Corrected Transcript
30-Oct-2024
Starbucks Corp. (SBUX)
Q4 2024 Earnings Call
Total Pages: 22 | |
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Starbucks Corp. (SBUX) | Corrected Transcript |
Q4 2024 Earnings Call | 30-Oct-2024 |
CORPORATE PARTICIPANTS
Tiffany Willis | Rachel Marie Ruggeri |
Senior Vice President, Investor Relations, Starbucks Corp. | Chief Financial Officer and Executive Vice President, Starbucks Corp. |
Brian R. Niccol | |
Chairman & Chief Executive Officer, Starbucks Corp. |
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OTHER PARTICIPANTS
Jeffrey A. Bernstein | David Palmer |
Analyst, Barclays Capital, Inc. | Analyst, Evercore ISI |
Sara H. Senatore | Christine Cho |
Analyst, BofA Securities, Inc. | Analyst, Goldman Sachs |
Brian Harbour | Jon Tower |
Analyst, Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC | Analyst, Citigroup Global Markets, Inc. |
John Ivankoe | Peter Saleh |
Analyst, JPMorgan Securities LLC | Analyst, BTIG LLC |
David E. Tarantino | Lauren Silberman |
Analyst, Robert W. Baird & Co., Inc. | Analyst, Deutsche Bank Securities, Inc. |
Andrew M. Charles | |
Analyst, TD Cowen |
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Starbucks Corp. (SBUX) | Corrected Transcript |
Q4 2024 Earnings Call | 30-Oct-2024 |
MANAGEMENT DISCUSSION SECTION
Operator: Good afternoon. My name is Diego, and I will be your conference operator today. I would like to welcome everyone to Starbucks Fourth Quarter and Full Fiscal Year 2024 Conference Call. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speakers' remarks, there will be a question-and- answer session. [Operator Instructions]
I will now turn the conference call over to Tiffany Willis, Senior Vice President of Investor Relations. Ms. Willis, you may now begin your conference.
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Tiffany Willis
Senior Vice President, Investor Relations, Starbucks Corp.
Thank you, Diego, and good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for joining us today to discuss Starbucks' fourth quarter and full fiscal year 2024 results. Today's discussion will be led by Brian Niccol, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer; and Rachel Ruggeri, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer.
This conference call will include forward-looking statements, which are subject to various risks and uncertainties that could cause our actual results to differ materially from these statements. Any such statement should be considered in conjunction with cautionary statements in our earnings release and risk factors discussed in our filings with the SEC including our latest Annual Report on Form 10-K and Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q. Starbucks assumes no obligation to update any of these forward-looking statements or information.
GAAP results in fourth quarter fiscal year 2024's comparative period include several items related to strategic actions, including restructuring and impairment charges and other items. These items are excluded from our non- GAAP results. All numbers referenced on today's call are on a non-GAAP basis, unless otherwise noted or there is no non-GAAP adjustment related to the metric.
As part of our non-GAAP results, revenue, operating margin and EPS metrics on today's call are measured in constant currency, whereby current period results are converted into United States dollars using the average monthly exchange rates from the comparative period rather than the actual exchange rates for the current period, excluding related hedging activities.
For non-GAAP financial measures mentioned in today's call, please refer to the earnings release on our website at investor.starbucks.com to find reconciliations of those non-GAAP measures to their corresponding GAAP measures.
This conference call is being webcast, and an archive of the webcast will be available on our website through Friday, December 13, 2024.
Also, for your calendar planning purposes, please note that our first quarter fiscal year 2025 earnings conference call has been tentatively scheduled for Tuesday, January 28, 2025.
With that, I now have the privilege of turning it over to Brian.
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Starbucks Corp. (SBUX) | Corrected Transcript |
Q4 2024 Earnings Call | 30-Oct-2024 |
Brian R. Niccol
Chairman & Chief Executive Officer, Starbucks Corp.
Thank you, Tiffany, and good afternoon and thank you for joining today. Starbucks is one of the world's great companies and most iconic brands. It really is a privilege to take on this role. And I am excited to be here and optimistic about the future.
Since joining Starbucks last month, I've spent my time digging into the business, listening to partners and connecting with customers. These experiences and my learnings have helped me form a clear understanding of where we are and what we need to do differently moving forward. Everything I have seen and heard tells me we have significant strengths to build on. The brand is strong and enduring. We have deep coffee expertise, and we have a fantastic team of Green Apron partners.
I look forward to sharing more about my plan to get Back to Starbucks with you shortly. But first I'd like to turn it over to Rachel for a more detailed overview of our final Q4 and full fiscal year 2024 financial results. Rachel?
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Rachel Marie Ruggeri
Chief Financial Officer and Executive Vice President, Starbucks Corp.
Thank you, Brian. And welcome to your first Starbucks earnings call. And good afternoon, everyone. As you saw in our press release last week, our traffic challenges persisted in Q4, resulting in pressures throughout our P&L from our top-line to our bottom-line. With that, I'll briefly discuss our Q4 and full year results and then turn the call over to Brian.
In regards to Q4, our Q4 consolidated revenue was $9.1 billion down 3% from the prior year, driven by a 7% decline in comparable store sales, consisting of an 8% decrease in transactions and a 2% increase in average ticket, partially offset by 7% net new company-operated store growth.
The revenue decrease was primarily due to a 6% decline in US comparable store sales driven by a 10% decline in comparable transactions, partially offset by a 4% increase in average ticket mainly from pricing. Traffic declined across all channels and dayparts, with the most pronounced decline in the afternoon daypart.
In addition to the continued decline of non-Starbucks Rewards Member visits, frequency also slowed across all SR member deciles in comparison to prior year, and ultimately impacted spend. While active SR membership grew 4% year-over-year, to 33.8 million, it remained flat to Q3 as our product innovation and offerings, as well as promotions, did not create sustained excitement or the stickiness we planned.
Our Q4 results also reflected China comparable store sales decline of 14% driven by an 8% decline in average ticket and a 6% decline in comparable transactions, weighed down by intensified competition and a soft macro environment that impacted consumer spending.
Although the market reached an all-time high of 23.5 million SR Active members during the quarter with 2.2 million net new members versus prior year, comp declined due to non-SR member traffic pressures, elevated discounting given the highly-promotional environment and lower sales of high-ticket items impacted by consumer sentiment.
Shifting to margin. Our Q4 consolidated operating margin was 14.4%, contracting 370 basis points from the prior year, primarily driven by deleverage, investments in store partner wages and benefits as well as increased promotional activities. The contraction was partially offset by pricing and the in-store operational efficiencies.
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Starbucks Corp. (SBUX) | Corrected Transcript |
Q4 2024 Earnings Call | 30-Oct-2024 |
In-store, we were successful in getting increased hours per partner, which is contributing to low hourly partner turnover and reduced training costs. However, we have additional work to do to obtain the correct staffing.
We also expect our throughput to be further optimized once the Siren Craft processes stabilizes across the company-operated store portfolio. Outside the store, we remained focused on capturing additional end-to-end supply chain efficiencies. Collectively in and out of store efficiency efforts have yielded savings of approximately 150 basis points in the quarter.
Our G&A expenses were higher than expected and exceeded 7% of revenue in Q4, primarily due to unplanned and non-reoccurringthird-party services and transition costs. Excluding these costs totaling approximately 50 basis points, G&A was 6.6% of revenue in Q4 and remained closer to 6% for the second half of fiscal year 2024 in line with expectations. We expect G&A to further decrease relative to revenue over time, leading to sustained margin expansion.
Q4 EPS was $0.80, down 24% from the prior year. The decline was primarily driven by a combination of traffic challenges and heightened investments, partially offset by our pricing and efficiency efforts.
Moving to full fiscal year 2024. Consolidated net revenues increased 1% to $36.2 billion in fiscal year 2024 driven by 7% net new company-operated store growth offset by a 2% decline in comparable store sales.
Full year consolidated operating margin was 15%, contracting 110 basis points from prior year, primarily driven by investments in store partner wages and benefits, deleverage and increased promotional activity. The contraction was partially offset by pricing and in-store operational efficiencies.
Our in-store and out-of-store efficiency efforts collectively delivered roughly 250 basis points of margin improvement for the full year, which is nearly $1 billion of cost reductions throughout our P&L as aligned with our original plan.
Full year EPS was $3.31, declining 6%, including a 1% unfavorable impact from higher effective tax rate.
Shifting to our outlook. As noted in our press release last week, given the company's CEO transition, coupled with the current state of the business, our guidance is suspended for full fiscal year 2025. This allows ample opportunity to assess the business and solidify key strategies as we refocus our efforts on the turnaround.
I would like to still briefly touch on our capital allocation priorities. As Brian mentioned in his prepared remarks last week, one of our top priorities includes re-establishing Starbucks as the community coffee house.
To do so, we plan to reduce the number of our new stores and renovations in fiscal year 2025 to accommodate a redesign while also unlocking capital to support our broader turnaround. We expect this shift, coupled with efficiencies, will help us balance our investments accordingly. We're working through the details of the impacts on key metrics, including store growth, and will revert back with insight at a future date.
In the meantime, I want to be clear that this shift in store growth strategy does not reflect and should not be interpreted as a statement on our long-term opportunity view or new store performance. In fact, we continue to see strong, highly incremental performance from our new stores.
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Starbucks Corp. (SBUX) | Corrected Transcript |
Q4 2024 Earnings Call | 30-Oct-2024 |
As a proof point, approximately 40% of our US company-operated stores had positive comp growth in full fiscal year 2024 with outsized contribution from our newer stores, especially in markets where store density remains low. We continue to see store growth opportunity, especially as we focus on continuing to create a welcoming coffee house and the store experience that both our Green Apron partners and our customers deserve.
Also last week, we announced an annual increase in the quarterly cash dividend from $0.57 to $0.61 per share. This marks our 14th consecutive year of annual increase at a CAGR of approximately 20%, offering shareholders a sense of certainty during the turnaround and our confidence in our long-term growth.
In summary, our results do not reflect the strength of our brand and what we're capable of. As a 20-plus year partner, I've seen what Starbucks is capable of when we focus on what we do best. It's because of that, that I have confidence in our ability to turn around our business. And I have the utmost confidence in our partners around the globe that together we can deliver.
With that, I'll now turn the call over to Brian.
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Brian R. Niccol
Chairman & Chief Executive Officer, Starbucks Corp.
Thank you, Rachel. Our financial results were very disappointing, and it is clear we need to fundamentally change our strategy to win back customers and return to growth. Back to Starbucks is that fundamental change.
We have to get back to what has always set Starbucks apart, a welcoming coffee house where people gather and where we serve the finest coffee, handcrafted by our skilled baristas. Regardless of the consumer environment, we must be at our best to succeed. And right now, despite the hard work of our Green Apron partners we aren't always at our best.
I've heard that while people love Starbucks, some feel like we have drifted from our core. We've made it harder to be a customer than it should be, and we focused our marketing too narrowly on Starbucks Rewards members.
I've spent my career understanding, building and stewarding brands, and it's clear the Starbucks brand is iconic and loved. My experience tells me that when we get back to our core identity and consistently deliver a great experience, our customers will come back.
Our problems are fixable, most of what we need to do is in our control. So our path forward is clear. And with our US business being our priority, work is already underway. Some things will take some time as we test and learn, but we're moving quickly on the things we can. I want to share a few examples.
We have to make it easier for our customers to get a cup of coffee. We are prioritizing work across the US business to support a clear throughput with quality goal. We want to hand deliver a high-quality handcrafted beverage to our cafe customers in 4 minutes or less and deliver orders on time for our Mobile Order & Pay customers every time. We have work to do to achieve this consistently, but we've learned lessons from our success improving the drive-thru experience and reducing out the window times.
Our throughput with quality aspiration and getting the core cafe experience right will drive everything we do and every decision we make. The moment our barista hands a cup of coffee directly to the customer is our brand moment of truth.
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Starbucks Corp. (SBUX) | Corrected Transcript |
Q4 2024 Earnings Call | 30-Oct-2024 |
So let's talk about some of the changes we're making to do this. First, we're working to get staffing right in our stores. As Rachel shared, we've made significant progress to improve average hours per partner and partner turnover is at another low. Our efforts to get partners, the hours and schedules they want are working.
Now we need to make sure we have the right number of partners on the floor, particularly during our morning peak and shoulder hours. We are moving quickly to test and learn. We're also making a commitment to grow from within by identifying internal hires for 90% of our retail leadership roles and to rally our team behind our Back to Starbucks plan and help support strong leadership in every store, we're planning to host a store manager conference in 2025.
Second, we're making it easier for customers to enjoy brewed coffee their way. We plan to bring back condiment coffee bars in all our cafes by early 2025. It's a great customer experience and will help with speed of service.
We also plan to complete the rollout of our Clover Vertica brewers in all our company-operated locations by the end of fiscal year 2025, providing customers more on-demand choice and high-quality brewed coffee. And we're evolving store routines to hand deliver brewed coffee to customers faster upon order.
Third, to improve throughput, quality and consistency, we will cut down our overly complex menu to align with our core identity as a coffee company. We will still offer customers great choice but we'll be focused on fewer, better offerings consistently crafted.
Fourth, we will continue to scale our investment in Siren equipment and Siren Craft processes to improve the in- store experience for our partners and customers. This work is a critical enabler in helping to achieve our 4-minute wait time aspiration.
And finally, we'll bring order to Mobile Order and Pay, so it doesn't overwhelm our cafes. Today, more than 30% of transactions are driven by mobile orders. At peak, it can drive an influx of orders that can be difficult to sequence and quickly deliver to our customers. When it works well, it's great, but sometimes it can be a challenge for both customers and partners. So we're working to improve sequencing with a new algorithm that enables on- time mobile order handoffs and supports our 4-minute throughput with quality being our goal for cafe customers.
We're also placing common sense guardrails on mobile ordering that we think will improve the experience for all customers. And over the coming months, we plan to take steps to better separate mobile order pickup from the cafe experience.
There are also some additional steps we're taking beyond a throughput with quality focus that we believe will resonate with our customers and partners. First, we are reimagining our pricing architecture, starting with non- dairy milk customizations. We know customization is an important part of the Starbucks experience, and we want to make it easier for customers to order their beverage just the way they want while still feeling like it's worth it.
So beginning with holiday launch on November 7, we're eliminating the upcharge for non-dairy milks at North American cafes owned and operated by Starbucks. It's the most popular customization after an extra shot of espresso. And once implemented, nearly half of customers that pay for a modifier could see a price reduction of 10% or more when they choose a non-dairy milk.
We're also investing in our customers with an intent not to increase menu prices at company-owned and operated stores in North America through fiscal year 2025. It's a great start, but we have more work to do to make our pricing architecture straightforward and logical.
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Starbucks Corp. (SBUX) | Corrected Transcript |
Q4 2024 Earnings Call | 30-Oct-2024 |
Next, we're reclaiming the Third Place. So our cafes feel like the welcoming coffee house our customers remember. In the coming months, we intend to reintroduce more personal touches to elevate the cafe experience. For instance, we'll begin to prioritize serving coffee in ceramic mugs for customers who choose to enjoy their coffee in our cafes.
We're also beginning to review and revise our cafe designs to bring back more comfortable seating and amenities. And to ensure our stores are a place where customers want to sit, work and meet, we're beginning to revisit certain policies with our partners and customers being top of mind.
Lastly, we're getting back to marketing Starbucks to all our customers. We've already made some changes. So first, we're focusing on coffee. Starbucks sources, roasts and crafts some of the finest quality coffee. I have always loved Starbucks Coffee, but I haven't always fully appreciated the quality and care that goes into every cup. From the work of our agronomists to support tens of thousands of independent coffee farmers to our master roasters, our high-quality equipment and our skilled baristas. Our marketing needs to tell our coffee story and showcase our premium coffee beverages.
Second, we're reducing the frequency of discount-driven offers that are proven ineffective, diluted our premium positioning, overburdened our baristas and detracted from a consistent customer experience. We're working to make every visit worth it for our customers with straightforward pricing, timely service and a more consistent enjoyable cafe experience.
Third, we need to broaden our marketing beyond our Starbucks Rewards customers. Our newly launched campaign focuses on talking to all customers and elevates the Starbucks brand in a much more visible way through broad reach media like linear TV. It reminds customers across age groups that Starbucks serves the best coffee.
You've likely seen our new approach in practice already, and you will see more of it throughout the holidays and into January.
Our customers find worth through quality, consistency and a sense of value. I'm confident that even these early steps will begin to remind customers the Starbucks experience is all of these things.
The US is my near-term priority, but our international business presents significant opportunities. Before discussing China in detail, I need to spend time there to better understand our operations and the market. All indications show me the competitive environment is extreme, the macro environment is tough, and we need to figure out how we grow in the market now and into the future. In the meantime, we continue to explore strategic partnerships that could help us grow in the long term.
Looking elsewhere, I've been pleasantly surprised to learn about significant international growth opportunities for the business beyond China. We'll spend more time and effort to capitalize on growth across other international markets in the coming years.
As I mentioned last week, success comes from staying true to your identity, taking care of customers and your team, simplifying the business, delivering consistently high-quality products and experiences and telling your story. I'm confident we'll make it easier to be a customer, and we'll encourage customers to visit more often.
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Starbucks Corp. (SBUX) | Corrected Transcript |
Q4 2024 Earnings Call | 30-Oct-2024 |
And I'm confident we'll set our partners up for success, so they can deliver the great customer experience I know they want to provide. In doing so, we'll reinvigorate our brand, drive stronger financial returns and return Starbucks to growth. Thank you for your time. And as we get Back to Starbucks, we'll regularly share results driven by our work. And as we begin to see results from pilot projects and early initiatives, we'll share more about our long-term plan.
With that, we will open the call for questions. Operator?
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QUESTION AND ANSWER SECTION
Operator: Thank you. [Operator Instructions] Your first question comes from Jeffrey Bernstein with Barclays.
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Jeffrey A. Bernstein
Analyst, Barclays Capital, Inc.
Q
Great. Thank you very much, and welcome to Starbucks, Brian. Just a bigger picture question. Obviously, you met with baristas presumably a lot over the past 50 days. I'm wondering what your key learnings have been in terms of maybe top requests or what areas you think are the greatest opportunities because presumably, you're bringing it back to kind of the basics at Starbucks and you would think that handoff between barista and customer is the most important. So just wondering kind of what your key takeaways were?
And if I could just layer in another component there. I mean it just seems like you had tremendous success at Chipotle implementing very similar initiatives. I'm just wondering what you think were some of your greatest wins at Chipotle with some initiatives that maybe could be applied at Starbucks? Thank you.
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Brian R. Niccol
Chairman & Chief Executive Officer, Starbucks Corp.
A
Yeah. Thanks. And terrific to be here at Starbucks and delighted to be talking about the business with all of you. So to answer your first question, yeah, I had the opportunity, frankly, to spend time with our baristas from the West Coast to East Coast, middle of the country, in the South. And one thing that was consistent that I got to start with is they love this brand, okay? They love serving craft coffee that they know we go the extra mile to ensure it's absolutely the best.
And I had the opportunity to ask people over and over again, what is your favorite drink to prepare. And consistently, every barista came back to me with, you know what, I love making the espresso drinks, the latte art, the flat whites, the cappuccinos, the lattes. These are things that literally, they shined when they answered the question.
Now as regard to - I also asked them, what do you think are some things we could be doing better. And right out of the gate, one of the things they said that would help the whole process is if we could get brewed coffee not to be going down the line and ending up down at the counter. And so that's why you heard me in my prepared remarks here, talk about how we're going to bring back the coffee condiment bar, because both our customers are asking for it and our baristas are saying it would help them deliver the speed of service that they want to provide.
So that's one big piece of feedback I got. The second piece of feedback right there with the brewed coffee is take a hard look at the staffing, both during peak and shoulder hours to ensure that we're setting the teams up for
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Starbucks Corp. (SBUX) | Corrected Transcript |
Q4 2024 Earnings Call | 30-Oct-2024 |
success all day long. And so, we've looked at it. I'm happy to say we're already implementing some changes in a couple of thousand stores, and we are going to be piloting some new approaches on how we set up the labor model so that our baristas have time to give not only great craft drinks, but also that hospitality and that human touch of handing off the drink to our customer at the counter and then also making sure that we're on time with the mobile order business.
The other thing that they shared with me in some of the stores is they wanted their cafe dining room back. They like leading the coffee house. I think there is a moment of pride of saying, this is my place. They know our customers by name. They have their regulars. They want to have a great seat for them. They want to have a great environment for them to enjoy whether it's a moment for themselves or whether it's sharing a moment with others. And so I couldn't agree more, frankly, with a lot of their feedback.
I'll touch on one more, which was, hey, is there any way to simplify the customization that we provide? Can we put in some guardrails on this, so that it's not out of hand? And so those were the big ones.
To your question on similarities of Chipotle, what I would tell you is the similarity start with, you've got an employee/partner base at Starbucks that is hugely committed to the brand and hugely committed to doing the right thing for the business. And when you start with that kind of foundation, you're able to put in the right programs so that we can get the business turned around.
So I would say that is one big similarity. The thing obviously that I've also just been really impressed by is just how special Starbucks is to so many people, both customers at all ages and whether they're getting just a brewed cup of coffee quickly or whether they're getting a flat white. The brand means a lot to them, and it means a lot to their communities. And I take that as a lot of responsibility. So long answer to your question, but I wanted to make sure I was thorough. So thanks for the question.
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Operator: Your next question comes from Sara Senatore with Bank of America.
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Sara H. Senatore
Analyst, BofA Securities, Inc.
Q
Thank you. And thank you for that color, Brian. I wanted to ask, I know you're getting a lot of questions comparisons to Chipotle. But one of the things that I think struck me at the time was that there were a lot of benefits that you were able to extract from what say, reallocating resources. So reinvesting in some parts of the business and maybe finding things that were less productive elsewhere.
And I guess I'm wondering, it sounds like maybe that's the case for Starbucks, too. You talked about reducing upcharges for non-dairy milk, which as an almond milk drinker, I thank you for, but you're also promoting less. And similarly, maybe shifting to linear television, but it sounds like perhaps away from other channels.
So I wanted to see if that's the right interpretation including around scheduling perhaps, which is maybe not more hours, but different hours?
And then just a quick question for Rachel. I think you mentioned some one-time charges in G&A, but I think they were included in the non-GAAP EPS. So I just want to make sure I understand what kind of non-recurring might actually be in the adjusted EPS? Thanks.
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Starbucks Corporation published this content on October 31, 2024, and is solely responsible for the information contained herein. Distributed by Public, unedited and unaltered, on October 31, 2024 at 22:50:03.017.