But Jimmy also said in the prepared remarks that we’re also not going to compromise investments that we need to invest in our company for future growth, but there is room for improvement. And that’s a promise that we have made to everybody, and that’s a promise we’re going to keep. I just can’t quantify for future years right out past fiscal ’23.
Daniel Gold: Got it. Thank you very much.
Jeff Uttz: You are welcome.
Operator: Our next question comes from the line of Jeremy Hamblin with Craig-Hallum. Please proceed with your questions.
Jeremy Hamblin: Thanks. I wanted to just come back to the traffic versus menu pricing versus mix portion of the commentary for the November quarter. In terms of — I think that I calculate close to 8% menu pricing that you would have been carrying throughout the quarter before you took this December price increase. And if traffic was up of 4%, does that imply that you had a fairly significant mix shift during the quarter?
Jeff Uttz: What did suggest — go ahead, Jimmy. Go ahead, Jimmy.
Jimmy Uba: Okay. Thank you. So in terms of Q1, we did see a little bit less of flow-through from pricing than we had in past quarters. That being said, we did see average check growth on a quarterly sequential basis from Q4 to Q1, and so, it’s not like there’s aggressive check management, checks are still growing. And the purpose and plate consumption over the same period was flat as well. Certainly, it’s a point of focus for us. But given that this is just result from one quarter, we don’t think this is necessarily indicative of a trend yet.
Jeremy Hamblin: Okay. Got you. And you’re not providing any color on kind of quarter-to-date trends, whether or not because I did want to ask you a 7% price increase that you took in December, whether or not that’s having any impact on traffic trends? And then the second part that’s kind of tied into that is, you did see a pretty healthy jump now the last two quarters in food and beverage costs. We know that there’s inflation out there, certainly on commodities. But I wanted to get a sense for, are we getting close to where you feel like that peak in food cost inflation has happened? And with that incremental 7% that you took in December, is that hopefully going to balance out kind of your COGS as a percent of sales?
Jeff Uttz: So in terms of — let’s take the first part of your question, which is about December and the price increase, and early indications that we’ve seen is that, the response by guests has been just fine. Previous price increases that we’ve taken, we’re seeing pretty much the same pattern, which is little to no negative response to the pricing increase. We’re very lucky where our pricing is compared to our competitors. We do have headroom to take price, and we did take that price to 7% at the beginning of December. So we’re happy with what we’ve seen so far in terms of no negative response to that. But we’re not going to give any other more color. December is only closed five days ago, so we’re not able to really give any more color as it relates to the beginning of the second quarter.
As far as your question on COGS. I am optimistic that we’re reaching a peak, but I’m not banking on that. We do see some things continue to go up when we have seen sequential month-to-month inflation since the beginning of the year and even as we go back into Q4 of last year. And I’m planning for that to continue to go up, which is why we took the price. The price does not fully offset the impact of what we’re seeing with inflation, and we don’t expect it to, but it is helping. And one thing that really encourages us is because of that traffic of 4% during the quarter. Is that — guests are reacting pretty favorably to the pricing. That really isn’t impacting whether or not they want to come visit us. But I’m optimistic, but I’m not optimistic enough to tell you that I believe that we’ve reached the peak.
There are some positive signs out there. But again, same thing we see on the last couple of questions, that’s not a trend yet.
Benjamin Porten: Just to add on that note about commodity inflation. As we mentioned earlier, what are the few concepts that are posting positive traffic in the casual guiding sector? And I think, really a big part of this is due to our exceptional value proposition, and that includes a lot of guests that are trading down from more expensive sushi restaurants. And so this — we sort of see this as a long-term investment in terms of growing our overall restaurant base, which is an opportunity that I just don’t think other people are seeing here. And so, while there may be short-term commodity pressures, this — in the end, having this excellent value, I think is going to position us for that much more success once we see a normalization in inflation.
