Dive Brief:
- Payments technology company Toast is known mainly as a point-of-sale software and card reader provider for restaurants, but its executives said during a fourth-quarter earnings webcast Wednesday that the firm is eyeing the retail industry as an area of growth.
- Specifically, Toast intends to partner with more food and beverage retailers such as grocery and convenience stores, executives said.
- The Boston-based company experimented with offering services to retailers last year and was persuaded by the experience to make a bid for more retail clients, Toast CEO Aman Narang said during the earnings webcast. “In retail, 2024 was really a year to test and learn,” he said.
Dive Insight:
The retail sector offers the company a new opportunity, Narang told investors and analysts.
Toast plans to invest this year in expanding its “retail-specific sales team,” Chief Financial Officer Elena Gomez said during the call.
Toast’s signature point-of-sale credit card readers are growing more ubiquitous. Roughly 134,000 businesses use the company’s services, she said, 7,000 of which were added in the fourth quarter of last year.
The company expects to have a total of 10,000 customers in new segments, such as international businesses and retail some time this year, Gomez said. Toast has a presence in Ireland, the United Kingdom and Canada, according to the company’s website.
A Toast spokesperson declined to provide a more precise number or a more precise timeline, or say what international markets the company is targeting for expansion, but said Toast’s retail partners include the Decatur, Georgia deli and grocery store Kelly’s Market.
Toast, which was founded in 2012, saw its first full-year of profitability in 2024, Gomez said. The payments firm reported $33 million in net income for the fourth quarter, compared to a $36 million loss in the year-ago quarter. For the full year, Toast reported $19 million in net income, compared to a $246 million loss in 2023.
The company reported total revenue of $1.34 billion for the fourth quarter, up roughly 29% from the $1.04 billion it reported in the fourth quarter of 2023. For the full year, Toast reported revenue of $4.96 billion, up about 28% from the $3.86 billion in revenue it reported in 2023.
Analysts from the investment firm Robert W. Baird warned that the move into retail and international markets won’t bear fruit right away.
“It likely takes a few years before retail/international are meaningful contributors to growth,” the analysts wrote in a note to investors Wednesday.