Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by, and welcome to the third quarter 2016 earnings release call. During the presentation, all participants will be in a listen-only mode. Afterwards, we will open the floor for your questions. To ask a question during that time, please press star followed by one on your touch-tone phone. If your question has been answered, you may remove yourself from the queue by pressing the pound or hash sign. We do ask that you pick up your handset to allow for optimum sound quality. Lastly, if you should require operator assistance, please press star zero. It is now my pleasure to hand our program over to Tim McIntyre, Executive Vice President of Communications, Investor Relations. Please go ahead.
Thank you, Kristen, and good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining our third-quarter 2016 earnings call. I've enjoyed the opportunity to meet some of you in the past few months, and I'm looking forward to seeing many of you at our annual Investor Day in January. As you know, this call is primarily for our investor audience, so I kindly ask that all members of the media and others be in listen-only mode. I also refer you to our safe harbor statement that is in both this morning's press release and 10-Q in the event that any forward-looking statements are made today. Our plan for this morning includes prepared comments from our Chief Financial Officer, Jeff Lawrence, and our Chief Executive Officer, Patrick Doyle, followed by your questions. With that, I'll turn it over to Jeff.
Thanks, Tim, and good morning, everyone. In the third quarter, we continued to deliver tremendous same-store sales in both our domestic and international businesses, as well as strong bottom-line results. U.S. comps grew by 13%, and international comps grew by 6.6%. We are thrilled with these results, particularly when you consider that Q3 same-store sales a year ago in our domestic and international businesses were up 10.5% and 7.7% respectively. We have now had 22 straight quarters of positive U.S. comps and 91 consecutive quarters of positive international comps. We also continue to increase our store count at an impressive rate and have now opened more than 1,100 net new stores over the trailing 12 months. These factors all contributed to our diluted EPS growing 43% over the prior year quarter. With that, let's take a closer look at the financial results for Q3.
Global retail sales, which are the total retail sales at franchise and company-owned stores worldwide, grew 14.9% in the quarter. When we exclude the adverse impact of foreign currency, global retail sales grew by 17.2%. The drivers of this retail sales growth included strong domestic same-store sales, which, as I just mentioned, grew by 13% in the quarter. Broken down, our U.S. franchise business was up 12.9%, while our company-owned stores were up 13.8%. Both of these comp increases were driven by order count or traffic growth as consumers continued to respond positively to the overall brand experience we offer them. Our Piece of the Pie loyalty program continues to contribute significantly to our traffic gains, while overall ticket was relatively flat during the quarter.
Moving to the unit count front, we are very pleased to report that we opened 28 net domestic stores in the third quarter, consisting of 36 store openings and 8 closures. Our international division had another great quarter as same-store sales grew by 6.6% and also added 288 net new stores during Q3, comprised of 300 store openings and 12 closures. Our international growth continues to be strong and diversified across markets, and we continue to benefit from an increased number of store conversions in select international markets. Turning to revenues. Total revenues for the third quarter were up $82 million or 16.9% from the prior year. This increase was primarily a result of three factors. First, higher supply chain center food volumes driven by strong U.S. comps and store growth.
Second, higher domestic same-store sales and store count growth resulted in increased royalties from our franchise stores and higher revenues at our company-owned stores. Finally, higher international royalties, again, from increased same-store sales and store count growth, which were partially offset by the negative impact of foreign currency exchange rates. Currency exchange rates negatively impacted international royalty revenues this quarter by $1.5 million versus the prior year quarter due to the dollar strengthening against certain currencies, primarily the British pound. For the full fiscal year, we now estimate that foreign currency could have a $7 million-$9 million negative year-over-year impact on royalty revenues. As you know, there are many uncontrollable factors that drive the underlying exchange rates, which makes this a harder part of our business to predict. Moving on to operating margins.
As a percentage of revenues, consolidated operating margin for the quarter increased to 30.7% from 29.3% in the prior year quarter. This increase was driven by positive same-store sales, higher supply chain volumes, and lower insurance expenses. As a reminder, we recorded a large insurance charge in Q3 2015, which hurt operating margin last year. The operating margin in our corporate stores increased to 23.5% from 19%, driven primarily by lower insurance expenses, as I just mentioned. To a lesser extent, increased sales and lower occupancy costs benefited the company-owned stores' operating margin, while higher transaction-related expenses and food costs partially offset these increases. The supply chain operating margin increased to 11.1% from 10.2%. The primary driver of this increase was also lower insurance expenses. Aside from insurance, higher volumes benefited the supply chain operating margin.
Commodity costs were relatively flat this quarter and did not have a material impact on the operating margin. We had previously estimated that the commodities we use domestically would be flat to up 2% in 2016 from 2015 levels, and we now expect commodities to be relatively flat for the full year 2016. Let's now shift to G&A. G&A increased by $11.6 million in the third quarter versus the prior year quarter, due primarily to three factors. First, our planned investments in technology, primarily in e-commerce and other technological initiatives, and the teams that support them. Please note that these investments are partially offset by fees recorded as revenues that we receive for digital transactions from our domestic franchisees and international franchisees. Second, our strong performance led to higher performance-based compensation expense. Third, our continued planned investment to support the strong growth of our international business.
Based on our positive performance and our outlook for the rest of the year, we continue to estimate that our G&A will be in the range of $305 million-$310 million for the full fiscal year. Keep in mind too, that our G&A expense for the year can vary up or down by, among other things, our performance versus our plan, as that affects variable performance-based compensation expense. Moving down the income statement. Interest expense increased by $5.2 million in the third quarter, primarily a result of increased net debt from our 2015 recapitalization. Our weighted average borrowing rate was 4.6% during the quarter, down 70 basis points from the prior year quarter. Our reported effective tax rate was 37.7% for the quarter. We expect that 37%-38% will be our effective tax rate for the full year.
When you add it all up, our third quarter net income was up $9.4 million, or nearly 25%. Our third quarter diluted EPS was $0.96 versus $0.67 last year, which was a 43% increase. Here is how that $0.29 increase breaks down. Lower diluted share counts, primarily a result of the accelerated share repurchase program completed in Q1, and our additional share repurchases in the second and third quarters, benefited us by $0.12. Our higher interest expense, primarily as a result of our higher debt balance, negatively impacted us by $0.06. Foreign currency exchange rates negatively impacted us by $0.02. Most importantly, our improved operating results benefited us by $0.25, which does include a $0.06 year-over-year benefit from the Q3 2015 casualty insurance charge. Turning to our use of cash.
During the third quarter, we repurchased and retired approximately 412,000 shares for $59.7 million, or an average purchase price of approximately $145 per share. During the third quarter, we also returned $18.4 million to our shareholders in the form of our quarterly dividend and made $9.6 million of required principal payments on our long-term debt. Over the trailing 12 months, we have returned more than $950 million to our shareholders in the form of share repurchases and dividends. Always, we will continue to evaluate the most effective and efficient capital structure for our business, as well as the best ways to deploy our excess cash to the benefit of our shareholders. Overall, our tremendous momentum continued, and we are thrilled with the results this quarter. We will remain laser-focused on driving the brand forward and providing great value to our shareholders.
Thank you for joining the call today. Now I will turn it over to Patrick.
Thanks, Jeff. Good morning, everyone. Those who joined us for our Investor Day last January heard me talk about our fundamentals, our steady strategy and momentum within the metaphor of 36 Blast, a basic off-tackle football play. The point was a simple one. It's not a flashy play, but when executed properly with players fully aware of their roles and responsibilities, it becomes nearly impossible to stop. Instead of short-term benefit or trick plays, we went to work years ago to make sure we established our identity, strengthened our foundation, and perfected our fundamentals. If the third quarter is any indication, running this play is continuing to work very well and, most importantly, greatly benefit our customers. As I think about the quarter, I continue to be proud of our approach to building success.
It would've been easy to shift or overthink our strategy and perhaps question our faithful emphasis on long-term fundamentals. Pivoting to a short-term mentality never crossed our minds. Reason being, I have never felt stronger about the momentum of our brand and business. The performance of our outstanding group of franchisees across the globe, our unmatched, relentless, meaningful innovation, and a team that has never been more energized and aligned. Our domestic business, driven by our U.S. franchisees and corporate store operators, continues to reach new heights with outstanding sales results. Our international business did what it does best by putting another highly impressive quarter of store growth on the scoreboard while notching its 91st consecutive quarter of positive same-store sales growth. To add yet another milestone to the quarter, we surpassed the 13,000th store milestone and held a celebration at the Seattle-based location in early August.
The business model continued to demonstrate tremendous strength, delivering once again with solid flow through to our bottom line. A big part of this is continued meaningful, responsible investments in the business. When coupled with an innovative customer experience, terrific food, and consistent, reliable value, we are left with a foundation of fundamentals that are as dependable as ever across the globe each and every day. Our domestic performance was phenomenal in the third quarter. Frankly, I'm not quite sure how else to put it. Our 22nd consecutive quarter of positive same-store sales also marked +31% on a three-year basis, a figure that demonstrates our commitment to facing the challenge of sustaining success head-on. Few have done this better than our U.S. franchisees and corporate team members, I am very proud of the work they have done to continue to put their customers first.
We opened 28 net domestic stores during the quarter, and with the tailwinds of record-setting unit economics in 2015, excitement around our Pizza Theater reimage, and unparalleled brand momentum, I am very pleased to see this continuing to track in the right direction. We added a brand-new product line to the menu, introducing our new salads with a full national launch campaign, which began in mid-August. I actually think the current campaign puts it best. This is something that may help the veto vote and offer additional choice on pizza night. Also, it's a terrific addition to the $5.99 mix and match menu, offering three choices, Classic Garden, Chicken Caesar, and Chicken Apple Pecan, and remaining consistent with our approach to value. The digital loyalty program continued to perform very well.
It has proven to be a strong case study demonstrating the importance of consumer insights, simplicity, and implementing a program that through its focus on order counts, is consistent with our overall strategy. It is fair to say we are very pleased with where the program stands after a full year in existence, providing yet another great boost to the momentum created by our domestic leadership, corporate teams, and operators, and of course, an efficient, determined U.S. franchisee base that is second to none. Staying on the topic of digital, we launched yet another ordering platform to the expanding AnyWare suite with ordering via Facebook Messenger available beginning last month. Much the same as our partnerships with Apple and Amazon, to name a couple, we seek to partner with leaders within their space, and Facebook clearly remains the largest social network in the U.S.
Between that and an easy order platform that is simple to execute, featuring a bot that is actually quite fun, we are very excited to be the first pizza company to deliver this technology to our digital customers and fans. Our worldwide digital participation keeps ramping up. We continue to increase participation in our global online ordering platform and now have nearly 70% of stores outside the U.S. using Domino's PULSE, our proprietary point-of-sale system. We continue to take advantage of the master franchisee model by sharing digital best practices and remain committed to technology growth as a true worldwide initiative for the business. I continue to be extremely encouraged by our relentless approach to innovation and our unquestioned lead within a competitive technology space.
Speaking of competitive spaces, our international business once again came through with tremendous store growth during the quarter, with 288 net openings, topped off with very solid sales performance. Two of our four public master franchisees announced double-digit same-store sales increases in their most recent quarters, and we hit a few store milestones, including the opening of our 2,000th store in Europe with a celebration in Hamburg, Germany, last month. We also reached 600 stores in Australia, 100 stores in New Zealand, and 200 stores in Saudi Arabia during the quarter. Our current conversions are on track in South Africa, France, and particularly Germany, which is ahead of schedule.
As we have noted, it will take some time to see direct revenue impact from these markets, but we have green lights related to the progress, timelines, and potential of each market to sooner than later find itself in a strong position to compete. We've come to expect this type of performance from the best international model in QSR, and I commend our master franchisees worldwide for once again getting it done. In summary, the energy and alignment of our entire system continues to amaze me. The results are fantastic. Beyond that, I continue to be most encouraged by the passion and vigor of our franchisees, operators, and team members. Getting a lead is one thing, maintaining it is another, and not always an easy task. We remain as determined as ever to build upon our success. Thanks. We'll now open it up for questions.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, the floor is now open for your questions. To ask a question, please press star one on your touch-tone phone. If your question has been answered, you may remove yourself from the queue by pressing the pound or hash sign. We ask that you do please pick up your handset to allow for optimum sound quality. Our first question comes from Gregory Francfort with Bank of America.
Hey, guys. Congratulations on a good quarter. I just had a couple of questions. One, on the food cost line, I know you guys mentioned in the Q some promotional activities that drove that higher. Are those ongoing promotions, or is that something specific to the third quarter, as we look out?
Yeah, great question. This is Jeff. In the food line item for corporate stores specifically, there definitely have been and will continue to be probably some mix and promotional activity that runs through there that may cause that to bounce around a little bit. I think the bigger picture point, though, is that commodities continue to be fantastic in 2016. As we look out a little bit, certainly to the end of this year, we continue to expect them to be pretty flat. Other than that, nothing really pushing that margin around.
Got it. Thanks. Then just as I think about domestic store growth, how much of it's being driven by new franchisees versus existing franchisees? When you look across the market, can you comment on what you think cash-on-cash returns are for some of the independent and small chains? I know you guys have been taking share from them, and I'm just wondering, you guys are getting them low 40% cash-on-cash return, and maybe what the average is in the marketplace.
Sure. Greg, in terms of who's building the stores, it is mostly existing franchisees. In fact, it's really all existing franchisees. We have typically 20 to 25 new franchisees every year, but those are people who come up through our system. They're managers before, and then typically their first store, they wind up buying as opposed to building their first store. Essentially all of the openings are coming from our existing franchisees. In terms of cash-on-cash returns for others in the category, clearly I don't know. In terms of the overall, I guess what I would say is we have been seeing net closures amongst the mom and pops for a number of years now, really going back to the downturn, and that has continued as the category has been consolidating. My assumption, if they're closing is those are stores that don't have great cash-on-cash returns.
In terms of the overall averages, honestly, I don't know.
Got it. Thank you very much. A helpful perspective, and congratulations again.
Thanks, Greg.
Our next question comes from Brian Bittner with Oppenheimer and Company.
Thanks. Good morning, guys. If you let analysts become franchisees, that'd be great, too, based on these numbers. The numbers are amazing. I'm just trying to better understand the acceleration that you've seen in the last few quarters in the U.S. business. As you look at kind of the drivers of your performance internally, how important has the benefits of the loyalty program played in the improving results and just the traction you're getting from that?
Yeah, it's certainly been important. We're not going to break apart the specific components, as you would guess, for competitive reasons. The quarter was about order counts, as has been the consistent pattern. We are clearly taking share within the category. As I said in the comments and as you've heard us say before, this is about getting the fundamentals right. This is about the power of momentum that is causing franchisees to build more stores. It's increasing the amount of advertising that we're able to do. We continue to, with growing scale, be able to, with our supply chain folks, do a better and better job of buying commodities based on higher volume. There's just an awful lot of things that are going right that are driving the momentum.
Most importantly, when you put up a 13%, I will tell you that you don't go into the year planning a 13%. What I am most proud of within our system is our franchisees and our store managers handling that kind of volume growth and doing it well and giving great service to our customers because it isn't easy. They've done a terrific job of trying to keep up with the volume, and only with that kind of execution do you continue the momentum. Hats off to our whole system.
Yeah, indeed.
Patrick, historically, I think you've kind of talked about another 1,000 stores being able to be built in the U.S. Is that still how you think about the domestic store growth opportunity, or has that changed?
No. What I've always said is I think that there are at least 1,000 more. I continue to believe that that's the case. You're certainly seeing that playing out. All I would add to that is that as volumes go up and as our share goes up, that only creates the opportunity to build even more stores, because places that might not have been viable become viable as your overall volumes and market share go up. Yes, we continue to believe that there are 1,000-plus more out there that can be built.
Okay, thanks, guys.
Thanks, Brian.
Our next question comes from Karen Holthouse with Goldman Sachs.
Thanks for taking the question. Yet another quarter of accelerating store growth, if you look at the overall system. I guess, how should we think about that relative to any visibility you have in the pipeline? Are there timing things that are affecting that as a meaningful ramp-up in the conversion rate, or is that something that we could think of as manageable or continuable for the foreseeable future?
Yeah. It's a good question. Our long-term guidance has been 5% to 7%, and that is still the best number. We certainly feel very good about the growing momentum, but one of the important things to keep in mind is we had about 100 conversions in Europe in the third quarter. That's not something that continues long term. There's a little bit of one time in that number on the international side. There are still more to be converted, but we're going to see the bulk of that done by the end of this year. The third quarter was the largest quarter of those conversions. Apart from that, you're seeing the base continue to grow as we opened the 13,000th in the quarter. That five to seven range continues to get bigger on an absolute store count basis.
We clearly feel very good about the momentum around store growth. We're particularly excited to see the domestic store growth moving because, as we've talked about before, there are fundamentally four ways you can grow the business, right? Same-store sales domestically and internationally, and store growth domestically and internationally. We've had three of those four for quite some time. We now have the fourth part, which is nice growth on the domestic side as well. The momentum there is terrific, but there was a little bit of a short-term boost from the conversions in the third quarter.
One other question, which I will apologize in advance for something that's a little bit more short term in nature. There's been, both in the third quarter and then into the fourth quarter, a couple of events between the Olympics debates that I think folks have been pretty focused on as potentially nights that benefit the pizza players. Just anything you're willing to share on sort of, is that something that you think can flow through into additional demand?
No, I really don't think so. We've looked at that very hard this year and in the past. Events like that, at the margin, could have an effect. In terms of any real material effect, in our business, you really don't have to think about those. They don't drive enough in any given quarter to really register.
All right, great. Thank you, congratulations.
Thanks, Karen.
Our next question comes from John Glass with Morgan Stanley.
Patrick, in the past, I remember you saying that there was some seasonality in the business in terms of new users using the brand for the first time in the third quarter, back to school, back to college. Was that dynamic still in place this quarter? Was it exaggerated this quarter? In other words, are you finding you're getting incrementally even more users than you've ever had before in this quarter? Any color around the seasonality, particularly this quarter, would be helpful.
Yeah. The seasonality is really more into the fourth quarter, typically, in terms of growth on digital orders. It kind of starts in the fall, but most of that, just based on when the quarter ends, is really hitting in the fourth quarter. That's the sort of thing that we have very consistently seen now for five, six, seven years, that the ramp-up is kind of September to, call it January, something like that, and then it tends to flatten out as a percentage of sales. May even see a slight tick down in the summer, and then you get the ramp-up again through the fall. The real answer is that pattern we wouldn't have seen much of through the third quarter. We continue to be very happy with the overall growth on the digital side.
Thank you. Then just on the category itself, most of your gains have come from share gains, as you've talked about over time. How's the category performed? Has it been a tailwind for you now? Maybe ex Domino's, is the category a little better? Conversely, as we've seen in a lot of restaurants, has the category actually decelerated, so these gains are even more profound in that context?
Yeah. I think the pizza category is continuing to be up in the 1% or 2% range, something like that. I don't know that we've seen a material change in the overall momentum. Clearly, this kind of growth has been far more about share gains, than about anything going on in the category. I think very modest growth in the category, though I would remind you, when you look at overall growth in the category, you're typically going to be looking at maybe 2% ticket growth. Modest category growth means fundamentally flat orders with a little bit of ticket. I think that's what we've kind of continued to see in the category. Thankfully, we've been able to outperform the category.
Great. Thank you.
Thanks, John.
Our next question comes from Alton Stump with Longbow Research.
I think good morning, once again, great job on the quarter.
Thanks, Alton.
Just two quick questions. I guess first off, on the salad launch, obviously it's very new here. You probably don't have a whole lot of data back on it yet, but just is there any color that you can give us as far as how much of that is coming from ticket as an add-on purchase versus of course pizza votes being lessened or just any more color that you can give us on how salads are faring so far?
Yeah. Salads are performing very nicely, very much in line with what we had projected. It all fits into our $5.99 mix and match, and as you've seen with the advertising when we launched salads, it was as much about pizza, as it was about salads. Salads only launched in mid-August, so you're looking at basically one out of three periods for us that have the salads in them. We're very happy with how they're performing. I think very much in line with kind of what we had expected there.
Got it. Well, I've had the salads myself, and they are shockingly good. Great job.
Thank you
On that launch. Then one other question real quickly. Just as far as U.S., of course unit count growth was up just over 3% year-over-year here in third quarter, which is a great number obviously given you've already got almost 5,200 stores. Is there any reason to think that you guys couldn't hold that kind of three-ish type of growth number into the foreseeable future in the U.S.?
Well, I guess what I'd say is I'd go back to the overall guidance of 5%-7%. Globally, we certainly like the momentum that we've built in the domestic business. I'm not going to start kind of pulling together specific projections on international versus domestic. We're very pleased to be getting a nice contribution from the domestic business and with more stores to be built, as I was just discussing, there is certainly room for momentum to continue. We're not going to give it a specific projection around domestic versus international.
Got it. Thanks, Pat and team.
Thank you.
Our next question comes from Matt McGinley with Evercore ISI.
Good morning. I have a follow-up on that unit growth comment you made on the U.S. stores. My question is, what's the limiting factor on U.S. store growth among franchisees? These guys have done exceptionally well over the past few years with large increases in the AUV, and the profit per store has been, I think, just about a double. Your growth is around 2% or 3%. You did a little bit better this quarter. Why hasn't that growth rate even accelerated more given the unit economics are looking so much better than they did even five years ago?
You're tough to satisfy, Matt.
We have to be tough whenever you comp 13 and tackle any minimal growt h you're going to be.
Honestly, clearly the capital is there. The will of our franchisees is there to do it. They're busy right now. I'll go back to the comment that I made about execution. You do a plus 13 and you're very busy just keeping your stores staffed and managing your existing stores well. I will tell you, I actually remember questions a few years ago when we announced our re-imaging program, which we are still on track to substantially complete by the end of 2017. Our franchisees are busy running the stores they already have. They've been busy doing re-images on stores. The capital has not been a constraint at all. They've also been busy swinging hammers building new stores. You've got to find real estate, you've got to prove through the construction process. It is not constrained by capital.
It's not constrained by return on investment. At some point it becomes constrained by just how many available opportunities there are, but that's well off over the horizon for us. We like the fact that it's been just continually progressing the last few years. The new stores are opening very well. Our franchisees who have been opening on average are very happy with their decision to do that. I think the constraining factor is really just the ability to find the new sites and work through the progress.
Got it. Thanks for that. I have a quick follow-up one for Jeff, probably on the company-owned transaction related expense. In the Q, you called out about 140 basis point increase to 3% of sales for this transaction-related expense. My first question is, what's actually in that 3%? Because if it's just interchange, that seems to be a pretty big number as a percentage sales. Then, given that tender is such a small percentage of sales, it's hard to imagine you would've had a mix shift in tender that would've driven that up so much. I guess, what is that and what actually drove that number up so much on the company-owned side?
Yeah, Matt. Transaction-related expenses, as we pointed out, mostly credit card related. Over time, our credit card mix of our sales, particularly when you think about the success of our online presence with the profile ability to have a card securely stored, continue to push up the credit card mix of our business. Credit card companies don't give us a break the more we actually send their way. That actually is going to increase. The other thing we're seeing a little bit there are just some chargebacks. You get certain locales that have customer bases that basically charge back to the stores saying that they didn't get the pizza or things like that. Again, certain locations have been a little bit more of a thorn in the side than others, but it's really a bunch of things that add up to move that.
At the end of the day, it's a couple points of margin there. It's something that we're focused on, particularly around the chargebacks to make sure we limit those in the stores.
Okay, great. Thank you.
Our next question comes from Chris O'Cull with KeyBanc.
I wanted to follow up on the increased promotional spend. Jeff, is the increase in promotional spend related primarily to the loyalty program?
Promotional spend, I think the original question was what impact does promotional activity have on food, I think was the original question I think we kicked the call off with. As far as advertising, specifically, as you can imagine, when you do a 13 and our stores contribute about 6% of their sales in the U.S. into the advertising fund. Very healthy on the cash flow coming in. The ROIs are where these guys are spending the money. This is the first time in my 20-plus-year career in QSR where the marketing guys think like finance guys, and if they don't find a great ROI, they won't spend it.
The good news for us is they are finding great ROI with the dollars that are in the advertising fund. Again, we take that very seriously. Those are 95%-plus franchisee money. We need to put those to work in a good way, not just to build sales, but to build profitable sales. We feel great about the money coming in. We feel great about how we're spending it. You can't get a 13 without getting that part of the business right.
Should we expect the cost of sales to continue to be impacted by promotional spend as long as commodity prices are down? If commodity prices start to inflate, do you expect that you'll pull back on some of those discounts?
I think the biggest thing when you think about food as a percentage of sales in corporate stores is if commodities move significantly, you're going to see that move around, right? If the cost of cheese and meats and flour start to go way up, you're going to see that percentage suffer. If it goes the other way, you're going to see a benefit. As far as promotional mix, not as big of an impact, possibly. It's really going to be the way commodities move. Again, as we look at commodities, 2016's been a really good year for us. We expect it to finish out that way. Early look into 2017, at least based on the independent consensus that we get from economists, at least at this point, not appearing to be significant in 2017 either way. Again, it's more about driving the sales.
We're less concerned about the percentage, more concerned that corporate stores are making more money than they've ever made, even with those little bit of margin bouncing around a little bit.
The commodity prices deflated this quarter. Your cost of sales went up year-over-year. If commodities start to go up, let's say the cheese prices start to go up for some reason, should we expect the rate of growth in your cost of sales to increase even further?
No, not significantly.
The one thing I'd say is, as you know, we're one of I think only two largely franchised restaurant companies that talk about our franchisees' profitability. They had a terrific year last year, and they're going to have a better year this year on overall EBITDA. We feel very good about how that's trending. Look, you manage all of it. At the end of the day, you've got to have a compelling offer for your customers, and you've got to generate a great return for your franchisees on the investments in the stores. As long as we're crossing both of those hurdles, then we're feeling pretty good about where we are and we're certainly continuing to see that.
You may see some movement in the components of that, food, labor, all the rest of it, but our job is to continue to generate a strong return on investment for our franchisees.
Fair enough. Thanks, guys.
Thank you.
Our next question comes from Alex Lange with Jefferies.
Thanks. I'd like to get some perspective on your carryout business and how your success with the fast-growing digital ordering platform and the rollout of a loyalty program and re-images is driving your carryout business relative to delivery.
Yeah. Carryout has continued to do well. Both are growing. I think the one thing that we continue to see is the majority of our stores are now re-imaged. It is a better experience for our customers than it was in the past. There have been questions in the past about kind of specific return on investment from re-imaging a store, and we've always talked about the fact that any individual store simply re-imaging where they are is a 1% or 2% lift, but that our expectation has always been that you're going to see kind of a catalytic event as the majority or all of the stores are re-imaged. I think we're seeing that. I think part of what's driving our comps right now is that the stores look better. It's a better environment for carryout customers to walk into.
That's an important part of our business. We're getting growth on both sides. Delivery is growing, carryout's growing. I think the re-imaging is certainly going to have at least a near-term, more positive impact on the carryout business than it does on the delivery business.
Okay. One question on the domestic supply chain. Given the significant volume growth in the last few years, do you see a need to meaningfully expand supply chain capacity? If so, when should we see that, and to what magnitude?
Yeah, we absolutely are going to have to increase capacity in our supply chain. Troy and the team have done a great job kind of keeping up with the volume that's been coming through. We've talked about this before. There are certainly, in the next few years, are going to be some increased investments into the supply chain. Volumes are up very dramatically if you go back six, seven years now. We've been kind of in an ongoing repair and maintenance mode as opposed to a significant capacity increase. We had excess capacity, but we're certainly using that up. We think that there's an opportunity to build more capacity, which frankly will help efficiencies because they're getting busy enough that at some point you're not going to be as smooth with operating those supply chain centers as you would have been otherwise. It's a very high-class problem.
I love trying to figure out how to deal with higher volumes going through our system, but it is something that we're definitely going to be addressing.
Okay. Thank you.
Our next question-
Thank you.
Our next question comes from John Ivankoe with JP Morgan.
Thank you. It's been a little while since we've talked about the digital ordering fees that you charge the franchisees, I hope you could shed some light on that both in the U.S. and international. I think it was a couple of years ago, you took up the fee from $0.17 to $0.21, I just wanted to see how much flexibility that you had in terms of taking that fee up more, and what the franchisees would think about that. If we could talk about what percentage of the international stores are currently paying the fee, and if that is a long-term opportunity.
Right. We're still at $0.21 domestically. It's a little bit higher outside of the U.S. just because there are some costs of getting smaller markets up and running on the platform. Today, we have a reasonable number of international markets that are operating. I think it's kind of 20-plus countries that are operating on the global online ordering system. Many of those are smaller, it is still a relatively low percentage of the system. The biggest market that's on our platform today is Canada. We've got a lot of markets in the Caribbean, a few in the Middle East, South Africa, some of our newer markets that have been opening. Certainly, as that expands more around the world, and it has been growing, we have been adding countries to that. It's an opportunity.
It is global enabled, we've got a system that will operate in multiple markets. There is an opportunity there that those digital fees will grow just as the number of stores around the world are added to the platform. In terms of that charge Right now it's at $0.21. Clearly, investments that we've been making have been working. As we've talked about often, the return on investments on our digital platform has been terrific. You're seeing that playing out in our comp growth. We're committed that we're going to generate a good ROI off of that. What that means for the future, we'll work through. But right now, we are still at that $0.21 that you quoted domestically.
Thank you.
Our next question comes from Jeffrey Bernstein with Barclays.
Great. Thank you very much. Two things. One, Patrick, just you mentioned the sustained success and how you don't necessarily plan on a 13% comp when you go into any quarter or year. Maybe on that, are there any hidden challenges that maybe that we don't appreciate? Whether it's capacity in store or I think you touched upon the supply chain or from a labor or guest satisfaction perspective, are there any areas that you get caught off guard when you have this type of volume growth that you're then forced to play defense on?
Not really other than we've already talked about in terms of just the sheer volume. You've heard me say before in terms of what I worry about. I wake up every day and I worry about cybersecurity, and I worry about food safety. Those always have to be top of mind, and you're never going to be in a position where you can relax on those things. In terms of the volume growth and what worries me there, the stores have been doing a terrific job of kind of keeping up. We're building more stores, which will help any capacity constraints there. The supply chain, we've said we're going to need to invest in, but the team has done a great job of kind of keeping up.
Our technology folks have to make sure that we've got enough capacity and that the pipes are big enough to handle all the volume that's going through. In general, we've been in awfully good shape on those fronts. We know where those constraints could be and actively have been managing that.
Got it. Jeff, just on the return of cash, I think you mentioned in your prepared remarks the board looks at the return pretty regularly in terms of presumably, I guess right now, the balancing of a dividend and share purchase. With the stock price appreciation, now the dividend is a modest, right now, I guess it's a sub 1% yield. Just wondering, is there a target level or what goes on in the boardroom discussions, and is it just preferred flexibility of share purchase over dividend, or could in any one year those flip or just wondering what the thought process is behind the choices there?
Yeah. I can't tell you everything that goes on in our boardroom. What I can tell you is that we have a very astute board who has been around a long time with us, who understand that we're serious about optimizing our capital structure. We will continue to be serious about optimizing our capital structure. If that provides us with an opportunity to have some excess cash, we roll through with them the different menu options that we have. As you know, we have a history of really kind of being flexible depending on what's going on in the marketplace, both with capital structure choices as well as use of cash choices. We feel good about the choices we've made in the past. Going forward, we are fully flexible.
We do have about $925 million of debt, which is due in January of 2019, which is par callable without a penalty in July of 2017, next summer. Again, doesn't mean that we're going to hit it at that point in time. We could go earlier or later. Back to use of cash. Our board has liked the fact that we've done an ordinary dividend in the past. I can't control the yield, obviously. The investors control the yield. No, listen, we're comfortable with the way we spend our cash here, and it's going to continue to be a challenge, hopefully going forward, if our operators continue to perform the way they have.
Good problem to have. Thank you very much.
Appreciate it.
Our next question comes from Peter Saleh with BTIG.
Great. Thank you. I just wanted to come back to your philosophy on menu pricing. I think every quarter we're hearing traffic is up pretty dramatically, but the check is flat. Are you taking any price and we're seeing maybe mix kind of declining, or what's your philosophy and how should we be thinking about pricing going forward?
Ultimately, pricing is getting set by our customers. Customers continue to be a little bit cautious, as they have been since the recovery. We've been finding ways that we can create great value for them and continue to accelerate the profitability of our stores. We feel good about kind of the balanced approach that we've taken there. There's certainly over the course of the last few years, on average, we've seen a little bit of ticket growth. The majority of our growth has been through orders. We think that's the healthier way to do it. Ultimately, the health of the business is going to be driven by order counts and how many people are choosing to do business with you each day. We have cautiously found ways to get ticket.
Remember, ticket is a function both of price, but also of how much is in that basket. When you see us launching salads or we launched the Marbled Cookie Brownie last year, those sorts of things allow us to have smart upsells that can be a way of growing ticket without necessarily taking price.
Got it. Can I ask on the salads, are the gross margin on the salads, are they higher or lower than the overall pizza menu?
Yeah. Not going to get into the specifics on that, but we feel very good about where they are and how they're performing. They fit nicely into our $5.99 mix and match.
Lastly, given the store performance, the comps, the EBITDA improvements that are likely coming for this year, are we going to see more of the DXPs? Are the franchisees asking to get more of the DXPs in the market?
They are. Kind of our initial run is done. Yeah, there is some demand for more out there. There was a model change on the model that we put it on. If we were going to do more, we'd actually have to produce new tooling, I'm not sure that we wind up doing that unless there was a lot of demand for more. We certainly could have our franchisees buy more if they were available today, but something we'll look at. What I will tell you is customers love it. For the relatively few number that are out there, the visibility of those cars is terrific, and we get an awful lot of comments about them.
All right. Well, thank you again, and congrats on the quarter.
Thank you, Peter.
Our next question comes from Steve Anderson with Maxim Group.
Has been answered, but I do want to ask a broader question about the pizza industry. You mentioned about the 1%-2% growth in the broader industry. Do you include fast casual pizza players within that 1%-2%? Do you see any sign of a potential shakeout in that segment, and do you see any lift off from that?
We do include them in the overall category. The overall category growth, you have continued to see stores getting built. I don't know that I would call it a shakeout, but I am relatively confident that at some point you will see consolidation. There are an awful lot of players that decided that it was a good idea at roughly the same time. Enough similarity in approach that I wouldn't be surprised that you saw some consolidation at some point. In terms of shakeout, I don't know. That implies closures. I guess what I would say is what you have heard me say before, which is fast casual pizza to me is really about the idea of a better environment, great food, still needs to be fast. Value still needs to be there. We are working hard at all of those consumer benefits.
That's why we think we're growing so strongly. They're out there. They're growing. I just don't view it as a new category. I view it as new competitors who frankly have been taking share from mom and pops and regional chains that simply haven't been performing as well. The overall thesis on the category, I think remains the same, which is there is limited growth in the category. You're seeing big players take share from smaller players on average. We have thankfully been getting more than our fair share, though we'd always like even more than that. The fast casual players, as they're referred to, I just think they're people who are doing a nice job with their pizza restaurants, and they're taking share from existing players.
All right. Thank you.
Thank you, Steve.
Our final question comes from Mark Smith with Stifel .
Yes. First, can you just talk about your ability to compete with grocery stores versus maybe the rest of the restaurant industry? Secondly, if you can talk about any competition that you see coming from gas stations as we look at Casey's or grocery stores within the pizza category.
Yeah, look, at the end of the day, I suppose anybody who is feeding anybody in the U.S. is competition. As it relates to pizza and frozen pizza or take and bake, there is some interplay between our category and those categories, but not much. During the time when you saw a lot of growth in frozen, we just couldn't see that it was directly affecting us much, if at all. The same is true of gas stations. Any take and bake, it's out there, but I'm just not so sure that there is that much interplay there. My view on frozen pizza, in particular, has always been that I think frozen pizza, despite how they try to position themselves, tends to just cannibalize other frozen food as opposed to cannibalizing the fresh pizza category.
I think, despite how they've tried to position themselves, one more sale of frozen pizza is one less sale of frozen lasagna. I think that's why you haven't seen the overall frozen category grow much in grocery over the last few years. There was some time when they were adding doors of frozen pizza, and that was growing the frozen pizza category. I don't think you saw a lot of net growth in frozen prepared foods overall. I think that is more a competitive issue within grocery and within the frozen aisles than it is necessarily to the pizza category.
Okay, great. Thank you.
Thank you.
That does conclude our questions for today's call. I will now turn the program back over for any closing remarks.
All right. Thank you everyone for joining the call today. We look forward to seeing many of you at our Investor Day in January. Following that, we'll be discussing our fourth quarter and full year 2016 results with you on Tuesday, February 28th.
Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for joining the third quarter 2016 earnings conference call. You may now disconnect your lines, and have a wonderful afternoon.