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Text: 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.
With the rollout of vaccines in full swing and restrictions lifting across the country, our guests' pent-up demand for a dine-in experience is being released as well.
People are finally starting to feel safer to venture out and spend more -- spend some of the money they've been saving over the past year.
We're excited about the positive momentum in our economy and the resurgence in our dining rooms.
When we last talked at the end of January, we were already seeing progress in the business, even as we were navigating a COVID spike that drove another wave of capacity restrictions in our dining rooms.
Just as we started to see numbers of cases come back down, we were hit with the winter storm of the century that impacted our restaurants across Texas and the southeast at levels we haven't experienced before.
But despite the challenges at the start of the third quarter, we ended strong, delivering an adjusted earnings per share of $0.78 with Chili's sales returning to positive territory from an absolute perspective.
And we've seen those sales trends continue into April.
When we look at our more normalized performance of fiscal '19, Chili's sales are up 10%, and nearly three-quarters of our restaurants are generating meaningful positive results, even though we're still social distancing and wearing masks in all of our restaurants and we're still operating under capacity restraints across the country.
We believe, all along, the consumers' increased demand for convenience would continue post-pandemic, and it's playing out that way.
As our dining room traffic increases, our off-premise business continues to hold strong.
We expect that when things normalize, we'll see stronger dining rooms and a takeout and delivery business stronger than it was pre-pandemic.
As you think about Maggiano's in the context of this recovery, upscale casual is playing itself out a little differently.
We're pleased with the significant improvements in the Maggiano's business, especially in their dining rooms.
Now, it's just a matter of how quickly banquets come back.
We know there's significant pent-up demand and we're well-positioned to meet it.
We're already seeing signs of social occasions returning, and we feel good about building our corporate business back in time for the important holiday season.
Staying focused on our strategy throughout the extraordinary events of the past year has served us well as we consistently outperformed the industry.
We have good line of sight to hit the targets we were expecting post-pandemic at both Chili's and Maggiano's.
Navigating the past year taught us we can run this business even more efficiently than in the past, and we're committed to keeping our cost structure in line.
We think our category leadership -- driven by the multiyear investments in our infrastructure and digital capabilities will help us continue to outpace the industry.
We still have a lot of heart for our restructured marketing approach, and we'll continue to leverage our digital expertise to connect with consumers and drive traffic.
The subject of labor is clearly top of mind across our industry.
Today's labor market is one of the toughest ones we've experienced, but we have the tools to navigate through it successfully.
While our performance throughout the pandemic enabled us to keep higher levels of staffing in our restaurants, we are hiring more team members than usual to support our increased volumes.
We're also benefiting from our decision to keep our managers on board throughout the pandemic as they provide the operational leadership to staff our teams and take care of our guests.
We're fortunate to be able to leverage our scale, the digital expertise we built, and our PeopleWorks team to recruit talent in creative ways to keep our cost structure intact and our guests coming back.
We know the best way to maintain profit margins in this business is through volume, so we leaned into virtual brands as a way to leverage our assets and tap unused capacity.
It's Just Wings continues to perform well, and we're on track to hit that $150 million target we set at the beginning of the year.
Almost all of our domestic franchise partners jumped on the opportunity and globally, several of our partners have already picked it up.
Wings is now in nine countries and 160 locations outside the U.S., making it a formidable brand in just its first year.
It's a real testament to our methodical and disciplined virtual brand strategy, how we've executed it and the leverage it brings to our P&L and to our franchise partners' business.
We have the system up and running and we're executing it well, especially during high volumes.
Now, we're focused on building the brand and leveraging the growth opportunities ahead.
We believe takeout holds a lot of potential for us.
And now that we've invested in the technology and infrastructure to support it, we're working to increase awareness levels outside the delivery channel.
We've learned a lot this year with the launch of It's Just Wings that will leverage when we're ready for our next virtual brand.
We're pleased with the current results from the expanded test of Maggiano's classics, and we're working through the timing to ensure we're able to support our operators and deliver a great guest experience.
So this has been an exceptional year of learning for us, not just with virtual brands but in many ways.
We've learned the restaurant industry in general, and specifically, our team is full of unbelievably resilient amazing human beings.
I'm so impressed by how this team has risen to every challenge that's come our way.
We're stronger for it, and we're prepared for the growth opportunities ahead as vaccinations spread across the country and dining rooms fill up.
As we look forward, our ability to navigate through any short-term cost headwinds is solid.
Our scale affords us advantages in terms of forward contracting, keeping our employment base intact, and delivering one of the strongest value propositions in the industry.
Longer term, we see a lot of organic growth potential for Brinker.
Obviously, we'll continue to execute our multiyear virtual brand strategy and protect our improved business model.
And with higher volumes, we'll capture new development opportunities and keep the brand fresh through our remodel program.
I'm proud of our progress on our results, the strength of our brands, and our line of sight to future earnings performance.
While the quarter definitely had its unique issues, I'm most pleased with the momentum we are generating as we move closer to a more normal operating environment, setting up further success both this quarter and next fiscal year.
For the third quarter of fiscal 2021, Brinker reported total revenues of $820 million with consolidated comp sales of negative 3.3%.
Our adjusted diluted earnings per share for the quarter was $0.78.
Chili's recorded flat comp sales and positive 4% traffic for the quarter, with the year-over-year performance improving throughout the quarter.
Regional performance is strong nationwide with a broad range of state markets rebuilding their dining room sales back to higher levels, above 75%, let's say when compared to pre-COVID performance.
We do still have a smaller set of state markets such as California and Illinois, which are important markets for us, that are earlier in their dining room reopening process.
We anticipate they will follow similar growth patterns as we move through the next several months.
A couple of items to note related to the third quarter.
First, we had a holiday flip the first week, with Christmas moving into the quarter, resulting in a negative 1% comp sales impact.
In February, we experienced Uri, a most unique winter storm that hit with historic subzero temperatures and power outages for more than a week, affecting approximately 30% of our restaurants.
The material impact of the storm resulted in an estimated $10.5 million in lost revenues, a negative impact to consolidated comp sales of 1.2%, and reduced adjusted earnings per share of approximately $0.06.
Once things thawed out, our positive progression returned, with average weekly sales volume hitting record highs in March.
As we started to lap the beginning of the pandemic in mid-March, as one would expect, comp sales moved significantly positive and are likely to remain elevated for the foreseeable future.
While pleased with this progression, we believe a two-year comp comparison is a more insightful view of our performance.
In this regard, the consolidated two-year comp results for Brinker for the first four weeks of April was a positive 6.3%, driven by Chili's results of a positive 10.1% for the same time frame.
I would note that Chili's is lapping off of a positive 2.9% in the third quarter of F '19.
Increasing sales volumes also favorably impacted margins, resulting in a consolidated restaurant operating margin for the third quarter of 13.9% compared to 12.8% for the third quarter of fiscal '20.
Again, the winter storms had a negative impact on ROM, reducing the margin by an estimated 30 basis points.
Food and beverage expense as a percent of company sales was 70 basis points favorable to prior year, primarily driven by menu mix as we featured steak on three for $10 in the prior year.
Pricing was slightly favorable, and commodities were flat.
Labor expense, again as a percent of company sales, was favorable 70 basis points as compared to the prior year.
During the quarter, lower dining room capacity year over year resulted in a reduced hourly labor cost.
We do anticipate hourly labor to increase, importantly along with sales volumes as capacity restrictions lift in certain states.
During the quarter, we meaningfully increased our manager bonus payout, impacting margins by approximately 60 basis points as we move to reward this critical leadership level for outstanding performance.
By leveraging our scale, our well-established people, practices, and benefits and utilizing our digital connectivity know-how, we are confident in our ability to effectively manage through the current labor market environment.
Restaurant expense was unfavorable year over year by 30 basis points, a reflection of increased off-premise costs such as packaging and fees, driven by our successful off-premise sales channels.
Advertising expense continues in a favorable year-over-year position as we lean into our digital and loyalty-driven marketing strategy.
Brinker continues to deliver strong operating cash flow.
Year to date, we have generated $268 million in operating cash flow.
During the third quarter, we used a portion of that cash flow to repay $115 million in revolver borrowings, bringing the outstanding balance to under $300 million.
We anticipate further borrowing reduction in the fourth quarter.
Additionally, we are investing significantly into the growth of our brands.
Capital expenditures year-to-date totaled approximately $62 million.
We opened two new Chili's during the third quarter and two additional locations in April, bringing our total for this fiscal year to 10.
We are moving aggressively to further build our development resources and increase the NRO pipeline.
We continue to target expanding new restaurant development to a range of 18 to 22 restaurants a year.
We also are investing in reimages of our existing fleet, with a particular focus on the Midwest restaurants acquired in early fiscal '20.
Brinker has continually proven to be a leader in utilizing technology to enhance the guest experience and improve operational performance.
In fiscal 2021, we will invest approximately $20 million of capital and technology that enhances our digital guest connectivity, supports our virtual brand growth, and improves our in-restaurant dining experience.
Now, turning to our expectations for the final quarter of this fiscal year.
We expect both Chili's and Maggiano's to maintain their current favorable sales trends throughout the quarter, assuming COVID cases continue to decline and state and local restrictions continue to ease.
Let me provide some additional specifics for the fourth quarter.
Total revenue is estimated to be in the $950 million to $1 billion range.
Adjusted earnings per diluted share are estimated in the $1.55 to $1.70 range.
Weighted average diluted shares are estimated to be in the 47 million to 48 million share range.
Also, as we have previously noted, fiscal 2021 includes a 53rd week at the end of this fourth quarter.
As we settle into the last quarter of the fiscal year, we are excited about the momentum we have built from the uncertainty that surrounded the restaurant industry a year ago.
During the past year, the members of our support teams here in Dallas stepped up and provided innovative solutions to any number of issues since the pandemic changed how we all approach our work.
And our frontline team members in the restaurants have continually delivered for our guests in ways none of us would have contemplated not too long ago.
We are grateful to both these groups of team members who combined to lead the casual dining sector throughout this past year.
They are all committed to finishing strong this fiscal year and then carrying the success forward.

user
estimated impact of winter storm uri during q3 of fiscal 2021 was a decrease in company sales of $10.5 million.
estimated impact of winter storm uri during q3 was a decrease comparable restaurant sales of 1.2%.
brinker international - estimated impact of winter storm uri during q3 was decrease in net income per diluted share, excluding special items, of $0.06.
q4 2021 revenues are expected to be in range of $950 million to $1.0 billion.
q4 2021 net income per diluted share, excluding special items, is expected to be in range of $1.55 to $1.70.
excluding special items net income per diluted share in q3 of fiscal 2021 was $0.78.

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