Cracker Barrel Old Country Store Inc. continues to expand its Maple Street Biscuit Co. brand, but the company’s focus is reviving its eponymous chain of restaurant and retail stores.
Cracker Barrel reported lower earnings and basically flat sales for the fourth quarter and fiscal year ended Aug. 2.
In the company’s Sept. 19 conference call with analysts, CEO Julie Felss Masino expressed confidence in its program to improve results.
“Our multiyear strategic transformation journey is off to a great start,” she said.
The company ended fiscal 2024 with 658 Cracker Barrel stores across the country, two fewer than it had a year earlier, and 66 Maple Street restaurants, seven more than the end of fiscal 2023.
That’s double the number of Maple Street restaurants than when the then-Orange Park-based company was acquired by Tennessee-based Cracker Barrel in 2019 for $36 million.
The Cracker Barrel chain is basically the same size as it was five years ago.
The company said in its earnings report it intends to open two new Cracker Barrel locations in fiscal 2024 and add three to four new Maple Street restaurants.
Cracker Barrel does not report data on sales and earnings for Maple Street in its quarterly reports and company officials did not discuss Maple Street in the conference call, other than its plans to add the additional restaurants.
Cracker Barrel’s total revenue for the fiscal year, including results from Maple Street, rose 0.8% to $3.47 billion, but that was helped by an extra week in the fiscal 2024 calendar.
The company’s Cracker Barrel sites combine a restaurant with a retail store. Sales at restaurants open for more than one year fell 0.1% and comparable retail store sales dropped 5.5%.
Adjusted earnings dropped 30% to $78.5 million, or $3.52 per share.
Masino said the company expects to improve results with several initiatives including menu enhancements and store remodels to make the locations more appealing.
“Our incremental investments are focused on areas we think are the most impactful to the guest and employee experience, things like exterior paints, parking lots, flooring and restrooms,” she said.
Masino said she is encouraged by early results from a pilot remodeling program.
“We have consistently seen traffic and sales growth across the four stores that were updated in fiscal ’24. Guests have noted that the updated stores feel brighter and more open but most importantly, remain authentically Cracker Barrel,” she said.
Cracker Barrel is also looking to remake the retail side of the business.
“Here, we’re focused on optimizing our assortments, improving the shopping experience and driving profitability,” Masino said.
“We’re continuing to lean into our seasonal themes, which have been a relative strength. We’re encouraged by the guest response to our Halloween and harvest collections and we’re seeing positive momentum in our everyday businesses.”
Cracker Barrel’s stock has been trading at its lowest levels in more than a decade in recent weeks and the price didn’t move much after the earnings report.
CL King analyst Andrew Wolf maintained his "neutral" rating after the report.
“Despite these steep current valuation discounts to their historical medians we have retained our Neutral rating as we view Cracker Barrel’s turnaround as still in its relatively early stages and the industry environment unfavorable at this time,” Wolf said in a research note.
Truist Securities analyst Jake Bartlett maintained a “hold” rating.
Bartlett said in a research note that data shows recent sales are improving with industry trends.
“However, we expect Cracker Barrel’s traffic to stay pressured until spending from lower income consumers improves, the timing of which remains highly uncertain,” he said.
All Elite Wrestling, the professional wrestling organization run by Shad Khan’s son, Tony, is closing in on a big television rights deal, according to several industry reports.
The report first attributed to Puck news said AEW is nearing a deal with Warner Bros. Discovery worth about $170 million a year.
Tony Khan operates AEW, which is co-owned with his father, owner of the Jacksonville Jaguars.
According to an April report by Forbes magazine on the combat sports industry, AEW had estimated revenue of $250 million in 2023.
Forbes estimated AEW’s value at $2 billion, making it the third-most valuable combat sports organization behind UFC, at $11.3 billion, and AEW’s competitor WWE at $6.8 billion.
Forbes in August estimated the Jaguars’ value at $4.6 billion.
Since AEW was founded in 2019, it has had a relationship with Warner Bros. Discovery, with programming on the company’s cable television stations TNT and TBS.
In a Dec. 19 interview with SiriusXM satellite radio show Busted Open, Khan said he could not confirm the new deal but he indicated AEW will continue its relationship with the television broadcaster.
“All the people at Warner Brothers Discovery have been so great to us. I think we have a really exciting future there. I can say with 100% certainty that AEW and TBS and TNT are here to stay for a long time,” he said.
“We talk about all this wrestling history and AEW wrestling history. A big part of AEW from the very beginning is bringing wrestling back to TNT and TBS.”
PureCycle Technologies Inc.’s stock has been surging after two investment firms invested $90 million in additional capital.
PureCycle is developing a process that purifies recycled plastic products.
The company’s Securities and Exchange Commission filings list its headquarters office in Jacksonville, but most of its operations are conducted at a plant in Ironton, Ohio.
PureCycle announced Sept. 11 that Sylebra Capital Management and Samlyn Capital LLC entered into a series of transactions, including purchases of preferred and common stock, which resulted in gross proceeds of $90 million for the company.
Sylebra is PureCycle’s largest stockholder and the additional transactions increased its stake from 17.75% to 19.3%, according to SEC filings.
Samlyn’s stake rose from 5.49% to 8.2%, making it the company’s second-largest shareholder.
“This investment combined with the progress we are seeing on our production and commercialization efforts at the Ironton Facility should enable us to drive toward our long-term goals,” CEO Dustin Olson said in a news release.
According to company releases, PureCycle “holds a global license for the only patented solvent-driven purification recycling technology, developed by The Procter & Gamble Company, that is designed to transform polypropylene plastic waste (designated as No. 5 plastic) into a continuously renewable resource.”
PureCycle reported no revenue in the first six months of the year but Olson said the company is entering a new phase, transitioning “from a pre-revenue company to a commercial operation.”
PureCycle’s stock rose $2.07 to $6.76 on Sept. 11 after the announcement and has continued climbing, reaching a 52-week high of $10.24 on Sept. 24.
A day after the Federal Reserve lowered interest rates, Miami-based homebuilder Lennar Corp. reported quarterly earnings Sept. 19 and co-CEO Stuart Miller said he expects the rate cut to help the housing market.
“Lower interest rates will enhance affordability, which will enable many more families to access and attain homeownership at the entry level, while growing families will be able to unlock value from existing homes, enabling them to move up to more bedrooms and more living space,” Miller said in the company’s conference call with analysts after the earnings report.
“More listings for existing homes will provide supply of entry-level homes while driving more demand for move-up product. The dynamic of lower interest rates is likely to accelerate demand for both new and existing homes while expanding access to homeownership,” he said.
Miller said consumers have reasons to be confident, and the lower rates will help.
“Consumers remain employed, they are generally confident that they will remain employed, and they generally believe that their compensation will rise,” he said.
Lennar reported earnings for its third quarter ended Aug. 31 rose 5% to $1.2 billion, or $4.26 a share.
Lennar has homes available for sale in eight communities in the Jacksonville market, according to its website.
Mosaic Flavors, a California-based maker of liquid and powdered flavors, announced Sept. 18 it acquired Ponte Vedra Beach-based First Coast Flavors.
First Coast Flavors, founded in 2022, is known for its expertise in food and beverage applications, Mosaic said.
“Our combined strengths will enhance our ability to serve our customers and accelerate our growth. We look forward to this exciting next chapter,” First Coast Flavors co-founder and President Rich Flanagan said in a news release.
Flanagan will become chief commercial officer of Mosaic.
Terms of the deal were not announced.
Private equity firm DC Capital Partners Management LP announced Sept. 16 it is making a control investment in Jacksonville Beach-based C5MI.
C5MI, founded in 2016, provides supply chain and logistics services to government and commercial markets.
“Our plan is to invest in our people, customer relationships, and technology offerings to become the premier supply chain and logistics digital modernization provider across the U.S. Government and commercial clients,” DC Capital Partner Jerry Chernock said in a news release.
DC Capital said the founders of C5MI reinvested equity as part of the transaction, but details of the investment by the founders and by the private equity firm were not announced.