Steve Hislop: Yeah. Andy, when we looked at that, we looked at it with the e-sight to make sure and kind of look at it that — would look at anything that has under 5% cannibalization, and actually any ones that we did in the last couple of years has been much better than that on the expectations. New Braunfels is on — it’s halfway between here and San Anton as going down south. So we don’t expect — that’s in between our Selma store, which is in the San Anton and our San Marcos store, it’s about 18 miles from either one of them. So it’s going to be very, very minimal, and we’re pretty excited about it, and we’re really excited, obviously, what we think we’re going to do there. Obviously, when you’re looking at where we’re going to be opening stores, definitely this year and over the next three to four years.
We’re opening, as we mentioned, in roughly five states that we have good AUVs, strong AUVs that are a lot higher than our system-wide AUV, which is currently at $4.5 million. You’ll probably see a pickup of $10 million to $15 million in the five states will — I mean, 10% to 15% in the states that we’re looking at. So we feel real comfortable about our growth over the next three to four to five years.
Andy Barish: Got it. Good to hear. And then one final, just on ezCater and catering. Is that primarily the lunch day part. That’s kind of where I’ve seen ezCater, but I may be not fully aware of how you’re using it.
Jon Howie: Yeah, I think that’s right, Andy. We expect a larger percentage of that coming from lunch. As we — as you know, we’ve got about 72 stores on that right now. We’re hoping to get the rest of them by the end of Q1. Just to give you an indication, last year, we did about $2.5 million in that platform, just shy of under about 1,000 a week per store. And so we’re looking to get that up and running in the first quarter.
Steve Hislop: Yeah. And we’re excited about that actually as people continue to go back to their offices.
Andy Barish: Great. Thanks guys.
Steve Hislop: Thanks, Andy.
Operator: Thank you, sir. The next question we have comes from Brian Vaccaro from Raymond James. Please go ahead.
Brian Vaccaro: Hi. Thanks and good evening, guys. Just on the quarter-to-date and it might be a tough ask, but as you parse through the weather impact, do you think you’ve seen a change in your underlying demand trends or any changes in behavior or order patterns that you’ve noted in recent months compared to the prior couple of quarters?
Jon Howie: Not really, Brian. I mean, we continue to see kind of lower attachment rates in the bar area. We are seeing a little higher attachments in the appetizers, and that’s really due to what we’re doing during the happy hour timeframe with our Chips ‘n’ Dips kind of program. So we are seeing that come back a little bit, but that is a discounted program. And so the dollars are slightly better, but the attachment rates are definitely better.
Steve Hislop: And we’re still seeing a similar mix over the last — even through COVID and back to even pre-COVID with a 40:60 mix at lunch to dinner, and those are staying very, very consistent.
Jon Howie: And really, that to-go, as we said earlier, the off-premise is still staying fairly consistent from a percentage.
Brian Vaccaro: Okay. Okay. And Jon, I think you made a comment on February, you said a decline of around half of the down 7% in January. So I just wanted to make sure I understood that some way down in the mid-3s or —
Jon Howie: Yeah.
Steve Hislop: Yeah, yeah. And that’s again, the key number there for us is rolling over that the implementation of Uber.
Brian Vaccaro: Right, right. Understood. Okay. And then, Jon, on margins, I wanted to just ask on the commodity side. The deflation that you saw in the fourth quarter, I think was much more significant than you kind of expected, could you just provide some color on what drove that favorability?
Jon Howie: Yeah. A lot of it was continuing — just one second here. It’s continuing in — I pull it up here. Yeah, the big items, if I look at it was continuing in chicken and produce were the big items and dairy and cheese, those things came down a lot more than we were expecting.
Brian Vaccaro: Okay. And I think you said low-single digits for the year in 2024. Is there any year-on-year lumpiness or differentials we should be mindful of thinking about the quarters or relatively stable through the year?
Jon Howie: Yeah. If we’re looking at that, I mean, I would say it’s relatively flat — going to be flat in the first quarter and then start growing with our highest quarter probably in the fourth — third and fourth quarters.
Brian Vaccaro: Okay, thank you. I’ll pass it along.
Jon Howie: Thank you.
Operator: Thank you, sir. [Operator Instructions] The next question we have comes from Aisling Grueninger —
Aisling Grueninger: Hi, good afternoon guys —
Operator: From Piper Sandler. Please go ahead.
Aisling Grueninger: Hi, good afternoon guys. You mentioned in the last earnings call that you were going to increase ad spend during the 4Q time period. I’m just wondering if you saw an increase in traffic or any other measurable points from the ad spend that would just influence your decision on how much you’re going to spend going into 2024?
