US Foods Holding Corp (USFD) 2024 Q4 法說會逐字稿

Thank you for standing by. My name is Greg, and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to today's US Foods Holding Corporation Q4 2024 earnings call. All the lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speakers' remarks, there will be a question-and-answer session. (Operator Instructions) Thank you.

感謝您的支持。我叫格雷格，今天我將擔任您的會議主持人。現在，我歡迎大家參加今天的美國食品控股公司 2024 年第四季財報電話會議。所有線路均已靜音，以防止任何背景噪音。演講者發言後，將進行問答環節。（操作員指示）謝謝。

I would now like to turn the call over to Mike Neese, Senior Vice President and Head of Investor Relations. Mike, the floor is yours.

現在，我想將電話轉給資深副總裁兼投資者關係主管 Mike Neese。麥克，現在你來發言。

Thank you, Greg. Good morning, everyone, and welcome to the US Foods fourth quarter and full year fiscal 2024 earnings call. On today's call, we have Dave Flitman, CEO; and Dirk Locascio, CFO. We will take your questions after our prepared remarks conclude. Please limit yourself to one question and one follow-up. Our earnings release issued earlier this morning and today's presentation can be found on the Investor Relations page of our website at ir.usfoods.com.

謝謝你，格雷格。大家早安，歡迎參加美國食品 2024 財年第四季和全年財報電話會議。今天的電話會議由執行長戴夫·弗利特曼 (Dave Flitman) 主持；以及財務長 Dirk Locascio。我們將在準備好的發言結束後回答大家的問題。請限制自己只問一個問題和一個後續問題。我們的收益報告和今天的簡報可以在我們網站 ir.usfoods.com 的投資者關係頁面上找到。

During today's call and unless otherwise stated, or comparing our fourth quarter and full year 2024 results to the same period in fiscal year 2023. In addition to historical information, certain statements made during today's call are considered forward-looking statements. Please review the risk factors in our Form 10-K for a detailed discussion of the potential factors that could cause our actual results to differ materially from those anticipated in forward-looking statements.

在今天的電話會議中，除非另有說明，或將我們的 2024 年第四季和全年業績與 2023 財年同期進行比較。除了歷史資訊外，今天電話會議中的某些陳述被視為前瞻性陳述。請查看我們的 10-K 表中的風險因素，詳細討論可能導致我們的實際結果與前瞻性陳述中預期的結果有重大差異的潛在因素。

Lastly, during today's call, we will refer to certain non-GAAP financial measures. All reconciliations to the most comparable GAAP financial measures are included in the schedules on our earnings press release as well as in the presentation slides posted on our website. We are not providing reconciliations to forward-looking non-GAAP financial measures.

最後，在今天的電話會議中，我們將參考某些非 GAAP 財務指標。所有與最具可比性的 GAAP 財務指標的對帳均包含在我們的收益新聞稿中的附表中以及我們網站上發布的簡報幻燈片中。我們不提供前瞻性非公認會計準則財務指標的對帳表。

And with that, thank you, and I'll turn the call over to Dave.

最後，謝謝您，我將把電話轉給戴夫。

Thanks, Mike. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us today. Before we turn to today's agenda, I want to take a moment to acknowledge the devastating fires in the Los Angeles area. Our thoughts are with everyone impacted by this tragedy. I'm relieved to share that all of our associates in the LA area are safe. We eagerly supported the critical work of first responders, including CAL FIRE by providing food and hydration, and we are very thankful for their brave and tireless efforts.

謝謝，麥克。大家早安，感謝大家今天的參與。在我們討論今天的議程之前，我想花點時間來了解洛杉磯地區發生的毀滅性火災。我們的心與所有受到這場悲劇影響的人同在。我很高興地告訴大家，我們在洛杉磯地區的所有同事都很安全。我們熱心支持包括加州消防局在內的急救人員的關鍵工作，提供食物和水分，我們非常感謝他們的勇敢和不懈的努力。

Now, let's turn to today's agenda. I'll start by recapping our 2022 to 2024 long-range plan. Then, I'll share highlights from 2024, including the significant progress our team made executing our strategy. I'll then hand it over to Dirk to review our fourth quarter and full year 2024 financial results as well as our fiscal 2025 guidance.

現在，我們來討論今天的議程。我將首先回顧我們 2022 年至 2024 年的長期計劃。然後，我將分享 2024 年的亮點，包括我們的團隊在執行策略方面的重大進展。然後，我將把它交給德克，讓他審查我們 2024 年第四季和全年的財務業績以及 2025 財年指引。

We delivered another strong quarter, which resulted in record 2024 full year earnings of $1.74 billion, capping off the final year of our long-range plan. We are proud to have overachieved our original commitment, which was all underpinned by the focused execution of our strategy.

我們又度過了一個強勁的季度，2024 年全年盈利創下 17.4 億美元的紀錄，為我們長期計劃的最後一年畫上了圓滿的句號。我們很自豪能夠超額完成我們最初的承諾，而這一切都得益於我們專注執行的策略。

The fact that we didn't get there exactly the way we originally planned three years ago demonstrates our ability to adjust to any macro environment and our team's relentless focus on controlling the controllables to ensure we reach our target. During the past three years, we accelerated our work on key initiatives, including delivering consistent share gains with our three target customer types, driving more than $230 million in cost of goods savings, extending our technology leadership position, reducing net leverage ending 2024 at 2.8times within our 2times to 3times target range, and expanding adjusted EBITDA margin by 100 basis points to 4.6%.

事實上，我們並沒有完全按照三年前的原計劃實現目標，這證明了我們適應任何宏觀環境的能力，也證明了我們團隊堅持不懈地專注於控制可控因素，以確保我們實現目標。在過去三年中，我們加速了關鍵措施的實施，包括：在三類目標客戶中實現持續的份額增長、節省超過 2.3 億美元的商品成本、擴大我們的技術領導地位、將 2024 年底的淨槓桿率降低至 2.8 倍（在我們的 2 倍至 3 倍目標範圍內），並將調整後的 EBITDA 利潤率提高 4.6% 4%。

I am equally excited about starting our new long-range plan, continuing to execute our strategic initiatives to drive sustained growth and return capital to shareholders. Our future is bright, and our current momentum gives us confidence in achieving a 5% sales CAGR, a 10% adjusted EBITDA CAGR, at least 20 basis points of annual adjusted EBITDA margin expansion and a 20% adjusted diluted EPS CAGR through 2027. I am highly confident in our ability to continue to outpace industry volume growth over the long term and expand margins through our extensive portfolio of self-help initiatives while driving long-term value creation for our shareholders.

我同樣對啟動我們的新長期計劃感到興奮，繼續執行我們的策略舉措以推動持續增長並向股東返還資本。我們的未來是光明的，目前的發展勢頭使我們有信心到 2027 年實現 5% 的銷售額複合年增長率、10% 的調整後 EBITDA 複合年增長率、至少 20 個基點的年度調整後 EBITDA 利潤率擴張和 20% 的調整後攤薄每股收益複合年增長率。我對我們有能力在長期內繼續超越行業銷量成長，並透過我們廣泛的自助計劃組合來擴大利潤率，同時為我們的股東創造長期價值充滿信心。

As we turn the page on our momentous chapter for US Foods, I thank our 30,000 associates for their extraordinary efforts, dedication and sharp focus to deliver excellence and help our customers make it every day. This next chapter will be even more exciting.

當我們翻開美國食品公司重要篇章的時候，我要感謝我們 30,000 名員工的非凡努力、奉獻精神和高度集中精力，以提供卓越的服務並幫助我們的客戶每天取得成功。下一章將會更加精彩。

Turning to slide four. Our strong fourth quarter results finished the year in which we achieved record adjusted EBITDA of $1.74 billion, while we expanded adjusted EBITDA margin by 22 basis points. We also delivered record adjusted EPS of $3.15, which was 20% growth and we grew adjusted EPS 8 percentage points faster than we grew adjusted EBITDA. Importantly, we deployed our strong cash flow through our $220 million acquisition of IWC and nearly $1 billion of share repurchases in 2024.

翻到第四張投影片。我們第四季的業績表現強勁，全年調整後 EBITDA 達到創紀錄的 17.4 億美元，同時調整後 EBITDA 利潤率提高了 22 個基點。我們也實現了創紀錄的 3.15 美元調整後每股收益，成長 20%，調整後每股盈餘的成長比調整後 EBITDA 的成長快 8 個百分點。重要的是，我們透過 2.2 億美元收購 IWC 以及在 2024 年回購近 10 億美元的股票部署了強勁的現金流。

Let's turn to the broader macro environment. Chain restaurant food traffic, as published by Black Box, was down a little less than 2% for the fourth quarter and while still negative, it showed sequential improvement from the third quarter. Independent restaurant industry volume per Circana was down less than 1% in the fourth quarter and in line with last quarter's year-over-year results. Our ability to outperform the market was again demonstrated in the fourth quarter as we posted a 3.2% increase in total independent case volume and our 15th consecutive quarter of share gains with independent restaurants.

讓我們來看看更廣泛的宏觀環境。Black Box 發布的連鎖餐廳食品客流量第四季度下降了不到 2%，雖然仍然是負增長，但與第三季度相比有所改善。Circana 數據顯示，第四季獨立餐飲業銷量下降不到 1%，與上一季的年比業績持平。我們超越市場的能力在第四季度再次得到證明，我們的獨立案例總量增長了 3.2%，並且連續 15 個季度在獨立餐廳中的份額有所增長。

Also, Case volumes in healthcare and hospitality, which together comprise more than 25% of our sales, grew 4.7% and 2.4%, respectively. We continue to gain share in both customer types and in fact, we just posted our 17th consecutive quarter of share gains in healthcare. These two high-growth customer types are an important part of our differentiated go-to-market strategy.

此外，醫療保健和旅館業的銷售額占我們銷售額的 25% 以上，分別成長了 4.7% 和 2.4%。我們在兩種客戶類型中的份額均持續增長，事實上，我們剛剛公佈了連續第 17 個季度在醫療保健領域的份額增長。這兩種高成長客戶類型是我們差異化行銷策略的重要組成部分。

The fourth quarter was noisy due to the impact of the devastating hurricanes that hit near the end of the third quarter and early in the fourth quarter, affecting industry volumes, specifically in the Southeast, where we have a larger portion of our independent business. In addition to storms, the election and the holiday calendar shift also impacted restaurant foot traffic. These impacts translated to an estimated 150 basis points to 200 basis points headwind to our independent and hospitality case growth.

由於第三季末和第四季初遭受的毀滅性颶風的影響，第四季度的業績不景氣，影響了行業銷量，特別是在我們獨立業務佔比較大的東南部地區。除了風暴之外，選舉和假期日曆的變化也影響了餐廳的客流量。這些影響相當於我們的獨立和酒店案例增長遭遇約 150 個基點至 200 個基點的阻力。

Despite these external factors, we continue to capture profitable market share, grow volumes and expand our margins. And in the fourth quarter, we improved our share gains with independent restaurants compared to the prior year, and we also grew our new independent accounts at the fastest rate of the year in December.

儘管存在這些外部因素，我們仍然繼續佔領有利可圖的市場份額，增加銷售並擴大利潤率。在第四季度，與去年相比，我們在獨立餐廳中的份額有所提高，12 月份我們的新獨立帳戶增長速度也是今年最快的。

Moving to slide five. Let's take a look at some of the key achievements in 2024 that our team delivered under our four strategic pillars. 2024 was another strong year for US Foods. As I reflect on my two years here, I am now even more confident in delivering our new long-range plan and our ability to consistently gain profitable market share in our three target customer types of independent restaurants, healthcare and hospitality, the three most profitable segments of the food service industry. We also have line of sight to continued productivity gains of 3% to 5% and further gross margin expansion.

移至第五張投影片。讓我們來看看我們的團隊在四大策略支柱下於 2024 年取得的一些關鍵成就。 2024 年對美國食品來說又是強勁的一年。回顧在這裡的兩年，我現在對實現我們的新長期計劃更加有信心，並且能夠持續在獨立餐廳、醫療保健和酒店這三大目標客戶類型（食品服務業最賺錢的三個部分）中獲得有利可圖的市場份額。我們也預計生產力將繼續提高 3% 至 5%，毛利率也將進一步提高。

Now, let's move to some highlights in each of our pillars. Our first pillar is culture. The safety of our associates continues to be and always will remain our number one priority. Our injury and accident frequency rates improved 19% from the prior year on top of our 23% improvement in 2023. These safety results are our best in many years, but we still have more work to get to our ultimate goal of zero. As we look to further reduce associate injuries, the rollout of centerized power and industrial equipment is a key initiative that is underway across the network. We are nearly 50% through this deployment. And importantly, where this equipment has been already rolled out, we have not had a single injury.

現在，讓我們來看看每個支柱的一些亮點。我們的第一個支柱是文化。我們員工的安全繼續是、並且永遠都是我們的首要任務。我們的傷害和事故頻率比前一年改善了 19%，而在 2023 年則改善了 23%。這些安全結果是我們多年來最好的，但我們仍需要做更多的工作才能達到最終的零安全目標。為了進一步減少員工受傷，我們在整個網路中推行集中電力和工業設備的一項重要措施。這次部署我們已經完成近 50%。重要的是，在已經部署該設備的地方，我們沒有發生過一起傷亡事件。

In 2024, we donated more than $14.5 million to support hunger relief, culinary education and disaster relief efforts. This contribution included nearly 7 million pounds of food and supply donations, the equivalent of approximately 6 million meals for more than 260 truckloads of product.

2024年，我們捐贈了超過1,450萬美元，用於支持飢餓救濟、烹飪教育和救災工作。這筆捐款包括近 700 萬磅的食品和物資捐贈，相當於 260 多卡車的產品，約 600 萬頓飯。

Turning to our service pillar. We're striving to differentiate our service platform to our customers to provide a best-in-class delivery experience. In 2024, we deployed the cart, a leading rounding technology in 25 markets resulting in nearly 50% of our routed miles on the system at year-end. It enabled us to ramp more dynamically and drive even greater delivery efficiency while also providing a better customer experience by delivering their orders within a more precise time window.

轉向我們的服務支柱。我們致力於向客戶提供差異化的服務平台，以提供一流的交付體驗。2024 年，我們在 25 個市場部署了領先的繞行技術——手推車，到年底，該系統的路線里程占我們路線總里程的近 50%。它使我們能夠更具活力地提高交付效率，同時透過在更精確的時間窗口內交付訂單來提供更好的客戶體驗。

We improved distribution productivity in 2024 by delivering our best cases per mile performance in our company's history. This was driven through our market-led routing initiative, combined with a more than 2% productivity uplift in markets where the cart has been deployed. We are making continued progress with the rollout of the cart and expect to complete it by the end of this year.

2024 年，我們實現了公司歷史上最好的每英里運貨量表現，從而提高了配送生產力。這是透過我們以市場為主導的路線計劃推動的，同時結合了已部署購物車的市場超過 2% 的生產力提升。我們的購物車推出工作正在不斷取得進展，預計將在今年年底前完成。

We are also transforming the experience for our customers through our continued enhancements to our MOXe digital solutions platform that enables customers to easily place orders, manage inventory and pay their bills. We have been and will continue to be the e-commerce leader in our industry. We closed the year at 77% e-commerce penetration for our independent customers and 87% for the total company. The 77% is an all-time high for our independent customers and represents a 4.5 percentage points improvement versus 2023 and an 11 percentage point improvement versus 2021.

我們還透過持續增強 MOXe 數位解決方案平台來改變客戶體驗，讓客戶能夠輕鬆下訂單、管理庫存和支付帳單。我們一直是並將繼續成為行業內的電子商務領導者。截至年底，我們獨立客戶的電子商務滲透率達到 77%，整個公司的電子商務滲透率達到 87%。77% 是我們獨立客戶的歷史最高水平，比 2023 年提高了 4.5 個百分點，比 2021 年提高了 11 個百分點。

Now, let's turn to our growth pillar. In 2024, net sales grew 6.4% to $37.9 billion through continued market share gains in all three of our target customer types. Our differentiated team-based selling model and consistent addition of new seller headcount over time, which was up 5% in 2024, remain at the core of our growth plan. We continue to invest in our hungry for better program with three distinct product portfolios of over 4,000 products, Serve You, Serve Good and Serve Local. Hungry for better makes it easy for our customers to help meet diners' preferences for delicious on-trend vehicles from clean ingredients that support individual dietary, and lifestyle needs to sustainably source products.

現在，讓我們來談談我們的成長支柱。2024 年，透過我們在所有三種目標客戶類型的市佔率持續成長，淨銷售額成長 6.4% 至 379 億美元。我們差異化的基於團隊的銷售模式以及隨著時間的推移不斷增加的新賣家人數（2024 年增長了 5%）仍然是我們成長計劃的核心。我們將繼續投資於我們的「追求更好」計劃，該計劃包括三個不同的產品組合，包含 4,000 多種產品，即「為您服務」、「提供優質服務」和「為當地服務」。Hungry for better 讓我們的顧客能夠輕鬆地滿足食客對美味潮流食品的偏好，這些食品採用支持個人飲食和生活方式需求的清潔食材，以可持續的方式採購產品。

In fact, in 2024, our responsibly sourced Serve Good portfolio of private label products achieved record-breaking sales, surpassing $1 billion for the first time. Pronto, our small truck delivery service continues to grow and is live in 40 markets. We remain excited about this growth opportunity and its ability to reach hard to service customers in dense geographies. Pronto provides these previously untapped independent restaurant customers with smaller, more frequent deliveries and later cutoff times. In addition, we launched Pronto penetration in the middle of 2024 in two pilot markets and expanded that to six later in the year with the goal to launch 15 to 20 more markets in 2025.

事實上，2024 年，我們負責任地採購的 Serve Good 自有品牌產品組合實現了破紀錄的銷售額，首次超過 10 億美元。Pronto，我們的小型卡車送貨服務不斷發展，目前已涵蓋 40 個市場。我們對於這一成長機會及其在人口密集地區服務客戶的能力仍然感到興奮。Pronto 為這些先前未開發的獨立餐廳客戶提供更小規模、更頻繁的配送和更晚的截止時間。此外，我們於 2024 年中期在兩個試點市場推出了 Pronto 服務，並於當年稍後將其擴展到 6 個市場，目標是在 2025 年再拓展到 15 到 20 個市場。

This service fills in non-routine delivery days for our existing independent restaurant customers, leading to the potential for further wallet share for US Foods. In our first two pilot markets, we are seeing an approximate 20% uplift in our overall case growth from customers in the program. As expected, Pronto exited 2024 with approximately $730 million of annualized run rate sales and we expect it to grow double digits this year.

這項服務為我們現有的獨立餐廳客戶填補了非常規送貨日，這有可能進一步提高 US Foods 的市場份額。在我們的前兩個試點市場中，我們發現來自該計劃的客戶的整體案例成長率約為 20%。正如預期的那樣，Pronto 在 2024 年實現了約 7.3 億美元的年化銷售額，我們預計今年的銷售額將實現兩位數成長。

Turning to M&A. We completed one tuck-in acquisition last year by purchasing IWC Foodservice, which serves the greater Nashville area. More recently, in January, we acquired Jake Spinder Foods in Houston, our fourth acquisition over the last two years. Jake also includes a quality meat-cutting facility, which will fit in nicely with our stockyard network. With more than $160 million in annual revenue, this acquisition increases our local capacity and expands our presence in South Texas.

轉向併購。去年，我們完成了一項小型收購，收購了為大納許維爾地區提供服務的 IWC Foodservice。最近，今年一月，我們收購了休士頓的 Jake Spinder Foods，這是我們過去兩年來的第四次收購。Jake 還擁有優質的肉類切割設施，可以完美融入我們的牲畜飼養場網絡。此次收購的年收入超過 1.6 億美元，增強了我們的本地產能，擴大了我們在南德克薩斯州的影響力。

Finally, let's move to our profit pillar. Adjusted gross profit grew 7.3% in 2024 to $6.6 billion. We continue to make additional progress on cost of goods through our strategic vendor management efforts, realizing more than $70 million in savings last year. We also remain focused on growing our private label brands, where our full year penetration was up nearly 50 basis points to 52% with our core independent restaurant customers. Our momentum accelerated throughout the year with penetration nearing 53% by the end of 2024. And we see no near-term ceiling with our ability to further increase our private label brand penetration.

最後，讓我們來談談利潤支柱。2024 年調整後毛利成長 7.3% 至 66 億美元。我們透過策略供應商管理努力，繼續在商品成本方面取得進一步進展，去年實現了超過 7,000 萬美元的節省。我們也將繼續專注於發展我們的自有品牌，我們在核心獨立餐廳客戶的全年滲透率上升了近 50 個基點，達到 52%。我們的勢頭全年都在加速，到 2024 年底滲透率將接近 53%。我們認為，短期內我們進一步提升自有品牌滲透率的能力不會受到限制。

Finally, as part of our ongoing goal of achieving 3% to 5% annual productivity improvement, we made significant progress in 2024 to streamline administrative processes and costs and achieved $120 million in annualized operating expense savings.

最後，作為我們實現 3% 至 5% 年度生產力提高的持續目標的一部分，我們在 2024 年取得了重大進展，簡化了行政流程和成本，並實現了 1.2 億美元的年度營運費用節省。

Regarding CHEF'STORE, we are nearing the conclusion of exploring the sale of this business and expect that we will have more to say about that by the end of this quarter or early in the second quarter. We remain fully committed to supporting the business, our associates and our customers throughout the process. As we have previously said, in the event of a sale, we would expect to deploy the majority of the proceeds to repurchasing shares.

關於CHEF'STORE，我們即將完成對該業務出售的探討，預計在本季末或第二季初我們將有更多相關消息。在整個過程中，我們始終全力致力於支持企業、我們的員工和我們的客戶。正如我們之前所說，如果發生出售，我們預計將大部分收益用於回購股票。

Before I hand it over to Dirk, I would like to recognize two associates who have gone above and beyond during the wildfires that raged across California. Two of our associates, Danny More and Paul Wheeler, dedicated their personal time to serving the approximately 10,000 firefighters in the area. With Danny supporting the Pacific Palisades fire and Paul supporting the Eaton Fire, both were on-site daily to coordinate the delivery of over 75 truckloads of products and we're in the kitchens, preparing food for first responders. Both have made incredible personal sacrifices being away from their families, and I thank them and all of our associates for their service to support those who are on the front line during this tragedy.

在我將主席台交給德克之前，我想表揚一下在加州野火肆虐期間做出卓越貢獻的兩位同事。我們的兩位同事丹尼·莫爾和保羅·惠勒奉獻他們的私人時間為該地區約 10,000 名消防員提供服務。丹尼支持太平洋帕利塞德火災，保羅支持伊頓火災，他們每天都在現場協調超過 75 卡車的產品運送，而我們在廚房為急救人員準備食物。他們兩人遠離家人，做出了令人難以置信的個人犧牲，我感謝他們和我們所有的同事，感謝他們在這場悲劇中為支持身處前線的人們所做的貢獻。

Let me now turn the call over to Dirk to discuss our fourth quarter results and our 2025 guidance.

現在，我將電話轉給德克，討論我們的第四季業績和 2025 年指引。

Thank you, Dave, and good morning, everyone. Our fourth quarter performance finished off strong in 2024. We continue to execute our strategy of driving healthy balanced growth through the P&L, which resulted in margin expansion and double-digit earnings growth.

謝謝你，戴夫，大家早安。我們的 2024 年第四季業績表現強勁。我們繼續執行透過損益表推動健康平衡成長的策略，從而實現利潤率擴大和兩位數的獲利成長。

Turning to Slide 7. Fourth quarter net sales increased 6.2% to $9.5 billion driven by total case volume growth of 3.5% and food cost inflation and mix impact of 2.7%. Our independent restaurant volume grew 3.2%, including 140 basis points from acquisitions. Healthcare growth remained strong at 4.7% and hospitality grew 2.4%. As Dave mentioned earlier, industry case volumes were impacted by storms, the election and timing of the holiday season.

翻到幻燈片 7。第四季淨銷售額成長 6.2% 至 95 億美元，主要得益於總箱量成長 3.5% 以及食品成本通膨及組合影響成長 2.7%。我們的獨立餐廳數量增加了 3.2%，其中 140 個基點來自收購。醫療保健業維持強勁成長，成長 4.7%，旅館業成長 2.4%。正如戴夫之前提到的，行業案件數量受到風暴、選舉和假期時間的影響。

Despite the noise in the quarter, we continue to focus on the outcomes that we can control, and we again drove healthy share gains in all three of our target customer types. We remain encouraged that 2025 will produce a stronger macro backdrop than 2024, and when combined with our focus on share gains, will enable us to accelerate organic case growth. January growth rates in independent cases, although significantly impacted by weather in the California fires, showed signs of strengthening over Q4.

儘管本季度存在一些噪音，但我們仍繼續專注於我們能夠控制的結果，並且我們在所有三種目標客戶類型中再次實現了健康的份額成長。我們仍然感到鼓舞，因為 2025 年將產生比 2024 年更強勁的宏觀背景，並且結合我們對份額增長的關注，將使我們能夠加速有機案例增長。1 月獨立病例的成長率雖然受到加州火災天氣的顯著影響，但第四季顯示出增強的跡象。

Fourth quarter adjusted EBITDA grew 13.7% from the prior year to $441 million through a balance of profitable volume growth, gross profit gains and operating expense productivity. Our actions to drive profitable growth resulted in 30 basis points of adjusted EBITDA margin expansion to 4.6%. Importantly, adjusted gross profit dollars grew 240 basis points faster than adjusted operating expense dollars.

第四季調整後的 EBITDA 較上年同期成長 13.7%，達到 4.41 億美元，這得益於獲利銷售成長、毛利成長和營運費用效率的平衡。我們推動獲利成長的措施使調整後的 EBITDA 利潤率擴大 30 個基點，達到 4.6%。重要的是，調整後的毛利成長速度比調整後的營業費用成長速度快 240 個基點。

Finally, adjusted diluted EPS increased 31.3% to $0.84. We again grew adjusted EPS significantly faster than adjusted EBITDA, and we expect this to continue as we execute our share repurchase plan on top of strong adjusted EBITDA growth. Zooming out to the full year, we delivered record profitability as we grew adjusted EBITDA by 11.7% to $1.74 billion expanded adjusted EBITDA margin by 22 basis points to 4.6% and increased adjusted diluted EPS by 19.8% to $3.15, despite the macro challenges that persisted throughout 2024.

最後，調整後的稀釋每股收益成長 31.3% 至 0.84 美元。我們的調整後每股收益成長速度再次顯著快於調整後息稅折舊攤銷前利潤，我們預計，隨著我們在強勁的調整後息稅折舊攤銷前利潤增長的基礎上實施股票回購計劃，這一趨勢將繼續下去。放眼全年，儘​​管 2024 年宏觀挑戰持續存在，但我們仍實現了創紀錄的盈利能力，調整後 EBITDA 增長 11.7% 至 17.4 億美元，調整後 EBITDA 利潤率擴大 22 個基點至 4.6%，調整後攤薄每股收益增長 19.8% 至 3.15 美元。

Our results are a testament to the focused execution of our self-help initiatives and our ability to control the controls. This performance gives us confidence that we have the right strategy and initiatives in place to achieve our new long-range plan.

我們的成果證明了我們自助計劃的集中執行和我們控制控制的能力。這樣的表現讓我們有信心，我們擁有正確的策略和舉措來實現我們的新長期計劃。

Moving on to slide eight. We continue to drive significant gains in operating leverage. We again grew adjusted gross profit per case faster than adjusted operating expense per case. In the fourth quarter, adjusted gross profit per case grew by $0.28 or 3.6% compared to the prior year, while adjusted operating expense per case increased by $0.08 or 1.4%. Fourth quarter adjusted EBITDA per case was $2.12, up $0.19 from the prior year as we grew adjusted gross profit per case, 3.5times fast as adjusted operating expense per case. The full year result was very similar as we increased adjusted EBITDA per case $0.14 to $2.07.

轉到第八張投影片。我們持續大幅提高營運槓桿。我們的調整後每案毛利的成長速度再次快於調整後每案營業費用的成長速度。第四季度，調整後每案毛利較上年增長 0.28 美元，增幅 3.6%，調整後每案營業費用增加 0.08 美元，增幅 1.4%。第四季調整後每案 EBITDA 為 2.12 美元，較上年同期成長 0.19 美元，原因是我們調整後的每案毛利成長速度是調整後每案營業費用的 3.5 倍。全年業績非常相似，因為我們將每案調整後的 EBITDA 提高 0.14 美元至 2.07 美元。

We continue to drive gross profit gains and offset a significant portion of operating expense inflation with supply chain productivity improvement and other efficiency gains, including streamlining administrative processes and costs and realizing indirect procurement spend savings.

我們繼續推動毛利成長，並透過供應鏈生產力提高和其他效率提升（包括簡化行政流程和成本以及實現間接採購支出節省）來抵銷很大一部分營運費用通膨。

Specific to indirect spend, we achieved more than $30 million in savings for full year 2024, above the $20 million estimate I discussed on the last earnings call. And we remain on track for $60 million by 2027. Our fourth quarter and full year results demonstrate our ability to drive strong leverage through the P&L we expect to maintain an operational discipline in 2025 and beyond.

具體到間接支出，我們 2024 年全年實現了超過 3000 萬美元的節省，高於我在上次財報電話會議上討論的 2000 萬美元的預期。我們仍有望在 2027 年實現 6,000 萬美元的目標。我們的第四季和全年業績證明了我們有能力透過損益表推動強勁的槓桿作用，我們預計在 2025 年及以後將保持營運紀律。

Turning to slide nine. We are growing our business in a responsible and sustainable way to drive earnings, cash flow and improved return on invested capital. Over the past three years, we delivered significant profit growth from a balance of top line growth and EBITDA margin expansion including an 18% adjusted EBITDA CAGR and a 27% adjusted diluted EPS CAGR. As a result, we increased ROIC by 1,300 basis points to 31%.

翻到第九張投影片。我們正在以負責任和永續的方式發展我們的業務，以推動獲利、現金流和提高投資資本的回報率。在過去三年中，我們透過營業收入成長和 EBITDA 利潤率擴大實現了顯著的利潤成長，其中調整後 EBITDA 複合年增長率為 18%，調整後稀釋每股收益複合年增長率為 27%。因此，我們將ROIC提高了1,300個基點，達到31％。

Turning to slide 10. Our strong cash flow, combined with our healthy leverage profile enables us to deliver on our capital allocation priorities of investing in the business for growth, returning capital to shareholders and executing accretive tuck-in M&A. We ended the year at 2.8times net leverage within our 2times to 3times target range. Our net leverage remains in line with 2023, even with repurchasing 16.4 million shares for $958 million and closing on the $220 million acquisition of IWC.

翻到第 10 張投影片。我們強勁的現金流，加上健康的槓桿狀況，使我們能夠實現資本配置優先事項，即投資於業務成長、向股東返還資本和執行增值性補充併購。年底，我們的淨槓桿率為 2.8 倍，處於我們的 2 倍至 3 倍目標範圍內。即使以 9.58 億美元回購了 1,640 萬股股票並以 2.2 億美元收購 IWC，我們的淨槓桿率仍與 2023 年保持一致。

In 2024, we invested $341 million in cash CapEx as we continue to focus on projects to enable organic growth, including expanding our fleet, investing in capacity as well as enhancing our technology lead. So far in 2025, we completed the acquisition of Jake's Finer Foods for $92 million and repurchased $23 million of shares. We are disciplined in our capital deployment, and we remain committed to returning capital to shareholders. We expect to return to more meaningful share repurchases in the second quarter and balance of the year. And we'll adjust based on future tuck-in M&A opportunities.

2024 年，我們投資了 3.41 億美元的現金資本支出，我們將繼續專注於實現有機成長的項目，包括擴大我們的機隊、投資產能以及增強我們的技術領先地位。到 2025 年為止，我們已以 9,200 萬美元完成了對 Jake's Finer Foods 的收購，並回購了價值 2,300 萬美元的股票。我們對資本配置十分嚴謹，始終致力於向股東返還資本。我們預計第二季及今年餘下時間將恢復更有意義的股票回購。我們將根據未來的併購機會進行調整。

As a reminder, we expect to generate more than $4 billion of cash flow over our new long-range plan period of 2025 through 2027 and expect to deploy approximately half of these proceeds or $2 billion towards share repurchases. Additionally, we expect to reduce net leverage due to earnings growth.

提醒一下，我們預計在 2025 年至 2027 年的新長期計劃期間將產生超過 40 億美元的現金流，並預計將其中約一半或 20 億美元用於股票回購。此外，我們預計獲利成長將降低淨槓桿率。

Moving on to slide 11 and our guidance and modeling assumptions for fiscal year 2025. We expect to grow total company net sales by 4% to 6% compared to prior year, driven by total case growth of 2% to 4%, which includes faster independent restaurant case growth of 4% to 7%. The lower end of our range assumes a slower macro environment persists. We expect a normal inflationary environment with sales inflation and mix impact of approximately 2%.

繼續第 11 張投影片，了解我們對 2025 財年的指導和模型假設。我們預計，公司總淨銷售額將比去年同期增長 4% 至 6%，這得益於總案例增長 2% 至 4%，其中包括獨立餐廳案例增長更快，達到 4% 至 7%。我們的範圍下限假設較慢的宏觀環境持續存在。我們預期通膨環境正常，銷售通膨和組合影響約為 2%。

We expect to grow adjusted EBITDA 8% to 12% and adjusted diluted EPS, 17% to 23%. Our expected double-digit earnings growth will be driven by the combination of profitable volume growth and margin expansion as a result of adjusted gross profit per case continuing to grow faster than adjusted operating expense.

我們預計調整後的 EBITDA 將成長 8% 至 12%，調整後的稀釋 EPS 將成長 17% 至 23%。我們預期的兩位數獲利成長將由獲利量成長和利潤率擴大共同推動，因為調整後的每箱毛利的成長速度將繼續快於調整後的營業費用。

In closing, I am very pleased with our financial performance as we delivered record adjusted EBITDA for 2024 and achieved a long-range plan that we presented in early 2022. We did this by staying focused on executing our strategy, being agile and control in the controllables during times of macro uncertainties. I am excited about the opportunity in front of us as we embark on our new long-range plan and we are confident in our ability to achieve it given the momentum we are generating.

最後，我對我們的財務表現非常滿意，因為我們實現了 2024 年創紀錄的調整後 EBITDA，並實現了我們在 2022 年初提出的長期計劃。我們透過專注於執行我們的策略、在宏觀不確定時期保持敏捷和控制可控因素來做到這一點。當我們開始實施新的長期計劃時，我對眼前的機會感到興奮，並且憑藉我們正在產生的勢頭，我們有信心有能力實現這一目標。

I'll now pass it back to Dave for his closing remarks.

現在我將把它交還給戴夫，請他作結束語。

Thanks, Dirk. You've heard about the great progress that we made last year. We are extremely pleased with how we successfully completed our prior long-range plan and are very optimistic about our momentum heading into 2025 and beyond. Ours is very much a self-help and execution story with a long runway of top and bottom line growth in front of us. We will continue to run our playbook, execute our strategy and effectively deploy capital.

謝謝，德克。你們已經聽說了我們去年的巨大進展。我們對成功完成之前的長期計劃感到非常高興，並對我們在 2025 年及以後的發展勢頭非常樂觀。我們的故事很大程度上是一個自助和執行的故事，我們面前還有很長的營收和利潤成長之路。我們將繼續執行我們的劇本，實施我們的策略並有效地部署資本。

I'd like to quickly draw your attention to slide 12 and what differentiates US Foods versus our competition. We are the only pure-play US-focused food service distributor with national scale. We have a differentiated value proposition and significant scale with the three most profitable customer types in the industry, independent restaurants, healthcare and hospitality. We have the industry-leading digital ecosystem. We are in the early innings of self-help initiatives that will drive sustained profitable growth for many years to come. We believe we have the fastest P&L growth algorithm in the industry, underpinned by accretive capital allocation, which will enable us to grow adjusted EPS faster than adjusted EBITDA over the next several years.

我想快速提請您注意第 12 張投影片，以及 US Foods 與我們的競爭對手的差異。我們是唯一一家專注於美國且具有全國規模的食品服務分銷商。我們擁有差異化的價值主張和龐大的規模，擁有業內最賺錢的三大客戶類型，即獨立餐廳、醫療保健和旅館業。我們擁有領先業界的數位生態系統。我們正處於自助計畫的早期階段，這將推動未來許多年持續的獲利成長。我們相信，我們擁有業界最快的損益成長演算法，並以增值資本配置為基礎，這將使我們在未來幾年內調整後的每股盈餘成長速度快於調整後的 EBITDA 成長速度。

And finally, we are accelerating cash flow generation, which will result in more than $4 billion to deploy over the next three years. We are much stronger today than we were several years ago, and we are just getting started. We have sustainable competitive advantages to outperform the market well into the future, and we will continue to drive shareholder value for many years to come.

最後，我們正在加速現金流的產生，這將帶來超過 40 億美元的未來三年的現金流部署。我們今天比幾年前強大得多，而且我們才剛起步。我們擁有可持續的競爭優勢，能夠在未來很好地超越市場，並且我們將在未來許多年繼續推動股東價值。

With that, Greg, please open up the line for questions.

格雷格，請打開熱線來回答問題。

Great. Thanks, Dave. (Operator Instructions) And as Mike mentioned earlier, in the interest of time, we ask that you please limit your question to one primary question and one follow up. Mark Carden, UBS.

偉大的。謝謝，戴夫。（操作員指示）正如麥克之前提到的，為了節省時間，我們要求您將問題限制為一個主要問題和一個後續問題。瑞銀的馬克卡登（Mark Carden）。

So to start, it seems like there's new tariff news every day, including today with reciprocal tariffs. What percentage of your offering do you import overall? And then, if tariffs on food products end up occurring, would you expect a pivot sourcing or would the industry simply be able to pass through the pricing?

首先，似乎每天都有新的關稅新聞，包括今天的互惠關稅。你們的產品中進口的總量佔比是多少？那麼，如果最終對食品徵收關稅，您是否會預期出現樞軸採購，還是該行業只需透過定價就能轉嫁關稅？

I would just point out that the overwhelming majority of our products are produced and distributed in the United States. We have a low to mid-single-digit importing from the various countries that have been mentioned. And just recall that the majority of our customer interactions and our agreements are pass-through in nature. But having said all of that, at the heart of our work with our customers, is helping them handle inflation. And I would wrap the tariff issue into just more inflationary pressures on our customers.

我只想指出，我們的絕大多數產品都是在美國生產和分銷的。我們從上述各國都有低至中位數個位數的進口量。請記住，我們與客戶的大部分互動和協議本質上都是傳遞性的。但話雖如此，我們為客戶開展工作的核心是幫助他們應對通膨。我認為關稅問題只會給我們的消費者帶來更大的通膨壓力。

So how we go to market, the way our restaurant operations consultants work to help take cost and waste out of the back office of our operators, our Scoop products, our private label brands that end up being cheaper for our customers and help them save time and money in the kitchens. That's at the heart of what we do every day, and we'll continue to work hard to help support our customers.

因此，我們如何進入市場，我們的餐廳營運顧問如何幫助我們的營運商、我們的 Scoop 產品、我們的自有品牌的後台辦公室降低成本和減少浪費，最終為我們的客戶帶來更便宜的價格，並幫助他們節省廚房的時間和金錢。這是我們每天工作的核心，我們將繼續努力幫助支持我們的客戶。

And then as you think about your independent case growth assumptions in the year ahead, how are you thinking about the balance of new account growth versus penetration growth and how that could progress really throughout the year?

然後，當您考慮未來一年的獨立案例成長假設時，您如何考慮新帳戶成長與滲透率成長之間的平衡，以及這種平衡在全年如何真正取得進展？

So penetration has been a challenge given the foot traffic challenges really all throughout 2024, especially in the back half of the year. But just over time, the overwhelming majority of our growth comes from new account generation. That's why I pointed out, we had the highest new account generation of the year in December, even with all the calendar and food traffic challenges. I am very encouraged. We also have one of our strongest monthly year-over-year share gains in the month of December. And all of that positions us very well for growth going forward, especially when that foot traffic environment improves, which we expect to happen throughout the course of 2025.

因此，考慮到整個 2024 年（尤其是下半年）的人流挑戰，滲透一直是一項挑戰。但隨著時間的推移，我們絕大部分的成長來自於新帳戶的產生。這就是為什麼我指出，儘管面臨日曆和食品流量方面的種種挑戰，但我們 12 月的新帳戶產生量是今年最高的。我感到非常鼓舞。我們的 12 月份股價年增率也是最強勁的月份之一。所有這些都為我們未來的成長奠定了良好的基礎，尤其是當人流環境改善時，我們預計這將在 2025 年實現。

Edward Kelly, Wells Fargo.

富國銀行的愛德華‧凱利。

I just wanted to maybe just start with double-clicking on the independent case growth. I mean you're clearly taking share. There's no doubt about that. But you're below the 5% to 8% out to, right, that you've kind of talked about. I mean, guidance seems to be that because you're talking about the 2% to 4% total organic case growth that you see a sharp improvement in the independent side. Could you just maybe talk about the expectation for the year, your confidence, the visibility? How maybe you think about bridging back to that target and how we should be thinking about the cadence of the year as that occurs?

我只是想從雙擊獨立案例增長開始。我的意思是你顯然佔據了份額。毫無疑問。但是，您提到的數字低於 5% 到 8%。我的意思是，指導似乎是，因為你談論的是 2% 到 4% 的總有機案例增長，所以你會看到獨立方面的急劇改善。您能否談談對今年的期望、信心和前景？您如何考慮實現這一目標以及我們應該如何考慮這一目標實現後的年度節奏？

Let me just start by just reframing that 5% to 8% case growth as we did at Investor Day. And recall that the underlying assumption there was a normalized plus 2% foot traffic environment, which we did not see in 2024. So I'd start with that. And if you just bridge the performance that we had during the fourth quarter, at that 1.8% organic growth, you add the 2% foot traffic back in that 150 basis points to 200 basis points impact that we had from the storms, weather and calendar. That all puts us right in the heart of low to upper 5s even in that environment.

首先，我想重新定義 5% 到 8% 的成長情況，就像我們在投資者日所做的那樣。回想一下，當時的基本假設是人流環境標準化且成長 2%，而這種情況在 2024 年並未出現。因此我就從那開始。如果您只是將我們在第四季度的業績（1.8% 的有機成長率）加上 2% 的客流量，那麼風暴、天氣和日曆給我們帶來的 150 個基點到 200 個基點的影響就會產生。即使在那樣的環境下，這一切也使我們處於 5 分以下到 5 分以上的水平。

So I'm confident in what we put forward. And then as you heard Dirk comment, we saw some improved foot traffic trends in January, in the way kind of we're looking at the month of January, if you take the impact of the strike that we had last year and the weather, and that offsets completely the weather, which was much more significant this year. So I would call that year-over-year for US Foods a wash. And then underneath that, we saw strengthening from December to January.

所以我對我們提出的建議很有信心。正如您所聽到的 Dirk 的評論，我們看到 1 月份的人流量趨勢有所改善，從我們對 1 月份的看法來看，如果將去年罷工和天氣的影響考慮在內，這完全抵消了天氣的影響，而今年天氣的影響更為顯著。因此，我認為美國食品的年比表現並無太大變化。在此之下，我們看到從12月到1月出現了增強勢頭。

So as Dirk pointed out, the low end of that range assumes that the foot tracking environment doesn't improve. We're confident it will. It's just at what rate that happens in 2025. But we've got a lot of confidence based on the underlying momentum that we've seen, the share gains that we're taking to put forward that guidance range for the year.

正如德克指出的那樣，該範圍的低端假設足部追蹤環境不會改善。我們堅信一定會如此。這只是 2025 年發生的速度問題。但基於我們看到的潛在勢頭，以及我們將採取的份額增長，我們對今年的指導範圍充滿信心。

Maybe just a follow-up to that, Dave. I mean, you've pretty consistently talked about that you can adjust to the macro and controlling the controllables. And I think '24 obviously proved that you're exiting the year with a lot of momentum and profit per case like the self-help side of the profitability equation. So does the same mentality applies as you're thinking about '25 guidance? Just curious as to how you would size the self-help opportunity in '25 versus what you accomplished in '24?

也許只是對此的一個後續，戴夫。我的意思是，你一直在談論你可以適應宏觀並控制可控因素。我認為，『24』顯然證明，你在年底將擁有巨大的發展勢頭和利潤，就像盈利方程式的自助方面一樣。那麼，當您考慮 25 年指導時，是否也適用同樣的心態？只是好奇您如何衡量 '25 年的自助機會與您在 '24 年取得的成就相比？

I would say we feel really good about the momentum. And as I pointed out, Ed, and I really believe this, we're in the early innings of all the work that you see us doing on the top line, continuing to take share. There's a lot more share for us to be had in all three of our targeted customer types. I feel really good around the way the team is aligned around our mission there and the numbers that we're putting up, but there's more to do. And then as you think about the gross profit per case work that we have going on and our margin improvement work, our strategic vendor management work, that $260 million of target we plow over the next three years, the momentum we're exiting the year with in that area, our exclusive brands nearing 53% at the end of the year. There's a lot more for us to do and to be had.

我想說我們對這一發展勢頭感到非常滿意。正如我所指出的，艾德，我真的相信這一點，我們正處於所有工作的早期階段，正如你所看到的，我們在營收所做的那樣，繼續佔據市場份額。在我們所有三種目標客戶類型中，我們都可以獲得更多的份額。我對團隊圍繞我們的使命所達成的一致以及我們所取得的數字感到非常滿意，但還有很多工作要做。然後，當您想到我們正在進行的每箱工作的毛利和我們的利潤率提高工作、我們的策略供應商管理工作時，我們在未來三年內實現的 2.6 億美元的目標，以及我們在今年年底在該領域的發展勢頭，我們的獨家品牌在年底接近 53%。我們還有很多事情要做，還有很多事情要做。

And then, supply chain productivity with all the framing that we've done and the structural improvement work overlaying things like the cart. We're going to just get continued momentum as we roll that out across the rest of this year. Our turnover continues to reduce in both selectors and drivers, I'm confident that our delivery and outbound productivity will continue to improve throughout the year. So just feel really good about the execution story that we have in front of us and the way the team is driving the outcomes.

然後，我們完成了所有框架的構建，以及覆蓋購物車等結構改進工作，從而提高了供應鏈生產力。隨著我們在今年剩餘時間內推出這項計劃，我們將繼續保持這一勢頭。我們的挑選者和司機的流動率持續下降，我相信我們的送貨和出站生產力將在全年持續提高。因此，對於我們面前的執行故事以及團隊推動成果的方式感到非常滿意。

I think, the other thing to not forget is the benefit that we have from not just from a growth, not just independents, but the strong base, as Dave mentioned, it's more than a quarter of our business in healthcare and hospitality, which both were growing at a significant rate with healthcare at almost 5% for the fourth quarter hospitality at 2.4% and despite having the same headwinds basically as independents had and both of those have come out of the gate in January, well within our guidance range. So that's another good growth engine for us as we talk about that, our EBITDA growth and EPS growth coming from a balance of top line growth and margin expansion.

我認為，另一件不要忘記的事情是，我們獲得的好處不僅僅是增長，不僅僅是獨立酒店，還有強大的基礎，正如戴夫提到的，醫療保健和酒店業占我們業務的四分之一以上，這兩個行業都以顯著的速度增長，其中醫療保健在第四季度的增長率接近 5%，酒店業的增長率為 2.4%，儘管我們面臨著獨立酒店的進步與獨立酒店一樣在 1 月份的企業之間取得了進步。正如我們所討論的，這對我們來說是另一個良好的成長引擎，我們的 EBITDA 成長和 EPS 成長來自於營業額成長和利潤率擴張的平衡。

Jeffrey Bernstein, Barclays.

巴克萊銀行的傑弗裡·伯恩斯坦。

My first question is just kind of bigger picture. I think you guys mentioned you're assuming or suggesting a stronger macro backdrop in '25 versus '24. Just wondering what metrics gives you that confidence. I know there are some that are concerned that the consumer environment has been getting much better. I suppose around that because you're talking about the long-term algo for case growth, 5% to 8%, which assumes positive 2% industry traffic.

我的第一個問題只是涉及一個更大的圖像。我想你們提到過，你們假設或暗示 25 年的宏觀背景將比 24 年更為強勁。只是想知道什麼指標給了你這樣的信心。我知道有些人擔心消費環境是否會越來越好。我認為大概是這樣，因為您談論的是案例成長的長期演算法，即 5% 到 8%，假設行業流量為正 2%。

There's definitely a question as to whether or not the industry will ever get back to positive 2% traffic. It just seems like it's year after year. There are always challenges there. So just wondering your kind of broader view on the macro backdrop and the confidence you have in getting back to that 2% positive industry traffic.

毫無疑問，這是一個問題：該產業是否還能恢復到 2% 的正客流量。好像年復一年。那裡總是存在著挑戰。所以只是想知道您對宏觀背景的更廣泛的看法，以及您對恢復 2% 正行業流量的信心。

It's Dirk. Technomic is one source that we use is calling for a healthy improvement in '25 over 2024. Also, when you had a decline last year sort of reset of base and not expect further declines again versus some improvement we have likely more -- some more stability with the election behind. So those all give us the optimism that the traffic environment will continue to get better.

是德克。我們使用的一個資料來源是 Technomic，它預測 2025 年的經濟將比 2024 年出現健康改善。此外，當去年出現下滑時，基礎會重新調整，預計不會再出現進一步下滑，相反，隨著選舉的進行，我們可能會獲得更多的穩定。這些都讓我們對交通環境的持續改善充滿樂觀。

It's a thing that we stay focused on that. These things is not new that you've heard us talk a lot about is things that we can control around the share gains in all three of our target customer types were continue to drive that and is self-help control the controllables, however you want to talk about it, that is at the heart of how we're thinking about it, whether it's top line growth or just bottom line earnings growth.

這是我們一直在關注的事情。這些事情並不新鮮，您已經聽到我們經常談論的是我們可以控制的所有三種目標客戶類型的份額增長，並繼續推動這一點，並且自助控制可控因素，無論您想如何談論它，這都是我們思考的核心，無論是營業額增長還是底線收益增長。

And my follow-up is just on -- Dave, you mentioned the independent customer gains on about the fastest growth. I was just in the month of December and that January is on a strong start. I'm just wondering, is there anything that's you view as the key driver of that acceleration? And maybe what's your expectation is that sustainable throughout 2025, specific to that independent customer gain metric?

我的後續問題是－戴夫，你提到了獨立客戶收益是成長最快的。我剛剛進入十二月，一月份的開局很不錯。我只是想知道，您認為這種加速的關鍵驅動因素是什麼？也許您的預期是，這一趨勢將在 2025 年持續下去，具體到獨立客戶收益指標？

I think the focus that we've had in independent 15 quarters of share gains running our playbook. The way we use the sarcoma data to target customer growth by market, by ZIP code. Our team is on it, you augment that with our continued hiring of sellers. Some of them are maturing over the last 12 to 18 months, we'll continue to hire in that low to mid-single-digit range as we committed to, as we did in the last two years. And it's just continuing to run our playbook. And I remind our team all the time, given our share position, regardless of the macro, there's plenty of volume to be had in the industry and specifically with independent customers. And our job is to go get those cases and that's what our team continues to do.

我認為，我們在獨立的 15 個季度中一直關注的重點是市場份額的成長。我們使用肉瘤數據來根據市場和郵政編碼定位客戶成長。我們的團隊正在努力實現這一目標，我們將持續招募賣家來增強我們的實力。其中一些公司在過去 12 到 18 個月內逐漸成熟，我們將繼續按照承諾在低到中等個位數範圍內招募員工，就像我們過去兩年所做的那樣。它只是繼續運行我們的劇本。我一直提醒我們的團隊，鑑於我們的份額地位，無論宏觀情況如何，行業內，尤其是獨立客戶，都有足夠的交易量。我們的工作就是處理這些案件，這也是我們的團隊正在繼續做的事情。

Lauren Silberman, Deutsche Bank.

德意志銀行的勞倫·西爾伯曼。

So I wanted to ask if you're going to expand a bit more on what you saw in terms of cadence in 4Q and into January. It's good to your growth accelerated in January. I guess you within striking distance of the 4% to 7% independent case growth target for the year. Just trying to understand whether the guide implies industry trends improve from here? What's the magnitude of that?

所以我想問您是否可以進一步詳細說明您在第四季度和一月份的節奏方面看到的情況。很高興看到你在一月份成長加快了。我猜你距離今年 4% 到 7% 的獨立案件成長目標已經很近了。只是想了解指南是否意味著產業趨勢從此有所改善？它的規模有多大？

This is Dirk. So in the fourth quarter, we saw more growth in October, November, just like the rest of the industry and peers have talked about in December with the shift in the holiday timing, you saw slower growth overall. We did see some acceleration in January. I think with the weather and the fires made it pretty noisy. So I think for the -- when you think of the first quarter, just a reminder kind of January, early February, lower volume periods relative to overall.

這是德克。因此，在第四季度，我們看到 10 月和 11 月的成長更加強勁，就像業內其他公司和同行所談論的 12 月一樣，隨著假期時間的轉變，整體成長速度有所放緩。我們確實看到了一月份的一些加速。我認為天氣和火災使得那裡非常吵鬧。所以我認為—當你想到第一季時，只需要提醒一下，一月、二月初，相對於整體而言，交易量較低的時期。

So our expectation is that we will accelerate throughout the year. And have that confidence for the reasons Dave talked about earlier that we achieved that 4% to 7% independent case growth as well as our overall 2% to 4% case growth.

因此，我們預計全年都會加速發展。我們有信心，因為 Dave 之前提到過，我們實現了 4% 到 7% 的獨立案件增長，以及 2% 到 4% 的總體案件增長。

On that 2% to 4% case growth, I just want to confirm what's organic versus whether there's any M&A contribution embedded? And just more broadly, how you're thinking about the M&A environment for '25?

對於 2% 到 4% 的成長，我只想確認什麼是有機成長，以及是否有任何併購貢獻？更廣泛地說，您如何看待 25 年的併購環境？

That incorporates anything that we've transacted already. So it would include IWC and the small contribution from takes, which is relatively small, as I mentioned. Our pipeline continues to be worked, and we continue to look for opportunities out there, and we'll continue to be opportunistic with the right businesses. And [Chester] is a good example of fit the network very well, doubled our capacity in the Houston area, allow for continued growth. As Dave mentioned, a very good meat cutting facility that fits well into our network.

其中包括我們已經交易的所有事項。因此它將包括 IWC 和來自收入的少量貢獻，正如我所提到的，這相對較小。我們的管道仍在繼續運作，我們將繼續尋找機會，並將繼續抓住合適的業務機會。而[切斯特]就是一個很好的例子，它非常適合網絡，使我們在休斯頓地區的容量翻了一番，並實現了持續增長。正如戴夫所提到的，非常好的肉類切割設施非常適合我們的網路。

So I would say the environment remains healthy, and we continue to work our pipeline and engage with people. As you've heard us say plenty of times, the thing you can't determine is when they're ready. And so our work continues on that front.

因此我想說環境仍然是健康的，我們將繼續努力工作並與人們互動。正如您多次聽到我們說過的那樣，您無法確定的是他們何時做好準備。因此，我們的工作將繼續在這方面進行。

John Heinbockel, Guggenheim Partners.

古根漢合夥人公司的約翰‧海因博克爾 (John Heinbockel)。

I want to start with, can you discuss what you're seeing when you sort of take out weather and calendar trend line on lines per account and cases per line, right? And obviously, cases per line, right, as we see the macro impact. Is it possible -- could that be down 5% or mid-single digit with the bulk of that being macro?

首先，您可以討論一下當您從每個帳戶的行數和每行的案例數中取出天氣和日曆趨勢線時，您看到了什麼嗎？顯然，每行都有案例，對吧，正如我們所見的宏觀影響。有可能嗎——下降幅度會是 5% 或中等個位數，其中大部分是宏觀因素？

Yes. The cases per line has been the challenge, John. I think lines it relatively stable. Obviously, we continue to look for those penetration opportunities, but particularly in the back half of the year, it's been kind of overwhelmed by the foot traffic challenges, and that's where that shows up.

是的。每行的案例都是一個挑戰，約翰。我認為線路相對穩定。顯然，我們會繼續尋找這些滲透機會，但特別是在今年下半年，我們被人流帶來的挑戰壓得喘不過氣來，這就是問題所在。

Maybe a totally different topic. Where are we -- if you think about the rest of this year, the rollout of Descartes and [WMS], right, the rollout on that? And then I think last quarter, you talked about productivity was up 3.5%. And I don't know what that was for the full year, maybe maybe it was similar. Could that be higher, right, in '25 because of the rollout of those programs? Do you think it's about the same?

也許是個完全不同的話題。我們在哪裡——如果你想想今年剩下的時間，笛卡爾和 [WMS] 的推出，對吧，它的推出？然後我想上個季度你談到了生產力上升了 3.5%。我不知道全年的情況如何，也許情況差不多。由於這些項目的推出，25 年的數字會更高嗎？您覺得差不多嗎？

It's Dirk. I think so with Descartes, we expect to be fully rolled out by the end of this year, continues to deploy to more markets. I would say that our expectation is the productivity impact is pretty similar to what it was last year. These are rolling off some older ones that lap and then continue to add new ones. But as we come into 2025, we're still very pleased with the outcomes that both those are offering. And then for Descartes, the opportunity that it will continue to afford us in the coming years by having a more advanced surrounding platform.

是德克。我認為 Descartes 會如此，我們預計在今年年底全面推出，並繼續部署到更多市場。我想說，我們預期生產力影響與去年非常相似。這些都是一些舊的滾掉，然後繼續添加新的。但隨著我們進入 2025 年，我們仍然對這兩項計劃所帶來的成果感到非常滿意。對於笛卡爾來說，透過擁有更先進的周邊平台，它將在未來幾年繼續為我們提供機會。

Peter Saleh, BTIG.

彼得·薩利赫（Peter Saleh），BTIG。

Just a couple of questions. First, I wanted to come back to the conversation around tariffs. I think, Dave, you mentioned low to mid-single-digit imports from the countries that may be affected. Just curious if the private label brands that you guys have, are they more or less exposed to those countries versus the branded? That's my first question.

僅有幾個問題。首先，我想重新討論關稅問題。戴夫，我認為您提到了從可能受到影響的國家進口的低至中等個位數的進口量。我只是好奇，你們的自有品牌與品牌相比，在這些國家的曝光率是否更高或更低？這是我的第一個問題。

I'd say it's about equal there, Peter. No plus or minus on a relative basis.

我想說那裡的情況大致相同，彼得。相對而言沒有加或減。

That's very helpful. And then just on the MOXe roll out? I know you gave some metrics there. Are you still seeing the case count growth there? I think maybe several quarters ago, you were mentioning about a case and half more per order. Just any update on that would be helpful.

這非常有幫助。然後只是推出 MOXe 嗎？我知道你在那裡給了一些指標。你還看到那裡的病例數在增加嗎？我想也許幾個季度前，您提到的是每個訂單大約一箱半。任何關於此的更新都會有幫助。

Yes, Peter, it's relatively the same that a case and a half in that one to two cases is where we continue to land with MOXe, and we're confident in that, and we expect that will continue.

是的，彼得，相對而言，在那一到兩起案件中，有一起半案件是我們繼續使用 MOXe 的情況，我們對此充滿信心，並且我們預計這種情況將會持續下去。

Brian Harbour, Morgan Stanley.

摩根士丹利的布萊恩哈伯 (Brian Harbour)。

Just on the healthcare and hospitality side. Has that been mostly kind of new business wins versus penetration? I know the new business wins there can be a little bit lumpier. But would you expect that rate to kind of continue into this year or anything that affected in 4Q?

僅在醫療保健和酒店業方面。這主要是新業務的成功還是滲透？我知道，新事業的成功可能會有些坎坷。但您是否預計這種利率會持續到今年或會對第四季產生影響？

This is Dirk. So overall, as we said, we're quite pleased with the way both are performing. And it's really coming from a combination of new and penetration across that customer base. And our expectation is we continue to grow at a very healthy rate. And as I mentioned, we're growing well within our guidance range for the year. We have differentiation with those customer types just like we do in our go-to-market with independent restaurants. And the wins can be, yes, there can be some chunky pieces, but there also can be smaller that we continue to bring on a regular basis. So we think we're very well positioned and excited about the growth that comes from those customer types.

這是德克。總的來說，正如我們所說，我們對兩家公司的表現都非常滿意。這實際上來自於新客戶和整個客戶群的滲透。我們的預期是，我們將繼續以非常健康的速度成長。正如我所提到的，我們今年的成長前景良好，符合我們的預期範圍。我們將這些客戶類型區分，就像我們針對獨立餐廳的行銷所做的那樣。是的，勝利確實可以有一些大塊的勝利，但也可以有一些較小的勝利，我們會繼續定期取得這些勝利。因此，我們認為我們處於非常有利的位置，並且對這些客戶類型帶來的成長感到興奮。

Dirk, what's a rough CapEx number for this year and I guess, just kind of any changes in the different buckets of that versus '24?

德克，今年的資本支出大概是多少？

So we guided to $375 million to $425 million for the year. That's a step up from a little under $350 million in 2024, and it's really right in line with what we talked about at Investor Day. And it's a combination of, as the business gets a little bit bigger, its fleet, it's a little more IT to support some of our initiatives. It's some of the word ground building maintenance and capacity.

因此我們預計今年的銷售額將達到 3.75 億至 4.25 億美元。這比 2024 年的略低於 3.5 億美元有所增加，並且與我們在投資者日所討論的內容完全一致。隨著業務規模逐漸擴大，我們的車隊也逐漸增多，我們需要更多的 IT 來支援我們的一些計畫。這是關於地面建築維護和容量的一些詞。

So it's not a single driver there. But I think the important part is that and depreciation, both are what we have been contemplating, and it's really as we step up coming off of a few years of lower investments around the COVID period of getting back to investing in a healthy way. And what you see is, even with that, we continue to grow EPS meaningfully faster than adjusted EBITDA.

因此那裡不只有一個司機。但我認為重要的是，這和折舊都是我們一直在考慮的，而且隨著我們在擺脫新冠疫情期間幾年的較低投資後，真正恢復到健康的投資方式。而您所看到的是，即使如此，我們的每股盈餘成長速度仍然遠快於調整後的 EBITDA。

Kelly Bania, BMO Capital Markets.

凱利·巴尼亞 (Kelly Bania)，BMO 資本市場。

Just a couple of questions from us. Lots of focus on the restaurant traffic and the broader trends there. But anything you're seeing underneath the hood, whether it's cuisine types that are performing better or income cohort dynamics or even regional dynamics. I'm just curious if there's areas that are stronger that maybe you might be leaning into forces as we think about 2025.

我們只想問幾個問題。大量關注餐廳客流量和那裡的更廣泛趨勢。但您所看到的任何內部情況，無論是表現更好的菜系類型，還是收入群體動態，甚至是區域動態。我只是好奇，當我們考慮 2025 年時，是否存在一些更強大的領域，也許您可能會依靠這些領域的力量。

I wouldn't point to any regional challenges. I think that pressure -- foot traffic pressure has been pretty broad-based, so particularly in the back half of the year. Our strength, we have a lot of strength in the bar and grill area and our team continues to do a nice job there taking share. Tends to hold up on a relative basis, better than some other segments. But that's really the only thing, I would probably point out to mention that.

我不會指出任何地區挑戰。我認為壓力——人流量壓力一直相當廣泛，特別是在今年下半年。我們的優勢在於，我們在酒吧和燒烤店領域擁有強大的實力，我們的團隊將繼續在那裡出色地完成工作，佔據市場份額。與其他一些部分相比，相對而言表現更好。但這確實是唯一的事情，我可能會指出這一點。

And then, Dave, I think you mentioned sales force head count was up 5% in 2024. Is it safe to assume '25 is on a similar trajectory. And just color on how you feel about the compensation structure for the team and feedback and how that's going or any changes or things that we should consider on that front?

然後，戴夫，我想你提到過到 2024 年銷售人員數量將增加 5%。是否可以安全地假設'25 也處於類似的軌跡上？並且請您談談您對團隊薪酬結構和回饋的看法，以及進展如何，或者我們在這方面應該考慮哪些變化或事項？

Yes, we're up 6% in '23 and 5% last year. I think that 4% to 6% range feels good for us. We've got good momentum around it. Our team does a nice job of onboarding new sellers. And so I think we will stay in that range. And we thoughtfully did not make any challenges to our compensation plan going into this year because we feel good about the changes we made or so ago. And that's playing out as we hoped. And we'll continue to review it through the course of time and make any tweaks as we need to.

是的，我們在23年成長了6％，去年成長了5％。我認為 4% 到 6% 的範圍對我們來說感覺良好。我們在這方面取得了良好的勢頭。我們的團隊在引導新賣家方面做得很好。所以我認為我們會保持在這個範圍內。我們經過深思熟慮，並沒有對今年的薪酬計劃提出任何挑戰，因為我們對之前所做的改變感到滿意。而這一切都正如我們所希望的。我們會持續審查它並根據需要做出調整。

Alex Slagle, Jefferies.

傑富瑞 (Jefferies) 的亞歷克斯‧斯拉格爾 (Alex Slagle)。

Congrats on the performance this year. I wanted to ask on the private the private label and just environment seems prime to support further expansion here. It sounds like you've seen the momentum climb through '24. I was wondering if you could kind of talk about some of the drivers that could allow that to ramp further in '25 as you think about the effectiveness of the seller incentives and the kinds of products you're offering or any other industry dynamics that might impact that?

恭喜你今年的成績。我想問私人品牌和公正環境似乎對於支持這裡的進一步擴張至關重要。聽起來你已經看到了 24 年來的勢頭。我想知道您是否可以談談一些可能使這一趨勢在 25 年進一步提升的驅動因素，同時您考慮賣方激勵措施的有效性以及您提供的產品類型或可能影響這一趨勢的任何其他行業動態？

Yes. I'll just take you back in history a little bit, Alex, there with the pressure that ourselves, and really the industry saw in private label coming out of COVID. We all were challenged with supply for a few years there. And it was really in the back half of '23 when all that started to normalize and then regaining the seller confidence. So we entered 2024 with full supply capability.

是的。亞歷克斯，我稍微回顧一下歷史，我們自己以及整個行業都面臨著來自自有品牌在 COVID 疫情中出現的壓力。我們在那裡的幾年都面臨著供應的挑戰。直到23年下半年，一切才開始正常化，賣家信心也開始恢復。因此，我們以全面的供應能力進入2024年。

You overlay that with our innovative Scoop process where we're launching new products, highly innovative products that, again, great quality and help our customers save time and money. We do that twice a year in the spring and the fall, and those have been quite successful. And most of those products stack once we launch them. And so we feel really good about it. And that's why I pointed out earlier that we exited the year with a much stronger momentum than we had for average for the year. And I expect that, that will continue.

您可以將其與我們創新的 Scoop 流程相結合，我們會推出新產品，這些產品具有高度創新性，品質優良，並能幫助我們的客戶節省時間和金錢。我們每年春季和秋季都會進行兩次這樣的活動，而且都非常成功。一旦我們推出這些產品，大多數產品就會被堆疊起來。因此我們對此感到非常高興。這就是為什麼我之前指出，我們以比全年平均更強勁的勢頭結束今年。我預計這種情況將會持續下去。

In challenging times when our customers are feeling those inflationary pressures, our private label brands are exactly what they need and our team is intended to sell those. And so it's a win-win for our customer and for our sales team.

在我們的客戶感受到通膨壓力的困難時期，我們的自有品牌正是他們所需要的，我們的團隊旨在銷售這些品牌。因此，這對我們的客戶和銷售團隊來說是雙贏的。

And a follow-up on the acquisitions with Jake being the newest addition. Maybe an update on kind of where we are with some of the other recent acquisitions by IWC, Renzi, in terms of integrating those businesses in that journey towards kind of getting the productivity and the growth and the synergies that you've been looking for there?

並跟進收購情況，傑克 (Jake) 是最新加入的。能否介紹一下 IWC、Renzi 最近進行的一些其他收購的進展情況，如何整合這些業務，以實現您一直在尋找的生產力、成長和協同效應？

It's Dirk. We've been pleased with each of them, each continue to progress from an integration perspective, both from a process and system. And we'll continue that over the course of this year. As you can probably remember we've talked about. And when we buy companies, we do integrate them into our systems over time. But each of them continue to largely perform as we expected, and we expect the same amount of Jake, as we bring it on and are excited about that one as well.

是德克。我們對它們每一個都感到滿意，它們每一個都從整合的角度（包括流程和系統）不斷取得進步。今年我們還會繼續這樣做。您可能還記得我們討論過此事。當我們收購公司時，我們會隨著時間的推移將它們整合到我們的系統中。但是他們每個人的表現基本上都符合我們的預期，我們對傑克也抱持著同樣的期待，我們對此也感到很興奮。

Jake Bartlett, Truist.

傑克·巴特利特，Truist。

My first one was on the product cost and mix guidance of 2% in '25. Trending higher than that in the fourth quarter. It looks to me like some food PPI is remaining elevated. So I guess the question is, would you view that as kind of conservative on the 2% versus the 2.7% on a blended basis? And also, maybe there's some mix impact in there that I'm not contemplating. So any commentary there would be helpful.

我的第一個建議是關於'25 年 2% 的產品成本和混合指導。與第四季相比，趨勢有所上升。在我看來，有些食品的 PPI 仍然處於高位。所以我想問題是，您是否認為 2% 相對於混合基礎上的 2.7% 來說有點保守？而且，也許其中還存在一些我沒有考慮到的混合影響。因此任何評論都會有幫助。

And overall, it probably is a little on the conservative side since we don't know exactly how the inflation is going to play out, and we've used that 2% very similar to how we've talked about it previously. And just as a reminder, the inflation plays out a little bit higher than that, it will be more of an impact on sales than it will on earnings. Just because when we think about the inflation even in the fourth quarter and very similar to the third quarter is more of that's coming through proteins to center of the plate. And those cases has more of an impact on sales dollars than it does earnings. So we're well positioned here, and we'll continue to work on managing inflation effectively just as we have in the last few years.

總體而言，它可能有點保守，因為我們不知道通貨膨脹將如何具體發揮作用，我們使用的 2% 與我們之前談論的非常相似。需要提醒的是，通貨膨脹率會略高一些，它對銷售的影響會大於對收益的影響。只是因為當我們考慮通貨膨脹時，即使在第四季度，也與第三季度非常相似，更多的是透過蛋白質到達盤子的中心。這些案件對銷售額的影響大於對收益的影響。因此，我們目前處於有利地位，我們將繼續努力有效地管理通貨膨脹，就像過去幾年所做的那樣。

And then I had a question on some of the margin drivers in '25. And hopefully you can quantify maybe some of the what you're looking to get with procurement savings? Just remind us on what you think you're going to get there as well as the corporate cost savings. Any other initiatives maybe that you could quantify for us as we think about the margin build in '25?

然後我對'25年的一些利潤驅動因素產生了疑問。希望您可以量化您希望透過採購節省獲得的部分收益？只要提醒我們您認為您將會實現的目標以及企業成本節省即可。當我們考慮 25 年的利潤率建設時，還有其他什麼舉措您可以為我們量化嗎？

Sure. Well, I'm not going to get into a lot of specifics on the components. I think on the cost of goods, the $260 million that we talked about, it's relatively balanced across the years. So you can sort of think about that in that way. Dave made the comments and I referenced on the cost savings of the $120 million that we took this year, and some of that will carry forward into next year.

當然。好吧，我不會詳細談論這些組件。我認為，就商品成本而言，也就是我們談到的 2.6 億美元，多年來是相對平衡的。所以你可以從這個角度來思考這個問題。戴夫發表了評論，我提到了我們今年節省的 1.2 億美元成本，其中一部分將結轉到明年。

And then indirect spend, we achieved more than $30 million on our way to the $60 million. I would expect we'd probably get to another $15 million to $20 million of gains this year incrementally, so it's that plus and the elements of productivity in supply chain that we're targeting in that, again, 3%-plus range. So it all contributes and that's why because of the visibility we have to the actions and initiatives that will drive it, which gives us such confidence in achieving the overall earnings outlook that we put forth.

然後是間接支出，我們在朝著 6,000 萬美元的目標邁進的過程中實現了超過 3,000 萬美元的支出。我預計今年我們可能會再逐步獲得 1,500 萬至 2,000 萬美元的收益，所以這就是我們的目標，供應鏈生產力要素也將達到 3% 以上的範圍。所以這一切都是有貢獻的，這就是為什麼我們對推動它的行動和舉措具有可見性，這使我們對實現我們提出的整體盈利前景充滿信心。

(Operator Instructions) Andrew Wolf, CL King.

(操作員指示) Andrew Wolf，CL King。

I wanted to ask a couple of questions around the Pronto penetration initiatives that you've launched recently and gave some color on. First, could you just clarify, Dave, I believe that's for the entire independent customer base, not just the Pronto folks. And specifically, I wanted to ask about the 20% uplift in sales with those who have tried it.

我想就您最近啟動的 Pronto 滲透計劃問幾個問題並提供一些詳細資訊。首先，戴夫，你能否澄清一下，我相信這是針對整個獨立客戶群，而不僅僅是 Pronto 客戶。具體來說，我想詢問那些嘗試過的人銷售額是否成長了 20%。

I assume that's got to be new lines based on the convenience them having a stock out or whatever. Or just a little color on whether it's mainly new lines or what's driving that? And also the economics because I was thinking about it near term, it's a truck delivery. But longer term, you might have a chance to consolidate that into a larger purchase. So just kind of get some clarity on how you're thinking about what it is and how the economics can sort out if that 20% uplift holds out.

我認為那一定是新的生產線，以方便缺貨或其他情況。或者只是稍微解釋一下這是否主要是新線路還是什麼推動了這一點？還有經濟因素，因為我正在考慮近期的情況，這是一個卡車運輸。但從長遠來看，您可能有機會將其合併為更大的購買量。所以，請弄清楚您是如何看待這個問題的，以及如果 20% 的增幅持續下去，經濟將如何發展。

Let me just take you back to the original launch of Pronto and for several years, this was aimed at urban markets difficult-to-reach areas and overwhelmingly, actually 100% targeting new customers only. And it was just the middle of last year when we started to take what we call Pronto penetration to our new customer base. We started that in two markets. Towards the end of last year, we extended that pilot to four markets.

讓我回顧一下 Pronto 最初推出的時候，幾年來，它一直針對難以到達的城市市場，而且實際上 100% 只針對新客戶。就在去年年中，我們開始將所謂的 Pronto 滲透到我們的新客戶群中。我們從兩個市場開始這麼做。去年年底，我們將試點擴展至四個市場。

So this is now for the first time ever aimed at our existing customer base. And it gives them a chance -- and actually, the lens that opens for us is competing against specialty suppliers. And so many of the products that we're delivering on Ponton are products that our customers are buying some from us, some from competitors to specialty guys, and they're really looking for more frequent deliveries of fresh product. And so think about produce, think about center-of-the-plate items, think about seafood. Those sort of things are what typically goes on a Pronto truck.

因此，這是我們第一次針對現有的客戶群。這給了他們一個機會——實際上，我們面臨的機會是與專業供應商競爭。我們在 Ponton 上運送的許多產品都是客戶從我們這裡購買的產品，有些是從競爭對手那裡購買的，有些是從專賣店購買的，他們真正希望的是更頻繁地運送新鮮產品。所以想想農產品，想想餐盤中央的物品，想想海鮮。這些東西通常都安裝在 Pronto 卡車上。

And to your question around the 20% uplift, that is aimed at specifically the customers in those penetration markets that we've opened this up to. And again, this is in pilot phase. So we've entered a market with one or two just a couple of trucks to test it. And just recall to your question, we were looking at two things as we took this to our existing customer base. One is our ability to maintain the profitability, which is important. And that's linked also with making sure that we don't cannibalize our existing business. And that's why we're being thoughtful about the ramp-up of Pronto penetration. And so far, we feel good. And from a profitability standpoint, it's right in line with our broad line profitability.

至於您提到的 20% 的增幅，這是專門針對我們已經開放的滲透市場中的客戶。再次強調，這還處於試點階段。因此，我們用一兩輛卡車進入了市場進行測試。回想一下你的問題，當我們將其推向現有客戶群時，我們考慮了兩件事。一是我們保持獲利的能力，這很重要。這也與確保我們不會蠶食現有業務有關。這就是我們認真考慮提升 Pronto 滲透率的原因。到目前為止，我們感覺良好。從獲利能力的角度來看，這與我們的綜合獲利能力一致。

If I could just get one housekeeping question. Dirk, the 4% to 7% independent case growth, it's in the plan. If I use the acquisitions and assume it's all for independents, is that -- at least at this juncture, what you've announced seems to add about 1% to that number with the organic component be about 1% lower.

如果我只能問一個基本問題。德克，4% 到 7% 的獨立病例增長是在計劃之中的。如果我使用收購並假設所有這些都是獨立的，那麼 - 至少在這個時刻，你所宣布的似乎會使這個數字增加約 1％，而有機成分會降低約 1％。

So it will be -- it's not all independents. I think for each of them, they tend to be, call it, half on the independent side. So it will add probably not quite that much, but it will definitely be a contributor to it. I think the the bigger sort of improvement, as Dave talked about, is the continued share gains and then over the course of the year, some improvement in the foot traffic environment. But that's going to all lead us to our expectations for the 4% to 7% and kind of ramping that up as the year goes on.

所以情況就是這樣——並不是所有的人都是獨立的。我認為他們每個人往往都有一半的獨立性。因此，它可能不會增加那麼多，但肯定會有所貢獻。我認為，正如戴夫所說的，更大的改進是份額的持續增長，以及一年來人流量環境的一定改善。但這一切都將使我們達到 4% 到 7% 的預期，隨著時間的推移，這一數字將會逐漸上升。

John Ivankoe, JPMorgan.

摩根大通的約翰伊凡科 (John Ivankoe)。

The question is on the amount of broad liners that you might be able to acquire nationally that could drive your independent restaurant case volume specifically. Is it not to completely put numbers in your head, but could you potentially expand that business 25%, 50%? Just give us some kind of sense in terms of how big of an acquisition opportunity there may be to do more tuck-in acquisitions is the first question?

問題在於您可以在全國範圍內收購多少類型的企業，從而能夠具體推動您的獨立餐廳案例數量。是不是不需要將數字完全記在腦子裡，但你是否有潛力將業務擴大 25% 或 50% 呢？第一個問題，您能告訴我們，進行更多補充收購的機會有多大嗎？

And the related ones for some of the businesses that you've acquired, have you actually learned anything from them? I mean, have you learned anything from the various businesses that you've acquired that's actually made US Foods a better operation, both for customers and employees, maybe that surprised you on the positive side?

對於您收購的一些企業，您實際上從中學到什麼了嗎？我的意思是，您是否從所收購的各種業務中學到了什麼，使得美國食品公司的運作變得更好，無論是對客戶還是員工而言，也許這在積極的一面讓您感到驚訝？

So overall, I think what I can -- as you pointed, I'm not going to get into specific numbers. We think there are a number of opportunities primarily in the tuck-in space that are out there, and that is one where you've heard Dave say plenty of times. We don't need to do them. So that's why our focus is on in probably a couple of year if the opportunity is more or less in a given year, we'll evaluate that. But our primary growth engine is going to be our organic growth, but these are nice complements to add to the business.

所以總的來說，我認為我可以——正如你所指出的，我不會提到具體的數字。我們認為，主要在小型餐飲領域存在著大量機會，這也是戴夫多次提到的機會。我們沒必要做這些。所以這就是為什麼我們的重點放在可能未來幾年，如果某一年的機會或多或少，我們都會對其進行評估。但我們的主要成長引擎將是我們的有機成長，但這些都是對業務的良好補充。

I think to your question on what have we learned. What we learned is that the sort of the relationships and the ultimate density in the these markets the way they serve those local customers has been something that we've been able to then apply a little more broadly and when you think of on a bigger basis, so the food group, there's some capabilities around logistics, produce, things like that, that we've leveraged across our entire network. So there are learnings as we go in and we do keep our eyes open for those rather than just the US Foods.

我想回答你關於我們學到了什麼的問題。我們了解到，這些市場中的關係類型和最終密度以及他們為當地客戶提供服務的方式，是我們能夠更廣泛地應用的東西，當你從更大的範圍考慮時，比如食品集團，我們已經在整個網絡中充分利用了物流、生產等方面的能力。因此，我們在進入的過程中不斷學習，並且時刻關注這些，而不僅僅是美國食品。

Jacob Aiken-Phillips, Melius Research.

Jacob Aiken-Phillips，Melius Research。

I wanted to ask about ROIC. You indicated and you showed a significant increase over the last few years kind of slowing a little bit. But just how should we think about ROIC going forward over the next three years with margin expansion, kind of a reshuffle of the debt profile.

我想問ROIC。您指出，過去幾年成長明顯，但略有放緩。但是，隨著利潤率的擴大，我們應該如何看待未來三年的 ROIC，以及債務結構的重新調整。

Our expectation is ROA continues to increase to a point, with a much, much higher base than just a few years ago on a percentage basis or basis points, likely less than it's been for the last few years. But our expectation and where our long-term comp is set up is to continue to drive and improve that over time. And that balance of earnings growth, and earnings growth in a responsible way of deploying capital responsibly is important to us, and it's something you'll continue to see us do.

我們的預期是，ROA 將繼續增加到一定水平，以百分比或基點計算，其基數將比幾年前高得多，但可能低於過去幾年的水平。但我們的期望以及我們的長期目標就是隨著時間的推移繼續推動和改善這一點。對我們來說，獲利成長與以負責任的方式部署資本之間的平衡非常重要，這也是我們會繼續做的事情。

And then just a quick one on how do you look at labor inflation and labor availability, just generally, but also in the context of last year, there was some union stuff within the company but currently, there's been some other industry union activity.

然後再簡單問一下您如何看待勞動力通膨和勞動力可用性，總體來說，但就去年的情況而言，公司內部有一些工會活動，但目前，也有一些其他行業的工會活動。

Overall, from a labor availability inflation. So we continue to be successful in being fully staffed, whether it's supply chain for drivers and selectors or sellers through the organization. So that hasn't been a challenge. Of course, we want to make sure we continue to create an environment that people want to work in, and that's an important part for us. I think overall, the inflation sort of -- that's why we target 3% to 5% productivity because our cost inflation tends to be right in that range.

整體而言，從勞動力可用性通膨來看。因此，我們繼續成功地配備齊全人員，無論是司機和選擇者的供應鏈，還是透過組織銷售的賣家。所以這並不是什麼挑戰。當然，我們希望確保繼續創造一個人們願意工作的環境，這對我們來說很重要。我認為總體而言，通貨膨脹是——這就是我們將生產力目標定為 3% 到 5% 的原因，因為我們的成本通膨往往就在這個範圍內。

Overall, labor inflation that we saw in the last year or so come down where it's sort of closer around that range, which is a positive for everybody, given that it had been above that for a few years in a row. So I don't expect 2025 at this point look very different than that, and that's contemplated in our outlook for the year.

總體而言，我們在過去一年左右看到的勞動力通膨已經下降到接近這個範圍，這對每個人來說都是有利的，因為它已經連續幾年高於這一水平。因此，我預計 2025 年的情況不會有太大不同，這也已在我們對今年的展望中得到體現。

Thank you for the questions, Jacob. And that does conclude our Q&A session today. So with that, I will now turn the call back over to Dave Flitman for closing remarks. Dave, the floor is yours.

謝謝你的提問，雅各。今天的問答環節到此結束。因此，我現在將電話轉回給戴夫·弗利特曼 (Dave Flitman) 作結束語。戴夫，現在你來發言。

Thank you, Greg, and thanks, everybody, for joining us today. Let me just finish by thanking our associates again for their hard work over the last three years and the foundation that they've built to strengthen our company and give us a strong launching point for our next three years, which is even more exciting. Thanks for joining us today, and have a great Valentine's Day, everybody.

謝謝你，格雷格，也謝謝大家今天的參與。最後，我要再次感謝我們的同事在過去三年的辛勤工作，感謝他們為加強我們公司而建立的基礎，並為我們未來三年的強勁發展奠定了堅實的基礎，這更加令人興奮。感謝大家今天的參與，祝大家情人節快樂。

Thanks, Dave. And again, ladies and gentlemen, that concludes today's call. Thank you all for joining, and you may now disconnect. Have a good day, everyone.

謝謝，戴夫。女士們、先生們，今天的電話會議到此結束。感謝大家加入，現在可以斷開連線了。祝大家有美好的一天。