BLMN - Bloomin' Brands Inc. (BLMN) Q4 2023 Earnings Call Transcript
2024-02-23 12:32:08 ET
Bloomin' Brands, Inc. (BLMN)
Q4 2023 Earnings Conference Call
February 23, 2024, 08:00 AM ET
Company Participants
Tara Kurian - VP, Corporate Finance and IR
David Deno - CEO
Chris Meyer - EVP and CFO
Conference Call Participants
Jeffrey Bernstein - Barclays
Alex Slagle - Jefferies
John Ivankoe - JP Morgan
Sharon Zackfia - William Blair
Jeff Farmer - Gordon Haskett
Sara Senatore - Bank of America
Brian Harbour - Morgan Stanley
Lauren Silberman - Deutsche Bank
Brian Vaccaro - Raymond James
Brian Mullan - Piper Sandler
Dennis Geiger - UBS
Jon Tower - Citi
Andrew Strelzik - BMO Capital Markets
Presentation
Operator
Greetings and welcome to the Bloomin' Brands Fiscal Fourth Quarter 2023 Earnings Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. A brief question-and-answer session will follow management's prepared remarks.
It is now my pleasure to introduce your host, Tara Kurian, Vice President, Corporate Finance and Investor Relations. Thank you, Ms. Kurian. You may begin.
Tara Kurian
Thank you and good morning, everyone. With me on today's call are David Deno, our Chief Executive Officer, and Chris Meyer, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer.
By now, you should have access to our fiscal fourth quarter 2023 earnings release. It can also be found on our website at www.bloominbrands.com in the Investors section. Throughout this conference call, we will be presenting results on an adjusted basis. An explanation of our use of non-GAAP financial measures and reconciliations to the most directly comparable GAAP measures appear in our earnings release on our website as previously described.
Before we begin formal remarks, I'd like to remind everyone that part of our discussion today will include forward-looking statements, including a discussion of recent trends. These statements are subject to numerous risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ in a material way from our forward-looking statements. Some of these risks are mentioned in our earnings release. Others are discussed in our SEC filings, which are available at www.sec.gov.
During today's call, we'll provide a brief recap of our financial performance for the fiscal fourth quarter 2023, an overview of Company highlights and current thoughts on fiscal 2024 guidance. Once we've completed these remarks, we'll open the call up for questions.
With that I would like to now turn the call over to David Deno.
David Deno
Well, thank you Tara, and welcome to everyone listening today.
As noted in this morning's earnings release, adjusted Q4 2023 diluted earnings per share was $0.75. This compares to $0.68 in Q4 2022, reflecting a growth of 10% year-over-year, combined U.S. comparable sales were down 20 basis points. Our fourth quarter and 2023 results were largely in line with expectations.
Importantly, we had a sequential U.S. comp sales and traffic improvement from Q3 into Q4, and within Q4, a softer October was offset by progressively improving comp sales, ending with the strong holiday season.
Before we discuss 2024 and more specifically our plans at Outback Steakhouse, I would like to recognize two businesses that had outstanding results in 2023, Carrabba's in Brazil. Carrabba's continues to take share versus the industry. Carrabba's posted comp sales growth of 3.9% and positive traffic growth for the year. In 2023 Carrabba's outperformed the industry in sales by 90 basis points and in traffic growth by 300 basis points. They continue to demonstrate strength, specifically in their off-premises channel and growing catering business....
Bloomin' Brands, Inc. (BLMN) Q4 2023 Earnings Call Transcript