Jollibee Foods Corp. on Wednesday projected a profitable 2025 for its burger joint in the U.S., Smashburger, on the basis of steadily increasing sales.
Richard Chong Woo Shin, Jollibee CFO, said the business has on boarded several key people at Smashburger including former Starbucks executive Denise Nelsen as CEO.
“We’re super excited about Smashburger turning the corner and the numbers are showing it in terms of the average daily sales and everything else that’s slightly improved,” Shin said.
According to him, “Smashburger will not only be EBIT (earnings before income tax) profitable, because it is already but it will be NOI or net operating income profitable,” he said.
“And the reason we believe that is because we track the average daily sales, which have certain triggers that calculate and predict profitability levels,” he said.
He acknowledged that in the first quarter this year, Smashburger’s annual same-store sales fell 4.1 percent but its month-on-month daily sales improved, particularly in terms of average daily sales.
Smashburger has 232 branches as of the first quarter, 127 of which are co-owned and the rest franchised.
Jollibee took full ownership of Smashburger in 2018 and spent P4.81 billion including transaction cost when it started to acquire the company in 2015.
Smashburger uses Angus Beef for its burgers, which are smashed on a hot seasoned grill in an open kitchen.
Its menu features grilled and crispy chicken sandwiches, turkey and black bean burgers, and fresh salads with signature sides like Crispy Brussels Sprouts and SmashFries.
Jollibee’s attributable income rose 27 percent in the first quarter this year to P2.61 billion from previous year’s P2.06 billion on higher foot traffic on its stores.
System-wide sales for the period rose 10 percent to P86.8 billion from P78.6 billion last year, while revenue grew 11 percent to P61.3 billion from P55.09 billion.
