United Parks & Resorts - Q1 2023

Transcript

Operator (participant)

Hello, and welcome to SeaWorld's first quarter 2023 earnings conference call. All participants will be in listen only mode. Should you need assistance, please signal a conference specialist by pressing the star key followed by zero. After today's presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. To ask a question, you may press star then one on your telephone keypad. To withdraw from the question queue, please press star then two. Please note this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Matthew Stroud, Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Matthew Stroud (VP of Investor Relations)

Thank you, and good morning, everyone. Welcome to SeaWorld's first quarter 2023 earnings conference call. Today's call is being webcast and recorded. A press release was issued this morning and is available on our investor relations website at www.seaworldinvestors.com. Replay information for this call can be found in the press release and will be available on our website following the call. Joining me this morning are Marc Swanson, Chief Executive Officer, and Jim Forrester, Interim Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer. This morning, we will review our first quarter financial results, and then we will open the call up to your questions. Before we begin, I would like to remind everyone that our comments today will contain forward-looking statements within the meaning of the federal securities laws.

These statements are subject to a number of risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to be materially different from those forward-looking statements, including those identified in the Risk Factors section of our annual report on Form 10-K and quarterly reports on Form 10-Q filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. These risk factors may be updated from time to time and will be included in our filings with the SEC that are available on our website. We undertake no obligation to update any forward-looking statements.

In addition, on the call, we may reference non-GAAP financial measures and other financial metrics such as Adjusted EBITDA and Free Cash Flow. More information regarding our forward-looking statements and reconciliations of non-GAAP measures to the most comparable GAAP measure is included in our earnings release available on our website and can also be found in our filings with the SEC. I would like to turn the call over to our Chief Executive Officer, Marc Swanson. Marc?

Marc Swanson (CEO)

Thank you, Matthew. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us. We're pleased to report another quarter of record financial results despite adverse weather across a number of our markets, particularly in our California market, and a shift in the timing of the opening of our new rides. In the first quarter of 2022, we had seven of our 10 new rides and attractions opened, while this year in the first quarter, we only had two out of our 11 new rides and attractions open. This marks our eighth consecutive quarter where we have generated record financial results. I want to thank our ambassadors for their ongoing efforts as we prepare for what we anticipate will be another busy summer season.

We continue to drive growth in total per capita spending in the quarter, demonstrating the effectiveness of our revenue strategies, our pricing power, and the strength of consumer spending in our parks. Looking ahead, we are very encouraged by our group booking trends, which are running well ahead of 2022, and we are really excited about our 2023 lineup of new rides, attractions, and events, several of which are some of the most anticipated rides of 2023 and looking forward to most of them opening in the coming weeks. On the international front, we are also thrilled for the opening of the fourth SeaWorld park and the first SeaWorld branded park outside of the United States in Abu Dhabi on May 23, 2023.

We are very proud of this project along with our partners in Abu Dhabi, are excited about introducing a new region of the world to the wonders of SeaWorld and introducing a next generation SeaWorld park, the first new SeaWorld branded park built in 35 years. SeaWorld Abu Dhabi is a custom-built, approximately 183,000 sq meters, almost entirely indoor park that will feature over 100,000 marine animals, the world's largest multi-species aquarium, and eight different realms that showcase the complexity, interconnectivity, and beauty of life under the sea. I spent some time visiting this park last month, I could not have been more impressed by the facility, the staff, and of course, the animals and attractions on display. It's really a one-of-a-kind world-class venue, we are excited to see this open.

As a reminder, this is a licensing arrangement with our partner in Abu Dhabi, and we will share more information once the park is operating. For 2023, the company has a truly exciting lineup of new rides, attractions, events, and upgrades, including four of the most anticipated roller coasters of 2023, according to USA Today. In February, Busch Gardens Tampa Bay opened the Serengeti Flyer, the world's tallest and fastest screaming swing that takes riders up to 135 feet at speeds reaching 68 mi per hour. In March, Aquatica San Antonio opened Kata's Kookaburra Cove, a newly expanded and upgraded 3,000 sq ft area with multiple unique water play elements, water spouts, all new private cabanas, and a fully themed splash pad in multi-shade, multiple shade structures.

This month, SeaWorld Orlando will open Pipeline, the surf coaster, the first of its kind surf coaster with seats in a surfing position that rise and fall to mimic the sensation of riding a wave. The coaster will accelerate riders to 60 mi per hour through five airtime moments and an innovative wave curl inversion. Busch Gardens Williamsburg will open DarKoaster, the first all-indoor straddle coaster in North America, where riders experience four launches at speeds up to 36 mi per hour through over 2,400 feet of track.

Aquatica Orlando will open Turi's Kid Cove, an all-new water play area will featuring watering palms, tipping buckets, spraying jets, water bobbles, and more. Sesame Place Philadelphia will open Bert and Ernie's Splashy Shores, a water play area featuring water umbrellas, tipping buckets, spraying jets, water bobbles, and a spraying water tower.

Later this spring and summer, SeaWorld San Diego will open Arctic Rescue, the fastest and longest straddle coaster on the West Coast that takes riders through three launches at speeds up to 40 mi per hour. Water Country USA will open Riptide Race, the first dueling pipeline slide in Virginia. Sesame Place San Diego will open The Count's Splash Castle, an enhanced water play area and expanded play structure, which features three tipping buckets, four water slides, and over 100 other water play elements. Finally, we anticipate that SeaWorld San Antonio will open Catapult Falls, the world's first launched flume coaster, features the world's steepest flume drop. North America's only flume with a vertical lift and the tallest flume drop in Texas. Now, let me give a brief update on some of our strategic initiatives.

First, our cost and efficiency-related work with our dedicated internal team and specialized outside consultants is progressing well, and we are on pace to deliver at the high end of our cost savings target of $30 million-$50 million. The team continues to find ways for us to source and organize more efficiently, replace labor with capital and technology, and eliminate unnecessary and/or redundant expenses.

Second, on the digital transformation front, we continue to build out our CRM capabilities, which are still in their infancy, and roll out and improve our mobile app. On CRM, we really see upside opportunities from us ultimately having more rich data about our pass members and guests and being able to more effectively engage, analyze behavior, and tailor messages and offerings. On the mobile app, we are excited about our performance today.

Our recently rolled out app, which is being used by an increasing number of guests in our parks and has been downloaded more than 5 million times. As of the end of April, the number of active users is up over 20% compared to prior year, and the total revenue generated on the app is up over 200% compared to prior year. Mobile ordering has been expanded to additional restaurants and is now operating at approximately 70% of our target restaurants. Mobile orders have had a 26% higher average order volume compared to non-mobile orders. While we are happy with these early results, we see additional upside from continuing to improve the app experience and functionality and to continue to expand mobile ordering capability across our portfolio.

We are excited about the potential of the app and its ability to improve the in-park guest experience, drive increases in revenue and decreases in costs. Third, as you know, we have strategically increased our park-specific ROI investments this year in an effort to drive incremental revenue and/or decrease costs through expanding, enhancing, and improving our food and beverage and retail offering, park infrastructure and aesthetics, and generally improving the guest experience and journey around our parks and facilities. Many of the new, improved, and/or enhanced venues will be opening as we move into the summer season, and others will be opening over the course of the rest of the year. We are really excited for our guests to experience these new venues and improvements and to begin to see the benefits of these important investments.

Fourth, on the international front, as I have already discussed, we are thrilled with the coming opening of SeaWorld Abu Dhabi and continue to make good progress on discussions related to other international opportunities and expect to have more to share in coming quarters. Fifth, on the hotel front, we also continue to make progress with our plans that we discussed last quarter, and as we communicated last quarter, expect to have our first hotel open in 2025, followed by our second hotel in 2026. We are working on design and planning for those two hotels and on-site selection for additional hotels across our park portfolio. We very much look forward to sharing more specifics in future quarters on what we expect to be really exciting and value-creating projects.

I'm very excited about the significant investments we are making and the many initiatives we have underway across our business that we expect will improve the guest experience, allow us to generate more revenue, and make us a more efficient and more profitable enterprise. We are building an even stronger and more resilient business that we are confident will deliver improved operational and financial results and meaningful increases in shareholder value. Let me briefly comment on our balance sheet, which continues to be strong. Our March 31, 2023 net total leverage ratio is 2.7x, and we had approximately $426.4 million of total available liquidity, including $54.8 million of cash on the balance sheet in advance of us starting our summer season, where we generate the majority of our cash flow.

This strong balance sheet gives us flexibility to continue to invest in and grow our business and to opportunistically allocate capital with the goal to maximize long-term value for shareholders. Despite the uncertain times that we are living in, our financial position is strong. Our business is resilient. Our first quarter results, along with the coming opening of our ride, attraction, and event lineup, the opening of new and improved venues and other park upgrades and enhancements, and all of the initiatives that we have underway give us high confidence in our ability to continue to deliver meaningful growth and new records in revenue and Adjusted EBITDA for 2023. With that, Jim will discuss our financial results in more detail. Jim?

Jim Forrester (Interim CFO and Treasurer)

Thank you, Marc. Good morning, everyone. It's good to be back with you for another quarter. During the first quarter, we generated record total revenue of $293.3 million, an increase of $22.7 million or 8.4% when compared to the first quarter of 2022. The increase in revenue is due to an increase in total revenue per capita of 9.2%, partially offset by a decrease in attendance of 0.7%. The decrease in attendance was primarily due to adverse weather across a number of our markets, particularly at our California parks, including during peak visitation periods. Attendance was also likely impacted unfavorably by the timing of new ride and attraction openings in 2023 compared to 2022.

Our pricing and product strategies continued to drive higher realized pricing, resulting in record total revenue per capita in the quarter of $86.84 compared to $79.54 in the first quarter of 2022. This increase was driven by improvements in both admissions per capita and in-park per capita spending. Admissions per capita increased by 9.4% to a record $48.51, and in-park per capita spending increased by 8.9% to a record $38.33 in the first quarter of 2023 compared to the first quarter of 2022.

The increase in admissions per capita was primarily due to the realization of higher prices in our admissions projects and products resulting from our strategic pricing efforts, along with the net impact of the admissions product mix when compared to the prior year quarter. In-park per capita spending improved primarily due to an increase in revenue related to the company's international services agreements, along with the impact of pricing initiatives when compared to the first quarter of 2022. Operating expenses increased $19.7 million or 12.9% when compared to the first quarter of 2022.

The increase in operating expenses is primarily due to an increase in costs associated with our international services agreements, increased labor-related costs due to more optimal staffing, and an increase in legal costs, including approximately $3.5 million related to the previously disclosed temporary COVID-19 park closures, partially offset by structural cost savings initiatives when compared to the first quarter of 2022. Selling, general, and administrative expenses increased $2.2 million or 4.8% compared to the first quarter of 2022. The increase in Selling, General, and Administrative expenses is primarily due to a $3.6 million increase in third-party consulting costs, including one-time costs of $1.7 million, partially offset by decreased marketing-related costs along with the impact of cost savings and efficiency initiatives.

We generated net loss of $16.5 million for the first quarter, the second lowest ever for the first quarter, compared to a net loss of $9 million in the first quarter of 2022. We generated record Adjusted EBITDA of $72.4 million, an increase of $6.5 million when compared to the first quarter of 2022. The improvement in Adjusted EBITDA for the first quarter of 2023 was primarily driven by an increase in total revenue per capita, partially offset by an increase in expenses when compared to the first quarter of 2022. Turning to our balance sheet. Our current deferred revenue balance as of the end of the first quarter was $212.8 million, an increase of approximately 2.3% when compared to March of 2022.

At the end of April 2023, our pass base, which includes all pass products accounting Premium, Fun Card, Teacher, and Preschool, was at near record levels for this time of year and down only approximately 1% compared to April 2022. We feel well-positioned with the current status of our pass base with most of our new rides and attractions opening in the coming weeks and the peak advertising and selling season approaching. We are also quite pleased that we continue to realize double-digit price increases on our pass products compared to prior year. Marc Swanson mentioned we have a very strong balance sheet position.

As of March 31, 2023, our total available liquidity was $426.4 million, including $54.8 million of cash and cash equivalents on our balance sheet, and $371.6 million available on our revolving credit facility. Cash flow from operations was $50.3 million for the first quarter of 2023. We spent $69.8 million on CapEx in the first quarter of 2023, of which approximately $56.3 million was on core CapEx and approximately $13.5 million was on expansion and/or ROI projects. For 2023, as our investment estimates have been refined and completion timelines solidified, we expect to spend approximately $160 million-$175 million on core CapEx.

We plan to spend between $90 million and $100 million of CapEx on high conviction growth and ROI projects. In total, we still expect to spend approximately $250 million-$275 million in CapEx for 2023. We're excited about our ability to make these high-confidence ROI investments and sincerely look forward to the benefits and returns from these investments flowing through to our financial results. Now let me turn the call back over to Marc, who will share some final thoughts. Marc?

Marc Swanson (CEO)

Thank you, Jim. Before we open the call to your questions, I have some closing comments. In the first quarter of 2023, we came to the aid of 85 animals in need. Over our history, we have helped over 40,000 animals, including bottlenose dolphins, manatees, sea lions, seals, sea turtles, sharks, birds, and more. I'm really proud of the team's hard work and their continued dedication to these important rescue efforts. I want to thank them and all our ambassadors for all they do to operate our parks. I want to call out some recent awards received for some of our parks, which underscore the quality of our assets and the enthusiasm for our parks and experiences. USA Today readers once again voted Aquatica Orlando as the best outdoor water park in the United States.

They voted the Mako roller coaster at SeaWorld Orlando as the best roller coaster in the United States. They voted Tidal Surge at SeaWorld San Antonio as the best non-roller coaster ride. They voted Celtic Fyre, live Irish step dancing at Busch Gardens Williamsburg, as the best theme park entertainment. Additionally, SeaWorld Orlando, Busch Gardens Tampa Bay, and Busch Gardens Williamsburg all placed in the top 10 for best theme parks in the United States. The Iron Gwazi roller coaster at Busch Gardens Tampa Bay and the Emperor roller coaster at SeaWorld San Diego also placed in the top 10 for best roller coasters in the United States, while Water Country USA in Williamsburg and Adventure Island in Tampa also placed in the top 10 for best outdoor water parks in the United States.

We are very proud that our parks are receiving this kind of recognition from readers of USA Today. We are certainly excited about 2023 with an exciting lineup of new rides, attractions, events, and new and improved in-park venues and offerings, some of them opening in the coming weeks ahead as we start the busy summer season. We continue to believe there are significant additional opportunities to improve our execution, take advantage of clear growth opportunities, and continue to drive meaningful long-term growth in both revenue and Adjusted EBITDA. We continue to have high confidence in our long-term strategy and in our ability to deliver significantly improved operating and financial results that we expect will lead to meaningfully increased value for stakeholders. Now let's take your questions.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. We will now begin the question-and-answer session. To ask a question, you may press star then one on your telephone keypad. If you're using a speakerphone, please pick up your handset before pressing the keys. In the interest of time today, please limit yourself to one question and one follow-up. You may reenter the queue with any additional follow-up questions. To withdraw from the question queue, please press star then two. At this time, we will pause momentarily to assemble our roster. Today's first question comes from Steve Wieczynski with Stifel. Please go ahead.

Steve Wieczynski (Managing Director and Senior Equity Analyst)

Yeah. Hey, good morning, guys. Marc, real quick, just first a housekeeping question. Any idea in terms of the weather impact that you guys might have seen from an attendance standpoint? I don't know if there's any way you can kinda help us think about that or quantify that.

Marc Swanson (CEO)

Yeah. Hey, Steve. I can help you with that. Obviously, you know, the biggest impact was in California, I think you've heard our competitors talk about that as well. You know, that was over 100,000 in attendance lost alone just in California. Then we have other markets, notably Texas and Virginia, where we had some declines in weather. You know, in fairness, we had a little bit better weather in a few spots. When you net it all out, you know, it basically took us from, you know, being down 1% with the weather to probably up, you know, low single-digit %, if you didn't have the weather impact.

Steve Wieczynski (Managing Director and Senior Equity Analyst)

Okay, that's perfect. Thanks for that, Marc. Second question, obviously, you had SeaWorld Abu Dhabi opening up in, what? A couple of weeks here. We're starting to get a lot of questions, you know, from investors about what this could look like from a, you know, from a return perspective. And just wondering if you could kind of help us and investors, you know, understand the flow through here and how this is gonna look in terms of the impact on the income statement, what the potential impact, you know, it could have, and maybe what the ramp is gonna look like. And look, maybe you guys aren't even sure yet, given the park hasn't opened. You know, just, you know, trying to get an understanding of how you're thinking about the financial impact of, you know, this new asset?

Marc Swanson (CEO)

We're really excited, obviously about the park, as I mentioned, opening here later this month. It is a licensing agreement, and so we would share, obviously in some of the revenue and then a percent of the Adjusted EBITDA. You know, I would say it's a little early, you know, the park's not open right now, as you mentioned, but, you know, I think you can expect that's gonna likely deliver, you know, single-digit millions this year and ramp accordingly on the go forward basis, obviously, depending on how popular the park is.

We think it's a great park. I'm very excited for it. I think over the longer term, you know, certainly can expand from there. I think what you can expect us to do is as it gets opened and operating, we can provide, you know, some updates and some more details going forward, but certainly very excited about it.

Steve Wieczynski (Managing Director and Senior Equity Analyst)

The impact this year, you said kind of, you know, mid to upper single digit from an EBITDA perspective, and then going forward it should be, you know, higher than that?

Marc Swanson (CEO)

Yeah. Again, a little early to tell. I'd probably model more in the, you know, maybe the low to mid, you know, for this year. Just hard to know until we get it open.

Steve Wieczynski (Managing Director and Senior Equity Analyst)

Low-

Matthew Stroud (VP of Investor Relations)

The next question.

Marc Swanson (CEO)

Sorry. Low to mid-millions. Sorry.

Operator (participant)

The next question comes from Mike Swartz with Truist Securities. Please go ahead.

Mike Swartz (Director of Equity Research)

Hey, good morning, guys. just maybe clarification question on deferred revenue and your season pass base. I think you said at the end of April. I'm just trying to do the math here. I think you said deferred revenue was up 2% at the end of the first quarter. you're seeing a double-digit increase in pass products, but then you're talking about the end of April, the pass base was only down 1%. Does that mean that there was a pretty considerable uptick in season pass sales in the month of April, or am I reading that wrong?

Marc Swanson (CEO)

Well, let me start and then if Jim wants to add anything, he can. I think what we're seeing is, you know, as Jim mentioned, that with the pass base, down just about 1%. Remember that's versus a record last year of April of 2022 and without really many of our new rides open. The new rides are ahead of us, and we think that's obviously a time that many people would look to buy a pass.

I think once we get those rides open, we would expect to see, you know, our pass base, hopefully, sales would be going up. Also we'll have hopefully some more normalized weather. The lack of weather and the bad weather, I should say, and the rides not being open, put a little bit of pressure on that number. To be down 1%, I think is still a pretty good story with kind of the tailwinds ahead of us, I think.

Jim Forrester (Interim CFO and Treasurer)

Yeah. The only thing I would add, Marc, is, you know, we did have a nice increase in our pass sales between March and April, which we were comfortable with. On our deferred balance sheet for our deferred revenue, we did see an increase year-over-year, respectable in our season pass sales in our deferred revenue. Again, I think we're comfortable with where we are, relative to our plan for the year.

Mike Swartz (Director of Equity Research)

Okay. Perfect. That's helpful. Then just on the following up on the Abu Dhabi question prior. I think you had mentioned that, you know, that contributed to the in-park per caps in the first quarter. Any way to break out how much of the per cap, I think it was a 9% per cap growth, is driven by those international agreements? Is that how we should think about, you know, that revenue stream falling kind of in that, you know, in-park per cap number going forward, or that be broken out a little separate, differently or separately?

Marc Swanson (CEO)

Let me try to help you with that. I think you know, I would say there's about, you know, five and a half million dollars or so just over that in that number for the quarter. That's gonna ebb and flow a little bit depending on obviously you know, how the park performs and different, you know, things related to the revenue agreement. Hopefully that's a little bit of color. I wouldn't necessarily model that in, obviously, because like I said, it's gonna ebb and flow a little bit here on the go forward.

Mike Swartz (Director of Equity Research)

Okay. Thank you.

Operator (participant)

The next question comes from Phil Cusick with JPMorgan. Please go ahead.

Phil Cusick (Managing Director and Senior Analyst)

Hi. One specific and one maybe bigger picture. The specific is, can you tell us more about the financing for your hotels? How do you think about owning and operating versus partnering with someone outside? That'll matter on the capital side, I imagine. The bigger picture question, what are the big levers you think to get back to record attendance? You know, when you were at that record attendance, I know that was on a lot fewer potential, was it less competitive? Was there more demand overall? Do you think that the Blackfish issue is still weighing on the parks? How should we think about that? Thank you.

Marc Swanson (CEO)

Yeah. Hey, Phil, it's Marc. I can take that. On the hotel financing, you know, we don't have a final determination on that that we can share. When we do, you know, that's something that we can share on a go-forward basis. You know, we're obviously excited about the hotel. You know, we're one of the kind of few in the industry that doesn't own our own hotels or have our own hotels. We're excited for those possibilities. You know, as far as the attendance of, you know, big picture, what it takes to kind of get back to what we once did, and I'll reference, you know, what we put out on some slides last quarter.

You know, we did, you know, over $25 million in attendance in 2008, which is probably what you're, what you're referencing. You know, we're obviously several million less than that right now. We, you know, I think we have to continue to do the things we're doing, make investments in our parks. Certainly, you've seen, and we have demonstrated that we are doing that. You heard Jim talk about some of the things we're doing for this year. You heard me talk about the rides and attractions. Continue to make investments in our parks. Adding, you know, things like hotels, certainly, I think gives us, you know, which should hopefully, line up nicely with some attendance opportunities as well. We're refreshing venues in our parks.

We've added more events to our parks if I think back to where we once were. Trying to do things to drive more people. We have the CRM system, which we think still really learning how to use that. I don't wanna suggest that we've optimized that by any means. We have a lot of learning still to do on that, and I think that can help drive our performance as well as we learn how to better utilize that. Those are some, you know, examples of things that we believe will drive us there. We've done a lot of work around conservation and rescue efforts and broadcasting those to people. We'll continue to do that. We know we need to do more of that.

I'm excited about, you know, the prospects on a go-forward basis. Also, if you just think about if the population of the United States, you know, continues to grow and we take our share of that, we're largely, as you know, in markets that are, I think, very attractive from a population growth standpoint when you're in states like Florida and Texas and, you know, California, Pennsylvania, Virginia. We like those locations. So we feel poised that, you know, over the long term here, we can begin to grow attendance and, you know, our goal is obviously to not only get back to what we once did, but to do better than that.

Phil Cusick (Managing Director and Senior Analyst)

Thanks, Marc. If I can follow up on the hotel. If you're gonna open one in 2025, I imagine breaking ground pretty soon is gonna be important. Is there a time at which you're gonna tell us about the financing side? Thank you.

Marc Swanson (CEO)

What I can tell you is we will, I think when we have more to share, we will come back to you on that. Don't have anything to share right now.

Phil Cusick (Managing Director and Senior Analyst)

Thanks again.

Operator (participant)

The next question is from James Hardiman with Citigroup. Please go ahead.

Sean Wagner (Equity Research Analyst)

Hi, this is Sean Wagner on for James. Wondering if there's any quantification you can give on that ride timing that you called out, whether the first quarter hit from that or is there a benefit to 2Q as well that you can quantify?

Marc Swanson (CEO)

Yeah. Hey, Sean. What I would tell you is, you know, kind of what I said in the prepared remarks. If you remember last year, we had, you know, a lot of the new rides were already open in Q1. This year, our ride opening is following kind of a more historically traditional opening time of right around, you know, Memorial Day or in that range, into the summer, obviously. We, you know, we would expect, you know, we build rides because we expect people will find them attractive and wanna come visit.

You know, whatever, what that lift ultimately ends up being, you know, is still to be determined. Certainly, you know, I think that would be a positive for, you know, the year going forward once we get these rides open. As I mentioned, a number of them are some of the most anticipated rides out there and should be a nice addition to our park.

Sean Wagner (Equity Research Analyst)

Yeah.

Marc Swanson (CEO)

Thank you.

Jim Forrester (Interim CFO and Treasurer)

The only thing I would add, Marc, you know, we survey our guests periodically and know typically why they would come to our parks. We had a very good survey results last year for those rides we opened in 2022. We don't have that same level of detail in 2023. We have a fair estimate that there was some impact. That's why we called that out.

Sean Wagner (Equity Research Analyst)

Okay. Understood. Is there any way we should think about operating expenses in SG&A this year, whether by growth rate or absolute numbers? Kind of what are the major pressure points there, and how much of your savings that you've earmarked will come this year?

Marc Swanson (CEO)

Well, let me just give you some high-level thoughts on costs. I mean, we have, as you know, a tremendous focus on costs. You heard me mention that. You know, I think the team that is working on that has done a good job and is pacing well towards, you know, that $30 million-$50 million that we set out. You know, we believe we're closer to the higher end of that. That would include, you know, efforts around SG&A as well as OpEx. You know, I don't know that I have an exact number for you. You know, obviously, we would like to target, you know, low single-digit expense growth.

you know, that's a good recipe over the long term if we can grow our per caps and grow our tenants at, you know, single digits and then keep our costs in check by growing them at a lower, at a low single-digit percentage as well. That generally is a good recipe in this business. That's what we would target. Hopefully that's helpful.

Sean Wagner (Equity Research Analyst)

Yeah. Thank you very much.

Operator (participant)

The next question comes from Thomas Yeh with Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead.

Thomas Yeh (Executive Director of Equity Research)

Great. Thank you so much. wanted to ask about group bookings. You mentioned some healthy recovery there from 2022 levels. Can you give us an update on where that stands relative to pre-COVID? maybe also just on international visitation compared to 2019, how that might be trending.

Marc Swanson (CEO)

Yeah, I can help you there. Let me start with international. I mean, international, you know, was obviously up in Q1 versus 2022. It's still not up to 2019. Again, that is a, you know, reason to be optimistic, in my opinion, that we are still down roughly, you know, over 40% in Q1 to 2019 in international attendance. We have more ground, obviously, to make up there. There's macro factors that you're obviously, I'm sure, aware of. There's things I'm sure we could be doing better as well. We'll, you know, that's something that we're clearly working on. That is a, that's a good opportunity, I think, for us.

You know, the group business is trending very well versus 2022. We have, you know, we're well ahead of kind of the typical pacing we would have this time of year and ahead in units versus 2022. You know, versus 2019, we're, you know, we're in line, if you will. It was still down slightly in Q1, but, you know, it's really close to being back to 2019 levels. The good news is, you know, we're driving more revenue In most cases, the bookings we are doing.

Thomas Yeh (Executive Director of Equity Research)

Okay. Makes sense. Back on costs. Any incremental color on just maybe overall labor hours this year? How should we think about maybe just staffing levels and how that might look during peak season compared to last year? Is there an opportunity to kinda pull some stuff out with the tech initiatives that you're kinda putting in place?

Jim Forrester (Interim CFO and Treasurer)

Yeah, I would say, it's Jim. For overall labor hours, I think, you know, we feel comfortable that our staffing is somewhat improved in many of our areas. There's still a couple of pockets that we would like to see, especially in a few of our select locations. What is more comfortable to me is the recent labor rate from the Department of Labor said that inflationary pressures was about 4.5% year-over-year. Our labor rate is much less than that, measurably less. I think we're pleased with at least the labor expense side of the equation. Labor hours, we do have some initiatives in place to make ourselves more efficient.

As mentioned last quarter, there are a couple of technology projects that we look forward to at our main entrances. We are doing some things with modifying our restaurants in the capital spend to make them more efficient. We're also doing some very detailed labor hour analysis and making sure we've got the right labor at the right place, right time, that will also moderate our labor hour growth year-over-year to support our expected attendance.

Operator (participant)

The next question comes from Eric Wold with B. Riley Securities. Please go ahead.

Eric Wold (Senior Analyst)

Thank you. Two questions, I guess. One, just to follow up kind of on the last comment, or last topic. You mentioned that you're at about 70% of the planned restaurants for mobile ordering. Can you get to 100% this season? Is that a 2024, or maybe later, plan? What is kinda the ultimate goal around that? Is the goal to actually drive reduced labor staffing in those restaurants when it's fully implemented, or is the goal more on driving the higher basket sizes and purchases from consumers?

Marc Swanson (CEO)

Yeah. Hey, Eric. Let me give you just some high-level comments, and then Jim can fill in maybe on the timing that you talked about. Look, the goal with the mobile ordering and the app in general is, you know, severalfold. I mean, one is we want it to be a better experience for our guests. Certainly that's a key component of a better guest experience with an app, whether it's being able to order food or a Quick Queue or buy a reserved seat or, you know, have a map download, you know, whatever it may be. We, we like that from a guest satisfaction standpoint. We know clearly that people spend more when they're buying through the app, so that's another advantage.

you know, I guess the third thing would be, obviously, some of these mobile order, you know, locations, we believe we can staff, you know, more efficiently and ultimately, so we have lower costs. It's a combination of all those things that I think are kind of the goal of the app. As far as how we're thinking about the target and the timing of that, you wanna talk about that?

Jim Forrester (Interim CFO and Treasurer)

Yeah, sure, Marc. you know, as part of our capital spend that I mentioned, we do have a significant amount of that dedicated to Changing our service style of our restaurants, as part of that, installing mobile ordering and retrofitting on those legacy restaurants. We'll of course design new ones in the future to incorporate that. That's gonna be a multiyear project. You know, we've got some very major restaurants, and we're approaching the busy season.

We're somewhat limited in the ability to take down restaurants all at the same time to do some of these retrofits, so we'll do it methodically over 2023, 2024 is our goal for that. As far as the labor, I would only add that while we are gonna be more efficient, a lot of times when we're in constrained labor environments, we're able to take the labor and move them to other locations, other revenue generating areas so that it also helps us to maximize revenue there.

Eric Wold (Senior Analyst)

Thank you. Just a follow-up question, the same question. Obviously you've been repurchasing a lot of shares over recent years, as interest rates have moved higher. At what point does the focus of excess capital shift towards reducing the debt? What would you see as the optimal ratio, leverage ratio over the coming years?

Jim Forrester (Interim CFO and Treasurer)

Yeah. Hey, Eric. I mean, what I would tell you is, I mean, we're obviously comfortable where we are with the ratio we have now. We're at 2.7x. Not that we wouldn't be comfortable lower than that or even higher than that, but, you know, we don't really guide to a target. What we do is work with our board on what's the best use of cash, and so we'll continue to do that, you know, going forward.

Eric Wold (Senior Analyst)

Thank you.

Operator (participant)

The next question comes from Ben Chaiken with Credit Suisse. Please go ahead.

Ben Chaiken (VP and Equity Research Analyst)

Hey, how's it going? In last year you highlighted a bucket of transitory inflation costs. When you're looking at the operating environment today, are those kind of transitory items you highlighted in 2022 rolling off, or is it pretty sticky versus what you were seeing last year? Thanks.

Marc Swanson (CEO)

Yeah, Ben, I would say that we continue to be mindful of the cost pressures. We have seen moderation in many areas, like I mentioned already about the labor. I think we're very pleased at our ability to manage labor rate, either through a reduction in overtime hours, of it being more efficient or being more targeted at our labor rate growth allowance than a broad shotgun approach.W e're very targeted on that. The others with cost of sales, we've had very dedicated negotiations with our vendor partners to ensure we're getting the best pricing on that. We've seen moderation there. I think going forward, we've sort of reset or very close to that. We continue to look at some of our inflationary pressures. In general, I think we're at a new, fairly good baseline.

Ben Chaiken (VP and Equity Research Analyst)

That's helpful. I think if I heard you correctly, I think you said you saw a nice step up in pass sales between March and April. Is it a fair assumption that this kind of correlates with some of the attendance trends you're seeing, or was there something else? Thanks.

Marc Swanson (CEO)

Well, yeah. I think what I would tell you is, you know, we're not, you know, without commenting on attendance, I think we, as we get closer to opening our rides and things like that, you know, that's a driver a lot of times of what people buying pass products. You know, that, you know. We have those rides ahead of us, obviously.

Ben Chaiken (VP and Equity Research Analyst)

Okay, thanks.

Operator (participant)

The next question comes from Chris Woronka with Deutsche Bank. Please go ahead.

Chris Woronka (Senior Analyst)

Hey, good morning, guys. Thanks for all the details so far. I was hoping we could maybe drill down a little bit into the customer buckets or the segmentation. If we think about your visitation as, you know, local and then group and then international, we're probably talking a little bit more about the Florida parks, Is there any delineation in, I guess I would say, kind of in park spend among those groups or any change over the past, you know, three, six, nine months?

Marc Swanson (CEO)

Look, I don't know that we're gonna, you know, break that out or provide any more detail. I mean, I think what you can read into is obviously our per caps have been growing and, for, you know, quarter-over-quarter for some time now. And, you know, that's with, you know, different SOR levels visiting in our parks throughout the year. So I think we're generally pleased with the spending that we're seeing across our parks and, from the folks coming to visit our parks. You know, there's a number of new things in our parks, you know, specifically here in Orlando that I think are compelling to people when they do visit, whether they're a local or a tourist.

Chris Woronka (Senior Analyst)

Okay. fair enough. Thanks, Marc. Just as a follow-up, with Abu Dhabi now opening, is the licensing or perhaps, you know, joint venture thing, is that something that could be on the table domestically, whether it's, you know, for a larger park or even a smaller kind of Sesame size thing? Is that something you'd ever look at?

Marc Swanson (CEO)

Well, look, without, you know, getting into specifics, I think what I can tell you is we certainly entertain a lot of different things, we will continue to do that. Yeah, I mean, the right opportunity, the right situation, we would certainly look at it, whether it's domestic or international, so.

Chris Woronka (Senior Analyst)

Okay, very good. Thanks.

Operator (participant)

The last question today comes from Barton Crockett with Rosenblatt Securities. Please go ahead.

Barton Crockett (Managing Director and Senior Research Analyst)

Okay. Thanks for squeezing me in. I was curious about the description of the cadence of ride construction. You know, a little bit of explanation about why things are starting later this year than last year. Is that by design? In other words, this is the optimal time to, you know, build and, you know, launch your new rides for best impact on the season. Or does this reflect maybe kind of labor markets and construction markets just not being, you know, quite as efficient or as open as they were last year when you were able to get things out sooner?

Marc Swanson (CEO)

Yeah. Barton, I can take that one. If you remember, most of the rides we opened in 2022, we had under construction kind of during the COVID time period. They were in a lot of cases, you know, fairly far along when COVID hit. You remember a lot of them were gonna open in 2020 and got delayed due to COVID. There was less kinda runway to have to complete those rides, which was a pretty big advantage and why we were able to open them earlier. You know, obviously, you know, we're opening them now in many cases here in the coming weeks, and that is a more, like you said, kind of historically more traditional time to open new rides.

I mean, just like any construction project we, you know, we certainly have our challenges in certain rides with construction delays, whether it's weather impacted or, you know, labor, whatever it may be. You know, you have that on a lot of different things. We'll work through that, and I'm excited that we're gonna be delivering a compelling lineup for guests to enjoy as we move into the summer.

Barton Crockett (Managing Director and Senior Research Analyst)

Okay. That's it. Thank you.

Operator (participant)

This concludes our question-and-answer session. I would now like to turn the call back to CEO Marc Swanson for any closing remarks.

Marc Swanson (CEO)

Thank you, MJ. On behalf of Jim and the rest of the management team at United Parks & Resorts, we wanna thank you for joining us this morning. As you heard today, we are confident in our long-term strategy, which we believe will drive improved operating and financial results and long-term value for stakeholders. Thank you. We look forward to speaking with you next quarter.

Operator (participant)

The conference is now concluded. Thank you for attending today's presentation. You may now disconnect.