High Gas Prices Are Eating Into Food Budgets, Wingstop CEO Says -- Market Talk
Dow Jones
Apr 30
1240 ET - Consumers are pulling back on eating out, as they are forced to pay more at the gas pump. "Rapidly rising gas prices stressed the balance sheet of the lower-income consumer that our business over-indexes to," Wingstop CEO Michael Skipworth says on a call with analysts. "As a result, our same-store sales trend worsened during the quarter and resulted in a decline of 8.7%." The restaurant chain was also hurt by winter storms early in the year that prompted temporary store closures at over 700 locations, he adds. "If you exclude these unusual external factors, performance would have broadly been in line with our expectations," Skipworth says. Wingstop sinks 5%. (connor.hart@wsj.com)
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
April 29, 2026 12:40 ET (16:40 GMT)
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