Taco Bell President’s Pay Is Made Public

Taco Bell Corp. President Peter C. Waller earned $834,433 last year, thanks in part to a one-time bonus paid to retain senior executives when PepsiCo Inc. spun off its restaurant holdings. Waller’s pay, disclosed Friday in the annual proxy statement of Tricon Global Restaurants, is the first time that the compensation of Taco Bell’s top officer has been made public. Publicly traded companies are required to report the annual compensation of their top five officers to the Securities and Exchange Commission each year. Pepsico last year spun off its restaurant operations, which also included Pizza Hut and KFC, into Tricon, based in Louisville, Ky. Last year, Waller earned a base salary of $362,253 and received a $472,180 bonus. He also received $9,295 for moving expenses and $8,938 for tax-related expenses. Waller earned $345,042 in salary and bonus in 1996, when he was Irvine-based Taco Bell’s senior vice president of marketing. Tricon doesn’t break out Taco Bell’s revenue or operating profits, but the company said in its year-end financial report that Taco Bell reversed a two-year decline in sales at restaurants that were open more than a year.