Restaurant Brands International Inc. Price & Performance (QSR)

All participants will be in listen only mode. Please note this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Kendall Peck, RBI's Head of Investor Relations. Please go ahead. Thank you, operator. Good morning, and welcome to our earnings call for the year and quarter ended 12/31/2024. Joining me on the call today are Restaurant Brands International's Executive Chairman, Patrick Doyle CEO, Josh Casa and CFO, Sammy Sadiki. Following remarks from Josh, Sami and Patrick, we will open the call to questions. Today's discussion may include forward looking statements, which are subject to risks detailed in the press release issued this morning and in our SEC filings. We will also reference non GAAP financial measures. Reconciliations of which are available in the press release and trending schedules available on our Web Please note that franchisee profitability referenced on this call is based on unaudited self reported franchisee data. As a reminder, following our acquisition of Carroll's Restaurant Group, which closed on May 16, 2024, and our acquisition of Popeyes China, which closed on June 28, 2024, we introduced a sixth reportable segment, Restaurant Holdings, which comprises the Popeyes China business and the Burger King Carols Restaurant.

The consolidated growth metrics discussed on this call including organic adjusted operating income growth and organic adjusted EPS growth, exclude results from the Restaurant Holdings segment. With that, I'll turn it over to Josh.

Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us today. As I begin my third year in this role, I'm incredibly proud of the strong foundations we've built across all of our businesses. I've spent the past two years traveling the world. From Australia to Japan and Nova Scotia. Visiting countless Restaurant, and connecting with our dedicated team members. [indiscernible] Across every visit, one thing has remained clear. Successful restaurants execute the fundamentals of quality, service and convenience with excellence. Reflecting on 2024, while we encountered challenges, focus on delivering these fundamentals enabled us to provide even better experiences for our guests. And outperform most of our global QSR peers, from both the top line and bottom line perspective. In 2024, grew comparable sales 2.3%. Net restaurants 3.4% Restaurant, system wide sales by 5.4%. Our top line performance coupled with disciplined cost management, and a strong business model. Drove significant operating leverage and resulted in 9% organic adjusted operating income growth. Our brands continue to stand out for their high quality food and beverages. This year, we delighted guests with exciting menu innovations. From Wednesday's Whopper at Burger King in The U. S, to our King to Beef collaboration with a Michelin Star Chef, at Burger King, Spain.

And seasonal hits like the Thanksgiving sub at Firehouse.

Quality extends beyond menu and ingredients. It's also about execution. And delivering a great guest experience. By enhancing team member trainings, upgrading restaurant equipment, we are strengthening in restaurant operations and elevating product satisfaction across our flagship offerings like Popeyes, Bone and Chicken, Whopper App Burger King and Tim's Coffee and Breakfast Sandwiches.

In twenty twenty four, Tim's Canada reduced already remarkably fast drive through times. And hosted Tim's Way training symposiums to elevate hospitality.

Popeyes U. S. Improved order accuracy, driver wait times and product satisfaction. And across all our businesses, we reinforced our commitment to excellence by transitioning underperforming franchise portfolios to stronger more engaged operators. Expanding access to our brands for guests around the world remains a key focus. This year, we grew in 110 brand market combinations. And improved our digital capabilities to facilitate a seamless experience for all guest interactions. By delivering on these three core fundamentals, quality, service and convenience, We are solidifying RBI as the preferred home for franchisees looking to grow their businesses and for industry talent looking to grow their careers across brands and geographies. Our franchisees have the opportunity to invest in up to four strong growing brands. Offering high quality products that resonate with guests worldwide. All while benefiting from RBI's global infrastructure and talent.

We already have many examples of franchisees capitalizing on these opportunities. From Yuri Miranda, who helped grow Burger King Brazil into a nearly $1,000,000,000 system wide sales business and is now launching Firehouse subs in that market, to Gregorio Jimenez, built a thriving Burger King business in Spain. Later expanding to Portugal and adding Tim Spain, Popeye Spain and Popeye Italy to his business. Or Ken and Alicia Jour at Tim Hortons Canada who've grown their business in Manitoba to now include Firehouse Hubs. Supporting our franchisees profitability remains foundational to our success. It's why we continue to be accountable to franchisees sharing average restaurant profitability across our four brands in their home markets. We're two years into this commitment and feel good about the progress we've made. For 2024, average four wall and EBITDA at TIMES Canada exceeded CAD305000, up from CAD280000 in the prior year. And Popeyes U. S. Increased to just over $255,000 from $245,000 Burger King U. S. Remained stable at $205,000 marking a substantial improvement from just two years ago. In Firehouse Subs, saw a step back to approximately $90,000 largely due to broader sub sandwich category sales dynamics over the summer and fall. Overall, we're very pleased with the improvements we delivered at Tim's and Popeyes and we're working to return to growth at Burger King and Firehouse in 2025.

While 2024 had its challenges, our teams and franchisees remain focused and resilient. Positioning RB and its brands for long term success and for 2025 to be another year of 8% plus organic adjusted operating income growth. Together, we're building businesses that thrive on quality, service and convenience. While delivering meaningful value to our guests, our franchisees, shareholders alike. With that, let's move into our second highlights. Starting now with Tim Hortons. Tim Wharton delivered a strong performance in 2024. Surpassed $1,000,000,000 in AOI for the first time. TIMSS Canada grew comparable sales 4.3%. Significantly outpacing major peers in the market.

Which declined 0.5% on average.

For Q4, Tim's in Canada delivered a 2.5% increase in comparable sales, again outperforming the industry, which was relatively flat. Growth in Canada was primarily driven by traffic. The best way to get it done. With TIMSS delivering its fifteenth consecutive quarter of positive traffic growth, an impressive achievement given its leading market share position. This success highlights Axle and the team's focus on offering guests quality food and beverages at a great price. Having engaged restaurant owners, and providing exceptional digital and physical convenience. Q4 morning daypart sales outpaced overall sales. Fueled by high single digit growth in breakfast sandwiches and wraps. Including an extension of our $3 hot breakfast sandwich offer. Our continued morning innovation, including our recent launch of freshly cracked Canadian scrambled eggs, keeps us at the forefront of guest preferences In the PM, we built on the success of our loaded and anytime snackers platforms, which the launch of our Flatbread pizzas. In April and delivered over 5% growth in PM Main Foods during the quarter. Flatbread pizzas support our goal increasing Tim's presence throughout the day and expanding our fuel for families, We're excited to keep innovating with new flavors and side pairings, that leverage our Restaurant' new ovens.

We're also expanding our beverage leadership into strategic growth categories like cold, and espresso based beverages, Warmer than average Q4 temperatures contributed to over 6% growth in cold beverages. While our delicious lineup of ice caps, cold brews and fencers continues to meet evolving guest preferences. Meanwhile, our early results from new espresso machines, which are currently being tested in about 100 Restaurant, are showing promising potential. Our operations team and restaurant owners committed to operational excellence. Q4 marked TIM's eighth consecutive quarter of year over year improvements in average weekday morning drive through times. Which now average about twenty eight seconds per car at the window. This solidifies Tim's as one of the fastest drive through concepts in North America. The team's consistent focus on speed of service is enhancing guest satisfaction, boosting throughput and driving sales. We estimate every one second reduction in drive through time translates to approximately $30,000 of incremental annual sales per Restaurant. On the development front, very excited for Canada to return to positive net unit growth in 2025. Supported by compelling unit economics, and ambitious restaurant owners looking to expand. Especially in underpinned and traded regions where like Western Canada and in rural areas.

Ken Wharton's deep community ties remain a key pillar of its strength and brand love. In 2024, our restaurant owners helped raise Restaurant million for local charities, and our Tim's Foundation camps. Including nearly CAD11 million from Holiday Smile Cookie in Q4. I'm incredibly proud of our Tim's team and our restaurant owners. Tim Hortons remains one of the only brands in Canada consistently growing traffic which was up nearly 3% for 2024. We're doing it profitably for our restaurant owners. With its strong value proposition, number one brand love, innovative marketing, operational excellence and dedicated restaurant owners, I'm confident Jim's will continue to deliver positive sales growth and industry outperformance. [indiscernible] Shifting now to international, which continues to be a strong growth engine, closing the year with over 15,600 restaurants and over $18,000,000,000 in system wide sales. Approximately 60% of which was driven by our top 10 markets. We feel very good about the relative performance of our international business versus our global peers. In 2024, international comparable sales grew 3.3%, including 4.7% growth in the fourth quarter. We saw solid growth in many of our largest markets, including Australia, Spain, The UK and Brazil. Thanks to well executed calendar initiatives, compelling core value offerings and great restaurant level execution.

We achieved net restaurant growth of 6.1% despite temporary headwinds from geopolitical pressures in certain markets, as well as net closures in BK China, While we don't have an update on BK China today, we're optimistic we'll have a resolution relatively soon and Sammy will provide you with a few financial details on the business shortly. Importantly, since most of the development slowed down stemmed from lower average restaurant sales, or ARS markets like China the overall impact on system wide sales was minor. As a result, we delivered full year system wide sales growth of 10%. Looking ahead, Tiago and his team are concentrating efforts on our highest ARS market, such as those in Western Europe and Australia. Burger King France continues to shine. Posting a $3,800,000 ARS alongside 10% NRG Popeyes UK, which opened a little over three years ago, surpassed 65 units this year, growing nearly 75% year on year.

And reached nearly $3,000,000 in ARS, up from $2,600,000 in 2023.

Meanwhile, Burger King Spain and Italy each with strong ARS of $1,600,000 remains steady contributors to our restaurant expansion.

And the team at Hungry Jacks in Australia continues its momentum, delivering nearly $2,600,000 ARS across its four seventy one restaurants. We also know it's important to continue growing in markets with enormous white space opportunity is like India and China. While these markets are not yet major drivers of AOI, we are laying the foundation to ensure that RBI brands become strong players the world's largest QSR markets in the future. Additionally, our continued expansion of Popeyes, Tim Hortons and Firehouse Subs into new international markets be a long term catalyst for unit growth. Since acquiring Popeyes in 2017, we've brought the brand to more than 15 new markets. Including New Zealand, Italy and Costa Rica in 2024. We've grown the business from roughly 500 international restaurants to nearly 1,500 today.

And from around $300,000,000 in system wide sales, to nearly $1,300,000,000 The brand's remarkable 47% system wide sales growth this year building on 61% growth from the prior year, showcases its incredible momentum. This success is driven by strong partnerships with our master franchisees such as RB Iberia, expanded to over 150 locations in Spain in just five years and recently launched Popeyes in Italy. It's clear that Popeyes delicious high quality chicken and authentic Louisiana flavors resonate with guests around the world. And as we keep delivering strong system wide sales growth, we will see more robust contribution to our AOI. Turning now to Burger King in The U. S. And Canada. Which grew comparable sales 1% in 2024. In the fourth quarter, Burger King U. S. Outperformed major Burger QSR peers with a 1.5% increase in comparable sales.

A solid achievement following last year's 6.4% increase.

Tom, his team and our dedicated franchisees are executing the multi year reclaim the plan plan. And providing guests exciting menu innovation compelling value offerings and improved overall experience. By emphasizing operational excellence, and investing in modern, welcoming restaurants, setting the brand up for long term success. Recent menu initiatives such as the Adams Family menu featuring Wednesday's Lobber the $1,000,000 Whopper campaign and the Melt's platform have reinforced that guests create innovation and high quality food at a great price. For 2025, we'll continue leading into our key differentiators, of flame growing the Whopper and have it your way. While enhancing quality and consistency through menu renovation, and operational improvements. Operational excellence remains a key pillar of our strategy. In 2024, our A operators achieved average four wall EBITDA of over $275,000 That's 35% higher than the system average. This is one of the most compelling metrics we can share with our franchisees. As it demonstrates the direct impact of operational excellence on running a healthy and growing business. It also reinforces our ongoing efforts at the corporate level to raise the bar. Transitioning disengaged franchisees out of the system and attracting dedicated operators who share our vision for brand excellence.

In January, I had the opportunity to meet with two such dedicated operators, Tim Foley and John Kaufman. Since acquiring about 20 restaurants in North Carolina in 2021 Restaurant an underperforming franchisee, they've transformed their portfolio improving their franchise success score from a D delivered an over 30% increase in average restaurant sales. And more than doubled their restaurants' four wall EBITDA an impressive $325,000 per store on average. Their success is built on the right fundamentals, instilling a culture of operational excellence, training and engaging their team members, executing with a guest first mentality and modernizing their assets. They exemplify how powerful Burger King can be in the hands of strong operators. Which is why we're excited about their recent expansion of pouring 30 more restaurants from another underperforming franchisee in the Carolina region. Modern Image is another key driver of our success. During my trip to North Carolina, I toured two newly opened Carol Sizzle Restaurant, and they are truly stunning. These restaurants showcase the future of Burger King. Beautiful, inviting and well designed restaurants with modern guests and families in mind. With about 80 sizzles in operation today, we're thrilled with the early results. And excited to see how these restaurants will inspire both our franchisees and our guests with a transformed Burger King experience.

Our commitment to modernizing the Burger King system remains very strong. In 2024, we completed three seventy remodels, including about 60 Carrols Restaurant. Bringing the system to 51% modern image.

We had about two twenty remodels that have been open for more than six months now.

And they continue to deliver an average of mid teens year one sales uplift. [indiscernible] And even stronger improvements in franchisee profitability. As we've previously shared with you, we're on track to reach 85% plus modern image by 2028 we are confident this transformation will further strengthen Burger King's position in the industry. At Carroll's, we made progress towards modern image by accelerating our pace of remodels in 2024. Additionally, we've initiated work to begin refranchising select locations in 2025. Two years ahead of our original plan, and expect to accelerate refranchising efforts in 2026 and beyond. As we look ahead, Burger King is in a strong position to build on its recent success. With a continued focus on operational excellence, menu innovation and a modernized restaurant image, are confident in our ability to drive sustainable long term growth for the brand and strong returns for our franchisees. Turning now to Popeyes. In 2024, Popeyes continued its growth trajectory and grew net restaurants by 3.7%. Driving a 4.2% increase in system wide sales. While top line results came in softer than we would have liked, our $6 Big Box Value Meal, and protein only three for $5 offering, resonated with guests in Q4, helping us to modestly expand our share within the Chicken QSR category this year.

Over the past few quarters, Jeff and team have been working closely with our franchisees on several strategic initiatives to support our ED2L plan. We're excited to announce that roughly 85% of Popeyes restaurants committed to amend their franchise agreement. Resulting in alignment on our easy to love plan to drive sales through increased media investment and a unified restaurant image. This amendment commits participating restaurants to test higher national advertising rates over three years.

Beginning this April with an initial step up from 4.5% to 5% in year one and up to 5.5% by year three. Subject to meeting certain profitability thresholds. The amendment also establishes a remodel schedule by which most of the system will feature a modern image by 02/1930. Ensuring our guests will enjoy beautiful, updated restaurants across all locations. As part of this commitment, will receive a $4,000 royalty credit per restaurant to offset the year one increased advertising investment. Resulting in a $10,500,000 investment from Popeyes.

Taken together, the amendment supports our commitment to delivering impactful brand messaging, achieving modern image providing greater flexibility and alignment for our franchisees. Meanwhile, we're advancing the Popeyes experience and simplifying operations with our easy to run initiative. Which standardizes processes, enhances technology and introduces new kitchen equipment and a new production line. Following eighteen months of testing across 200 locations, we are excited to begin rolling out these updates By the end of twenty twenty six, our goal is for all Popeyes locations in The U. S. To feature cloud based point of sale systems, digital dropcharts, sticky label printers, order ready boards, kiosks and upgraded back of house equipment. Including auto battler makers and improved taut holding units. These upgrades enhance the team member experience, reduce wait times, and improve order accuracy. All while preserving the brand's unique Louisiana culinary heritage and our food quality, Franchisees can also choose to implement the new production line as they adopt the upgraded equipment or during their Restaurant next remodel.

During a recent visit to Orlando and to Houston, which are hub markets for easy to run, I saw firsthand how operators have embraced these improvements are already delivering notable performance gains. We also remain committed to our easy to access initiative, and have been raising the bar for new franchisee development so that every new Popeyes restaurant delivers a great guest experience. While this heightened focus on operational standards led to a slight slowdown in our pace of development, We still opened over 160 restaurants in 2024 Restaurant, and remained amongst the fastest growing freestanding drive through chicken QSR concepts The U. S. And Canada.

As we look ahead, we plan to build on this momentum through new format innovations enhance convenience, optimize build costs, and uphold strong average unit volumes. We are confident these strategic priorities and our franchisees alignment will strengthen Popeye's competitive position and drive sustainable growth well into the future. I'll close with an update on Firehouse Subs in The U. S. And Canada. While full year comparable sales declined about 1%, due to broader U. S. Sub sandwich category challenges in Q3, we saw about five points of sequential improvement in Q4, resulting in flat comparable sales for the quarter. This was driven by the successful launch of our hot sauce bar and the introduction of delicious menu innovations such as our Thanksgiving and French dip subs as well as strong performance in Canada.

On the development side, after several years of laying important foundational groundwork, including development team Restaurant, moving away from our legacy area developer arrangements, and introducing targeted development incentive programs, we are now seeing real acceleration in net restaurant growth. This year, Mike and team opened 80 net new restaurants across The U. S. And Canada, and more than doubled net restaurant growth from 3% last year to over 6% in 2024. [indiscernible] reinforcing our confidence in delivering another year of accelerated expansion. We're excited to continue building on the success and bringing Firehouse Subs To Even More Guests Across North America in the years ahead. With that, I'll hand it over to Sammy.

Walk you through our financial results. Thanks, Josh, and good morning, everyone. Today, I'll discuss our long term outlook, our 2024 financial results and capital structure, and some modeling nuances to keep in mind for the upcoming year. I'll also provide some incremental color on Burger King China. Last February, we introduced RBI's first long term growth algorithm targeting 3% plus comparable sales 5% plus net restaurant growth, 8% plus system wide sales growth, and 8% plus organic AOI growth on average over the five year period from 2024 through 2028. We acknowledge from the outset the results could fluctuate year to year due to market dynamics, unexpected headwinds or strategic Restaurant, and that we're committed to making the right long term decisions for our business to ensure sustainable growth 2024 was a good example of this. Global costs grew 2.3% outpacing global QSR peers but still reflecting a challenging consumer backdrop moderated pricing and some periods of marketing softness across some of our brands. Net restaurant growth of 3.4% was affected by a few discrete items, including a development slowdown in geopolitically impacted markets, and a 100 basis point year over year headwind from Burger King China. Importantly, given the low ARS contribution from BK China Restaurant we did not experience a material impact to system wide sales.

We know energy expectations are top of mind.

And we expect to have a resolution for Burger King China relatively soon.

Following a resolution, we will be able to update you with any potential implications Importantly, we are on track to achieve our guidance for 8% plus organic AOI growth. Supported by continued cost discipline and a development focus on higher system wide sales and AOI contribution markets. At Tim's, we're excited to return to positive net unit growth in Canada, while accelerating in The U. S. Importantly, Canadian unit growth where ARS is CAD2.4 million on average is accretive to both system wide sales and AOI growth. At BK, where ARS has now reached $1,600,000 unit we expect a more stable development outlook. While remodels remain our top priority, we are also giving strong operators with a modern portfolio the opportunity to expand.

At Popeyes, we've added nearly 1,300 restaurants since 2017 and reached over $1,900,000 ARS in The U. S. The team has been doing the right thing for the long term health of the brand by ensuring new development occurs with the strongest operators.

We expect to see continued growth at Popeyes supported by strong and improving unit economics. Firehouse, which delivers nearly $1,000,000 in ARS, achieved impressive NRG acceleration in 2024 and is well positioned for another strong year in 2025. And finally, in our international markets, growth will be driven by a mix of new brand market combinations as well as increased penetration in existing high ARS markets like France, Australia and The UK. Adding that all up, we are confident our business brands and partners can support reaching 5% NRG over time. While 2024 top line results were below our long term average targets, disciplined cost management enabled us to deliver above average organic AOI growth of 9%. Underscoring the strength of our business model.

Our two largest businesses Tim Hortons and International, stood out. Highlighting their strong fundamentals. Tim's achieved over 10% organic AOI growth in 2024. Building on 7% growth last year while international grew organic AOI over 7% following a robust 15% increase in 2023. Turning now to a few callouts from the year and the fourth quarter. First, segment G and A for the full year, excluding Restaurant Holdings, decreased to $632,000,000 driven by a $15,000,000 decrease in Q4. This was primarily due to lower incentive based compensation and benefits from cost initiatives identified during 2024 which should continue to flow through our P and L through the first half of twenty twenty five. Second, in Q4, Tim's Supply Chain saw a $20,000,000 increase in organic gross profit dollars driven by lapping an $11,000,000 trade expense true up in the CTG business from Q4 of 'twenty three and a $9,000,000 in Full year gross profit margin was 19.5% which was slightly ahead of our guidance of around 19%. And lastly, we recorded $20,000,000 of net bad debt expenses in Q4, primarily related to Burger King China, which I will expand on shortly.

Now turning to EPS. 2024 adjusted EPS increased to $3.34 per share from $3.24 last year. Representing organic growth of 4.4%.

While Q4 adjusted EPS grew 11% organically year over year to $0.81 As a reminder, our 2023 adjusted EPS it included a $0.12 per share net benefit related to discrete non cash For the full year 2024, we had roughly an 18% adjusted effective tax rate. Assuming no changes in tax policy, we'd expect our 2025 tax rate to be in the 18% to 19% range, though we will be monitoring potential legislation closely. 2024 adjusted net interest expense was $554,000,000 which was slightly better than our prior guidance due to benefit from our proactive FX risk management through cross currency swaps. In Q4, we upsized our USD CAD swap from $5,000,000,000 to $5,700,000,000 and we extended the maturity through 02/1930 to better align with our debt maturities. In 2025, our net interest expense will reflect a full year of benefits from these upsides cross currency swaps. As well as the benefits of our 2024 refinancings and our interest rate swaps. As a result of all of these, we expect adjusted net interest expense to improve to the $500,000,000 to $520,000,000 range.

Based on an average SOFR rate of 4.2% which flows through to approximately 15% of our debt.

Turning now to free cash flow and our capital structure. We generated $1,500,000,000 in free cash flow inclusive of approximately $180,000,000 of cash benefits from our hedges. Our strong cash flow generation allows us to continue investing in key initiatives [indiscernible] while returning over $1,000,000,000 of capital to shareholders via a healthy and growing dividend. This year, we successfully met our mid 4x net leverage target ending 2024 with $2,600,000,000 of liquidity and net leverage of 4.5 times, assuming a full year of Carol's results.

Looking forward, we continue to monitor the interest rate environment and we intend to continue prioritizing deleveraging. I'd now like to spend a moment on Burger King China. As previously mentioned, we expect to have an update soon thought it would be helpful to provide some financial context on the business. In 2024, we generated $37,000,000 of royalty and franchise fee revenue from BK China. Dollars 19,000,000 of which was reflected in our AOI. After terminating the agreement in October, we recorded bad debt expense for the remaining $18,000,000 of revenue recognized but not collected. Therefore, you were to model no change in the current situation, would see a $19,000,000 year over year impact to our 2025 AOI or about $0.03 on an EPS basis. Even factoring in this potential headwind, we are confident we would still deliver 8% plus AOI growth in 2025.

I'd also like to discuss restaurant holdings.

A reminder, RH includes our B. K. Carrols Restaurant, Popeyes China and starting in 2025 Firehouse Brazil. We do not plan to own and operate these businesses permanently which is why we've carved them out to maintain the franchisor relationship with our BK and International segment. 2025 will be our first full year with RH in our consolidated results, so there are a few modeling items worth noting. At BK Carols, we expect Q1 to see between 150 basis points to 200 basis points of restaurant level EBITDA margin compression compared to our fourth quarter margin of 12.3%.

This is driven by normal Q1 seasonality the stepped up add fund levy following our completion of the fuel to flame Restaurant and the higher commodity costs primarily related to beef. We also expect to have a step up in segment G and A for RH, from $59,000,000 in 2024 to around $100,000,000 in 2025, as we incorporate a full year of results of BK Carrols and build out our teams for Popeyes China and Firehouse Brazil. I'll now wrap up with four additional modeling topics for the year ahead. First, total CapEx, TI and remodel incentives will be between $400,000,000 and $450,000,000 for the full year 2025 as compared to over $330,000,000 in 2024. Both including CapEx related to RH. This increase is primarily driven by modern image investments at BKUS, increased remodels and development at TIMSS Canada and accelerating development at Popeyes China. Second, with the U. S. Dollar strengthening, we thought it would be helpful to provide a perspective on our FX For every $0.01 change in the USD CAD and the USB Euro, We see a roughly $8,000,000 and $4,000,000 annual AOI impact respectively. Based on today's rates and assuming rates were to stay constant This would translate to a nearly $15,000,000 FX headwind to our Q1 AOI and around $45,000,000 for the full year.

For context, in both 2024 and 2023, the business saw about a $38,000,000 annual AOI impact from FX. Third, as we think about our earnings and comparable sales we anticipate Q1 to be the lowest absolute same store sales and EPS quarter due to typical seasonality as well as a tougher comparable sales lack. Including the roughly 100 basis point weekday benefit of our business on Q1 of 'twenty four. We expect year over year comparisons to ease the summer months. And finally, because we achieved our 2024 Fuel to Flame franchisee profitability target, Burger King U. S. Franchisees have increased their ad fund levy from 4% to 4.5% beginning in 2025 through at least 2026.

As a result, our Burger King corporate advertising fund contribution which was $58,000,000 in 2024, will fall off. 2025. This benefit should help offset potential year over year drags from BK China bad debt, which I already discussed, and a $20,000,000 reset in incentive based compensation and G and A that stems from a lower bonus payout in 2024. I know this is a lot, as we start the year, we want to give you as much clarity as we can around the puts and takes of the P and L. In summary, we are pleased with our bottom line results in 2024 and are confident we will deliver another year of 8% plus organic AOI growth in 2025. And with that, I'll hand it over to Patrick.

Thank you, Sammy. As I reflect on the past year, the first thing I want to highlight is franchisee profitability.

The foundation for driving sustainable growth across all aspects of our business. In 2024, we've remained laser focused on enhancing franchisee profitability through top line growth, operational improvements and modernizing our restaurant image. Our continued emphasis on operational excellence, including all the hard work our franchising and development teams are doing to place our Restaurant in the hands of engaged operators is already starting to deliver results. At RBI, we also used our global procurement capability to drive incremental savings for franchisees. As you know, we fully own the procurement and supply chain at Tim Hortons in Canada and consistently deliver savings and And recently, our procurement team has been working much more closely with the Popeyes and Burger King systems as well.

We're already seeing the impact of these efforts. Tim Hortons has exceeded our CAD300000000 dollars goal and Popeyes continues making strides towards reaching the $300,000 U. S. Mark.

Burger King U. S. Was relatively stable this year while Firehouse did experience some pressure due to a challenging category That said, when I look at franchisee profitability compared to just two years ago and when I hear directly from our franchisees about their in the business, it's clear that our franchisee base is far stronger today and that directly translates to healthier brands. At the end of the day, it's franchisee profitability fuels our ability to hit our growth targets, which is why it remains a top priority for me and the entire team. Taking a closer look at each of our businesses, I couldn't be prouder of what we're achieving together. Tim's continues to prove quarter after quarter its incredible strength and ongoing potential.

One of the only brands growing traffic in Canada and we're doing it while maintaining leading market share. An incredible achievement, especially for a brand of our scale.

The return to positive unit growth in 2025 reflects the brand's strong underlying unit economics, and we're thrilled to bring more Tim's Restaurant to communities across Canada. Our international business is a standout performer. It's growing at a strong pace and continuing to outshine global peers. We see tremendous white space opportunities with new brand market combinations and lots of headroom in our existing higher ARS markets as well. Obviously, we're addressing a few markets where we face challenges, but the opportunities far outweigh these obstacles. Looking forward, I'm confident that we'll see momentum across the globe. In The U. S, Burger King continues making meaningful progress. By staying committed to doing the right things for the long term whether it's for the brand, our franchisees or our guests. It's clear that the team's efforts to clean up our franchisee and restaurant base is [indiscernible] And I believe most of our troubled situations are behind us. Now we're excited about the operational improvements and modernization efforts under way and we feel good about the direction of our marketing plans.

I'm looking forward to seeing more modern image Burger Kings thrive under strong operators.

For Popeyes, our strategy is clear. Attract more people to try our food and ensure every guest receives the consistently great experience. Our food quality speaks for itself delivering consistently exceptional guest experiences, we will be key to unlocking further growth.

I'm proud of the progress the team made in 2024 to grow our business while maintaining the quality of our restaurants and operators and I'm excited to see that continue in 2025. Finally, Firehouse Subs is just beginning to tap into its potential. The value here will really come from ramping up development. Mike and the team delivered a significant step forward in 2024 and we expect this momentum to continue in 2025. It's clear there's plenty of runway ahead for this incredible brand and we're really just getting started. I'm proud of our team and our franchisees. We're doing all the things that I know create outperformance versus the category. Our food is getting better, our service is improving, our Restaurant are getting remodeled, and we're being very smart about giving good value to our guests while helping generate improved profits for our franchisees. And where we have problems, we face them head on. And openly. While we do all of that, we're being smart about managing the cost side of the business, so that we're generating strong earnings growth for our shareholders.

With that, let's open the line for questions.

Operator?

We'll start with our first question, which comes from the line of Brian Bittner from Oppenheimer.

Please go ahead. Your line is now open.

Thank you. Good morning.

On 2025, the adjusted operating income growth, you stated that you anticipated on algorithm year of 8% plus. Just From a real high level, can you help us understand the same store sales range you're assuming to get there Do you need to be in line with your 3% long term target to achieve that operating income growth? Or do you have additional cost efficiencies built in like we saw in 2024. [indiscernible] It's Sami. Good morning and thanks for the question. Look, I think when we put out our algorithm last year, we talked about our algorithm being a a five year kind of growth outlook for the business and some years would be on and would be would be off, but on average, that was the target We're not going to get into the specifics of the top line components of what that looks like on a year to year basis. But we do feel good about the AOI bottom line guidance that we provided of 8% growth this year. I think there are puts and takes to all of that. Obviously same store sales is a component and we feel really good about the marketing programs we have planned for this year as well as the operational improvements we see across the business.

That will help deliver on that 8% plus AOI growth for this year. Thank you, Sammy.

Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Dennis Geiger from UBS. Please go ahead. Your line is now open.

Great. Thanks, guys. I appreciate it. I guess first is a clarification. I guess given that the BK China situation, as it relates to development, we're sort of waiting on that for color on 25 nodes. So just wanted to confirm that guys. And then the question if I could, is just as it relates to BK and Tim's brands, in their home markets in '25, against seemingly a difficult macro still, tough promotional backdrop seemingly.

If you could just kind of speak to that, how you think about the two brands in this year in their markets?

Is it fair to assume that some of the key 24 sales drivers will also support growth in 2025 or does that look a little different? If any color there? Thanks, Seth.

Hey, Dennis, thanks for the questions. I'll take it and then I'll pass it over to to Josh just to clarify. As I said in the [indiscernible] the Burger King China situation. And we can't speculate on sort of the outcomes, but we expect to have a resolution relatively soon. And following that resolution, we will update you with any potential implications on energy targets.

And Dennis, I'll take the second part on kind of on marketing plans across Burger King and Tim's in their home markets. For this year. I think you alluded to it well. I think you'll see a lot of building upon some of the things that really worked for the businesses in 2024. With a couple of new twists and innovations. And maybe just to recap that, in terms of Burger King, I think we have an excellent calendar for the year. And I think it's balanced across a few different things that have been working well for us. One of them has been families. We've done some great partnerships. You saw it with the Adams family and 2024. Kinds of things are really resonating when we have the right partnerships with the right properties. And we do really compelling innovation that leverages our core equities like the Whopper and Flan Grilling So I think you can expect to see a couple of really a really fun ones that I think will bring a lot of families and kids into the Restaurant. In 2025. You'll also see us focus on the Whopper again. We had some very successful activations, things like the $1,000,000 Whoppers, where we had guest created versions of the Whopper.

That really appealed to guests and And I think puts the Whopper in the right place as a premium product. So you should expect to see more Whopper innovation in 2025. You should also expect to see us focus very much on quality across the menu. And quality comes from a lot of different places. It can be working with our suppliers on upgraded recipes, but there are also really important elements that come from operations. As you'll see us focused a lot on training you've seen us focused on upgrading our equipment, which has big impact on our ability to deliver the quality that we want to consistently across the restaurant base. So you'll I think you'll see a continued focus on elevating quality in the system, And lastly, we will continue to bring news to value We've done that now in the first part of the year with our $5 duos and $7 trios. So I think you can expect some refreshed mess and mechanics on the value side just to keep that relevant and fresh for our guests. So that's what I would look for on the Burger King side.

On Tim's, similar story where we've been focused for a while on PM Food and Col Bev. So you'll see more of that. I think what might be a little bit a little bit new and incremental this year is we've got some really exciting breakfast innovation that's coming out too. You probably saw some news on scrambled eggs. That's one of the things that we're excited about for this year. And we might have some celebrity collaborations to go along with some of these innovations. To that we think will be pretty engaging for our guest base in Canada. So hopefully that gives you a little bit of an overview We're building a lot on the things that have worked. But keeping them fresh and new and adding a few new things and we're pretty confident in the plans for this year. Great. Thank you.

Our next question today comes from the line of Daniela Locardio from Bernstein. Please go ahead. Your line is now open.

Thank you.

It sounds like you're doing an excellent job also in speed of service with regards to Team Canada.

And also, if you can elaborate a little bit more on the early feedback from France disease from the testing of these new espresso machines and maybe the potential impact on speed of service in the number of seconds that you can save with a full rollout?

And then, Steve, on the coffee, if you don't mind, help us understand a bit more the impact of the coffee price increases on your supply chain margins and more in general on the coffee demand in Canada, that would be very helpful.

Thank you.

Thanks, Neil. I'll take the first part and then I think Sam will take the last part. In terms of speed of service, I'm really proud of the work that Matt Moore, who's our COO up there, has done with his team and the franchisees have been highly engaged on it. I mentioned one of the the statistics there about how much incremental sales we get from just one second of improvement.

And that tells you why we're all collectively so focused on the topic. And I think Matt and our our franchisees have done a great job driving continued improvement in in window times, which I mentioned. We've just done it quarter in quarter out through a lot of focus and a lot of small tweaks. [indiscernible] doing more and more of, one of the central elements of those renovations is an update to the way that the back of house flow works and those renovations are enabling us to get more throughput and faster speed of service as well. So you can kind of see it across the business. We're highly focused on driving speed of service. And I think it's we're seeing it come through and I think that's helping our sales and traffic momentum that I mentioned has been so consistent too. In terms of the espresso machines test, I think we're still early in that. So only I think we need to give it a little bit more time. I would tell you that as much as it is focused on speed, it's probably even more focused on enhancing quality. We really want to make sure across all of our brands, all categories, we're serving the best product in the market.

And that's something we're looking at across recipes, machines, procedures, And that's the piece that I think I'm most excited about. Where we're going with the espresso machines is the potential to serve an even better product to our guests and future.

So coffee, it's no secret. I think most of you have read about probably it's at historic highs. And I think a couple of things that we say about that. Number one, you think about our Tim Hortons commodity basket, coffee is only about 15%. Of our Tim Hortons total commodity basket. So relatively small smaller in terms of the entire basket [indiscernible] for a bit of background on how we buy coffee, We buy coffee forward typically six to eighteen months. [indiscernible] what this allows us to do is really smooth out potential volatility as we pass those costs on to franchisees. And it gives us visibility really into what the year might look like. And given that visibility, we still feel good that 2025 supply chain margin will be around 2024 a little bit higher than that at 19.5%. But we feel good about 19% for the full year and 2025 I will call out that we typically talk about the margin percentages a really good way to look think about this business is actually the growth in gross profit dollars. And as we think about where those gross profit dollars where that growth comes from, It's really around increased volume It's around mix shifts and it's around new development.

As we open restaurants as well as expansion of our CPG business. So taking all of that into account, I think we'll leave it at that, but 19% for the full year on supply chain margin.

Great. Thank you.

Thank you. Our next question today comes from the line of David Palmer from Evercore ISI. Please go ahead. Your line is now open.

Thanks. A very nice comp growth from the international segment this quarter. I'm wondering how you're thinking about 2025 for this segment and any color and feelings about key markets and shape to the year's growth would be helpful. Obviously, you entered the year pretty strongly. You talked about sort of a back weighted year for BK U. S. I wonder maybe it's going to be the opposite for Burger King and International, for example, but any color about how you're thinking about the year for that segment in terms of comps?

For the question. We were pleased with the improvement in same store sales trajectory going into Q4 in international. There was a pretty good step up there. And we're very happy with momentum. We're not ready to give guidance on the sales for that segment, but I think a lot of the things that you saw work in Q4 are things that we'll keep working on into 2025. We focus on making sure that we've had compelling value offerings and all of those markets and combining that with some really compelling innovation. I mentioned in my remarks earlier. So I think we'll keep working on those things and to continue the momentum we saw in Q4 through next year.

Dave, I'll just add that Q1, as I said in the prepared remarks, does have the impact of a leap day. So good to kind of adjust your model for that. Next question today comes from the line of John Ivankoe from JPMorgan.

Please go ahead. Your line is now open. Hi. Thank you. The question is on CapEx and just overall capital intensity in the business. $400,000,000 to $450,000,000 I think was guided for fiscal $2,025,000,000 dollars but the new development is that you're refranchising some of the Carroll's units ahead of your expectations, which might lessen your CapEx requirements in '26 and '27.

So the question is really, is 25 CapEx guide kind of the high watermark of CapEx? Might we expect further increases as the World Burger King U. S. Development accelerates? Into 2026 and 2027. And certainly, I do ask that CapEx question, not only in the context of you being pre cash flow positive, but the fact that you carry $1,300,000,000 of Cap dollars of cash, excuse me, on your balance sheet. So I wanted to get a sense of whether carrying that much cash on your balance sheet did make sense given future capital intensity of your business? Thank you.

Hey, good morning John and thanks for the question. I think when you take a step back and you think sort of about the cash flow generation of the business, you're absolutely right. We've We've had strong and growing cash flow generation which really does allow us to invest in our businesses. And I think as we think about capital allocation priorities, our number one priority is always to invest in our business and high ROI investments in our business. The CapEx as we think about 2025, is really a reflection of that. And that increase, I think, is probably two main things. Number one is a stepped up pace the reclaim of the flame remodels both in the BK franchise system, but also at Carroll's as we step up to a higher pace. You'll recall, we want the system to be at 85% to 90% modern image by 2028. So in order to hit those numbers, the CapEx has to naturally step up this year. And even as we refranchise restaurants at Carol's Restaurant, you won't see that direct as an offset in the CapEx. And typically, we will try to refranchise restaurants as we remodel. I think sort of on the second point and another driver of the increase in in CapEx is really around some stepped up development and development returning to development growth and new unit growth in Canada, As you recall, our business model in Canada is often around a full kind of real estate model and finding sites.

And typically that is a little bit more capital intensive. That said, the ROIs on that capital are extremely good and we think is a good use of our capital. So as we think about expanding penetration in Canada, which we still can do, we think that's a really efficient use of the capital.

And I realized my question was dense So as we think about capital needs in '26 and '27, is the '25 number a good number to use? Should we expect modest increases from here? And do you give us a sense of what the right level of cash RBI should run on the business longer term as it currently sits at around $4,000,000,000 on the balance sheet?

Yes. Look, I think as you think about the CapEx, trajectory of the business, I think around this $400,000,000 to $450,000,000 I think this elevated level is elevated and it will gradually [indiscernible] as we move towards 2028 and then then once reclaim the flame plan has sort of we've achieved kind of our target that will come down a little bit more. So you can kind of view this level for the next couple of years and then coming down. With respect to kind of cash on the balance sheet, we ended the year in a really good liquidity position. Think it is similar to kind of the liquidity position that we've had in prior years. And going back to capital allocation, I think beyond sort of those high ROI investments that we make in the business, we then look at how do we return capital to shareholders We've done that through a healthy and growing dividend. And last year, we did it through we also then deleveraged and we started taking leverage down. We finished the year. We were proud to finish the year at four point times net leverage. Assuming a full year of Carols. We will likely continue to take that leverage level down as we kind of monitor the interest rate environment and the general macro conditions.

But we feel good about those capital allocation priorities. That's great. Thank you so much. Thanks, John. Thank you. Our next question today comes from the line of Andrew Charles from TD Cowen.

Open. Great, thanks. Sami, I also wanted to expand on cash priorities. You talked about continuing to prioritize deleverage. Does this mean we shouldn't expect share repurchase to resume in 2025 after you took a pause in 2024? And then also in terms of CapEx, I know you guys called out three seventy BKUS remodels in 2024. Many are planned for 2025?

Thanks, Andrew. Thanks for the question. I'll reiterate what I said to John. I think, as you said, deleveraging is the priority. We're not going to rule anything out. We always sort of are opportunistic about things. We repurchased we did repurchase about $500,000,000 of shares in 2023. We did not repurchase shares in 2024. But as I said, deleveraging is the priority right now. In terms of remodels, I think for 2025, we're going to step up the pace of remodels and we'll do around 400 remodels in 2025. As you kind of do the math and you think about getting to 85% to 90% modern image, by the year 2028. The pace of remodels naturally have to step up over time. So we were really proud to finish 2024 kind of around three fifty remodels and stepping that pace up in four in 25 is a good step forward and you'll continue to kind of see that pace, as we approach the long term targets.

Thank you. Our next question today comes from the line of Laurence Silverman from Deutsche Bank. Please go ahead. Your line is now open. [indiscernible] Thank you very much Two part question on comp. One is just a follow-up on the 1Q commentary, understanding you're lapping over the LEAP day. Given how much noise is there, out there to start the year, any color that you can share at least on what you're seeing with underlying trends across the business And then my primary question is on St. Wharton's Canada comp. What was the composition across traffic and average check? And then how are you thinking about price in '25 given coffee costs as well as the competitive environment? Thank you. Hey, Lauren. Good morning. It's Josh. In terms of Q1, think as you point out, there's always a lot of noise especially when you're in the early part of Q1 with weather and it's a little bit hard to get a read. I think our preference is probably going to be just to wait till we get through the quarter and share how it went overall, if that's all right. And I think Sami just wanted to call out that you need to make sure we factor in that leap day.

So we'll probably wait to give an update on Q1 performance until get to our Q1 earnings call. In terms of Tim's Canada and the comp in Q4 and the composition of that, it was about two thirds driven by traffic and the rest was ticket and mix. And then in terms of of what we'd expect in terms of check-in 2025, We're always looking to overall CPI. That's kind of the starting point for us. So that's something that we're mindful of and we'll have to keep an eye on what happens with coffee prices As Sami mentioned, there's a pretty delayed impact of that for us because of the way that that we hedge. So that helps us remove a little bit of the volatility. But that's something that I think is a question we'll have to keep an eye on as we move through the next few months.

The next question today comes from the line of Sarah Sinatra from Bank of America. Please go ahead. Your line is now open.

Thank you. I just had a quick modeling, I guess, clarification and then a broader question. The clarification was on the [indiscernible] Franchisee for EBITDA it was stable year over year for Burger King and I guess stepping back, I look at it and see a 1% same store sales growth number It's actually pretty impressive. I would have expected maybe some more deleverage. So as you think about getting that number higher, what's the same store sales growth number you need to to lever? And if you can't get there, I'm thinking something maybe in the 3% range. Can you still can franchisees still get over time to these higher EBITDA targets? So that was just the kind of modeling question. And then could you talk a bit about Tim's, you called out high single digit growth in breakfast sandwiches. 5% growth PM Main Foods. 6% in cold beverage, What were some of the offsets because those are all very strong numbers and the healthy comp, but but certainly not of that magnitude. So might you be seeing trade offs? Hey, good morning, Sarah. I'll take the first part of the question.

And then I can throw it over to Josh. Just on sort of the modeling point, Bill, first off, yes, we were very pleased with the comp at Burger King in The U. S. And as you think about the margin, a bit of the offset that sort of offset some of that flow through would have been increased commodity costs in The U. S. Talked about that there was an inflationary environment on the commodity cost side. Which sort of which offset a little bit of that comp increase. As you sort of think about longer term and we've talked about this on prior earnings calls, As you get the comps growing and leveraging the P and L, there's there's approximately a 25% to 30% flow through on those incremental sales and that's ultimately over time growing the top line is the best thing we can do for growing franchise profitability and growing that margin. So that's really how we think about it and that's why we're so focused on really delivering a strong marketing [indiscernible] Thanks, Damian. I would just what I would add there is, I think another one of the levers that's very clear to drive franchise profitability is doing remodels.

That's one of the clearest ways that we get from where we are to trying to get towards that $300,000 in the long run. And we're actually in a lot of remodels that we've been doing, we're pretty close to that. So I think that's an important part in my mind. Addition to the marketing calendar and the operational improvements we've got to get to a modern image and I think that's part of getting the franchisee four wall EBITDA up. And in terms of the Tim's question, Sarah, I think you mentioned a lot of the categories that performed the best on a sales growth basis and kind of above the aggregate comp A couple of the ones that weren't above the comp I think were driven by some of the weather that we had. So we had a little bit warmer weather in the quarter and that drives that tends to drive more cold beverage. And so we saw less good performance in some of our hot beverage. And then with those hot beverages, usually you see cold or sorry, you see baked good attachment to some of those hot beverages. And that one was less of an out performer as well.

So, Patrick, I'd just jump in on the franchise profit we talked about the fact that our procurement team is working across the brands and our supply chains with the co op structure for Popeyes and Burger King operated pretty separately before. And one of the big benefits of, I think, increasing trust with our franchisees is they are letting us work with them to try to leverage the overall scale of our BI to drive efficiencies. And the other thing that's important is more of our of our restaurants are owned by stronger franchisees now who are simply better at running their stores. And we're seeing that play through both in the top line and the bottom line for those restaurant owners. And so so there remains a lot that can be done there. If you told us that 1% comp for 2024 was going to get us flat on the bottom line. We obviously want more than flat, but I think it's a reflection of the opportunities that are out there that we are able to do that and we continue to look for those opportunities. We continue to remodel the restaurants and we continue to move generating the growth or the results that you're seeing.

Thank you. That's exactly what I was looking for. Thanks, Patrick.

Thank you. This concludes today's question and answer session. So I'd like to pass the call back over to Josh for any closing remarks.

Well, thank you all very much for joining us today.

And thank you especially to our teams and to our franchisees then all of their hard work that allowed us to deliver these great results this quarter. We look forward to updating you on our performance again on our Q1 call here in a couple of months and have a great day everybody.

This concludes today's call. Thank you all for your participation. You may now disconnect your lines.