Ladies and gentlemen, good day, and welcome to the Devyani International's Earnings Conference Call. As a reminder, all participant lines will be in the listen only mode, and anyone who wishes to ask a question may enter star and one on their touchtone phone. To remove yourself from the question queue, please enter star and two. Should you need assistance during the conference call, please signal an operator by pressing star and zero on your touchtone phone. Please note that this conference is being recorded. I now hand the conference over to Mr. Anoop Poojari from CDR India. Thank you, and over to you, sir.
Thank you. Good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for joining us on Devyani International's Q2 and H1 FY 23 Earnings Conference Call. We have with us Mr. Ravi Jaipuria, Non-Executive Chairman of the Company, Mr. Raj Gandhi, Non-Executive Director, Mr. Virag Joshi, President and CEO, and Mr. Manish Dawar, CFO and Whole Time Director of the Company. We will initiate the call with opening remarks from the management, following which we'll have the forum open for a question and answer session. Before we begin, I would like to point out that some statements made in today's call may be forward-looking in nature, and a detailed statement in this regard is available in the presentation shared with you earlier. I would now request Mr. Ravi Jaipuria to make his opening remarks.
Good afternoon, everyone. I warmly welcome you all to our earnings conference call to discuss the business performance for the quarter ending September 30, 2022. I am pleased to share that DIL has maintained its store opening pace and opened 88 net new stores in the quarter, the highest ever. We are making consistent progress in expanding our reach and investing in our core brands to capitalize on the growth of growth opportunities available. In line with our strategy, we have continued our focus on consolidating our presence in metro cities along with the expansion in non-metro towns. At the end of quarter two, our total store count stood at 1,096 stores across the portfolio, with a split of 52% in the non-metros and 48% in the metro cities.
On the demand side, we have noticed that we are coming out of the pandemic. The consumer response is mixed for various categories. Continued retail inflation seems to have impacted the consumer demand to some extent in the staples and discretionary category. Although the inflation in input costs is stabilizing, the overall pricing levels continue to remain higher on a year-to-year basis. We have managed to take some judicious price corrections during early part of the financial year to protect the margins partially and are hoping that inflation will cool off as we go along, leading to enhanced consumer demand. Consolidated quarterly revenues for the quarter were up INR 747 crores, a growth of nearly 45% over the corresponding period last year. Our innovation pipeline continues to be strong. We launched Peri Peri Chicken in KFC, and the same has met with encouraging consumer response.
We are also investing in making our business future-ready with the launch of all-digital KFC Smart Restaurants. DIL is the leading long-term QSR player in the country, having a portfolio of multidimensional and well-recognized global brands, and we remain confident about the potential of our brands and the food services sector in India. Our investment in the core brands, expansion of our footprint, and innovation will help us to achieve sustainable growth. A recent study by one of the research outfits pegs the market growth of Indian QSR industry to remain above 15% for the coming years, and we are confident of growing higher than the overall market growth. With this, I now hand over to Manish for his comments. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Jaipuria. Good afternoon, everyone. A very warm welcome and thanks to all of you for sparing your valuable time to attend our Q2 and H1 FY 2023 earnings conference call, our fifth such call since the listing. We have crossed a strong 1,000-store benchmark in the current quarter for our core brands consisting of KFC, Pizza Hut and Costa Coffee. DIL opened 88 new stores across the portfolio, the highest ever in a single quarter. The revenues for quarter two stood at INR 747 crore versus INR 705 crore in the previous quarter, a sequential quarter-on-quarter growth of 6% in a seasonally low quarter. On a YOY basis, revenues grew 45%. Revenue growth has been broad-based across various brands as a combination of new store openings, pricing and the volume growth.
The gross margins at 70.2% were 90 basis points lower versus the previous quarter. This slight impact is the result of consistently high input inflation. While we've taken price corrections over the course of the year for our brands, the same has not been enough to offset the entire margin impact because of the increase in raw material and packaging material prices. As we are going along, we are seeing the input prices stabilizing over the remainder period of the year and therefore we expect our margins to come back. The impact of gross margins slows down and gets reflected in the brand contribution margins, which came in at 19.6% versus 20.5% on a company consolidated basis in the previous quarter.
Pre-Ind AS EBITDA at INR 113 crore for the quarter witnessed a growth of 42% on a YOY basis. The pre-Ind AS EBITDA margin came in at 15.1% versus 16.1% in the previous quarter. Reported EBITDA, which is post-Ind AS EBITDA, was INR 166 crore for the quarter, with margins at 22.1% versus INR 123 crore a year ago, which again reflects a 34% YOY growth. Profit before tax for the quarter stood at INR 59 crore versus INR 47 crore last year. The PBT for the quarter was lower than the previous quarter because of the significant currency impact in Nigeria and higher Ind AS adjustment as a result of the new store openings. Our core brands continue to perform well.
KFC, with 32 new additions, reached a mark of 423 stores at the end of the quarter. Being a seasonally low quarter, ADS was INR 121,000, with a healthy SSSG of 13%. Revenues at INR 443 crore for KFC remained robust and have grown 4% sequentially and 47% on a year-on-year basis. The quarter also saw the full impact of raw material price increases, and this led to lower gross margins at 67.9% versus 69% in previous quarter. Brand contribution margin was in line with the performance on the gross margins for KFC. On-premise consumption remained steady at 64% for the quarter. Pizza Hut added 30 new stores to reach a total count of 466 stores. ADS improved marginally to 45,000, with a SSSG at 3%.
Revenues came in at INR 181 crore, growing 36% year-on-year basis. Higher input prices and impact of changing product mix impacted the gross margins a little bit. Gross margins came in at 74.5% versus 76.2% in the previous quarter. Brand contribution margins were 17% versus 17.5% in the previous quarter, and on-premise consumption remained steady for Pizza Hut also at 45%. Costa Coffee added 19 new stores to reach a total of 88. Revenues grew to INR 22 crore. Gross margins came in at 79.6%, primarily due to higher input costs. Brand contribution at INR 4 crore and brand contribution margins at 19.6% were lower due to significant addition of new stores during the quarter. As we go along, we expect this to come back to our normal levels.
The ADS at the brand level was INR 31,000, reflecting dilution due to new store additions. During the first half of the current financial year, we've added 158 net new stores. Consolidated revenues for first half were at INR 1,452 crore, a 67% year-on-year growth. Gross margins at 70.6% and brand contribution margins at 20% have remained stable despite inflationary headwinds on H1 basis. Reported EBITDA post-Ind AS on a consolidated basis for the six months stood at INR 330 crore, representing a 22.7% margin. Profit after tax for the half year stood at INR 132 crore. Overall demand environment remains a little impacted in the face of continued inflation and elevated retail prices.
We expect softer input costs in the coming quarters, which will help us with the demand as well as the margins. We maintain our goal of sustainable and profitable volume-led growth for our brands. On that note, I would re-request the moderator to open the forum for any questions or suggestions that you may have. Thank you very much.
Thank you very much. We will now begin the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one on their touchtone telephone. If you wish to remove yourself from the question queue, you may press star and two. Participants are requested to use hands-free while asking a question. Ladies and gentlemen, we will wait for a moment while the question queue assembles. First question is from the line of Nihal Jham from Nuvama. Please go ahead.
Hi. Good evening. Am I audible?
Yeah, you are.
Yes, we can.
Yes. Thank you so much. A couple of questions from my side. First, despite the gross margin impact that we've seen both for KFC and PH, brand margins have not seen that big an impact and this is, I think, a reflection of the OpEx inefficiencies that we've been building in. Even versus last year there is an improvement of the OpEx per store when you look at both the formats. Is it that there are new initiatives that we keep doing and if you can highlight the same or we have tweaked the store formats which is leading to a better store ROC, more better than what we were doing even last year?
Nihal, as we've said in the past, that as we continue to open stores at an aggressive pace, and you would have noticed that we've opened almost 158 stores. Obviously from that perspective the operating leverage starts to kick in and that is what is happening. Basically if you look at what is happening on the brand contribution and lower down EBITDA, it's the gross margin which is kind of slowing down. Otherwise operationally we are absolutely in good shape.
Sure, Manish. On the brand contribution, it won't be a case of operating leverage because this is a per store cost that is being taken. In fact, as the store expansion happens it should rightly impact like it's happened in case of Costa.
No, because Costa the difference is the base was small and the new store additions have been very aggressive in the last two quarters and therefore that kind of gets reflected much more compared to Pizza Hut and KFC where your base store is very strong. Therefore your percentage addition versus the Costa percentage addition to the base is much lower, and that's the reason it is there. Within, let's say, the brand contribution also if you look at, we have labor cost, which will not go up significantly as we kind of expand. We have rentals, which is a combination of fixed and variable rentals, which gives you the operating leverage. That is what kind of contributes in the brand contribution.
Understood that. The second question was on a recent SKU launch in Pizza Hut, the Flavour Fun Range. If you could just highlight what is the ballpark contribution of that and for some of the stores, based on the data you see, where this number could end up heading to.
Nihal, it's because we launched this very recently, so it's too early to kind of give you the exact read. We've got good response from the consumers. The consumers are liking the product. We think this is one of the growth levers that we have if we have to grow the ADS and we have to bridge the ADS gap with the competition. We are bullish about this. Obviously we need to stabilize that whole piece because it's too early in launch, and it's a very, very important piece. We'll talk about in detail as we kind of go along. Otherwise, good response. Consumers have liked the price point, consumers have liked the quality, and therefore it is going as per our expectations.
Manish, do we have an internal target which is possible to share about what is it that this could contribute as a percentage of the ADS in the long run?
Nihal, we will come back to you on that one.
Sure. Just one last question, that on the store addition, we are running ahead of the guidance. Do we expect that this sustains or be 100 stores for each of the formats or something where eventually you will be back?
As of now we are staying with the same guidance, which is about roughly about 250 odd stores. We could kind of breach that a little bit, but formally we are not changing the guidance. Again, I mean, we've seen a good quarter, because, I mean, our pipeline was building up very strongly. We hope to expand on an aggressive basis.
Sure. Thank you so much. I appreciate it.
Thank you.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Sameer Gupta from IndiaInfoline. Please go ahead.
Hi, sir. This is Percy Panthaki here. You have sounded off a word of caution on the demand front. Just wanted to understand what's the reason behind the same, because the Q2 numbers were quite decent. Are you saying that in October we have seen a slowdown versus what a normal festive season should be?
Sameer, the basic reason is as you know, there have been high input inflation in the first half of the year. Obviously, we've taken a pricing fees also, which we've kind of alluded to in the past. Therefore the kind of volume increase that we used to see in the previous years, that volume growth was a little slow, and that got replaced with the pricing growth. That is the caution that we are talking about and nothing exceptional as such. Because if you look at the SSG numbers for KFC is very strong at 13%, which obviously is a combination of pricing and volume both, but more of pricing and less of volume.
There is a trade-off between volume and pricing. Sorry. There is a trade-off between volume and pricing, I understand that part of it. But if I look at solely in total sales or total value terms, there would be no slowdown, right? The slowdown which you are calling out is only for the volume part of it. Is that understanding correct?
You are right. Yeah.
Okay. Understood. As far as margins are concerned, gross margin, there is a input cost inflation which is weighing down on them. Where do you see this going? I mean, are you waiting for input costs to come down for margins to restore, or are you taking price increases to restore the margins, or are you accepting margins at the current level?
No, I think if you see that the basic input costs have already started coming down. Chicken prices are down, oil prices are down, and even gas prices have been reduced. I think going forward, it looks that I don't see the inflation effect will be there and we are not looking at raising prices for the time being. Hopefully the volumes will also start kicking in. It should be. Of course, our second quarter is a weak quarter, so on that basis also, you've seen some volume dilution.
Understood. Last question is, if I look at your CapEx per store, and this is of course just a mathematical derivation of looking at your total CapEx and dividing it by the number of stores added in first half, it's about INR 13.5 million. Do you think this is a fair number which will continue even for the next 2-4 quarters?
That's what it looks like.
Yeah. It's a combination of, Sameer, it's a new store addition as well as we are supposed to do the refurbs as well. Therefore there is some element of refurbishments, which also sits in that, which obviously will not get reflected in the denominator from the new store perspective. From a ratio perspective, you're not very far off.
Right. That's all from me. Thanks and all the best.
Okay, thank you very much.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Devanshu Bansal from Emkay Global. Please go ahead.
Yes, hi, thanks and congratulations on the highest ever store additions in a quarter. I wanted to understand the Pizza Hut SSSG performance, which was about 3% and this is despite mid-single digit price hikes as well as launch of Flavor Fun Pizzas, so which according to you led to a slower performance this year for Pizza Hut?
Devansh, if you see there is some bit of base effect also because obviously as you know that we have a higher concentration of smaller format stores and therefore they were kind of operational during last year as well and therefore to that extent, obviously pricing has impacted a little bit and that's the reason we've made that cautionary statement also from a volume perspective what I was talking to Sameer earlier. Therefore, we've seen some bit of volume drop in Pizza Hut, which is a combination of pricing plus Fun Flavor Pizza also. It's too early to kind of take that read. We still believe that Fun Flavor Pizza is a good initiative and long term it should become one of the very strong growth engines that we could have.
Therefore, we are not overtly worried in terms of the recent quarter SSSG numbers.
Okay. Sir, just as a flavor or outlook, if you can provide some trends on SSSG performance during the festive, it would be really helpful for both the formats.
Yeah. Too early to say, but let's see. I mean the Diwali time was good time, obviously, but let's see. I mean, we'll have to take the entire quarter. It's just one month gone. So far so good.
Okay. Last question is that we added a KFC Smart store during the quarter. The question is to understand what is the outlook on this front? Will further additions in the KFC format be on these lines? If yes, then what is the revised CapEx per store for this format versus the earlier format?
Devansh, in the overall context of additions, the CapEx will not significantly change. Basically, we are trying to digitize the stores by minimizing the orders at the counter, whereby the consumers can actually go to the kiosk and order on their own. Very small read because it's not really representative. It's just about 1 or 2 stores as of now. We've seen that the APC tends to grow a little compared to the normal APCs in a non-digital store. Again, we are not guiding anything. We are just sharing whatever we've seen so far.
Yes. I wanted to understand, as in for stores expected to open going ahead, what percentage of stores will be the smart store format and what would be the normal store format?
Too early. We really want to experiment it well with this, format and let's see how it goes. As of now, there is no fixed percentage that we are talking about. We've opened one store in Gurgaon, another store in Bangalore. Let's see how it kind of shapes up, so.
Sure, Manish. That's helpful. That's it from my end.
Okay. Thanks, Devansh.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Pujan Shah from Congruence Advisors. Please go ahead.
Hello, am I audible?
Yes.
Yeah, you are.
Yeah. Okay. My first question would be on the Costa Coffee side, as we have done so far good in Costa Coffee. What are the insights you wanted to give on a futuristic basis? Like, are we planning to add the same momentum? And what will be the ADS you are looking at in this specific segment?
Poojan, as we've talked about in the past, Costa, we are looking at adding about 40-50 stores. Obviously, the current quarter has been good. We had a strong pipeline, but overall our guidance remains the same. The brand is doing well, and our near to medium term objective for Costa is to reach an ADS of close to 40,000. It's not going to happen next quarter. That is what our target is.
Okay. My one question would be, we have just exited 2 stores in Q2, right? Q2 FY23.
You're talking about Costa?
No, no. Total, we have exited stores of 49, which is showing in the presentation slide number 29. It's two stores from quarter 1 to quarter 2, right? We have exited two stores.
Yeah.
Yeah. Okay. Thanks.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Sanjaya Satapathy from Ampersand Capital. Please go ahead.
Thanks a lot for the opportunity. The commentary that you have given about the staples, you are essentially talking about Pizza Hut, right, sir?
No, when we talk about staples, obviously we are talking about the core FMCG sector, because if you see the discretionary kind of follows, staples a little bit, and that is what we kind of in terms of reading the trends, what is happening on consumer behaviors, how the consumers are reacting. We track the consumer staples also. I mean, as you know, I mean we get classified as consumer discretionary.
Understood. Sir, when you are also talking about a bit of a slowness, softness in demand, and you're talking about the staples, are you essentially referring to what happened in quarter two or you are also giving some kind of guidance that your October was not that great and hence things are slowing down and growth outlook is getting weaker?
No, we are not giving any guidance. We've only talked about the quarter which has gone by. As I said, I mean, on Pizza Hut, for example, we talked about the volumes getting impacted a little bit. That is the whole context.
As such, it is a seasonally soft quarter, so I don't know how much one can read through from that. If you can just give us some flavor about how the festival season was in the month of October.
Look, the point is, 1, Q2 as a standard is a seasonally soft quarter. Again, at the same time, if you go back to last 2-3 years, there have been COVID impacts in various quarters. In some places, the restrictions were there, some places it was open, some places it was opening faster. Obviously from that perspective, it's a little kind of mixed reads and we are not able to kind of because various quarters because of COVID have behaved in a very, very different manner.
No, my question was that how has the festival season been?
It's too early to because festival season, if you see, I mean, one is obviously a Diwali time, which has gone well. The other big festival season really is the December month, which is where you get into Christmas, you get into New Year's and all. That is the real bump up which kind of happens.
Understood. If I can just ask last question that, when you have talked about this cost side and also you have just mentioned about the prices of various items have fallen recently, including chicken and many other things. Should one kind of make a conclusion that cost pressure is a bit behind you and you are rather looking forward to relatively a period in which you would focus more on volume growth and also margin will come back?
I would say largely, yes. As you know, I mean, still, for example, let's say, where inflation is today, despite the fact that we've seen the prices coming down, as Mr. Jaipuria said, the gas prices have come down, the edible oil prices have come down, the chicken prices have started to soften, but they still are at an elevated level where we used to be historically. Let's see how it kind of stabilizes. The movement has started, which is a good thing. It is no longer kind of now going up and up and up. We've seen the peaks, now it is coming down. Let's see how it pans out and basis that we will focus on our growth engines.
Understood. Thanks a lot, sir. Basically, after a long time, you have made some costly remarks. That's why all these questions. Wish you all the best.
Thank you very much.
Thank you. The next question is on the line of Nitin from CLSA. Please go ahead.
Yeah, thanks for the opportunity and congrats for the good set of numbers. From the demand perspective, just wanted to get a sense on like, how do you see the demand impact on the premium end? Similarly, like, how is the demand situation in the metro markets?
Fundamentally, we've not seen a big difference, Nitin. The metro markets continue to behave strongly. We've seen, if at all, the growth in non-metro markets is also becoming very significant. We've always kind of maintained in the past that the profitability for us in the non-metro markets is stronger than the metro markets because obviously your rentals are lower, your staff cost is lower, the utility is lower, and so on and so forth. That's how we've been kind of expanding our portfolio also. Today, if you look at our total store count, almost 52% of the total store count sits in the non-metro markets. We are bullish on non-metro markets. Again, as you know, the large consumption hubs still remain the metro markets.
The future is non-metro, is what we believe so.
Yeah. My question is from the context of staple companies where they have highlighted that the premium discretionary offerings are relatively doing better than the mass end discretionary. Something similar like we have a Fun Flavor Pizza launch for the mass end, like for recruiting a consumer. That drive definitely we have launched, we might be gaining it, but just wanted to get a sense like what about the premium end offerings we have. Do you see any impact on those or those are relatively immune at this point in time?
Look, in the short term, there will be some impact, obviously, because there would be, let's say if a consumer is coming into the store and there is a new product or a new SKU available, people try and experiment, right? Therefore, that's the reason I'm saying that in such a short span of time, it is not good to kind of take these leads. We've launched Flavor Fun from a longer term perspective. It's more of a strategic call rather than a tactical call. We are absolutely bullish on this. In short term, of course, there could be some aberrations here and there because people tend to experiment with whatever is new.
Okay. Thank you. From the KFC Smart digital KFC Smart Restaurants, so like apart from this self-ordering kiosk, is there anything else like we have tried out in the store from the digital?
It's largely a self-ordering kiosk. That is where the big difference is. Rather than a manual order and somebody punching the order for you place the order on your own through the kiosk. You make the payment through the kiosk, and then you go to the counter. Obviously from a look and feel perspective, the store is much more futuristic. From a consumer perspective, it kind of attracts the younger generation because they want to kind of take control of things, what they are doing. It is digital. As I said earlier, we've also seen that there is some bit of APC increase too early, very small read.
APC, I think, tends to kind of grow a little bit because consumers tend to add other things, let's say, if they are able to see it on the screen at the same time.
Okay. Thank you. Lastly, just wanted to get a sense on the Vaango, how has been the performance and given the unit economics is in place. Any call we have taken to sort of scale up the brand?
We are scaling up the brand. Again, as we've said in the past, I mean, Vaango is still not a destination brand. It does very well where the captive footfall is there. Even on Vaango also, we are expanding the stores, albeit at a small pace because for us the big priority is KFC, Pizza Hut, and Costa now. It's not that we are neglecting Vaango. We are bullish about the brand. There is no other Indian QSR brand which is available in the market, and therefore Vaango also in future will become a sizable category.
Okay. Thanks a lot. Thanks for the time.
Okay, thank you.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Vishal Gupta from Phillip Capital. Please go ahead.
Yeah, thanks. My question has been answered. Thank you.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Avi Mehta from Macquarie Capital. Please go ahead.
Hi, team. I just had two questions. First, wanted to understand this demand comment a little better. Is there any geographical divergence in the demand trends between, say, metros and smaller cities?
Not really, no.
Okay, sir. Okay, ma'am. The other bit was from your comments, would it be a fair comment to make that we are going to focus more on sustaining or supporting customer growth versus near-term margins across the segment? Is that the right read-through or did I mean, was that the right understanding?
Look, we are focused on both sides because volumes are important and a business can only kind of grow if there are healthy volume growth. Obviously, this time, the inflation has been unprecedented. We've seen this kind of inflation, I don't know, maybe after a decade or so. Having said that, we've taken the pricing pieces as well. The kind of pricing pieces we've taken, we don't think we could have taken a pricing piece beyond this. Therefore, to that extent, we've taken a temporary hit in our margins. Now as the input inflation is coming down, as Mr. Jaipuria mentioned earlier, that we've seen a reduction in gas prices, we've seen a reduction in chicken prices, even the edible oils are reacting favorably.
We are absolutely confident that our margins will come back.
Got it, Manish. Just the last bit from my end, if you did kind of allude to these pressures kind of offsetting, could you give me a sense on what's happening on the other costs like employee, rentals from new stores? Is that broadly stable or is there any signs of inflation over there as well?
It is stable. It is standard inflation. As you know, as far as the employee cost is concerned, it typically gets driven by the state governments from a minimum wage perspective. We've not seen any exceptional minimum wage revisions in the current year. If at all, last few years we saw higher minimum wage inflations compared to this year, so therefore that is not an issue. Rentals piece, as you know, I mean, the prime commercial rental locations in the country are always in great demand. Let's say if you talk about, let's say, across the country, there would not be more than 50 such locations, but outside of those 50 such locations the rental market is much better. The landlords' attitudes are very different.
They are wanting to work with the larger brands. They are wanting to kind of compromise on their demands if they want to deal with the larger brands. That's a significant change that we've seen during COVID and it continues post-COVID also beyond the absolute prime commercial locations in the country.
Perfect. That's heartening to hear. Thanks a lot. Thanks for this.
Thank you.
Wish you luck.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Tejas Shah from Spark Capital. Please go ahead.
Thanks for the opportunity. Couple of questions from my side. What percent of our store CapEx would be directly, indirectly impacted by INR depreciation in terms of imported equipment that we must be using? Is inflationary pressure at large showing up in CapEx per store as well?
There is an inflation pressure on the CapEx also, Tejas, because as you know, all of our fryers are imported for KFC. All of the ovens are imported for Pizza Hut. Obviously with the dollar value changing, that impacts the pricing. Again, if you look at the overall context in terms of what is the depreciation, what is the CapEx in the overall store economics perspective, it's completely negligible.
Okay. CapEx like to make would have increased by how much on YOY basis?
Last one year, which is again impact of COVID and the inflation, we have seen about 9%-10% inflation in the CapEx level. Because not just the imported equipments, we saw some increase in the air conditioning plants also. As I said, I mean 9%-10% in the overall context is completely insignificant.
Sure. Second, they are actually putting a lot of effort on digitizing the e-commerce part with ONDC. With the franchise and the network that we have, do we see any merit in logging onto that network or are we still contemplating?
Look, it is a space we are closely watching, and let's see how it kind of grows because you need to have the entire ecosystem to get built up before we jump into it because we are not able to provide the infra for that. We're watching it closely. The moment it starts to gain traction, we will be keen on that. As of now, we've not kind of taken a bet on ONDC so far.
Sure. The last one, bookkeeping. Tax rate guidance for this year, if you can help.
You will see at the end of the year, or maybe next quarter onwards, the normal tax coming in the books, which is 25%. Therefore in your modeling purposes, you can assume a 25% tax going forward.
Great. Thanks and all the best, sir.
Yeah, thanks.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Amruta Deherkar Sane from Wealth Managers India Private Limited. Please go ahead.
Thank you for the opportunity. My question is regarding Costa Coffee, as in, now that we are focusing on Costa Coffee, because the new stores we see that the margin has like is a bit lower. On a fairly established store, what is the kind of margin profile Costa Coffee outlets have?
If you look at the brand contribution level, the normal margin profile is about 28%-30% at a brand contribution level. The current quarter obviously has got impacted because of the new store openings and bunched up new store openings because last two quarters we've opened quite a significant number of new Costa stores versus the base. Over the next few quarters, it should get evened out.
Roughly, what is the time period required for Costa Coffee stores to, say, really break even or to become an established outlet?
The breakeven happens in the first six months. It takes almost about 15-18 months for a store to fully mature.
My second question regarding in CapEx, you said there is a certain component of refurbishment cost per store. I mean, this is the overall CapEx which I'm talking about. Roughly, what could be like if you could give us how much is the refurbishment cost that you need to incur for a store? How often do you need to do that? I mean, after how many years?
Okay. We don't split the CapEx from that perspective. Let me explain to you how the entire refurbishment works. There is something called a minor refurbishment and a major refurbishment. After every five years, we typically do minor refurbishment. Minor refurbishment basically is the customer area, where we will change the upholstery. We will do a new job on the paint and polish and look and feel and all of that. Major refurbishment is done once in 10 years, which will also include the kitchen area as well.
Okay. Thank you.
Okay.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Shirish Pardeshi from Centrum Broking. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Hi, good evening. Thanks for the opportunity, and congratulations on the good set of numbers. Manish, I was on slide 21, where I'm seeing the Pizza Hut numbers. We have reached to almost 466 stores, but then somewhat, the ADS is not showing that kind of trend. Just wanted to understand. Hypothetically, if we want to reach an ADS number of not exactly the market leader, but say around 60-65, what it takes? What we need to do? Maybe do you think the next three years we will be able to reach there? The related question is that, how much price increases you have taken in quarter two and maybe in the first half?
In quarter two, we've not taken any price increase. There could have been a small marginal 0.5% or 1%, and that's it. Majority of the price increases was taken in quarter one. Therefore from that perspective, quarter two numbers are kind of neutral. Obviously your question on ADS, we've talked about a SSSG number of 7%-8% for Pizza Hut. We continue to have new launches. We continue to have innovation pipeline. We've launched the new Fun Flavor Pizza now, which will help us to kind of bridge the gap with the market leader.
Do you think, 3 years time, we will be able to reach to 65?
I will not be able to commit any number.
No, no, I'm not asking for commitment. I mean, what I'm asking to reach that level in your frame of things, what do you think? I mean, you said Fun Flavor Pizza, which will get you somewhere. Then do you think whatever speed at which we are growing, of course operating levels will kick in at some stage. Do you think, is it possible to reach that level in three years?
Look, it is possible. It is not beyond possibility. Again, I mean, you have to look at the macro environment also. I mean, if you look at, let's say, the current year, there has been a huge inflation in the first quarter. Obviously, this inflation has not been a food inflation this time. It's a very well-rounded impact various categories. The consumer wallets have not grown so much. Therefore, to some extent, the consumers get impacted as far as the sentiment and emotions are concerned, and they kind of tend to pull back. Let's see. There are huge amount of headwinds available globally also. If you look at what is happening in Europe, what is happening in China, I mean, there are huge headwinds available.
Therefore we have to kind of be a little cautious from that perspective. Otherwise, we are bullish on our plans.
That's really helpful. I just have one last question. It's a fundamental question. Whenever I've seen the companies entering into the new space or white spaces or maybe launching new products and fill in to try and get more customer footfall. Now, what I need to understand fundamentally, this all new product introduction, is it directly targeted to premiumize the portfolio and hence?
The assumption is that the margin expansion will happen and we will not dilute. Is it true for both the brands, it's in KFC and Pizza Hut?
It works on both ends, because one is obviously premium. Premiumization remains a key objective. If you look at the Fun Flavor, it is to drive the footfall and the volumes. Therefore you have to work at all the ends to be able to make the brand more salient and appealing to the consumers. Obviously, if you have to grow the margins and you have to grow the top line, you have to balance it at both the ends.
Okay. That's really helpful. Thank you and all the best.
Thanks.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Prajwal Kabadaki from Valdiwa. Please go ahead.
Hi, Sachin. My queries are already been resolved. Hello?
Yes, we can hear you.
No, no. My queries are already been resolved.
Okay, sure.
You can. Yeah.
Thank you. Participants, if you wish to ask any questions, please enter star and one. The next question is from the line of Yashwant, Individual Investor. Please go ahead.
Yeah, hi. I have two questions. First question is about are we planning to cater off-site the parties? Could be like weddings or small get-togethers. Because I have seen, I know quite a few people who are in the unorganized sector and are providing there is an opportunity out there. So that's my first question. The second question is, are we planning for any discount program for the investors? Because I see there are around 3 lakh investors, retail investors. So which is strategically aiming at 3 lakh families out there. Yeah, yeah.
Okay, we are not planning to to launch in the weddings or cater to the weddings and so on and so forth. Our objective and priority is to kind of continue to do what we are doing in terms of opening the store, giving consumers a good response, come out with new innovative products and so on and so forth. That is what we are sticking to. As far as your other question on the shareholders family is concerned, let's consider that and we can come back to you.
Yeah. Thank you.
Okay.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Pujan Shah, Congruence Advisors. Please go ahead.
Thanks for the follow-up, sir. One of my question would be if we are exiting any stores, so what are the parameters we are looking into when we are closing out these stores? What are the, like, you can say, ratios or something like analytical thing which we look at into for the closure of the store?
Typically, we look at the store profitability, and obviously that kind of takes into account all the lines, at the store P&L level, and that's how we take a call. Whenever we open a new store, we typically try and make the store successful, for about 18-24 months period. Beyond that, which is let's say 2.5 years or so, we would take that call. Normally, let's say, a reasonable amount of store closures we normally bake in our model, and that's how we kind of manage the entire business.
Because not all the stores will be successful as we continue to expand, because we've seen in a number of places, for example, you open the store and there is some infra development which starts, let's say there is a flyover which starts to get constructed and the traffic shifts or there are some roadworks which come in. Or let's say there is a new road which gets cut out. So obviously in India these challenges are there and we plan for it.
Okay, sir. That is one message.
Thank you. That was the last question for today. I would now like to hand the conference over to management for closing comments.
Yeah. Thank you, chairman and, all the investors and those who have been on the call. I do hope that we have managed to respond to all your queries satisfactory. Should you need any further clarifications or would you like to know more about the company, please feel free to contact our investor relations team. Thank you once again for your time today to join us on this call and participate in our growth journey. Thank you very much.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, that concludes this conference. Thank you for joining us, and you may now disconnect your lines.