Restaurant Brands’ Popeyes sales soar amid coronavirus outbreak

Restaurant Brands International is reporting that its Popeyes brand saw a 26.2% uptick in same-store sales in Q1, amid the coronavirus pandemic. Yahoo Finance's Heidi Chung joins Zack Guzman to break it down.

Video Transcript

ZACK GUZMAN: But Heidi, it's not just McDonald's who's been navigating this. When we look at Restaurant Brands International, of course, the parent company between Popeye's and Tim Hortons, they reported earnings, and it seems like another serving of the same thing here with Popeye's being the strong standout and Tim Hortons not really doing it.

HEIDI CHUNG: Yeah, it was a busy week for earnings, but we heard from a lot of big fast food companies just on how their companies and businesses have been impacted by the COVID-19 outbreak. Restaurant Brands, of course, not immune to the pressures that they faced from that outbreak. Revenue during the first quarter here fell 3.2% year over year to $1.23 billion. And like you mentioned, Restaurant Brands the parent company to Tim Hortons, Burger King, and Popeye's.

At Tim Hortons, this part of the company continues to be a laggard. Same store sales during the quarter fell 10.3%. Burger King comp sales fell 3.7%. But Popeye's same-store sales surging 26.2%, thanks to that super popular chicken sandwich that we have had very many times on this show and also the company alluding to strengthen its digital and delivery as well.

The CEO of Restaurant Brands, Jose Cil, was on our programming earlier this morning. And he actually gave us a bit more insight into how COVID-19 was impacting their business during the quarter here. We saw that same-store sales at Burger King fell down in the 30s, and now it's back to the teens. And Popeye's actually saw same-store sales go flat at the peak of the crisis but now is back to pre-COVID levels. Tim Hortons saw same-store sales decline in the high 40s and is now just in the 30s so a big impact across the board for that company, Zack.

ZACK GUZMAN: Yeah, no, amazing to see what Popeye's was able to do. Now they just need to figure out a way to actually deliver the biscuits in my order, still a little sour about that. Heidi Chung, thank you so much for bringing us the update there.