By Ryan D. Lavender
Published on March 24, 2021 at 4:16 PM
With this report, we increase our Q1E U.S. same-store sales forecast for Applebee’s by +450 basis points, to +1.0%. As of this writing, sell-side consensus (according to Consensus Metrix) is at -3.5%. Our increased forecast represents factors including: (1) general improvement in one-year and two-year casual dining sector trends, (2) Applebee’s resumption of national advertising in early March (which it did not have in January and February), coupled with (3) our belief that the Applebee’s guest in general may be more motivated to act by national advertising than the casual-dining guest in general. Keep in mind that about 48% of Applebee’s guests are under the age of 35, and also Applebee’s relative shift embracing more marketing on social-media platforms — to which guests 35 and under seem to respond relatively better than folks above the age of 35.
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By Ryan D. Lavender
Published on February 22, 2021 at 4:41 PM
Dine Brands plans to release its Q4 2020 earnings before the market open on Tuesday, March 2nd. As regards Q4E, we retain our IHOP U.S. same-store sales forecast of -30.0%, but we reduce our Applebee’s U.S. same-store sales projection by -200 basis points, to -7.5%. Dine Brands has previously announced that for the first four weeks of Q4E, IHOP’s same-store sales declined by -24.0%, while Applebee’s same-store sales decreased by -1.9%. Our updated Q4E projections incorporate implicit same-store sales assumptions for the remaining weeks of that quarter of -10% (or so) for Applebee’s and -33% (or so) for IHOP. As a result of all this, our Q4E EPS projection goes down by -2 cents, to $0.68. Our full-year 2020E EPS estimate also goes down by -2 cents (to $2.06).
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By Ryan D. Lavender
Published on February 2, 2021 at 3:05 PM
With this note, we raise our full-Q1E Wendy’s U.S. same-store sales forecast by +300 basis points, to +10.0%. According to Consensus Metrix, sell-side consensus for Q1E as of this writing is at +7.3%.
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