Not Hungry? Must Be the Election

A company’s earnings call isn’t necessarily the place for chuckles, particularly these days as comparable sales tank at lots of chains. Yet we had to smile broadly when Wendy’s CEO, Todd A. Penegor, alluded to the upcoming elections as a reason for a lack of sales growth when answering a question:

Karen Holthouse — Goldman Sachs & Co.

So, is the right way to think about that then that you’re also anticipating category growth of flat for the back half, which would also sort of say category growth for the back half in line with the first half?

Todd A. Penegor — President, Chief Executive Officer & Director

That would be the way to think about it, Karen, as at this stage, there is a lot of uncertainty in the consumers’ mind as we work through the election. We continue to make sure that we’ve got the high-low messaging working to make sure that with the gap widening between food at home and food away from home that we drive reasons to bring our customers into our restaurants, and our focus is really to delight every customer, period, through our restaurants, our food, making sure we have the appropriate value and then ultimately have a service experience that brings them back.