Operations

Burger King's value offerings boost parent RBI's Q1 revenues

Photo: iStock.

April 30, 2021

Burger King's royal blood mixed with a healthy dose of everyday value helped pull its parent company, Restaurant Brands International Inc., out of the pandemic-era doldrums in the first quarter of this year, as quarterly revenue results outpaced analysts' estimates this morning.

The company said Burger King U.S.'s launch of the $1 Your Way value menu helped drive favorable results for the entire business, which also includes the QSR brands of Popeyes and Tim Hortons. RBI reported total revenue for the quarter ending March 31 systemwide grew to $1.26 billion, exceeding average analysts' estimates of $1.25 billion and also up from $1.23 billion during the previous year's quarter.

Still, RBI's chicken-sandwich wunderkind, Popeyes failed to meet Wall Street's expectations of 1.7% same-store sales growth, coming in at just 1.5% quarter-year over quarter-year, according to results released this morning. Other key Q1 highlights for the triple-QSR brand company include:

• Consolidated systemwide sales grew 1.4% (to $7.896 billion) compared with flat growth Q1 2020 ($7.639 billion).
• 7% systemwide sales growth for Popeyes ($1.344 billion) versus 32.3% growth ($1.258 billion) the same period last year.
• 1.8% systemwide sales growth for Burger King ($5.173 billion), versus a 3% ($4.999 billion) lost last year's quarter.
• 4.9% drop in systemwide sales at Tim Hortons ($1.379 billion), versus its loss of 9.9% ($1.382 billion) last year's quarter.
• Consolidated net restaurant growth was 0.2% (total of 27,173) versus 5% last year's quarter (27,109).
• Tim Hortons comp sales fell 2.3% versus a decrease of 10.3% during the same quarter last year.
• Burger King comp sales grew 0.7%, versus a loss of 3.7% last year's quarter.
• Popeyes comp sales grew 1.5%, versus last year's quarterly gain in comp sales of 26.2%.

"Our first quarter results signal our return to growth with system-wide sales surpassing Q1 2019 and net restaurant growth nearly matching our best-ever Q1 performance in 2018," RBI CEO Jose Cil said in the release. "We are excited by the global growth potential of our brands and are encouraged by this early momentum as we work toward a return to historic levels of unit growth this year."

"Our home market recovery from the pandemic is well-underway, including at Tim Hortons in Canada where our business fundamentals have continued to improve as we execute on our Back to Basics plan, which included exciting product launches in Q1 like our new dark roast coffee and fresh cracked egg breakfast sandwiches. Our C$80M investment announced during the quarter to supercharge our advertising and digital platforms is a further indication of our strong confidence in Tim Horton's market-leading position as the Canadian economy fully reopens later this year.

"The results of long-term investments we are making in digital initiatives, such as loyalty programs and our branded apps, were best demonstrated in Canada during Q1 where digital channels drove nearly one-third of all sales for Tim Hortons in the quarter; almost twice the levels for the same period last year and the largest quarter yet for digital sales for any of our brands in Canada and the U.S. Our digital channels will allow us to drive incrementality for our restaurants as well as a more personalized and valuable experience for our guests."