Murphy USA Inc. (NYSE:MUSA) Q3 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

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By moving it to the back, you’ve got a grab-and — kind of prepare reheat counter area that’s significantly larger. I think before you had one small microwave that was down low. Now you’ve got 2 larger ones up on a counter. And so more people are using that feature than ever before. We set up queuing lanes like we had trialed at QuickChek that were highly successful. And it took about a couple of weeks for customers to get used to it. I was in one of the stores on Monday and there are 6 customers in the Queuing lane. They all lined up exactly like they were supposed to, and that’s an opportunity to sell more impulse items that way. So it’s largely centered around re-locating the grab and go food and beverage, which is what Murphy USA has the right to win with the customers because it’s the best national and regional brands.

It’s a better space for them to grab and add condiments or to reheat those items. Similarly, from a coffee standpoint with the bean to cup and dispensed beverage that the condiments that go with the coffee are better positioned for them. So it’s just a better overall experience. But now the layout flows better. You’ve got the queuing lanes, which then adds more selling space. And then it just opens up the store, both from a safety line of sight for the store associates and for the customers to be able to see in as well. And again, look, some of this isn’t highly innovative kind of earth-shattering findings. But again, there are examples of the singles that we can hit like so many of our initiatives over the year. And so we have the opportunity to, one, address that in all the existing 2,800 square foot stores and then we’ll be building our first, we call it store of tomorrow store next year, which takes all the learnings from our consumer research and strategy work into a format that enhances this further.

Corey Tarlowe : That’s great. Very helpful. And then I just wanted to follow up. I think early on in your prepared remarks, you had mentioned that you’ve seen an improvement in the Northeast. I was wondering if you could provide any additional context or color as to what drove that improvement.

Andrew Clyde : Yes. Look, I think as we look across our various markets, we see volume margin traffic, et cetera, vary to a variety of factors. It’s no surprise anyone that the Northeast demand has not picked up as much as other parts of the business. We see that not only in some of our data, but other industry data and then services that provide insights on broader consumer spending. I believe that our promotional activity or New York Giants launch with those subs, which have had a meaningful impact on the food sales and Quick Check, some of our innovative frozen energy drink concepts, et cetera, have really helped from a traffic standpoint for QuickChek in particular. And then the margin environment has just improved there where it was a little bit weaker over the summer. It’s now improved, more consistent with what we’ve seen in some prior quarters.

Operator: And there are no further questions at this time. Andrew Clyde. I’ll turn the call back over to you.

Andrew Clyde : Great. Well, thanks, everyone, for tuning in. As I said, we truly look forward to these opportunities to provide updates on our journey towards long-term value creation. We’re excited about all the opportunities that we have in front of us and look forward to our next update. Thank you.

Operator: And this concludes today’s conference call. You may now disconnect.

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