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Text: As usual, Wyman and Joe will first make prepared comments related to our operating performance and strategic initiatives.
During our call, management may discuss certain items, which are not based entirely on historical facts.
And of course, on the call, we may refer to certain non-GAAP financial measures that management uses in its review of the business, and believes will provide insight into the company's ongoing operations.
Looking broadly at the quarter, we're encouraged by the continued improvement in the environment, the consumers increasing engagement with the category, and we hope to see those trends continue.
We know there are still challenges out there, especially with independents, yet Brinker continues its strong recovery, posting a better-than-expected first quarter and also delivering earnings of $0.28 a share.
Both brands increased their progression from last quarter with Chili's reporting comp sales of negative 7.2% and Maggiano's negative 38.6%.
And both brands delivered solid sequential improvement throughout the quarter, with Chili's ending September down just 1.4% and Maggiano's down 32.5%.
Plus casual is obviously a more challenged segment that's facing greater headwinds, but the Maggiano's team is doing a great job managing their cost structure and flow through.
We feel good about where Maggiano's is from a very relative perspective, and we're excited about the bold strategy Steve Provost and the team are putting in place to build the business.
The Chili's brand continues to exceed expectations from both a relative and an absolute perspective.
The month of September marked our return to positive traffic, and that's pretty impressive given there are still major states like California and New Jersey, not yet near full dining room capacity.
This brand continued its nearly three-year streak of outperforming other casual dining chains in KNAPP-TRACK, driving a 16-point gap in sales and 23 points in traffic this quarter.
When we broaden our view of the category to include independents, our GAAP widened significantly.
Current credit card data shows a whole category down 30%, which reflects our ongoing impact of this pandemic and the reality of what is likely to be a meaningful shift in the competitive landscape.
In this tough environment, I couldn't be prouder of the resilience and agility of our operations team.
For the quarter, they improved restaurant operating margin 60 basis points year over year.
When the pandemic hit back in March, the market really drove us all to dramatically cut costs.
Since then, we've judiciously evaluated every cost within our P&L, and we've been diligent about reestablishing our media -- our spending levels.
In many cases, we're comfortable maintaining a level of spend below pre-pandemic levels.
One of the biggest changes we made was to rethink our marketing spend.
We significantly reduced traditional television advertising so we could invest more aggressively in digital and direct channels that work harder for us, like My Chili's Rewards.
And with the increased desire for convenience, we're shifting to support all our brands more aggressively with delivery resulting in higher third-party delivery fees and promotional expenses.
Based on where we're tracking with sales and the efficiency of our P&L, we feel really good about these decisions.
Our top priority has been and remains the safety of our team members and guests.
We're committed to supporting our team that's working so hard to take care of our guests.
We've now brought back most of our hourly team members, and that we've been able to help them maintain their hourly wage levels.
We've also kept our management structure intact.
We know how critical their leadership is to our guests and our business and we're proud that we've been able to bonus our managers close to target.
Instead, we leaned into the same strategies that have been helping us take share from the last three years, and they've been even more effective since the pandemic.
But even before that, our challenge was to prove to ourselves and to you that we could create a growth model out of a legacy business in a category that's seen meaningful declines in traffic over the years.
We have always believed growth is available in this category if you do the right things.
By delivering a better guest experience, a strong value proposition and more effective marketing, we unlocked sustainable organic growth within our base business.
Our results demonstrate we're doing the right things.
Our improvements to the base enables us to introduce our first virtual brand, It's Just Wings, an incremental growth vehicle that offers convenience and value in a way no one else is positioned to do.
Now there's been a lot of discussion about what a virtual brand is.
It's Just Wings is not a disposable vehicle.
We're committed to this brand for the long haul.
There are barriers to entry in doing virtual brands well, and Brinker is uniquely positioned to do it right.
We have the scale, the asset ownership that's available capacity in our well-equipped kitchens, the right technology and unbelievably strong operators who can focus and deliver consistently.
When we rolled out It's Just Wings overnight to more than 1,000 restaurants.
Now that's easy to say, but tremendously hard to do.
So I know everyone is curious about how it's going so far.
We're excited with how the brand is already performing, and we're well on track to meet our first year target of more than $150 million in sales.
We're encouraged by what DoorDash sees with regard to our consumer data.
The brand is really generating high satisfaction scores and strong repeat usage.
It's really resonating with consumers, which we know is critical to the health and long-term success of any brand.
Going forward, our focus is to ensure we're executing at the highest level possible, and we're maximizing the brand's growth potential.
It's Just Wings started as a virtual brand, but as we wire in the execution and accelerate growth, it may take different trajectories.
We're evaluating internal and external opportunities to increase awareness levels and expand access to consumers.
This is just phase I for It's Just Wings.
We also believe we have capacity to expand our virtual brand portfolio.
We're testing a few ideas to better understand consumer demand and ensure that we can execute at a high level.
We'll have more to say on that in the not-too-distant future.
Obviously, we see a lot of upside for virtual brands.
Listen, with the uncertainty surrounding COVID and the economy, we anticipate some volatility ahead.
And like the rest of our country and the world, we are hoping and planning for a vaccine and an end to the sickness and deaths from this virus.
We are hoping and planning for economic stability and continued recovery in the post-election environment.
But despite the things no one can know, here's what we do know.
We will keep running our own race and working our strategy.
We will stay flexible and agile, and we'll take care of each other and our guests.
We will also continue to manage our P&L and our balance sheet with discipline to create an even more stable model for our shareholders.
And we will boldly grow these brands so we can continue to be a great place for our team members to work and our shareholders to invest.
And with that, I'll turn now it over to Joe.
As you just heard, we begin our fiscal year 2021 with momentum on the top and bottom line.
We continued our recovery by delivering adjusted diluted earnings per share of positive $0.28, marking the return to profitability after just a one quarter hiatus.
Now for the quarter, Brinker's total revenues were $740 million and consolidated reported net comp sales were negative 10.9%.
Importantly, comp sales materially improved as the quarter progressed, with September consolidated comp sales down only 5.2%.
Chili's has continued to lead the casual dining sector, ranking as the #1 brand in the KNAPP-TRACK index each month in this quarter.
And as Wyman indicated, beat by significant margins in both sales and traffic.
In September, Chili's achieved another important milestone in its recovery, posting positive traffic for the brand of 2.2%.
Another way to see Chili's impressive progression is to look at our net comp sales results, excluding those restaurants and markets not fully open for our indoor dining during the quarter, such as California and New Jersey.
These restaurants represent approximately 86% of the Chili's system, and they were only negative 1.3% for the quarter and positive 3.6% for September.
Now turning to margins.
Restaurant operating margin for the first quarter was 11.6%, a noteworthy 60 basis points improvement versus prior year.
Food and beverage expenses were favorable 10 basis points versus prior year due to the favorable menu mix, offset by low level of commodity inflation.
Labor was also favorable 120 basis points versus prior year.
Now several items contributed to this improved performance.
First, labor expense relative to prior year benefited from the shift in sales from dine-in to off-premise in the quarter.
Second, favorability was also buoyed by the fact some of our higher labor cost states reopened at a slower pace during the recovery, a benefit that will diminish as we move forward.
Of course, naturally, we'll take the sales that go with adding that labor back into the equation.
And finally, labor expense benefited from the ability to seamlessly integrate our It's Just Wings brand into the existing labor model, a point of leverage and we plan to sustain.
The labor favorability was partially offset by the increase in restaurant expenses, which was up 70 basis points for the first quarter versus prior year.
Sales to leverage, higher delivery related fees and packaging expense were the primary increases, while lower advertising and repairs and maintenance expenses helped mitigate the overall increase.
Generating positive cash flow is an important part of our recovery process.
With the business improving, we generated operating cash flow of $83 million.
After capital expenditures of the approximately $14 million, our free cash flow for the quarter totaled more than $69 million.
Our first priority for cash generation is to invest back in the business.
And as such, we have resumed both restaurant reimages and new restaurant development.
We have increased our capex budget for the year and now expect to spend approximately $100 million during this fiscal year.
As Wyman reiterated, strengthening the balance sheet is also a key area of focus for us.
As such, our second cash priority is to pay down debt, and we executed against this strategy during the quarter, reducing our long-term debt by approximately $50 million.
We will continue to lower leverage as we move forward from here targeting an adjusted debt level of about 3.5 times EBITDAR.
Now turning to our current second quarter.
Let me provide some color as to our expectations for the quarter and then some specific guidance metrics for the quarter.
Today marks the end of our October period, and it appears we will continue the positive progression of comp sales established during the first quarter.
We expect Chili's to further build its positive traffic performance this period, getting the second quarter off to a very fine start.
While we anticipate year over year improvements in Chile's operating performance in the second quarter, our consolidated performance will likely reflect a more difficult holiday environment for the Maggiano's brand.
With that being said, let me provide some specifics for Brinker's performance in the second quarter.
We expect consolidated comp store sales to be down in the mid single-digit range.
We believe Brinker's restaurant operating margins will be relatively similar to prior year.
Adjusted earnings per diluted share are estimated to be in the range of $0.40 to $0.60 and weighted average diluted shares are estimated to be in the 45 million to 46 million share range.
I would also note we have the holiday flip in the second quarter with Christmas Eve and Christmas Day moving into the third quarter.
This holiday shift will have a positive impact to second quarter comp sales that will be offset in the first period of Q3.
Despite the ongoing challenges in our operating environment, we continue to demonstrate strength and resilience.
So, our first quarter performance is a testament to our ability to deliver results.
While operating in a pandemic environment comes with some uncertainties, there is no doubt we will continue to execute our share gaining strategy, take care of our guests and team members and be a leader in the restaurant industry for the short and long term.

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brinker international inc - qtrly net income per diluted share, excluding special items $0.28.
brinker international inc - chilis total comparable restaurant sales decreased 7.2% in q1 21.
brinker international inc - maggiano's total comparable restaurant sales decreased 38.6% in q1 21.
brinker international inc - for q2 21 net income per diluted share, excluding special items, expected to be $0.40 to $0.60.

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