Carrols Restaurant Group Inc. Q4 2008 Earnings Call Transcript

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2009-03-02 16:50:34.0

Tags: Barclays Plc., Call Transcript, Earnings, Carrols Restaurant Group Inc., Branding, Marketing, Seeking Alpha

Question-and-Answer Session

Operator

(Operator Instructions) Your first question comes from Reza Vahabzadeh - Barclays Capital.

Reza Vahabzadeh – Barclays Capital

Just some housekeeping items Paul; the $0.07 share that you are attributing to the 53 week, any idea what the operating income implication of that is?

Paul Flanders

I must say about $3.5 million.

Reza Vahabzadeh – Barclays Capital

As far as the debt balances as of the end of the fourth quarter, can you bring us up to date on what’s outstanding in which facility and which piece of debt?

Paul Flanders

Year end?

Reza Vahabzadeh – Barclays Capital

Yes.

Paul Flanders

There was about $18 million borrowed under the revolver. As you know we bought back about $15 million of the sub debt during 2008. So, we had about $165 million of a sub debt, but the lease obligations that were remaining on the books were about $14.9 million and then the term loans were at $117 million.

Reza Vahabzadeh – Barclays Capital

Was there any cash on hand?

Paul Flanders

Cash balance was $3.5 million to $4 million.

Reza Vahabzadeh – Barclays Capital

Okay. Just turning to operations Alan and Dan, the labor costs management has been obviously very helpful to the numbers and helped you manage the P&L. Is that sustainable or are there any concerns that service levels maybe impacted or any commentary on that?

Dan Accordinon

No, we think it’s sustainable. Part of that is just the leverage of the menu price increases Reza, but no, the operating measurements that we use for all three brands, we use a consistent metric across all three brands in terms of how we measure consumer satisfaction and those numbers are continuing to rise during the 2008 and into 2009. So we think that those labor costs are sustainable.

Reza Vahabzadeh – Barclays Capital

As far as the taco franchise is concerned, the difference in terms of the southern Texas markets versus the other ones, is it just a coincidence of QSR being more promotional in those markets?

Dan Accordino

That I think there’s a couple of things Reza. The is San Antonio and Austin certainly we have seen more competitive pressure than on the other markets, but Dallas has been a good performing market for us now for quite a period of time and Houston just as an overall market seems to be, it actually got an inflow of customers, an inflow of population.

 

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