Spur Corporation Ltd (SUR) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good morning to all our viewers this morning, both in person and online, local and international. A warm welcome to all our franchise partners, investors and shareholders and team. I would like to acknowledge our Board Chairman, Mike Bosman, our Board of Directors, our Spur Corp executives who are present this morning. I would also like to formally welcome Vuyo Henda, who was appointed Chief Marketing Officer of the group in May. We are truly blessed to have attracted such a talented marketing specialist that is already adding value to building brands that lead the experience. Welcome to Spur Corp family Vuyo. Upfront, I would like to express my thanks to each member of the Spur Corp team who have demonstrated their commitment to our business and through their passion and hard work have delivered high performance results. Thank you. [Presentation]

Total group restaurant sales increased by 28.2% and are ahead of the pre-pandemic levels. Group revenue increased by 32.5%. Comparable profit before tax increased by 74.9%, and headline earnings per share increased by 31%. For the second half of fiscal '22, the Board has approved and declared a dividend of ZAR 0.78 per share to shareholders. We are most grateful for these results and acknowledge our valued customers and our committed franchise partners and their respective restaurant teams globally. The results for the fiscal '22 full year July 2021 to June 2022 will be presented in 4 main sections. Our financial and segmental review will be presented by Cristina Teixeira, our CFO, after market and trading overview. Welcome, Cristina. Despite the negative start to the fiscal '22 with the KZN civil unrest and COVID-19 lockdown in July. We look back on the past fiscal known that we can eventually term 2022 as the post-COVID recovery year. As the economy has opened, we are grateful to see customer foot count increasing in our restaurants, although new trading patterns are emerging and these levels are erratic. A slower global economic growth has impacted the market. The consumer is spending less of the strained household income on eating out at less 12%. And we know that only 18% of the South African adult population represents 80% of economically viable consumer segment. So the chase is on between competitors to win over disposable income in restaurants. Our second wave of Kantar Research confirms that Spur remains solid with a high power score and equally high awareness and usage levels. Our marketing teams continue to focus on driving everyday value and enticing value-added campaigns to keep our brands relevant and appealing. Food prices in South Africa continue to soar, which has had a direct impact on the consumer's choice of eating out, or has at least reduced the incidence of engagement. Food inflation is estimated at 7.8%, and an increase of 8.2% in a year-on-year basket of basic grocery essentials. Petrol has increased by 41% since a year ago. The war between Russia and Ukraine has directly impacted our supply chain costs in a way that has influenced various other food categories in addition to oil. The increase of oil at 40% plus, which is significant in preparation of our menu offering. In recent [ retail ever ], it is pleasing to find out that it is softening and the oil price is reducing. After almost 2 years of poor trading conditions in higher tourist areas, we are seeing the evidence of tourists finally returning to South Africa. StatsSA confirmed in the last -- in the first quarter of 2022, 267,000 overseas visitors arrived in the country. These tourism levels are still a long way of prepandemic levels. Our benchmark remains our, Santa Ana Spur in the V&A Waterfront in Cape Town, which was trading at minus 23% in December in peak season and has shown signs of recovery by June at minus 10% year-to-date. This recovery and positive trend is likely to continue, which will have a favorable impact on our other high-volume sites such as airports, casinos and resorts. Overall, the restaurant and hospitality industries are indexing below pre-pandemic levels compared to other industries, which have reached or past 2019 levels. The takeaway industry in South Africa has shown a faster recovery than the casual dining segment, which is still lagging the recovery curve. The health of our brands have ensured that we remain relevant and appealing to customers who have ventured back into our restaurants as soon as the COVID-19 lockdown trading recovery commenced. As a group, we have benefited from the improved market conditions, and increasing customer counts in our restaurants confirm that our customers are choosing to dine and celebrate with us. We currently trade in 15 countries, with the dominance on the continent of Africa. Our New Zealand store has closed post fiscal, and this allows us to minimize our risk further in the nonprofitable Australasia region. Globally, we trade with 631 restaurants, 547 in South Africa and the balance of 84 in international countries. By brand count, Spur remains the largest contributor followed by the Panarottis global store count who have a strong foothold internationally in countries such as Mauritius and Zambia. RocoMamas is our growth brand that is expanding annually in both South Africa and international markets now with 100 restaurants. Some highlights for South Africa's restaurant turnover. 547 restaurants have delivered a 30.5% increase on previous fiscal. Our foundation brand and a truly South African brand Spur represents 68% of total restaurant sales. Spur exceeded 2019 sales levels as did RocoMamas and The Hussar Grill. Panarottis and John Dory's have increased turnover on a slightly reduced footprint, which is indicative of the rationalization process as we refine and reposition these brands. John Dory's delivered a good result despite the negative impact of the KZN civil unrest at the start of the fiscal. 31% of John Dory's restaurants operate in KZN. Our current specialty portfolio, The Hussar Grill, Casa Bella and Nikos has a footprint of 36 restaurants and expansion plans in this segment will continue into fiscal '23. The Hussar Grill with its personalized and quality grill house experience has delivered an outstanding growth of 52% up on previous fiscal. Our core competency and market USP remains casual dining. However, our brands have continued to benefit from the core for convenience and our takeaway sales have grown by 30%. We have endeavored to promote Click & Collect in order to reduce our dependency on the high commission third-party aggregators. Collect, whether it is click call or walk in, represents 52% of the total takeaway segment, and the balance is delivered by Mr. D and Uber Eats. Mr. D hold the majority due to the larger footprint. Pizza and burgers remain the most popular takeaway items and RocoMamas and Panarottis takeaway contribution is significantly higher at 57% and 39%, respectively. The virtual kitchen brands launched during hard lockdown in 2020 are now entrenched in our brand offering as franchisees optimize their restaurant capacity to capitalize on the rapid growth of e-commerce. Over 50% of the group's restaurants are now participating in the VK offering. Responding to the chicken growth in South Africa in May this year, the Spur brand has successfully launched a new VK called, Just Wingz, an outstanding range of the best chicken wings in town. As of yesterday, we had 95 restaurants participating in the Just Wingz offering. Our strategy to dominate the breakfast category offering with an everyday value with a popular item of the Spur Unreal Breakfast at ZAR 44.90, we are pleased to announce a growth of 31% in the group's breakfast sales. Lunch remains the group's biggest daypart segment at 52% of sales. However, for Speciality Restaurants dinner is the largest segment at 68%. Average spend per head in specialty is also double that of the group's average spend per head. Our brands continue to lead the experience. Spur remains the leading destination in South Africa for birthday celebrations. At Spur, this past year, we celebrated 830,000 birthdays. We continue to offer a safe play area, supervised by trained, play canyon supervisors. The sensor tags for children's safety currently in over 60% of our restaurants has become a prerequisite. A 100% compliance is scheduled by early next year as a key differentiator. John Dory's quality sushi is prepared by trained sushi chefs, and our sushi belts creates an interactive experience for consumers. Sushi now represents 23% of John Dory's turnover. RocoMamas' new campaign, Find Your More, differentiates with the build-your-own menu concept, and an actuary commissioned by RocoMamas has confirmed that our ingredients present 134 million ways to build your own smash burger. [Presentation]

The testament to our brands leading the experience is the 1.7 million active family club members that frequent our restaurants. Our international growth strategy gained momentum and showed a strong recovery in the second half of the financial year when the COVID-19 restrictions were eased in some countries. Africa is our most lucrative segment, representing 67% of the international turnover, followed by Mauritius, representing 19% of turnover. Our top-performing countries this past year was Zambia, Zimbabwe, Namibia, Kenya and Nigeria. Panarottis has 33 restaurants internationally and the highest performing international Panarottis is Bagatelle Mauritius. 15 RocoMamas trade successfully in the international markets and many innovations are currently underway with new concepts for petroleum sites as well as new formats such as the RocoMamas Minitainer, a 2-ton, 20-foot container that is easy to transplant in Africa, with reduced setup costs and Minitainer design that complements the RocoMamas value proposition. This summary shows the post-COVID recovery. Previous fiscal ending June 2021, a 1% growth, and this reporting period ending June 2022 at a 28.2% growth. The like-on-like growth of 23.9% for the group shows formidable results for both South Africa operations and international. Our customized network development model, the R8 model, adopted in January last year, has allowed brands to focus on keeping restaurants up to date in the markets they trade. In fiscal '22, we opened 31 new restaurants and closed 24. Closures include restaurants in the international market they could not -- that could not sustain the COVID-19 impact, marginal restaurants in South Africa and a couple as a result of the civil unrest in KZN. The group revamped 59 restaurants globally. And in the forthcoming year, the plan is to revamp another 90 restaurants. We acknowledge our franchise partners for their investment, and our development teams and contractors who collaborate with us to keep our network up to date. Our commitment to attract black franchisees to our network continues, and we are pleased to report our black franchise owners increasing from 22% to 28% this fiscal. Some examples of the revamped rest brands shown here: Dakota Spur in Northgate, wherever the opportunity exists, we are resizing restaurants for improved profitability, whilst maintaining turnover levels. The Hussar Grill in Morningside, a company-owned restaurant, that is showing a 30% growth in turnover since it's revamped. Our most significant revamp this year was a Panarottis Vaal Mall. This store represents a new brand positioning and a new restaurant concept for Panarottis. This has always been a high-volume site. And since the revamp, it has shown a 40% growth in turnover. We thank our franchise partners, the [indiscernible] family, for their commitment to the new generation Panarottis. The new brand is contemporary and the store design is comfortable and inviting for the ideal pizza experience at the table. Our drive-thru strategy is gaining momentum. Just over a year ago, we launched the first drive-thru at Sacramento Spur Car and Park, Pretoria. The drive-thru is clipped on to an existing Spur restaurant. This combined performance at the site has produced a growth of 110%. Our first RocoMamas drive-thru or as we term it as smash-thru, opened in July in Kwena Square, Little Falls, and is exceeding expectations. Another RocoMamas drive-thru is built currently in Queenswood, Pretoria, and is due to open at the end of this month. Features of the RocoMamas drive-thru include the personalized Rockstar customer experience at the smash-thru window, a prominent rotating RocoMamas pylon and exterior art features created by local South African artists. I trust that this has provided you with a solid overview and understanding of our trading performance of the past year. I'll now call on Cristina to present the financial and segmental review. Cristina, over to you.

Thank you, Val. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. I'm pleased to be able to stand here before you this morning to present our results for the 2022 year as audited within 7 weeks of our financial year end. As shareholders are aware, the group appointed PwC as our new external auditors, and they have just completed their first year-end audit with us. I'm grateful thanks to the Spur Corp finance team and to the auditors in a timeliness completion of this order to be able to deliver to shareholders. And in addition, of course, we thank the operational teams and our valued franchise partners in being able to deliver such financial results. As we begin with the income statement, I think it's appropriate that I just bring to shareholders' attention the fact that we've incorporated 3 changes with regards to our application of the IFRS standards, which is accompanied with a restatement to prior year's results. I mentioned these in that, although the impact on prior year results is not material, and we'll go through it now, certainly, it does impact the income statement and shareholders' understanding of how those income statement is presented relative to prior periods. So we'll go through them quickly. The first restatement with 0 impact on retained earnings is a reclassification of restricted cash on our cash flow statement, with no impact, as I said. The second change is on how we account for marketing funds. The group now accounts for marketing funds received over a period of time as opposed to a point in time. The impact on opening retained earnings of this restatement amounted to ZAR 711,000. And lastly, the third restatement relates to the fact that the group has a commercial arrangement with an outsourced distributor to procure and provide services, goods and services to our network. After an evaluation of interrelated contracts, the group has determined that it has the performance obligation to deliver these goods and services, and that the outsource distributor provides the -- merely the service and is therefore an agent. Although this has only [ ZAR 1,970 ] or less than ZAR 2,000 impact on opening retained earnings for the prior period. It is relevant in that it has required a grocer of both sales and cost of sales in the prior year by ZAR 1.1 billion, although gross profit and earnings unchanged, as I said. But it does introduce a material shift in our revenue and cost of sales disclosure. In addition, we now account for inventory at year-end and a corresponding liability as an amount due to the outsourced distributor. But let's maybe go through the income statement. Income statement. As Val mentioned, the restaurant sales increased year-on-year by 28.2% for the group. That has translated into an overall 32.5% increase on revenue. For clarity, we've included the 3 major categories of revenue to allow shareholders to have the transparency in terms of the change in our adoption of standards. The first line item, really the business of franchising, including our company-owned activities, generated 36% increase, our marketing-related activities, 21%, and then the sales element of the outsourced distributor sales introducing 32.8%, which then is a blended 32.5%. This translates into operating profit before net finance income at ZAR 209 million, which is a 44.8% increase year-on-year. Net finance income appears low at only ZAR 700,000. To note, that it includes, interest income received on cash balances of ZAR 12.7 million, which is higher than that of the prior year of ZAR 7.5 million, and is as a result of increased cash balances on hand as well as improved interest rates. That has been offset by a ZAR 12.6 million interest charge, which is made up of ZAR 4 million relating to interest on lease liabilities brought on for right-of-use assets as well as ZAR 8 million of a larger ZAR 22 million that we have disclosed to shareholders before relating to a charge put through the income statement for the current year following the Supreme Court's judgment against the group regarding the recoverability of a gross ZAR 22 million asset that we had on our balance sheet on our share option matter with the receiver revenue. So ZAR 8 million impacted the interest line and ZAR 14 million impacted the tax line. And therefore, the net gross income of ZAR 12.7 million offset by the ZAR 12.6 million, leaving really a minimal amount of net finance income on the income statement. The effective tax rate is 38.8%. And as just mentioned, includes ZAR 14 million, relating to the impairment of the capital portion of our tax matter where we had a ruling against us, of which cash flow was paid out in prior years, but did have an earnings impact for the current year. Excluding that, the tax rate would be 30% -- 30.9%, resulting in an EPS increase of 30.9%, closing at ZAR 0.144 per share. If we unpack now the segmental -- the income segment into its segmental overview, this segmental looking slightly different to one that shareholders would be accustomed to because of the incorporation of the outsourced distributor sales, as mentioned earlier. On the second numerical column from the left, you'll see at the bottom, the increase in revenue, as Val mentioned and as I mentioned, of 32.5% year-on-year. As we can see on the left column, numerically, South Africa contributes 98% of the group's revenue. It does, however, now contribute 94% of the group's profit, with an improved international performance for the year. Looking right up at the top, franchise business delivered or contributes 14% of group revenue. But it is important to note that it is still the most material profit generator of the group, generating ZAR 260 million in the year. And the most material brand supporting the franchise revenue and profitability being Spur, Spur generated ZAR 195 million profit being 75% of our franchise operations. It's then supported strongly by the next largest brand, RocoMamas, which contributed 11% of profit. The next segment that contributes materially to our profitability is our manufacturing and distribution business, which delivered ZAR 74 million worth of profit. And our international business this year, providing a net ZAR 12 million increase -- ZAR 12 million profit for the year. We'll unpack the segments now and look at their margins. This first slide depicts the total of South Africa franchising quite neatly aligned with Spur, as mentioned, being the most material contributor to the South African franchise. What is depicted is the last 4 halves so that we, as shareholders and as management, can track the performance. You'll see the trajectory from the first half of our financial year to the second. The Spur business delivered an additional ZAR 14 million revenue period-on-period, and that has translated on the right-hand side directly into profit. So that shows a well-controlled cost base from our Spur business, and has enhanced margin to 84% in the prior period ending December 2021, the Spur brand delivered 82% margin. And importantly to know that they've done that with a largely unchanged store base. During the period, for the year, the Spur brand opened up 5 stores and closed 4. So it was a net 1 increase, and they've been able to show improved revenue and profitability and margin. As mentioned, 69.6% of franchise revenue, but a healthy 75% of the franchise profit. The next slide depicts our remaining franchise businesses all in 1 slide. You can see the 4 different segments indicated. Pleasingly, each 1 of the brands has had an improved second half over that of the first half. And pleasingly, that has largely translated into profitability, again, showing a controlled cost base. Notably, if we look on the right-hand side and we look at the specialty brands, we delivered ZAR 7 million profit in the second half of the year, their margins are now 71% and the prior period was 58%. So certainly a good focus on cost management as well as translating revenue trade into profitability. And the segment as a whole delivered ZAR 65 million of the ZAR 260 million profit for franchising. When we look at our company-owned stores, you see the improved performance on the right-hand -- on the left-hand side -- pardon, regards revenue. And then on the right-hand side, a slightly more complicated graph, the black indicates our reported results. The blue, we have adjusted for some impacts in the company-owned stores for better transparency for our shareholders. In the second half of the last financial year, as you will remember, shareholders were reported ZAR 13.6 million profit. That included a ZAR 14.8 million proceeds or at least a profit relating to business interruption plans linked to COVID. If we strip out that [ ZAR 14.8 million ] claim, we reported actually a loss of ZAR 1.2 million in the second half of last financial year. Similarly, what we have done is, we have stripped out the impact of our pilots or concept, proof-of-concept store, Modrockers, so that you are able to see the impact of the underlying company stores trade relative to that of -- once it's included with the pilot store. And for the second half of this financial year, our company-owned stores, excluding Modrockers has delivered ZAR 1.2 million profit. Manufacturing and distribution, as shareholders are aware, is made up of 3 main activities: firstly, our central kitchens, which manufactures sources for the use of our network at restaurants and in table. Our retail sources, which is manufactured -- and well, manufactured for supply into retail stores and then the food being the procurement and supply of items, which includes by our outsourced distributor. At [ KBC ], due to the improved trading in our network, we can see an increased revenue as well as profitability coming through for this segment because the profitability is obviously driven by the extent of restaurant sales and the supply we can make into restaurants of both procured goods and services as well as sources. Our marketing funds, we provide the disclosure, which is evident in our segmental report. Revenue of ZAR 200 million, now are based on an accounting for over a period of time as opposed to a point in time. And what is notable to note is that in the prior year, we recorded a profit of ZAR 23 million in our earnings and in the current year, a profit of ZAR 2.4 million, which will be important to note when we do our comparable profit analysis. Unpacking a little bit of shared services and other, on the left-hand side, the revenue number that sits in other ZAR 36 million, is largely and nearly equally split between revenue generated from our export business as we export item into the Rest of Africa as well as our [ core ] business as the number of stores are being revamped and new stores being opened. The operating loss that comes through is largely due to an under-recovery from our trading department. On the right-hand side, we provide a further breakout of our shared services business or the corporate costs. As can be seen, the operating loss for the period is ZAR 132 million as compared to the prior period of ZAR 99 million. We unpacked that further to indicate that there were some one-off line items in 2022 as well as an increased marketing fund income of ZAR 14 million such that when we look at the shared loss item, we're actually reporting a shared overhead of ZAR 150 million as opposed to ZAR 121 million. The items that we include is the interest on our sales dispute, as mentioned earlier, the ZAR 8 million. We had smaller adjustments. And as mentioned, we have interest income coming through of ZAR 11.8 million and shed overheads of ZAR 150 million. We have a further breakdown of our ZAR 150 million in comparison to the ZAR 121 million of last year on the next slide. As we unpack the shared overheads included within the ZAR 150 million, are the line items that are listed. I'll focus only on the material line items. The first 1 being that shareholders are aware that we have an asset recoverable on our balance sheet relating to the Nikos purchase consideration. In the prior year, the balance sheet recorded ZAR 4 million, and that has now been reduced to ZAR 1.6 million. The impact of that adjustment is the ZAR 2.4 million charge to the income statement. Further down, in our overheads, we disclose ZAR 1 million that we are utilizing as a group to contribute to John Dory's to amplify their marketing and brand exposure activities. In addition, we provide for some legal costs of ZAR 1.5 million, which means that our comparable shared overhead is ZAR 144 million versus ZAR 109 million, representing a 31% increase, mainly as a result of employees included in our headcount for a full year as opposed to a portion of last year, new employees added in our shared services environment or corporate office as well as a slight increase in IT costs and consulting costs. But with a detailed per department for those comparable shared overheads available in an appendix presented to shareholders. Our International segment, you can see improved trading as well mentioned, on store sales as well as on revenue, and a pleasing profitability increase in the second half, delivering ZAR 7 million of the ZAR 12 million net profit in the second half. As we mentioned, there were 8 stores opened in the period, 9 closed. So the stores did end with 1 store less than the beginning of the financial year. And Australia now trades with 2 stores, 1 Spur and 1 RocoMamas, and New Zealand with Spur, and as Val mentioned, that still has not closed post financial year-end. Comparable profit analysis, which I think is an important schedule for stakeholders and shareholders often ask us about it. The top line item, the line that is reported. And shareholders are not familiar with that ZAR 209 million profit before income tax, representing a 41.9% increase. Once we strip out the marketing funds and just due to the fact that those marketing funds are restricted for marketing activities only and not for the benefit of the group, we then reflect a 66.4% increase year-on-year due to the material impact of a surplus included in the prior year. We adjust for a number of line items in order to provide comparable profitability. Without going through all of them, the 1 we haven't mentioned yet is IFRS 9, which is our ECL adjustment, ZAR 2.5 million, largely related to provisioning related to our Saudi operations, and debt that is due from Saudi. We've spoken about the interest on legal cost, the marketing contribution and Nikos, and therefore, that allows our comparable profit to be reported at ZAR 223 million, which is a 74.9% increase year-on-year, and is reflective of what we believe is the underlying performance and something we are pleased to be able to report. Looking at the balance sheet, a largely unchanged balance sheet other than I suppose the inventories and liabilities due to the consolidation of those assets and liabilities, as mentioned earlier. Property, plant and equipment, ZAR 92 million; ZAR 78 million land and buildings and leasehold improvements; ZAR 8 million associated with plant and equipment, no material changes. Right-of-use assets largely as a result of motor vehicles as well as property that we rent that from an accounting perspective in terms of IFRS 16, need to be brought on balance sheet with a corresponding liability sitting at a noncurrent and current liabilities. Intangible assets largely unchanged as well. ZAR 289 million of the ZAR 364 million represents our trademarks and IP, and ZAR 230 million of that relates to Spur; Spur being the biggest brand and having the largest intangible associated on the balance sheet. The goodwill element to ZAR 71 million and largely associated to the RocoMamas brand. Noncurrent assets at ZAR 4.9 million is deferred tax temporary differences relating to contract liabilities. Our inventories of ZAR 97 million include a figure of ZAR 85 million being the asset force onto our balance sheet as at year-end relating to the stock procured via the outsource distributor. Our trade and receivables increasing, in line with improved operating conditions and trading conditions. Pleasing to be able to reflect a cash and cash equivalent of ZAR 290 million, which will unpack -- we will unpack under the cash flow statement. Contract liabilities of ZAR 23 million and long term as well as the short-term provision of ZAR 56 million include the liability due to the outsourced partner associated -- sorry, let me be more correct. The contract liabilities include a marketing -- a deferred marketing fund income as well as deferred license fee amortization. Our lease liabilities associated with the right-of-use assets and our other noncurrent liabilities, mainly temporary differences on deferred tax associated with intangibles. If I move on to the cash flow statement, you'll see an operating profit of ZAR 305 million. Profit before tax ZAR 209 million, major items adjustment between [ that ] and operating profit for cash flow is depreciation of ZAR 19 million and then an increase in contract liabilities of ZAR 45 million and an increase in accruals and bonuses and employee benefits of ZAR 25 million. Working capital changes are flat, unchanged, and we can see the breakdown. Trade and other payables increased by ZAR 32 million as a result of an increase in the liability due to Atlas Partner and inventories reflecting that ZAR 85 million addition to the balance sheet mentioned earlier. Our final slide on the cash flow indicates taxation paid of ZAR 75 million, materially through Spur Group, the South African entity as well as our RocoMamas entity. Our dividends paid is made up of the payment of the accrued dividend from prior years of ZAR 66 million as well as the interim dividend of a net ZAR 44 million that was paid on earlier in the year. Our cash flow from investing activities of ZAR 5.4 million net includes some acquisition in PPE of ZAR 7 million. And then our cash flow from financing activities of ZAR 38 million is made up of ZAR 8 million repayment of lease liabilities and then a ZAR 29.7 million spent on acquisition of group shares. The group acquired 1.475 million shares pre year-end at an average share price of ZAR 20.16 and that translated interest spend of just under ZAR 30 million cash. Subsequent to year end, and if were not reflected in these numbers, the group has purchased an additional 575,000 shares for about ZAR 12 million. That's investing about ZAR 42 million in share buybacks. That allows our cash balances to close at the end of the year at an unrestricted cash balance level of ZAR 290.7 million. I'll now hand over to Val to continue our presentation on the way forward.

Thank you, Cristina. Our business model continues to provide the direction for the company, centered around brands leading the experience, all focused around 1 purpose, leading for the greater good. Our journey continues and our commitment to transformation and innovation this year will be amplified. Our transformation milestones include an investment of ZAR 3 million plus in fiscal '22 on learning and development and an increased spend planned in fiscal '23. This year, we have partnered with UCT to launch our Rising Leaders Academy, where 17 of our emerging leaders are participating in a 6-month leadership program at UCT. 67%of our rising leaders are black candidates and 41% are female. In addition to the UCT program, an internal leadership program IGNITES has been developed for middle managers, where 24 delegates are participating, 87% are black and [ 37% ] are female. Both these development initiatives are key enablers for our talent pipeline and succession planning. Annually Spur Corp employees' children are offered bursaries and currently 52 school children are sponsored by Spur Corp. This bursary commitment is for the balance of their school lives. Since inception in 2012, Spur Foundation continues to add value to early development centers and the Full Tummy Fund now feeds 1,120 children every school day. Our franchise partners globally continue to support ESG initiatives. 95% of our restaurants have generators and some restaurants, if located in suitable locations, are investing in solar systems to reduce operating cost and guarantee sustainability. Our Wild Eagle Spur invested just over ZAR 1 million to convert their parking shade covers to solar panels. In Lusaka, Zambia, Panarottis installed a borehole in the Kanyama district, where access to water was limited. The joy on that day was abounding as community members celebrated the arrival of water in the community. Our recognition program for environmental and sustainable projects, the Green Feather Award, is awarded to franchisees that have demonstrated a commitment to sustainability and who operate within the environmental boundaries. These initiatives vary from energy and water saving, waste management, et cetera. We thank our franchise partners and Spur Corp teams that believe in building healthy communities with clean air, natural resources and nontoxic environments. Our commitment and journey continues. Spur Corporation has participated in enterprise development, and this journey has commenced and is expanding. Eight small entrepreneurial businesses were supported by Spur Corp, which range from fresh vegetables, chicken, meat and clothing. Andile Matukane is shown in the photograph, attending to an urban farm at the rooftop of the Menlynpark shopping center and duly supplies our restaurants there with fresh vegetables. Whilst the country is facing severe headwinds and consumer disposable income is being eroded by higher fuel, electricity and fruit costs and rising interest rates, we are optimistic that the market conditions, should they remain stable, growth prospects will be a reality. Our fiscal '23 year has commenced with what we have termed Christmas in July, having achieved customer count numbers and restaurant sales in July very close to the December season of last year. Our plan for fiscal '23 is to open 32 restaurants locally and 9 restaurants internationally. Euromonitor estimates that the annual compound growth rate of the limited service category in South Africa is projected to grow by 8.6% from this year to 2026. This offers us hope for a positive outlook of the future as we begin to leverage this expected growth. A summary of our strategic focus is now visible to you, and you can see our deliverables that we have planned per brand. For specialty brands, a directive to expand the portfolio of these really unique and specialty dining experiences. John Dory's, who carries a quality seafood feast and a quality sushi, the need is to reposition the brand in the consumer's mind. Panarottis has rolled out with its new brand positioning and new restaurant concept, and that will continue. I think we've got 12 Panarottis lined up for the new revamp already. RocoMamas is to continue reinforcing the leadership position through a robust growth strategy and increased market awareness. Just to point out at this stage that the RocoMamas' advertising fee has increased from 2% to 3%, with great support from our network, and this investment will go into additional marketing for the brand that now has a bigger footprint. And finally, Spur, a very powerful brand. Our need is to keep the lead and to launch the new generation Spur as we move into the future. On the horizon -- on the vertical bench, you can see 6 key strategic areas that we're going to be focusing on this year. The first one, broaden our customer base, and there are a lot of initiatives under that. But as Spur represented the first dine-in place that welcomed the mainstream South African consumer, it is our intention to continue to be that to the future generation. So we have a robust strategy to see how we're going to bring in more customers who are welcome in our restaurants. We will continue to build leadership capability as outlined earlier. We've embarked on a new reinvention mindset. A reinvention academy called Ignite 67 has been launched. It will fall under the leadership of marketing headed up by Vuyo Henda. We're very excited about that. We've always been about innovation, but this is truly about reinvention. So we're building a reinvention mindset in the organization. We will continue to amplify the supply chain to improve profitability. The increased food prices are demanding that we really look at our business model around the supply chain in order for us to ensure franchisee profitability, but also to transfer some of that benefit to the consumer. Drive our R8 development model globally, as was outlined earlier, and our commitment to transformation and technology will continue. So that brings us to the end of the fiscal '22 financial results. On behalf of our Board of executives, I thank you for your time and your investment in our business. And I wish our teams and our franchise network all the great success with fiscal '23. We have great hope that we will be filled with growth. Thank you. I'll now open up over the session for any questions and answers, and I'll ask Cristina to join me up front. Thank you.

The first question is for Cristina, and it's from Cobus Cilliers at All Weather Capital. Cobus says, well done on a good set of results. The comparable profit before tax of ZAR 223 million and the adjusted headline earnings of ZAR 145.7 million on Slide 53 gives an effective tax rate of 34.7%. Going forward, what effective tax rate range should analysts be looking at [ using it ]?

Thank you for that question. It's a very good question. We would guide to a percentage of around 30%. I mean it's obviously -- it's just a blend between the African tax rates that we have, and so, therefore, the contribution of Africa through to South Africa. But with the South African tax rate of 28%, 27%, I would guide to a percentage of 30% because there is always withholding tax that gets deducted from the different South African authorities, which we can't always use, and therefore, that impacts our tax charge. So I would guide for 30%.

Then a follow-up question from Cobus. On your VK strategy, can you please elaborate a bit on how restaurants participate in this and how the franchise fee and marketing fee split works for these VKs?

Okay. Thank you, Cobus. The VK brands are merely an extension of our menu offering. So it falls under the existing franchise agreement with all the rules that are applicable in the franchise agreement, and they operated within their restaurants capitalizing on capacity and space and they deliver it through the third-party aggregators. I hope that answers the question.

And then another question from Cobus on the share repurchase program. He says, given that these shares were held by a company that is wholly owned by Spur, I assume this repurchase will not impact the weighted average number of shares for the 2023 financial year.

So the -- it's how the treasury shares and we've seen as an uplift to our earnings per share calculation effectively.

Thank you. There is a question from Kristen Collins at Excelsia Capital. How much of the input costs have you been able to pass on to the consumer? What have your menu price increase has been? And what has the impact been on volumes?

So with any menu price adjustment, we obviously do look at all the individual product cost pricing. Unfortunately, you can never pass that all on to the consumer. So what we endeavor to do with all our menu development is try and maintain our everyday value items and try and increase the higher ticket items or the items that are more unique to our offering. So our menu price increases in the past fiscal was around 2.6% the first half and around 3.5%, 3.8% in the second half and we do envisage a slightly higher increase for the second period.

Well, then there's a question from Zaid Paruk from Aeon Investment Management. Well done on the good results. Could you perhaps expand on the split of future CapEx plans, seeing as you have significant cash on your balance sheet post the dividend payment and a more normalized trading environment. Will the special dividend be considered in the absence of new opportunities?