Wingstop reported 12.8% same-store sales growth for its second quarter Thursday, but the fast-casual chain continues to feel pressure from high wing prices.
Wing prices are up 32.1% year over year, but the volatile commodity was at a four-year low last year, Wingstop CEO Charlie Morrison told investors.
“The price of wings is not going up,” Morrison said. “It’s just that we’re overlapping extraordinary deflation in the prior year.”
Meanwhile, digital sales for the 1,168-unit chain now account for a full third of Wingstop’s U.S. systemwide sales. Previously, two-thirds of those sales had gone through Wingstop’s digital ordering portal, with the rest through DoorDash. Those numbers have flipped recently, Morrison said.
“We had a very productive engagement with DoorDash to try to eliminate that gap in margin,” he said.
Going forward, the chain has negotiated a lower commission with DoorDash while also planning a price increase on orders placed via the third-party service.
“It’s a better value to go through Wingstop.com,” Morrison said.
The chain plans to offer delivery in 80% of stores by the end of the year. It’s currently available at about 60% of units.
For the quarter ended June 29, Dallas-based Wingstop reported a systemwide sales increase of 21.9%, to $372 million.
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