two quarters left where the labor is probably going to be a big increase versus the prior year is the fourth quarter and the first quarter of next year. We started to see the labor issues in the second quarter of this year, so we're going to start lapping that next year so it should be less of a headwind. It still will be a headwind, but less of a headwind than we certainly saw in the several quarters this year.
spk09: Understood. Last one for me is you continue to see underperformance in that south central region. I know the southeast also did not perform as strongly. Is there anything that you're seeing? I don't know how that necessarily compares versus the industry. I know that, you know, it's been a frustration here for a couple of years now because they've been stubborn in terms of performance, although you guys have really improved the four wall margins. You know, is there any thought, you know, to, you know, have you ever thought about maybe, you know, monetizing those assets, moving out of that region? or are there other things you think that can be done to kind of stimulate the productivity of those underperforming areas?
spk07: Yeah, the South Central is primarily the Cambridge restaurants, and actually they've turned around. We're actually positive now in Cambridge, and we're positive on a two-year basis. So we did what we said we would do. We said it would take us two years to get this from a sales standpoint. The margins, we got much more quickly than that. So we're making progress there with those restaurants. And because we have a lower labor rate there, I think we're heading in the right direction. Right now, the struggle is in the Carolinas. We are negative all across North and South Carolina. And we had a call yesterday with Burger King, and they say that's true for the balance of their restaurants in those markets. And we're trying to drill down specifically uh, Jeremy, to see if there's a particular reason why it's every aspect of the Carolinas where we're negative in GSA, we're negative in, uh, in Charlotte, we're negative in Greensboro. Uh, and, uh, uh, I don't really have enough. Those are legacy stores. Those aren't new restaurants and they operate well. And we're trying to determine where the market share is going. And Burger King did not have an answer for us. Uh, when we ask that question, but we're doing some more analytics on that to see if we can determine specifically if there's a day part across the region that's creating the challenge. But that's really where I'm most concerned about that right now.
spk09: Well, hopefully the parent can help contribute positively to the cause here in the coming months. Thanks for taking my questions, guys. Best wishes. Thank you, Jeremy.
spk11: Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of William Reuter with Bank of America. Please proceed with your question.
spk04: Good morning. So after the eight-tenths of a percent price increase in October, I think that we have nothing for the remainder of this year and that you're planning one in early fiscal year 22. Do you have a sense of the magnitude of the fiscal year 22 price increase you'll implement?
spk07: The one that we will be implementing will be a 2% and 2.5% kind of number, which will essentially mirror the increase that we had in March of 2021. Okay.
spk04: And that's helpful. And then with regard to your increased labor costs, is there a component of this that's being driven by overtime? I guess I'm trying to figure out if there's some way to adjust the increase in labor and and try and figure out if you're not paying some of that, how much, you know, your actual wages would be increasing.
spk06: Yeah, the overtime piece for the team players was not that significant. And so, you know, we think, you know, if the world goes, you know, it could stay that way for next year. We still could be required to pay overtime next year because we can't get the staffing up. Alternatively, we can get the staffing up, pay less overtime, but we're paying for more bodies. So it kind of would be a wash either way. So I think that cost base is going to be with us for a while, regardless of whether it's coming through overtime or more team members. If the world lets us hire more team members right now, it doesn't seem like we're going to be able to go over the $20 team members per store in any time in the near future. So it'll probably look the same a year from now on that front. And then the overtime for managers was just a, you know, reinstatement of overtime they had pre-COVID. So there may be some, you know, there may be some ability to cut that back in the future, but generally speaking, it's kind of getting back to pre-COVID levels.
spk07: Our assistant managers are paid hourly and they have a 50-hour work week. During COVID, because of all the challenges and the restricted hours and all the rest of that, we moved all of our assistant managers back to a 40-hour work week. And consequently, they received less income, and we didn't have any management overtime. So that was reinstated in the third quarter of 2020, and we just lapped that. Yeah.
spk04: Okay. And then just finally for me, you mentioned that most of your wages or a lot of your wages are above state minimums, so the impacts of rising minimums won't hurt you that much. I guess looking back at history, if we were to see a dramatic change in terms of the labor environment where the pool grew, is there any precedent for wages going down, or do you think that wages can only go up?
spk07: I think it depends geographically. I think there may be some markets where, in fact, we will be hiring newer employees at a lower rate than what we're currently paying. And there are other places, like in New York State, where the minimum for fast food workers is $15, and that's the way it's going to be. So I think in the South Central market, in Tennessee, Alabama, Kentucky, South Carolina, I think there may be an opportunity in the future to actually have new employees come in at a lower rate.
spk06: It's the only benefit of high turnover. So high turnover is tough. You can potentially roll back some of the stuff with the kind of turnover we see at the team level.
spk04: Great. Good to hear. All right, that's all from me. Thank you.
spk11: Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Michael Coppola with JP Morgan. Please proceed with your question.
spk08: Hi, good morning and thank you for taking our question. You know, we saw that you guys were planning to use free cash flow to reduce that, you know, reduce debt. We're curious if there's any sort of magnitude or goal that you had in mind for that outside of the working capital and free cash flow priorities that you mentioned earlier.
spk06: I mean, two things just to clarify. At this point, we have a $220 million swap. So our senior secured debt, until and if we change that swap, we're required to stay at $220 million, and then we have $300 million of notes, obviously. So we sort of have $520 million of debt, and it's not really repayable at this time. We said in our comments that we reduce net indebtedness, which means we'll build cash to reduce our net debt. So yeah, to the extent we generate free cash flow and don't have other extraordinary uses below free cash flow, which we did have this year, we use the money to reduce our net indebtedness. But again, our target is to stay at four times leverage or less. And obviously, we're right at the four times this quarter, and it's not because of the numerator. It's because of the denominator, you know, just because EBITDA was down versus last year on a 12-month basis. So that's really what drove us back to four times.
spk08: Great. Thank you.
spk11: Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, that concludes our question and answer session. I'll turn the floor back to management for any final comments.
spk06: Thank you all for joining us on this call, and we look forward to speaking further with those who would like to speak to us. We have a number of conferences we're attending either in person or virtually over the next month and a half or so, and hopefully we'll meet a lot of you in person or virtually. Thanks very much, and we'll talk to you in the next conference call early next year. Thank you. Bye-bye.
spk11: Thank you. This concludes today's conference. You may disconnect your lines at this time. Thank you for your participation.
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