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RAVE Restaurant Group, Inc. (RAVE)

Q4 2017 Earnings Call· Tue, Sep 26, 2017

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Good afternoon and welcome to the RAVE Restaurant Group, Inc. Fourth Quarter and Fiscal Year 2017 Financial Results Conference Call . All participants will be in listen-only mode. [Operator Instructions] Please note this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Tim Mullany, Chief Financial Officer. Please go ahead.

Tim Mullany

Analyst

Thank you. Good afternoon, everyone and thank you for joining RAVE Restaurant Group’s fourth quarter and fiscal year 2017 earnings conference call. Everyone should have access to our fourth quarter and fiscal year 2017 earnings release that was released this morning. The press release can be found at www.raverg.com in the Investor Relations section. Before we begin, I would like to remind everyone that part of our discussion today will include forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements are not guarantees of future performance and therefore you should not put undue reliance on them. These statements are also subject to numerous risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from what we expect. We refer all of you to our recent SEC filings for a more detailed discussion of the risks that could impact our future operating results and financial condition. Please note that during today’s conference call we will discuss certain non-GAAP financial measures which we believe to be useful evaluating our performance. Any such discussion of this information should not be considered in isolation or as a substitute for results prepared in accordance with GAAP, and reconciliation of comparable GAAP measures is available in our corrected earnings release. With that, I’d like to turn the call over to Scott Crane, Chief Executive Officer.

Scott Crane

Analyst

Good afternoon. Thanks for joining us, everyone. I am very pleased to discuss our full year financial and operating results with the fourth quarter financial results. I am still very optimistic about RAVE’s strategic direction. Our leadership team has been efficiently in addressing sales declines and has made significant progress in improving profitability and our cash position. To that end, we recently completed a $5 million rights offering that strengthens our shareholder equity and increases our Company’s liquidity. As expected, annual adjusted EBITDA decreased by $2.6 million over the prior year, negative $2.7 million. We had net loss of $12.5 million, which is $3.6 million greater than the prior year, primarily due to impairment charges and lease termination expenses. In the future, we believe that difficult decisions that were taken in fiscal 2017 will translate into a foundation for success in coming quarters. For the year, Pizza Inn comparable store sales increased 0.1% from the prior year while domestic retail sales decreased by 0.2%. We’ve know seen a full year positive same-store sales for the Pizza Inn system and we are seeing consumer activity that suggests we are on the right path. We also have seen a double-digit increase in international and an interest in new unit growth. The Pizza Inn leadership team has worked hand-in-hand with franchise leadership and created national plan to keep building momentum behind improved performance. Results suggest improved sales will begin translating to both facility upgrades and new store development for franchisees. Pizza Inn will soon celebrate sixth anniversary next year and is resonating with consumers across the country and internationally. In fact, the Pizza Inn system is starting to grow again. Pizza Inn opened eight new restaurants during the year, ending in fiscal year at 221 total Pizza Inn restaurants. And I believe we…

Tim Mullany

Analyst

Thanks, Scott. Total revenues for the fiscal year 2017 and a comparable prior year were $57.1 million and $60.0 million respectively, a decrease of 4.7% year-over-year. Pie Five ended the fiscal year with 84 Pie Five restaurants in 19 space, as Scott mentioned. So far, the current fiscal quarter, the Company has opened one restaurant where franchisees have opened two new restaurants and the Company signed two new franchise development agreements, as mentioned in the DFW and Pakistan for up to 57 additional restaurants. At fiscal year-end, the company had franchisee restaurant development commitments for up to an additional 174 Pie Five restaurants. Pizza Inn opened eight new restaurants during the year while closing nine domestically and none internationally, ending the fiscal year at 221 total Pizza Inn Company-owned and franchise-owned restaurants worldwide. During the fiscal year, our cash used in operating activities was $5.5 million versus cash provided in prior year of $1.9 million, also driven by change in impairments, loss on sale of assets and changes in our accrued expenses. For the year, we had $573,000 in capital expenditures compared to $8.1 million from the prior year, resulting from the refocus efforts on improving unit economics of existing stores. Regarding cash flow from financing activities, we had $4.7 million of cash provided in the current year compared to $866,000 from the prior year. The financing activities in the fiscal year were provided by net proceeds from issuance of convertible notes of $2.9 million, proceeds from the exercise of stock options for $806,000 and a short-term loan of $1 million. The $866,000 in cash provided in fiscal year 2016 was from proceeds from the sale of stock of $764,000 and proceeds from the exercise of stock options of $102,000. For the fourth quarter, total revenues decreased by $2.2 million…

Operator

Operator

[Operator Instructions]. Our first question comes from the line of John Gilliam with Point Clear Strategic Capital. Please go ahead.

John Gilliam

Analyst

Thank you for taking my call. Good afternoon, gentlemen.

Scott Crane

Analyst

Good afternoon.

John Gilliam

Analyst

Could you provide a little bit more color on the new prototype in Plano? Could you give an idea of what the numbers there are showing since the new prototype, new menu offerings were launched?

Scott Crane

Analyst

Yes. So, this is Scott. I’ll let Tim talk to the specifics to the extent we can. So, I would still try to give arms around that part. But we’re running, I would tell you about 7, 8% in mix in wings sales; we’re running fivish to 6% in larger format, Pizza for Two, if you will, 14-inch pie sales; 3 to 4% in craft beer sales. So, my goal was to operationalize some of these things against in the consumer work that said we love you but we want more -- more often, I would say, opening the top of the funnel and you got the day where we’re having our Pie Five’s actual annual conference today where if we can get 10 to 15 or 20 points of incremental revenue through these new initiative which is what we are working on and I think can happen, we are seeing, I guess I would tell you that coming out of there with the menu mix.

Tim Mullany

Analyst

So, while we can’t give out singular store level sales data, what I would say is that as we open a store, our intent really wasn’t to gauge just total sales volume for this one particular unit, but what it was intended to do was allow us to test out for some new sales platforms, as Scott mentioned. And also in addition to new operational processes just change the overall composition of our sales at a store level, which is the first time we have actually done a fairly radical restructuring of sales composition. So in addition to our traditional pizza platform, which we have in all of our restaurants, the store did roll out the wings platform, which as Scott mentioned, got a fairly significant amount of overall sales incidence at the store. We also did a unique craft beer bar at this location which we don’t have at any of the other locations, to cash that out. And what I mentioned, new operational processes. We’re also doing things here for example that we don’t do at other locations like an order first process. So this one has to register immediately at the line, so the order is taken before the pizza is made as opposed to after, like all the other locations, number one. And then, number two, we’re also testing out a number runner. So in all of our other locations when a pizza comes out of the oven, it’s the customer is effectively waiting there to take it to their table, where it’s here like in many other fast casual concepts, we’re giving them a number, they go sit down and then somebody runs the pizza out to their table when they’ve done. So, there’s quite a few new things that are happening at this location. It’s still early for us to make a determination on what’s successful and what’s not. We don’t expect them all to be winners, so to speak. But we are very enthused from the early data that we are getting.

John Gilliam

Analyst

Excellent. And do I understand correctly, with the Plano location, with the new prototype, was this a new store opening or is this one we converted or added these things to that had already been open?

Tim Mullany

Analyst

This was a new store opening but this was a resellers executed, probably about a year before Scott even joined the location. So, it was still being run through our heritage sort of real estate model, so to speak. So, in the last few years from when we signed that lease we have obviously updated massage, [ph] what we are looking for in our real estate metrics going forward. So I would say this is probably not the type of location that we would sign in future locations. It’s not that one. It’s not fitting of our forward-looking thinking.

Scott Crane

Analyst

With that concept, yes. We are trying to put the kitchen with new walk in, you can see the whole kitchen versus you walk down from I would say a vertical standpoint; you walk in but that just takes time to get through the system and get a few more, I would say linear feet on the horizontal versus the vertical. So that’s what it’s getting in.

John Gilliam

Analyst

Okay, great, good. Thank you. You guys mentioned the delivery will be offered for all the locations by the end of 2018. Was that end of calendar year or fiscal year 2018?

Scott Crane

Analyst

Calendar year.

John Gilliam

Analyst

Calendar year, okay.

Scott Crane

Analyst

Yes, we just announced it to all the franchisees today, actually this being our conference, so we’re still working through do that. We have got our two largest markets on it. So, I would say we are delivering now in 25 units roughly out of 85, showing -- clearly, consumer want Pie Five, they’d use us more often if we could add to the, like I said, the top of the funnel. So, we’re adding that but we’re hoping by the end of calendar year 2018.

John Gilliam

Analyst

Okay, great. Could you give an idea of what the -- where do we stand with regard to shareholders’ equity following the closing of that the recent offering?

Tim Mullany

Analyst

Yes. So, we closed -- so, we can’t -- we haven’t released any financials obviously since this 10-K this morning. But I would say that the capital raise puts us in a cash position and definitely positive with our current plans. So, from a pure liquidity point of view, we wouldn’t need to, for example, do another capital raise. So, I think this -- completing this round was something that just strengthened our overall cash position. But, it’s not something that we foresee a need to do any additional raises for, from a liquidity point of view.

Operator

Operator

[Operator Instructions] At this time, I’m showing no further questions. So, this will conclude our question-and-answer session as well as today’s conference. We thank you for attending the presentation and you may now disconnect your lines.