The Wendy’s Company (NASDAQ:WEN) Q4 2022 Earnings Call Transcript

Dennis Geiger: Great. Thank you. Another one that maybe strays a little bit from capital allocation, but just wondering if you’d be able to speak a bit more to the organizational restructuring and any kind of additional detail on some of the benefits that you spoke to as it relates to streamlining decision-making and sort of how that enhances growth potentially going forward, guys. I’d appreciate it. Thank you.

Todd Penegor: Great news is we’re starting from a position of strength, right? We got a lot of momentum in our business to finish the year. We feel like we have strong plans in place that we’ll share as we get into the March 1 discussion around 2023 guidance and our longer-term guidance. But as you think about where I wanted to go to evolve the org structure, it was really around how do we actually think more global in all we do. How do I really make sure that we’re focused on driving global unit growth? Are we driving more of a focus on digital activation leveraging our technology with a global mindset? And as you take some layers out of the organization, it allows us speed of decision-making, it can drive focus, it will drive efficiency, it will drive productivity.

And as GP just commented, also helps us on the G&A front, too. But ultimately, the way the resources will be reallocated and focused, it is around driving traditional new restaurant development without any distractions and things that we chase during the course of this past year. Continue to drive more digital demand and really raises the bar on the operational excellence of everything we do at the restaurant level, where we continue to build our breakfast business. So it’s as simple as that.

Operator: Our next question comes from the line of Chris Carril with RBC Capital Markets. Chris, your line is now open.

Christopher Carril: Hi. Thanks for the question. Could you expand a bit more on your latest thinking on the long-term development outlook? And then would you expect the org redesign to result in any changes to the development strategy, pacing or targets? I think you touched on that a little bit, Todd, just now, but any other further details would be great. Thanks so much.

Todd Penegor: Yes. On the long-term development outlook, unfortunately, we’ll have to wait until we get guidance put out there on March 1. So we’ll talk through that in the context of our guidance for 2023 on March 1. We will give you a little more flavor on an update to our long-term targets as we get to that date also. But as we think about the org redesign, we did test and learn in a lot of places during the course of this year. We’ve looked at REEF Kitchens. We did some things around hamburger stands and frosty cards. What I really want to do is make sure that we got a dedicated focus to drive the U.S. development plan, drive the international development plan with most of our time energy effort on traditional new units with our global next-gen 2.0 design, which we’re really excited about.

Operator: Our next question comes from the line of Jeffrey Bernstein with Barclays. Jeffrey, your line is now open.

Jeffrey Bernstein: Great. Thank you very much. Just following up on that org structure redesign, similarly encouraging to be the whole G&A flat in this environment over the next few years. But Todd, I presume this means you’ll be more intimately involved perhaps in the day-to-day as you’re removing a layer of management in there. I’m just wondering if you could share any color in terms of any changes expected in terms of primary focus or initiatives or what we can expect from that perspective as you presumably streamline the global structure. Thank you.