Los Altos, California-based-restaurant chain American Restaurant Group has announced a US$1.7m drop in sales at its 109 Stuart Anderson’s Black Angus Restaurants during its Q2 ended 1 July. Sales fell to US$74.6m from US$76.3m year on year.
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In the 103 base restaurants, sales decreased by 5.1% in the Q2 2002, year on year, primarily due to four fewer weeks of television advertising in 2002 than in the comparable period of 2001. As a result, operating profit declined to US$5.4m from US$6.5m in the Q2 2001. There were 109 Black Angus restaurants operating at the end of the Q2 2002 and 105 Black Angus restaurants operating as of 25 June 2001.
For the 26-week H1 period, total revenues were US$156.5m, down US$2m from the US$158.5m recorded in the prior year’s comparable period. Sales for the 103 base restaurants decreased 4.1% compared to the H1 of the prior year.
Significantly, of this unfavourable variance, customer traffic accounted for only 0.1%. The introduction of more casual “value” items on the dinner menu, which caused the average check to decline, accounted for the balance of the decrease. Operating profit for the H1 2002 decreased to US$13.2m from US$15.9m in the comparable period in 2001.
“Although operating profit declined compared to the prior year, the result was in line with our expectations given the US’ continuing recovery from last year’s terrorist attacks and softer economy,” said CEO and President Ralph Roberts.
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By GlobalData“We continue to study and respond to our customers’ needs under these circumstances. An example is the introduction into our menu of more casual ‘value’ items, which contributed positively to our stable dinner counts. With our good margins as a result of continued favourable raw material costs, we are encouraged the business will remain strong.”
