Fastfood giant Jollibee Foods Corp. said over the weekend tariffs in the United States and Canada have had a very small effect on its business in North America.
“The great news for now, as these rates are always evolving and changing, but as of now, based on the latest agreements that President Trump passed with various nations, we see that the impact of the tariff vis-a-vis to our cost base, and therefore profitability potential erosion is less than one percent,” JFC chief finance officer Richard Shin in a media briefing held Friday afternoon.
Shin said first quarter of the year operations in the U.S. and Canada together account for about 8 percent of the group’s EBITDA and 7 percent of total system-wide sales.
Shin said the company, however, remains watchful of tariff developments, but there is “no immediate impact to call out vis-a-vis the tariffs.”
Meanwhile, Jollibee is seeing positive changes in its China business. After struggling with sales declines in the past, the company said it made pricing adjustments and focused on its core menu, which has helped performance.
“For Q1, happy to report that we are down to now single digit in terms of same store sales rolling base or same store sales growth versus Q1 of last year and in April, I can tell you that we’re up now by 0.9 percent,” Shin said.
“So from negative double to negative single digit to in April, back to growth again. So the price repositioning seems to be working, and so now we rolled out this model throughout our network,” he said. Jenniffer B. Austria
The company said that it is now rolling out this new pricing and menu model across its China stores.
Globally, JFC operates nearly 1,800 stores, with 1,300 located in the Philippines. The company continues to expand across key markets while closely monitoring costs and external risks like tariffs.