Dine Brands Global, Inc.

Good day and thank you for standing by and welcome to the Dine Brands Third Quarter 2026 Earnings Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. After the speaker's presentation, there will be a question and answer session. To ask a question during this session, you'll need to press star 11 on your telephone. If your question has been answered and you'd like to remove yourself from the queue, simply press star 11 again. As a reminder, today's program is being recorded. And now I'd like to introduce your host for today's program, Matt Lee, Senior Vice President, Finance and Investor Relations. Please go ahead, sir.

Good morning and welcome to Dime Brands Global's third quarter fiscal 2026 conference call. This morning's call will include prepared remarks from John Payton, CEO and President of Applebee's, and Vance Cheng, CFO. Following those prepared remarks, Lawrence Kim, Chief Commercial Officer and President of IHOP, will also be available, along with John and Vance, to address questions during the Q&A portion of the call. Please remember our safe harbor regarding forward-looking information. During the call, management will discuss information that is forward-looking and involves known and unknown risk, uncertainties and other factors, which may cause the actual results to be different than those expressed or implied. Good morning, everyone, and thanks for joining us.

Today, I'll begin with an overview of Dyn's Q3 performance and share updates on the brand initiatives across Applebee's, Fuzzy's, and IHOP that are driving our results. And after that, I'll turn it over to Vance, who will walk through our financial results in more detail. Dyn delivered Q3 results in line with our expectations while continuing to make deliberate investments in the brands and the business. For the quarter, Applebee's reported a 0.9% increase in domestic comp sales, driven by a strong July during which the brand outperformed Black Box on both traffic and sales. IHOP posted domestic comp sales of positive 0.8% and delivered its seventh consecutive quarter of traffic outperformance and the fourth consecutive quarter of sales outperformance versus Black Box. And our adjusted EBITDA was $49 million compared to $49 million in the same quarter last year. With those results as the backdrop, let me share some insights on what's driving them, starting first with the consumer. Over the last three years, consumer behavior has been remarkably consistent. In the context of persistent inflation on food away from home and higher gas prices, consumer sentiment has remained low, and guests are driven by a strong value proposition where they know the full price of the meal. Notably, though, consumers are less likely to cut back on occasion dining and that is of benefit to us and we expect this dynamic to continue into 2027. Looking at guest behavior at our brands specifically, average check levels have held steady reflecting mild check management and value incidents also remained relatively consistent at 25% of transactions for Applebee's and 22% of transactions at IHOP, which is roughly in the middle to high end of our historical range. This is another indication that value is a big decision driver. Overall, casual dining has shown resilience this year, and ultimately, our performance comes down to our consistency in messaging and conviction in our strategy. So if you recall, in Q3 of last year, we made a deliberate set of changes. First, we introduced everyday value platforms at IHOP and amplified two for $25 at Applebee's. We dialed up menu innovation at both brands. We sharpened our operational focus within the restaurants and we rolled out a new marketing strategy to better integrate our brands into the cultural conversation. One of our greatest competitive advantages is that we own two of the most iconic American brands. We've managed through different economic cycles and we've demonstrated our ability to evolve with our guests' needs without sacrificing the core of what makes each brand so special. And as we look ahead, we're prioritizing investments that improve both comp sales and the overall footprint of our brands which includes refreshing restaurant appearance through our remodel programs and expanding our dual brand concept both to drive more value out of each location and accelerating that work through our company-owned portfolio as well. Of course, these investments require upfront capital, yet they yield significant long-term upside. Over the past two years, we've been able to aggressively lean into this strategy for two reasons. First, our asset-light model generates strong, consistent free cash flow Thank you for joining us today. Thank you for joining us. Since the pandemic, outperforming our previous best, loaded potato waves, that we launched just last quarter. Now, I want to take a moment to put a finer point on this. Since reinvigorating our menu innovation engine about a year ago, each new menu item has built on the popularity of the last. And looking ahead, we expect to have more new food items launching over the next 12 months than we have had in the last few years. Regarding off-premise, we extended our streak of positive comp sales to a seventh consecutive quarter, with comp sales growing 1.8%, supported by delivery growth. This is particularly notable given that only one of our three campaigns this quarter was available off-premise, which tells us that demand is broadening beyond specific promotions. Applebee's also saw strengthening social media performance this quarter, with third-party data from UBS showing that interactions more than tripled year over year, ranking among the top-performing restaurant brands. On remodels, we've completed 107 Applebee's Looking Good remodels year-to-date, already exceeding our target of 100 for the year, as part of a broader refresh cycle that will bring us to roughly half the portfolio remodeled by the end of 2027. On average, these restaurants continue to see at least a mid-single-digit lift to sales, driven by increased traffic following a reimage. From an operations standpoint, Our focus on driving excellence through simplicity and accountability continue to produce measurable results. Order accuracy has improved. Manager visibility in the dining room increased. Google ratings are up, all contributing to improving guest satisfaction. And last, I want to mention that we recently hosted our Applebee's Global Franchisee Conference, bringing together franchisees from across the system to align on priorities for the year ahead. Our conversations reinforced our strong sense of partnership and our franchisees were engaged on the initiatives driving the brand forward from menu innovation to remodels. Now, moving on to IHOP. In Q3, comp sales at IHOP grew 0.8%. The brand also outperformed BlackBox on both sales and traffic for the fourth consecutive quarter, with traffic outperformance now extending to seven consecutive quarters. Clearly, this isn't a one-quarter story, and it coincides with the launch of the Everyday Value menu last year. It's a steady performance, and that consistency is exactly the validation we're looking for in our strategy. The growth in comp sales was supported by a healthy growth in check, driven by strong in-store activations, including server incentives and in-restaurant point-of-purchase materials that drew attention to higher-priced items. The everyday value menu is a foundational element of IHOP's barbell strategy, providing accessible value while creating space for premium, innovation-led offerings as well. This quarter, the premium end was fueled by products like the Dubai Chocolate Pancakes and our signature Breck Feasts. Together, these offerings leverage cultural trends and menu innovation to drive incremental engagement and trade-up opportunities. Off-premise recorded 5.6% comp growth, with 10% growth at our first-party online-to-go channels. We're also seeing early strength in catering, a newer part of our business, where sales grew 44% compared to a year ago. That growth reflects new technology and packaging built specifically to handle larger catering orders, and we believe there's still meaningful upside in this channel. Our social and earned media efforts also showed meaningful growth, with third-party data from Listen First indicating engagement across all channels climbed 54% quarter over quarter. And finally, operationally, we continue to make good progress. Table turn times improved and reached a new all-time low post-COVID, and average Google ratings also increased year-over-year, reflecting improved and consistent in-restaurant experience. Turning to fuzzies, traffic improved sequentially every quarter this year, driven by technology enhancements, menu simplification, and a better in-restaurant experience. Off-premise remains a meaningful and consistent contributor to the brand's quarter-over-quarter progress. We are encouraged by Fuzzy's performance and are focused on sustaining this momentum through the end of the year. On development, our dual brand platform is one of our strongest long-term growth levers. Dual brand sales continue to perform well, averaging roughly 1.5 to 2 times the sales of the original standalone restaurant. As of today, we have 60 domestic dual brand restaurants open, including 9 company-owned, with 14 more under construction. remain on track to reach 80 domestic dual brands by year-end. As the platform has scaled, we've also refined how we operate. We've invested in additional training to help IHOP franchisees run the bar program more effectively, and we've adjusted Applebee's kitchen operations and equipment to handle the volume of IHOP's scratch-made breakfast day part. With each new opening, we learn more, and together with our franchisees, we are getting better at running these restaurants, and that matters just as much to long-term returns as the pace of our openings. Before turning the call over to Vance, I'll note that Q4 trends have been mixed across the brands so far. Appleby started the quarter somewhat soft, while IHOP is continuing its momentum, supported by the return of Stuffed French Toast in mid-September. We're tracking toward the lower end of our full-year guidance. All in all, we're pleased with the progress we're seeing across the business this quarter and we remain confident in the strategy we've laid out. Building Long-Term Value Through Consistent Execution Today and Disciplined Investment in Our Future Growth. And with that, I will turn it over to Vance.