Darden Restaurants<\/a> on Thursday reported mixed quarterly results as same-store sales growth at the company’s fine-dining restaurants and Olive Garden fell short of expectations.<\/p>\nThe company’s forecast for its fiscal 2027 earnings and revenue also came on the lower end of Wall Street’s projections.<\/p>\n
Shares of the company slid more than 3% in premarket trading.<\/p>\n
Here’s what the company reported for its fiscal fourth quarter ended May 31 compared with what Wall Street was expecting, based on a survey of analysts by LSEG:<\/p>\n
Earnings\u00a0per share: $3.66 adjusted vs. $3.63 expectedRevenue: $3.72 billion vs. $3.73 billion expected<\/p>\n
Darden reported net income of $404.9 million, or $3.51 per share, up from $303.8 million, or $2.58 per share, a year earlier.<\/p>\n
Excluding costs of restaurant closures and other items, the company earned $3.66 per share.<\/p>\n
Net sales\u00a0climbed 13.7% to $3.72 billion, boosted by the inclusion of an extra week during the fiscal year.<\/p>\n
Across all of Darden’s restaurants, same-store sales rose 4.6%, topping expectations of 4.1% growth based on StreetAccount estimates.<\/p>\n
LongHorn Steakhouse led the portfolio with same-store sales growth of 9.5%, beating StreetAccount projections of 7.1%. The chain has overtaken Olive Garden to become Darden’s top performer, although it still accounts for less of the company’s overall sales.<\/p>\n
For its part, Olive Garden saw same-store sales grow 2.4% in the quarter, missing expectations of 3.2% growth.<\/p>\n
Darden’s fine-dining segment reported same-store sales growth of 1.9%, falling short of StreetAccount estimates of 3.1%. The division includes The Capital Grille and Ruth’s Chris. <\/p>\n
The company’s “other business” segment saw same-store sales rise 4.6%, higher than the 3% projected by analysts. The division includes a handful of smaller restaurant chains, like Yard House and Chuy’s. <\/p>\n
Looking ahead to the next fiscal year, Darden is projecting total sales of $13.60 billion to $13.75 billion and net earnings per share from continuing operations in a range of $11.10 to $11.35. Wall Street is expecting the company to report fiscal 2027 revenue of $13.72 billion and earnings per share of $11.40.<\/p>\n
Darden is also forecasting that it will report same-store sales growth of 2.5% to 3.5% for fiscal 2027 and open between 75 and 80 new locations.<\/p>\n
Choose CNBC as your preferred source on Google and never miss a moment from the most trusted name in business news.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"An Olive Garden restaurant in Milpitas, California, US, on Tuesday, Dec. 16, 2025. David Paul Morris | Bloomberg…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":725142,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[448,116,28,122,93533,11588,8084,112,4322,5682],"class_list":["post-725141","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-breaking-news-business","tag-breaking-news-markets","tag-business","tag-business-news","tag-darden-restaurants-inc","tag-dividends","tag-earnings","tag-markets","tag-restaurants","tag-retail-industry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/725141","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=725141"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/725141\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/725142"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=725141"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=725141"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=725141"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}