Lancaster Colony Corporation (NASDAQ:LANC) Q2 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

Todd Brooks: Okay. Great. And then I’ll slide in a more strategic question just Horse Cave. Now that we’re up and running and producing product out of that facility, Dave can you walk us through maybe a Horse Cave ramp timeline? How does €“ long does it take to ramp fully? Then where do we go as far as that full ramp? We unlock maybe the Chick-fil-A expansion opportunities with larger pack sizes additional flavors. How do we unlock maybe some other licensed programs with the capacity that’s come online? And then finally where in that process does co-pack volume maybe come out and go back into an owned facility?

David Ciesinski: Yes. So good questions across the board. Love talking about these because it gives us a chance to talk about the strength of the top line of the business. So maybe first just focusing in on the factory itself. So I mentioned earlier that the start-up has gone very much in line with our plans. We’re literally producing hundreds of thousands of cases out of the facility now. And it’s enabled us to keep up with a really sort of a fun spike in demand that we’ve seen on BWW. I know most of you probably aren’t TikTokers. I don’t claim to be one but as a case in point we had two aspiring TikTokers that created recipes for a meal that included the Buffalo Wild Wings garlic parm sauce. And both of those videos combined have over 25 million views and that product has been absolutely on fire resulting in a big surge in demand, well in excess of what we had in the forecast and the fact that Horse Cave has been up and running has enabled us to meet that surge in demand and go.

So really Todd for all intents and purposes it’s running and it’s out there to meet our demand and we need it, because as we look forward, if you remember, it’s March when we go into the full rollout in Retail of our new items. That’s the large size of the Chick-fil-A sauce, that’s the barbecue and the Sweet & Spicy Sriracha on Chick-fil-A. It also includes the caesar item that we have for Olive Garden and not to mention just a whole lot more energy behind Buffalo Wild Wings. So I would tell you, I’m just thrilled with the progress that the team has made there. And our view now is just how high is high and how fast is fast, as we look to run that item. So it’s a good story. And on Retail as well, it’s out there. It’s producing product. And we just look forward to sweating it harder.

Now your last question was how does this factor in on co-pack? To the degree to which we have co-pack agreements we’re honoring those but we expect those to wean down through the remainder of this year and early into next year and then to bring that virtually all of that volume back in-house.

Todd Brooks: Just a follow-up on that and then I’ll pass it along. Tom, if we’re bringing that co-packs volume back in as we think about €“ I know we talk margin dollars more than we talk margin rate. But just kind of what type of benefit from a margin rate is in-house production versus co-pack production?

Tom Pigott: Yes. So we talked about it being a dilutive impact of 100 to 200 basis points throughout. So over time we’ll get that dilution back. So it’s certainly will be a catalyst as we go forward.

Todd Brooks: Okay. Great. Thanks, guys.

Tom Pigott: Thanks, Todd.

Operator: The next question comes from Connor Rattigan with Consumer Edge Research. Please go ahead.

Connor Rattigan: Hey, guys. Good morning.

David Ciesinski: Good morning, Connor.