Domino’s Pizza, Inc. (NYSE:DPZ) Q4 2022 Earnings Call Transcript

Russell Weiner: Sure. Good morning and thanks Peter. As I said during my remarks, we’ve been pleased with this program. We launched in 2017. We’ve got over 30 million active members, 77 million total members, and really at this point as we think about the evolution of the rewards program, it is about taking the best and keeping the best of what we have and then continuing to dial up on where the opportunities are, and so €“ and we’re not going to talk to the specifics of it now. But I think when you see us launch it later on this year, you’ll see those who are joining the program continue to €“ are going to continue to enjoy the positives of it, and probably some of our less frequent customers are going to be incented to do more. And I should tell you, I’m sorry I misspoke. The launched central loyalty program was 2015, not 2017.

Peter Saleh: Thanks. And then just one follow up for Sandy. Is it possible to get restaurant level margins for the franchisees back to you know 2020, 2021 levels with this mix of carryout delivery or do you really need delivery to resurge here to get back to those types of margins? Thanks.

A – Sandeep Reddy: Thanks. Thanks Peter for that question. Now, in terms of where we were, in terms of restaurant level margins on the franchise’s side, what you did see from a cadence standpoint was the profitability. It really went up pretty significantly between 2019 and 2021 from 143 to 174 I believe in 2021. But I think the cost increases that have actually come through have been really significant, and I think until that kind of beds in and the price increases that we’ve taken basically start normalizing, it’s going to take them some time. Over time of course, I think we’ll get back to those levels of profitability and absolute dollars. But I think in the short term we’re looking at small steps and I talked about Q4 specifically, because we’re now inflicting, we’re now inflicting the trend, and I think with the adjustments that we made on the pricing architecture, we’re in a good place with the franchisees, and we hope that as we move into 2023 this continues to accelerate and helps them actually see even better profitability in €˜23.

Operator: Thank you. One moment for our next question. And our next question comes from the line €“ one moment, from Sara Senatore from Bank of America. Your question, please.

Sara Senatore: Yes, can you hear me? Thank you. I wanted to ask about sort of the comments on the comp and the macro environment. You know we’re really not seeing very much softness or evidence of price sensitivity across the rest of the industry, and I understand delivery might be different, but I guess the question is two-fold. One is, is there any reason to think that maybe your pricing could be higher? You seem to be lagging the industry by 2 to 4 points, and that’s roughly where your comp gap is I would say. So you know as you think about pricing, is there room to maybe take more on the menu and perhaps less on delivery fees. And then separately, does this increase the likelihood or the attractiveness of partnering with aggregators, not delivery as a service, but as a marketing platform.

You know virtually everybody who has done that has suggested that the income cohort is higher on aggregator platforms and that it’s incremental to the €“ you know to remember maybe ordering through the proprietary ordering. So I’m just trying to piece together everything that’s happening in the context of pizza being a very good value in absolute, but the lag versus the overall industry and maybe some drivers. Thanks.