Kura Sushi USA, Inc. (NASDAQ:KRUS) Q3 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

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Jimmy Uba: Yeah. So in terms of quantifying it, we just finished the rollout in Q3 and there’s a six week learning period for the algorithm where it sort of takes in — use that to build its traffic expectations. And so we’re a little bit low to build because to — provide numbers or numerical expectations. In terms of what — your second question, I think, is really interesting about, does the impact build over time? And one thing that we’ve been discussing with the marketing department is that we rolled out these updates, these improvements to waitlist app is about really communicating that necessarily to our guests. And so the accuracy has improved, and I imagine the guest experience has improved, but there — I don’t think that guest behavior will change until there’s a concerted marketing effort so let guest know that there actually — has been a material improvement in our Waitlist app that they can build their schedule around it.

And so now that we finished the rollout of the Waitlist app, we’re working on the update to our new rewards program, which is going to have a new skin. It’s going to look completely different from the existing one. And so the idea is that we’re really going to bundle that communication with the rollout of the new apps. I can just say the app wasn’t as great. The app is really great now, come to launch.

Jeff Uttz: And also, Sharon, while we don’t have the data yet to be able to quantify what it means in terms of sales or comps, the new Waitlist app. But we do know and the information we do have is that wait times are more accurate. And we do know that the over quoting or the underquoting of people by 0.5 hour or more has decreased substantially to where we – some restaurants could have been in the 20% to 25% range of people being misquoted by half an hour or more on their wait times. And we know now that in most of our restaurants, that’s down into the single digits.

Sharon Zackfia: Great. Thank you.

Operator: Thank you. Our next question comes from Todd Brooks with Benchmark Company. Please proceed with your question.

Todd Brooks: Hey. Thanks for taking my questions. Jeff, I wanted to ask about the G&A performance in the quarter. Obviously, very strong improvement, provided guidance for the full year range. But where are you — and I know this is one of your priorities coming in as far as attacking this opportunity. And as we’re starting to look at forward years, have you completed most of the efficiency efforts that you went after or is there more opportunity for efficiency as we look out to fiscal ’24?

Jeff Uttz: There are more opportunities for our efficiencies. One of the things I talked about in the past was being able to leverage some more technology in the support center, on some of our daily things that we do. We actually recently — one of the first things we did is in our financial planning and analysis department, we’re launching a new software for FP&A that will improve substantially, not only our forecasting and our budgeting, but also the research tools that we have in the support for the restaurants to determine what’s going on with their P&Ls. And it’s going to give our operators a tool to be able to dig deep into their financials on their own as well as having us in the support center help them. Not just one technological step that we’ve taken.

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