Big Lots Inc (BIG) 2023 Q2 法說會逐字稿

Good morning. This is Alvin Concepcion, Vice President of Investor Relations at Big Lots. Welcome to the Big Lots Second Quarter Conference Call. (Operator Instructions)

早上好。我是 Alvin Concepcion，Big Lot 投資者關係副總裁。歡迎參加 Big Lot 第二季度電話會議。 （操作員說明）

As a reminder, this conference is being recorded. On the call with me today are Bruce Thorn, President and Chief Executive Officer; and Jonathan Ramsden, Executive Vice President, Chief Financial and Administrative Officer.

提醒一下，本次會議正在錄製中。今天與我通話的是總裁兼首席執行官 Bruce Thorn；喬納森·拉姆斯登（Jonathan Ramsden），執行副總裁、首席財務和行政官。

Before starting today's call, we would like to remind you that any forward-looking statements made on the call involve risks and uncertainties that are subject to the company's safe harbor provisions as stated in the company's press release and SEC filings and that actual results can differ materially from those described in the forward-looking statements.

在開始今天的電話會議之前，我們想提醒您，電話會議中所做的任何前瞻性陳述都涉及風險和不確定性，這些風險和不確定性受到公司新聞稿和SEC 文件中所述的公司安全港條款的約束，並且實際結果可能會有所不同實質上來自前瞻性陳述中描述的內容。

We would also like to point out that commentary today is focused on adjusted non-GAAP results. Reconciliations of GAAP to non-GAAP adjusted results are available in today's press release. The second quarter earnings release, presentation and related financial information are available at biglots.com/corporate/investors. A question-and-answer session will follow the prepared remarks. I will now turn the call over to Bruce.

我們還想指出，今天的評論重點是調整後的非公認會計準則業績。今天的新聞稿中提供了 GAAP 與非 GAAP 調整後結果的調節表。第二季度收益發布、演示和相關財務信息可在 biglots.com/corporate/investors 上獲取。在準備好的發言之後將舉行問答環節。我現在將把電話轉給布魯斯。

Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us. There are 3 key messages I want to convey this morning. First, our results for Q2 with comp sales down 14.6% and an adjusted EPS loss of $3.24 illustrate that we remain in a very challenging environment, which our core lower income customer remains under significant pressure and has limited capacity for higher ticket discretionary purchases.

大家早上好，感謝您加入我們。今天早上我想傳達3個關鍵信息。首先，我們第二季度的業績，公司銷售額下降了14.6%，調整後每股收益損失為3.24 美元，這表明我們仍然處於一個非常具有挑戰性的環境中，我們的核心低收入客戶仍然面臨著巨大的壓力，並且購買更高門票的能力有限。

Second, however, we did see some sequential improvement in the quarter and we were pleased to come in ahead of or in line with our beginning of quarter guidance on all key metrics. We believe this improvement was driven by the 5 key actions we have outlined on prior calls, which as a reminder, are to own bargains to communicate unmistakable value to increase store relevance to win with omni-channel and to drive productivity.

然而，其次，我們確實看到了本季度的一些連續改善，我們很高興在所有關鍵指標上都領先於或符合我們的季度初指導。我們相信，這一改進是由我們在之前的電話會議中概述的5 項關鍵行動推動的，這些行動提醒我們，擁有便宜貨，傳達明確的價值，提高商店相關性，以全渠道獲勝並提高生產力。

We expect that these key actions along with the gradual improvement in the macro environment over time will enable us to continue to improve our results. Third, stemming from these efforts and bolstered by the completion of our $300 million sale leaseback and ongoing cost reduction in capital management, we have a robust balance sheet to carry us through this turnaround.

我們預計，隨著時間的推移，這些關鍵行動以及宏觀環境的逐步改善將使我們能夠繼續改善我們的業績。第三，在這些努力的推動下，並在完成 3 億美元的售後回租和持續降低資本管理成本的支持下，我們擁有穩健的資產負債表來支撐我們度過這一轉變。

Coming back to the first point. For the past 1.5 years, we've been playing defense as the consumer environment quickly and sharply deteriorated. High inflation has disproportionately impacted our lower-income customers who have delayed or pulled back spending on discretionary items, particularly in high-ticket home and seasonal categories, which were already challenged by the post-COVID spend shift away from home categories.

回到第一點。在過去的1.5年裡，隨著消費環境迅速急劇惡化，我們一直在採取防禦措施。高通脹對我們的低收入客戶造成了不成比例的影響，他們推遲或減少了非必需品的支出，特別是高價家居和季節性類別的支出，這些類別已經受到疫情后支出從家居類別轉移的挑戰。

Further, we were unfavorably impacted by a furniture product shortage issue caused by the sudden closure of our key supplier late last year. While the consumer environment will likely remain challenging and result in negative comp sales in the back half of the year, we are now in a position to get back to playing offense. This will be supported by the incredible efforts of our associates and our outstanding vendor partners, who remained aligned with our efforts to offer great quality products and amazing value.

此外，去年年底我們的主要供應商突然關閉導致家具產品短缺問題，對我們產生了不利影響。儘管消費者環境可能仍然充滿挑戰，並導致今年下半年的銷售業績出現負數，但我們現在已經能夠重新發起進攻。這將得到我們的員工和傑出供應商合作夥伴的巨大努力的支持，他們與我們的努力保持一致，提供優質的產品和驚人的價值。

Coming back to the second point. As we make further progress on our 5 key actions, we are optimistic that trends will continue to improve, albeit slowly through the remainder of this year, aided by a higher penetration of bargains, more newness in our assortment, freight reductions, ongoing cost reduction and productivity efforts, more effective promotions and a more normalized level of markdowns.

回到第二點。隨著我們在5 項關鍵行動上取得進一步進展，我們樂觀地認為，趨勢將繼續改善，儘管在今年剩餘時間裡進展緩慢，這得益於降價商品的滲透率提高、我們的產品種類更多新奇、運費減少、成本持續降低和生產力的努力、更有效的促銷和更規範的降價水平。

Our confidence also stems from our belief that we have the right ingredients for success with the right strategy and the right team in place to make it happen. I continue to be impressed by our associates who have worked hard and demonstrated tremendous grip during the challenging time. Additionally, over the past 1.5 years, we've added several new members to our senior management team. They have been in place long enough to make a significant impact on our 5 key actions and they're doing it with a high spirit of collaboration.

我們的信心還源於我們相信我們擁有成功的正確要素、正確的戰略和合適的團隊來實現這一目標。我仍然對我們的員工印象深刻，他們在充滿挑戰的時期努力工作並表現出巨大的控制力。此外，在過去 1.5 年裡，我們的高級管理團隊增加了幾位新成員。他們已經就位足夠長的時間，足以對我們的 5 項關鍵行動產生重大影響，並且他們以高度的合作精神來做到這一點。

Lastly, on the third point. We significantly strengthened our balance sheet by closing the $300 million sale leaseback deal this past Friday. Combined with our efforts to aggressively manage costs, inventory and capital expenditures, we are prepared and positioned to navigate through the current economic challenges. On the cost reduction and productivity front, we are well on track to achieve our structural SG&A savings goal of over $100 million in 2023.

最後，關於第三點。上週五，我們完成了價值 3 億美元的售後回租交易，顯著增強了我們的資產負債表。結合我們積極管理成本、庫存和資本支出的努力，我們已做好準備並做好應對當前經濟挑戰的準備。在降低成本和提高生產力方面，我們有望在 2023 年實現超過 1 億美元的結構性 SG&A 節省目標。

In addition, we have a clear path to over $200 million of additional bottom line opportunities across gross margin and SG&A through our partnership with an external firm. Project SpringBoard as we now are calling these efforts is up and running, and we expect a high proportion of these benefits to be realized on a run rate basis by the end of 2024. Jonathan will speak more to this in a few moments.

此外，通過與外部公司的合作，我們有一條明確的途徑，可以在毛利率和銷售管理費用方面獲得超過 2 億美元的額外利潤機會。我們現在所說的 SpringBoard 項目已經啟動並正在運行，我們預計到 2024 年底，這些收益的大部分將在運行率的基礎上實現。喬納森稍後將對此進行更多討論。

I'd like now to circle back to highlight some of the recent progress we've made on the 5 key actions. As it relates to owning bargains, we took a huge leap in providing value as our mix of bargains, which are close-out items and other source products where we have significant comparable price advantage was nearly 30% in Q2, putting us well on track to exceed our goal of over 1/3 by the end of the year. We're by no means finished with this effort. It's merely the first milestone in our path to offer more compelling value.

現在我想回顧一下我們最近在 5 項關鍵行動上取得的一些進展。就擁有特價商品而言，我們在提供價值方面取得了巨大飛躍，因為我們的特價商品組合（包括清倉商品和我們擁有顯著可比價格優勢的其他來源產品）在第二季度接近30%，使我們步入正軌到年底超過我們1/3以上的目標。我們的努力還沒有結束。這只是我們提供更具吸引力的價值道路上的第一個里程碑。

To give you some context of how far we've come, bargains were high single-digit penetration, mostly in the food and consumables category before I joined in late 2018 and it got lower during the pandemic. Now it has grown across a broader range of categories, most notably in Soft Home and Hard Home, where it's nearly 30% as well as furniture where it's above 50% in the second quarter. We achieved this by procuring products from over-inventoried mass retailers, distressed retailers and vendors and through new factory direct sourcing partners, domestic and overseas.

為了讓您了解我們已經取得的進展，在我於 2018 年底加入之前，便宜貨的滲透率高達個位數，主要是在食品和消費品類別中，在大流行期間下降了。現在，它已在更廣泛的類別中實現增長，尤其是軟家居和硬家居，其增長近 30%，而家具在第二季度也超過 50%。我們通過從庫存過剩的大型零售商、陷入困境的零售商和供應商以及通過國內外新的工廠直接採購合作夥伴採購產品來實現這一目標。

These changes are resonating with our customers as our value perception scores increased more than 10% since the beginning of the year. We also continue to step up the newness of our assortment, 75% of Broyhill Upholstery is new as we begin the third quarter with 7 core collections and 6 modern collections from our new suppliers. This Broyhill relaunch has been supported by a strong marketing campaign, emphasizing higher quality at bargain prices better than before.

這些變化引起了客戶的共鳴，自年初以來，我們的價值認知得分增加了 10% 以上。我們還繼續增加我們品種的新穎性，從第三季度開始，我們的新供應商推出了 7 個核心系列和 6 個現代系列，Broyhill Upholstery 的 75% 都是新的。 Broyhill 的這次重新推出得到了強有力的營銷活動的支持，強調比以前更好的價格和更高的質量。

We also have additional modern furniture styles coming in September and October across nearly 400 stores, which we're very excited about. Further, we are adding Accent Furniture in September filling a gap in our assortment and offsetting the consumer shift away from ready-to-assemble products. As part of our consumables reset, we introduced new branded baby products, such as diapers and wipes at a great bargain to our stores in August.

我們還在 9 月和 10 月在近 400 家商店推出了更多現代家具款式，對此我們感到非常興奮。此外，我們將在 9 月份增加 Accent Furniture，以填補我們產品類別的空白，並抵消消費者對現成組裝產品的轉變。作為消耗品重置的一部分，我們於 8 月份在我們的商店以超值價格推出了新品牌的嬰兒產品，例如尿布和濕巾。

We have strong relationships with our vendor partners who are invested in our success. They are fully aligned in working side-by-side with us to offer new great quality products as well as enhanced bargains. We met with over 600 of our allies at our vendor summit in July and had tremendous support and dialogue around where we are going as a business. As it relates to communicating unmistakable value, our recent marketing efforts continue to bear fruit.

我們與供應商合作夥伴建立了牢固的關係，他們為我們的成功做出了投資。他們完全與我們並肩工作，提供新的優質產品以及更優惠的價格。我們在 7 月份的供應商峰會上會見了 600 多名盟友，並就我們的業務發展方向進行了大力支持和對話。由於它關係到傳達明確的價值，我們最近的營銷努力繼續取得成果。

Customers are recognizing our bargain offers and improved pricing. We held the first friends and family events since 2019 in June and offered exclusive e-commerce promotions in July that drove incremental sales. Our clearance events over the course of the quarter were also successful in rightsizing our seasonal inventory levels. We continue to emphasize comparable value for our bargain offers. As a result, we saw a further increase in the net customer value perception score now up by more than 10% since the beginning of the year when we began to roll out comparable value ticket pricing.

客戶正在認可我們的特價優惠和改進的定價。我們於 6 月舉辦了 2019 年以來的首次親友活動，並於 7 月提供了獨家電子商務促銷活動，推動了銷量的增長。我們在本季度的清倉活動也成功地調整了我們的季節性庫存水平。我們繼續強調我們的特價優惠的可比價值。因此，自今年年初我們開始推出可比價值門票定價以來，我們發現客戶淨價值感知得分進一步提高了 10% 以上。

We rolled out new promotional tools and processes in June, which will increase the effectiveness of our promotional markdown spend. Additionally, we continue to make progress in refining our customer segmentation and messaging by focusing on our best customers with our most attractive offerings, we are finding ways to improve the effectiveness of market. We continue to focus on increasing store relevance. We are continuing to flex our assortment by increasing food and consumables inventory in stores where category demand is strong. We also continue to optimize pricing and food consumables.

我們在六月份推出了新的促銷工具和流程，這將提高我們促銷降價支出的有效性。此外，我們通過專注於我們最具吸引力的產品和服務，在完善客戶細分和信息傳遞方面不斷取得進展，我們正在尋找提高市場有效性的方法。我們繼續專注於提高商店相關性。我們將繼續通過增加品類需求強勁的商店的食品和消耗品庫存來調整我們的品種。我們還繼續優化定價和食品消耗品。

These efforts have shown encouraging early results. Beyond these initiatives, we are also exploring new store formats, which can provide us with learnings that can be applied to our broader store base. And we have been improving the customer experience to help us win with omni-channel. We achieved a Net Promoter Score consistently in the mid-80s range in Q2, which is up from the prior year and top tier in the industry. Our online Net Promoter Score has also significantly improved in Q2 relative to the beginning of the year, as we continue to improve the customer journey through a more curated experience, better site navigation and eliminating friction.

這些努力已顯示出令人鼓舞的早期成果。除了這些舉措之外，我們還在探索新的商店模式，這可以為我們提供可應用於更廣泛的商店基礎的經驗教訓。我們一直在改善客戶體驗，以幫助我們通過全渠道獲勝。第二季度，我們的淨推薦值始終保持在 80 多歲左右，高於去年，處於行業領先水平。與年初相比，我們的在線淨推薦值在第二季度也有了顯著提高，因為我們不斷通過更精心策劃的體驗、更好的網站導航和消除摩擦來改善客戶旅程。

On that note, earlier this month, we launched a new landing page to showcase clearer value messaging, easier navigation and an elevated design. We also drove significant improvement in cost structure in Q2 versus the prior year, and we'll continue to find ways to reduce costs. So overall, we are excited to see signs of improvement across multiple fronts and combined with our focus on driving productivity, are confident that they will translate into continued sequential improvement in financial performance as the year progresses.

為此，本月早些時候，我們推出了一個新的登陸頁面，以展示更清晰的價值信息、更輕鬆的導航和更高級的設計。與去年相比，第二季度我們還推動了成本結構的顯著改善，我們將繼續尋找降低成本的方法。因此，總的來說，我們很高興看到多個方面的改善跡象，再加上我們對提高生產力的關注，我們有信心隨著時間的推移，這些改善將轉化為財務業績的持續改善。

I will now make a few more comments about Q2, which was overall ahead of our guidance, but still nowhere near where we want to be in terms of driving growth and profitability. Comp sales were down 14.6% ahead of our guidance of down high teens. Trends improved over the course of the quarter, aided by the full mitigation of the furniture supply disruption. We ended the quarter with inventory down in line with sales as planned. We continued to see a significant benefit from lower freight costs.

現在我將對第二季度做出更多評論，該季度總體上超出了我們的指導，但在推動增長和盈利能力方面仍遠未達到我們想要的水平。比較銷售額下降了 14.6%，超出了我們的指導值。在家具供應中斷的全面緩解的幫助下，本季度的趨勢有所改善。本季度結束時，我們的庫存量與計劃的銷售量一致。我們繼續看到貨運成本降低帶來的顯著好處。

As a result, gross margins were up by 40 basis points versus last year. Looking at specific category performance in the quarter, seasonal comps declined 26% in Q2 due to customers continuing to hold back on higher ticket outdoor furniture due to concerns about the economy. Given seasonal is historically one of the highest margin categories, the significant promotional activity required to successfully rightsize our seasonal inventory and favorably impacted our overall gross margin.

因此，毛利率比去年增長了 40 個基點。從本季度特定品類的表現來看，第二季度季節性比較下降了 26%，原因是客戶出於對經濟的擔憂而繼續保留購買高價戶外家具。鑑於季節性歷來是利潤率最高的類別之一，因此需要開展重大促銷活動來成功調整我們的季節性庫存規模，並對我們的整體毛利率產生有利影響。

In Q3, our assortment shifts from high ticket outdoor furniture into lower ticket decorative items, which our customers are less hesitant to spend on. And Halloween is off to a strong start with a focus on new and unique theme to core. Our furniture, Soft Home and Hard Home categories were each down double digits, but improved sequentially on a year-over-year basis relative to Q1. As a result of better in stocks, we saw Broyhill and Real Living increase their penetration of our business across all divisions to 26% versus about 23% in Q1.

在第三季度，我們的品種從高價戶外家具轉向低價裝飾物品，我們的客戶在購買這些物品時不再猶豫。萬聖節以新穎獨特的主題為核心，迎來了一個良好的開端。我們的家具、軟家居和硬家居類別均下降了兩位數，但相對於第一季度同比有所改善。由於股市好轉，我們看到 Broyhill 和 Real Living 在我們所有部門的業務滲透率從第一季度的 23% 左右增加到 26%。

Having the full assortment of our key private brands such as these will play a key role in increasing our appeal both in the category as well as a trade down destination. We remain focused on emphasizing the furniture categories where we can win. We are testing new assortments in the fall in areas such as accents, modern styles and pieces that are solutions focused, such as storage, sofas, sofa sleepers and reclining sectionals. By focusing on winnable categories offering great comparable value and sharp opening price points, we expect our results in the back half to benefit.

擁有諸如此類的全系列主要自有品牌，將在提高我們在該類別以及貿易目的​​地的吸引力方面發揮關鍵作用。我們仍然專注於強調我們可以獲勝的家具類別。我們正在秋季測試新的產品系列，包括裝飾、現代風格和以解決方案為重點的單品，如儲物、沙發、沙發床和斜倚組合件。通過專注於可贏得的類別，提供巨大的可比價值和急劇的開盤價，我們預計下半年的業績將受益。

Food and consumables held up relatively well given the traffic challenges we experienced. In general, customers have been shifting their spend towards these essential categories and away from high-ticket discretionary categories, which is also resulting in fierce competition in the space. We're pushing forward and resetting our consumables assortment to optimize productivity and make room for new assortments and will flex our assortments to stores where the demand is stronger in certain categories.

鑑於我們經歷的交通挑戰，食品和消耗品的情況相對較好。總體而言，客戶已將支出轉向這些必需品類，而不是高價非必需品類，這也導致了該領域的激烈競爭。我們正在推進和重置我們的消耗品品種，以優化生產力並為新品種騰出空間，並將把我們的品種靈活地調整到某些類別需求較強的商店。

Pet was a standout performer with positive comp growth, and we're only getting started. Pet now represents 12% of our food and consumables business, and we plan to expand our assortment in the fall. Baby is also back, and we began rolling out new branded items in August with an approach focused on creating great value for consumers. We expect this will drive incremental sales and traffic.

Pet 表現出色，薪酬呈正增長，而我們才剛剛開始。寵物目前占我們食品和消費品業務的 12%，我們計劃在秋季擴大我們的品種。 Baby 也回來了，我們從八月份開始推出新的品牌產品，重點是為消費者創造巨大價值。我們預計這將推動銷量和流量的增量。

I will now pass it over to Jonathan, and I will return in a few moments to make some closing comments before taking your questions.

我現在將其轉交給喬納森，稍後我將在回答您的問題之前發表一些結束語。

Thanks, Bruce, and good morning, everyone. I'd also like to say a big thank you to the Big Lots team for all of their efforts to drive improvements in our business. I'm particularly pleased this quarter by the results of those efforts in terms of reducing our expenses and increasing our liquidity. We drove significant cost reductions during the quarter and are confident that those efforts are going to continue to bear fruit. In addition, the closure of our sale-leaseback transaction on our California DC and 22 owned stores has secured our liquidity position, which has been further enhanced by our day-to-day management of expenses and working capital.

謝謝布魯斯，大家早上好。我還要向 Big Lot 團隊表示衷心感謝，感謝他們為推動我們業務的改進所做的一切努力。本季度我對這些努力在減少開支和增加流動性方面取得的成果感到特別高興。我們在本季度大幅降低了成本，並相信這些努力將繼續取得成果。此外，我們在加州和 22 家自營商店的售後回租交易的結束確保了我們的流動性狀況，而我們對費用和營運資金的日常管理進一步增強了流動性狀況。

For the quarter as a whole, and prior to factoring in the sale-leaseback proceeds, we were able to slightly reduce our ABL balance despite sales and margin headwinds. I will now go into more detail on our Q2 results, which I will discuss on an adjusted basis, excluding synthetic lease exit costs, distribution center closure costs, adjustments to impairment charges, a gain on the sale of real estate and related expenses, fees related to Project SpringBoard and the valuation allowance on deferred tax assets.

就整個季度而言，在考慮售後回租收益之前，儘管銷售和利潤率面臨阻力，但我們還是能夠略微減少 ABL 餘額。我現在將更詳細地介紹我們第二季度的業績，我將在調整後的基礎上進行討論，不包括綜合租賃退出成本、配送中心關閉成本、減值費用調整、房地產銷售收益及相關費用、費用與SpringBoard項目和遞延所得稅資產的評估備抵相關。

The second quarter summary can be found on Page 9 of our quarterly results presentation. Q2 net sales were $1.14 billion, a 15.4% decrease compared to $1.35 billion a year ago. The decline versus 2022 was driven by a comparable sales decrease of 14.6%, which was better than our guidance range. Going into the quarter, as Bruce mentioned, we expected weakness in the sales environment due to inflation and weak overall demand for high-ticket items. However, improvements in our furniture business, particularly Broyhill and effective promotional and clearance events helped us to do better than expected.

第二季度摘要可在我們季度業績演示文稿的第 9 頁上找到。第二季度淨銷售額為 11.4 億美元，比去年同期的 13.5 億美元下降 15.4%。與 2022 年相比下降的原因是可比銷售額下降 14.6%，這好於我們的指導範圍。正如布魯斯提到的，進入本季度，我們預計由於通貨膨脹和高價商品的整體需求疲軟，銷售環境將疲軟。然而，我們的家具業務（尤其是 Broyhill）的改善以及有效的促銷和清倉活動幫助我們取得了比預期更好的業績。

Importantly, our efforts to clear slow-moving inventory were successful and leave us well positioned with inventory coming into Q3. Our second quarter adjusted net loss was $94.4 million and the adjusted diluted loss per share for the quarter was $3.24. The gross margin rate for the second quarter was 33.0%, up 40 basis points from last year's rate, which was better due primarily to lower freight costs, partially offset by higher markdowns.

重要的是，我們清理滯銷庫存的努力取得了成功，使我們在第三季度的庫存方面處於有利地位。我們第二季度調整後淨虧損為 9440 萬美元，該季度調整後攤薄每股虧損為 3.24 美元。第二季度的毛利率為 33.0%，比去年同期上升 40 個基點，這主要是由於貨運成本下降，部分被降價上漲所抵消。

At the end of the quarter, we took significant markdowns against our remaining seasonal spring and summer merchandise to make room for our new exciting fall and holiday seasonal assortments. More normalized seasonal markdowns will benefit our gross margin in Q3.

在本季度末，我們對剩餘的春季和夏季季節性商品進行了大幅降價，為我們令人興奮的秋季和假日季節新品種騰出空間。更加正常化的季節性降價將有利於我們第三季度的毛利率。

Turning to adjusted SG&A. Total expenses for the quarter, including depreciation were $487.8 million, significantly better than the $523.5 million last year and better than our guidance of down slightly versus 2022. We saw favorability across multiple line items as we continue to manage expenses aggressively. Adjusted operating margin for the quarter was negative 9.8%. Interest expense for the quarter was $11.2 million up from $3.9 million in the second quarter last year due to a higher amounts drawn on our credit facility and higher interest rates year-over-year.

轉向調整後的銷售及管理費用。本季度的總費用（包括折舊）為4.878 億美元，明顯好於去年的5.235 億美元，也好於我們比2022 年略有下降的指導。隨著我們繼續積極管理費用，我們在多個項目中看到了有利的結果。該季度調整後營業利潤率為負 9.8%。本季度的利息支出為 1,120 萬美元，高於去年第二季度的 390 萬美元，原因是我們的信貸額度提取金額增加，且利率同比上升。

The adjusted income tax rate in the quarter was 23.3%. This excludes the impact of a valuation allowance against deferred tax assets, which significantly impacted the GAAP tax rate. The valuation allowance resulted from being in a 3-year cumulative loss position at the end of the quarter. Going forward, we will not be able to record a taxable benefit related to loss carryforwards until we are in a 3-year cumulative income position. Therefore, we expect the tax rate to be in the near zero range on an adjusted basis in Q3.

本季度調整後所得稅率為23.3%。這不包括遞延所得稅資產估值備抵的影響，該備抵對 GAAP 稅率產生了重大影響。估值備抵是由於本季度末處於 3 年累計虧損狀況所致。展望未來，直到我們達到 3 年累計收入狀況為止，我們將無法記錄與損失結轉相關的應稅福利。因此，我們預計第三季度調整後的稅率將處於接近於零的區間。

Total earning inventory cost was down 15.2% to last year at $0.98 billion. This was driven by both lower on-hand units and average unit cost and also lower in-transit inventory. During the second quarter, we opened one new store and closed 6 stores. We ended Q2 with 1,422 stores and total selling square footage of $32.9 million. Capital expenditures for the quarter were $13 million compared to $46 million last year. Adjusted depreciation expense in the quarter was $34.2 million, down $3 million for the same period last year.

總盈利庫存成本比去年下降 15.2%，為 9.8 億美元。這是由於現有單位和平均單位成本較低以及在途庫存較低所致。第二季度，我們新開了 1 家店，關閉了 6 家店。第二季度末，我們擁有 1,422 家商店，總銷售面積為 3,290 萬美元。本季度的資本支出為 1,300 萬美元，而去年為 4,600 萬美元。該季度調整後折舊費用為 3420 萬美元，比去年同期減少 300 萬美元。

We ended the second quarter with $46 million of cash and cash equivalents and $493.2 million of long-term debt. At the end of Q2 2022, we had $49.1 million of cash and cash equivalents long-term debt of $252.6 million.

截至第二季度末，我們的現金和現金等價物為 4600 萬美元，長期債務為 4.932 億美元。截至 2022 年第二季度末，我們擁有 4910 萬美元的現金和現金等價物長期債務 2.526 億美元。

Our debt position at the end of Q2 is prior to the impact of the closure of our sale-leaseback transaction subsequent to quarter end. Turning to the outlook. We are not providing full year guidance in light of ongoing economic uncertainties. Sales comp should improve sequentially in the back half of the year as our key merchandising and marketing actions continue to gain traction and as we lap easier comparisons, especially in Q4. We expect comps in Q3 to be modestly improved relative to Q2 and to be down in the low-teen range.

我們第二季度末的債務狀況是在季度末後售後回租交易結束的影響之前的。轉向前景。鑑於持續的經濟不確定性，我們不會提供全年指引。隨著我們的關鍵銷售和營銷活動繼續獲得關注，並且我們進行了更容易的比較，尤其是在第四季度，銷售業績應該會在今年下半年連續改善。我們預計第三季度的比較將相對於第二季度略有改善，並下降到青少年範圍內。

A net decrease in store count, partially offset by new stores and relocations will contribute approximately 140 basis points of the sales decline compared to the third quarter of 2022. In Q4, we see comps being down high single digits, reflecting further improvement from Q3. With regard to gross margin, we expect to see accelerated rate improvement in the back half of the year, with the Q3 rate up around 200 basis points versus the prior year due to more normalized markdown activity, lower freight costs and cost reduction and productivity initiatives.

與2022 年第三季度相比，商店數量的淨減少（部分被新店和搬遷所抵消）將導致銷售額下降約140 個基點。在第四季度，我們看到比較值出現高個位數下降，反映出較第三季度進一步改善。就毛利率而言，我們預計下半年毛利率將加速改善，由於降價活動更加正常化、貨運成本降低以及成本削減和生產力舉措，第三季度毛利率將比去年同期上升約 200 個基點。

We expect our fourth quarter gross margin rate to improve to a rate in the high 30s range, driven by the same factors. In Q3, we expect SG&A dollars to be down low single digits versus 2022. This includes up to $6 million of rent expense related to the sale leaseback. I will discuss more in a moment, which will be partially offset by lower interest expense. The incremental rent expense will be up to $9 million in Q4. These figures are estimates at this point and subject to the finalization of the sale leaseback accounting.

在同樣因素的推動下，我們預計第四季度的毛利率將提高至 30 左右。在第三季度，我們預計 SG&A 美元將比 2022 年下降低個位數。這包括與售後回租相關的高達 600 萬美元的租金費用。我稍後將討論更多內容，這將被較低的利息支出部分抵消。第四季度的增量租金支出將高達 900 萬美元。這些數字是目前的估計值，並取決於售後回租會計的最終確定。

With regard to CapEx, we now expect around $75 million for the year, down from around $80 million previously and continue to look for opportunities to reduce further. We expect 15 store openings in 2023 and 50-plus closures with the closures concentrated at the end of the year.

關於資本支出，我們目前預計今年資本支出約為 7500 萬美元，低於之前的約 8000 萬美元，並繼續尋找進一步減少的機會。我們預計 2023 年將開設 15 家門店，關閉 50 多家門店，其中關閉集中在年底。

We do not plan to restart store openings until our business performance has stabilized. That said, we do expect 3 store openings in 2024, which were projects originally slated for 2023. We expect full year depreciation of around $143 million, including approximately $35 million in Q3. We expect a share count of approximately 29.3 million for Q3.

在我們的業務表現穩定之前，我們不打算重新開店。也就是說，我們確實預計 2024 年將開設 3 家商店，這些項目原定於 2023 年進行。我們預計全年折舊約為 1.43 億美元，其中第三季度約為 3500 萬美元。我們預計第三季度的股票數量約為 2930 萬股。

We expect total Q3 inventory to be down approximately in line with sales again and are being aggressive in managing inventory levels through the balance of the year. Again, all of our commentary on Q3 excludes the potential impact of impairment charges and other items, including distributions and the closure costs, gains on the sale of real estate and related expenses and consulting fees related to Project SpringBoard.

我們預計第三季度總庫存將再次與銷售額大致同步下降，並在今年餘下時間裡積極管理庫存水平。同樣，我們對第三季度的所有評論均排除了減值費用和其他項目的潛在影響，包括分配和關閉成本、房地產銷售收益以及與 SpringBoard 項目相關的相關費用和諮詢費。

We expect the 53rd week will benefit our Q4 sales by approximately $65 million and EPS by a few cents. I'd now like to spend a few moments to provide more details on our cost reduction and productivity efforts. Our internal efforts have identified over $100 million of structural SG&A savings for 2023 and we are well on track to achieving our goal. We will also realize significant inbound freight savings in 2023, which benefits our gross margin. Beyond those efforts, as Bruce mentioned, we started action in Project SpringBoard in Q2, which we expect to drive an additional $200 million or more of bottom line opportunities across SG&A and gross margin, from which we expect to start seeing meaningful benefits in Q4.

我們預計第 53 週將使我們第四季度的銷售額增加約 6500 萬美元，每股收益增加幾美分。現在我想花一些時間提供有關我們降低成本和提高生產力工作的更多詳細信息。我們的內部努力已確定 2023 年結構性 SG&A 節省超過 1 億美元，我們正在順利實現我們的目標。我們還將在 2023 年實現大幅入境運費節省，這有利於我們的毛利率。除了這些努力之外，正如Bruce 提到的，我們在第二季度開始了SpringBoard 項目的行動，我們預計該項目將在SG&A 和毛利率方面帶來額外2 億美元或更多的利潤機會，我們預計將在第四季度開始看到有意義的收益。

Areas of focus include cost of goods, inventory optimization, marketing, pricing and promotions, store and field operations, supply chain and general office. Project SpringBoard is now well underway, and we are pleased with the rapid progress we are making supported by our external partner.

重點領域包括商品成本、庫存優化、營銷、定價和促銷、商店和現場運營、供應鍊和綜合辦公室。 SpringBoard 項目目前正在順利進行，我們對在外部合作夥伴的支持下取得的快速進展感到高興。

Turning to liquidity. We are very comfortable with our position coming into the second half of the year. We operated through Q2 without any increase in net debt. In addition, we are pleased that our liquidity position has been further strengthened through our sale-leaseback transaction.

轉向流動性。我們對下半年的形勢感到非常滿意。我們在第二季度的運營中淨債務沒有任何增加。此外，我們很高興通過售後租回交易進一步加強了我們的流動性狀況。

As a reminder, the sale and leaseback encompassed our Apple Valley, California distribution center and 22 owned store occasions, generating net proceeds of approximately $294 million. Given the transaction closed late last week, the sale-leaseback proceeds were not included in the net available liquidity of $258 million we had at the end Q2. We used $101 million of the proceeds to fully pay down the synthetic lease on the Apple Valley distribution center and the remainder to pay down debt on our asset-based lending facility.

需要提醒的是，售後回租涵蓋了我們位於加利福尼亞州蘋果谷的配送中心和 22 家自有商店，淨收益約為 2.94 億美元。鑑於交易於上週晚些時候結束，售後租回收益並未包含在我們第二季度末的 2.58 億美元可用淨流動資金中。我們用所得收益中的 1.01 億美元全額支付了 Apple Valley 配送中心的合成租賃費用，其餘部分則用於償還我們基於資產的貸款工具的債務。

The sale leaseback on 2 additional owned stores is expected to close when due diligence is completed and yield proceeds of around $9 million. We will continue to evaluate monetization opportunities for our 2 remaining owned stores and our corporate headquarters building. We will disclose details of how the sale leaseback will impact our financial statements in our third quarter 10-Q filing. The transaction result in a significant gain in Q3, which is excluded from our outlook commentary. Due to available NOLs, we expect cash taxes on the gain on sale of the assets to be insignificant.

另外兩家自有商店的售後回租預計將在盡職調查完成後完成，收益約為 900 萬美元。我們將繼續評估我們剩餘的 2 家自有商店和公司總部大樓的貨幣化機會。我們將在第三季度 10-Q 備案中披露售後回租將如何影響我們的財務報表的詳細信息。該交易導致第三季度出現顯著收益，但我們的展望評論中未包含該收益。由於可用的 NOL，我們預計資產出售收益的現金稅微不足道。

From an ongoing cash perspective, there will be a modest impact to cash outlays as we have previously indicated, since the cap rate on the sale leaseback transaction is modestly higher than our ABL borrowing rate. For book purpose, we will need to straight line the rent and make other adjustments, which will increase the annual spread on a pretax P&L basis up to around $12 million initially.

從持續的現金角度來看，正如我們之前指出的，由於售後回租交易的上限利率略高於我們的 ABL 借款利率，因此現金支出將受到適度影響。出於賬面目的，我們需要對租金進行直線調整併進行其他調整，這將使稅前損益基礎上的年度利差最初增加到約 1200 萬美元。

While the last 18 months have been challenging, we have taken decisive actions to lower costs, manage capital and bolster our balance sheet. All of these actions put us in a strong position to weather a continued period of macro-driven challenges and to start moving to play offense, as Bruce referenced in his comments. We look forward to returning the company to growth and profitability as these efforts bear fruit.

儘管過去 18 個月充滿挑戰，但我們已採取果斷行動來降低成本、管理資本並加強我們的資產負債表。正如布魯斯在評論中提到的那樣，所有這些行動使我們處於有利地位，能夠應對持續的宏觀挑戰，並開始採取進攻行動。我們期待著這些努力取得成果後使公司恢復增長和盈利。

I will now turn the call back over to Bruce.

我現在將把電話轉回布魯斯。

Thank you, Jonathan. So to sum it up our trajectory is sequentially improving in the face of a challenging consumer environment, and we're confident that the key drivers of our improvement are the 5 key actions we are taking to turn our business around. Importantly, we are now in a position to get back to playing offense as we've taken significant actions to build a robust balance sheet to carry us through this turnaround.

謝謝你，喬納森。總而言之，面對充滿挑戰的消費者環境，我們的發展軌跡正在逐步改善，我們相信，我們改善的關鍵驅動力是我們為扭轉業務而採取的 5 項關鍵行動。重要的是，我們現在能夠重新發起進攻，因為我們已經採取了重大行動來建立穩健的資產負債表，以幫助我們度過這一轉變。

I will now turn the call back over to the moderator so that we can begin to address your questions. Thank you.

我現在將把電話轉回給主持人，以便我們可以開始解決您的問題。謝謝。

We'll now be conducting your question-and-answer session.

我們現在將進行問答環節。

(Operator Instructions)

（操作員說明）

Our first question comes from Jason Haas with Bank of America.

我們的第一個問題來自美國銀行的賈森·哈斯。

So maybe to start, Bruce, Jonathan, I'm curious if you could provide some more color on Project SpringBoard. I'm particularly curious as to where some of these cost savings are coming from?

首先，布魯斯、喬納森，我很好奇你們能否為 SpringBoard 項目提供更多的信息。我特別好奇這些節省的成本來自哪裡？

Jason, I'll jump in on that. Yes, so it's still fairly early days. We are -- as we said in the script, we do have a clear line of sight to $200 million of run rate benefit by the end of fiscal '24. There's an SG&A component to that. There's a COGS direct component to that. And then there is a benefit we expect to get from inventory optimization, from pricing and promo. So there are a few different buckets. I think what we're going to be likely doing is starting on the next call, we'll talk about the specific projects that we put into effect and the cumulative benefit from those, and then you'll see that number building over the next several quarters towards that $200 million run rate benefit in late fiscal '24. But again, it's a combination of direct SG&A reductions, cost of goods reductions and then other gross margin benefits.

傑森，我會介入的。是的，所以現在還為時尚早。正如我們在腳本中所說，我們確實有一個明確的目標，即到 24 財年末實現 2 億美元的運行率效益。其中有一個 SG&A 部分。其中有一個銷貨成本直接組成部分。我們期望從庫存優化、定價和促銷中獲得好處。所以有幾個不同的桶。我認為我們可能要做的是從下一次電話會議開始，我們將討論我們實施的具體項目以及從中獲得的累積效益，然後您會看到這個數字在下一次電話會議中不斷增加幾個季度後，我們將在2024 財年末期實現2 億美元的運行率收益。但同樣，這是直接銷售費用、管理費用（SG&A）減少、商品成本降低以及其他毛利率收益的結合。

That's great. And then, Jonathan, can you provide any color on how you're thinking about free cash flow in the remainder of the year?

那太棒了。然後，喬納森，您能提供一下您對今年剩餘時間自由現金流的看法嗎？

Yes. So what we said, Jason, is that we anticipate no net cash burn from the end of Q1 through the end of Q4. We were slightly better in Q2. So over the balance of the year, we wouldn't anticipate any net cash flow, and that's obviously prior to factoring in the sale-leaseback proceeds, which will come in -- or did have come in Q3.

是的。因此，賈森，我們所說的是，我們預計從第一季度末到第四季度末不會出現淨現金消耗。我們在第二季度稍微好一點。因此，在今年餘下的時間裡，我們預計不會出現任何淨現金流量，這顯然是在考慮售後回租收益之前，該收益將在第三季度出現，或者確實出現。

Our next question comes from line of Brad Thomas with KeyBanc Capital Markets.

我們的下一個問題來自 KeyBanc Capital Markets 的 Brad Thomas。

Hoping you could just talk a little bit more about the sales trajectory. If you can give us a little more color about trends you saw in the quarter. How you're thinking about 3Q playing out and maybe some of the early reads that you're seeing in terms of back-to-school and Halloween and some of the seasonal categories that become more important for you in the back half of the year?

希望您能多談談銷售軌跡。您能給我們更多關於您在本季度看到的趨勢的信息嗎？您如何看待 3Q 的播出，也許是您在返校和萬聖節方面看到的一些早期讀物，以及一些在下半年對您來說變得更加重要的季節性類別？

Brad, yes, so we talked about Q2, we saw some sequential improvement through the quarter. We did get some benefit in Q2 from the significant markdowns that we were taking on seasonal to flush through that inventory and we did run a couple of incremental promotional events. So we've guided to a slight improvement in Q3 in the comp trend and then a more significant one in Q4, which reflects various underlying dynamics, including the fact that we're now fully through the United Furniture issue that impacted us in Q1 and Q2. There's also some year-over-year promotional impact baked into that. But we do expect to see continued improvement into Q3 from Q2 and further in Q4 from Q3 and beyond that into 2024.

布拉德，是的，所以我們談論了第二季度，我們看到了整個季度的一些連續改善。我們確實在第二季度從季節性大幅降價中獲得了一些好處，以沖掉庫存，並且我們確實舉辦了一些增量促銷活動。因此，我們預計第三季度的比較趨勢略有改善，然後是第四季度的更顯著改善，這反映了各種潛在的動態，包括我們現在完全解決了第一季度影響我們的聯合家具問題和Q2。其中還包含一些逐年的促銷影響。但我們確實預計第三季度的業績將比第二季度持續改善，第四季度將比第三季度進一步改善，並持續到 2024 年。

That's great. And then maybe just as a follow-up, as you sort of step back and reflect on the first half of the year and some of the challenges that you had to go through with the supplier changes in the furniture category. Do you think that, that was a net headwind for you for sales with having to deal with that? Or you mentioned a little bit of a benefit from some of the promotions you had. Just trying to think about how you -- how you assess the performance and impact from those versus the potential lift you may be seeing going forward now that you have this new assortment?

那太棒了。然後也許只是作為後續行動，當你退後一步反思上半年以及家具類別供應商變化時你必須經歷的一些挑戰。您認為這對您的銷售來說是一個淨逆風嗎？或者您提到了一些促銷活動帶來的一些好處。只是想一下，您如何評估這些產品的性能和影響，以及既然您擁有了這種新產品，您可能會看到未來的潛在提升？

Yes, Brad, I'll take that. Obviously, the disruption to Broyhill supply was a definite headwind for us. It was a 9-month interruption. We now have that behind us. We're looking forward to launching -- well, we have launched Broyhill. We've got great product coming out, 75% of Broyhill Upholstery is now new heading into Q3. We've got new Accent Furniture coming in. We've got 99 different styles of furniture coming in from all over the place, adding new freshness, fear of missing out across, as we mentioned in our opening remarks.

是的，布拉德，我會接受的。顯然，布羅伊希爾供應中斷對我們來說無疑是一個阻力。這是一個長達9個月的中斷。我們現在已經把它拋在腦後了。我們期待著推出——嗯，我們已經推出了 Broyhill。我們推出了出色的產品，75% 的 Broyhill Upholstery 現已進入第三季度。我們已經推出了新的 Accent 家具。正如我們在開場白中提到的，我們從世界各地引進了 99 種不同風格的家具，增加了新的新鮮感，避免錯過。

So we feel very good about recovering our Broyhill interruption and entering the back half of the year with just bargain furniture, a great quality, great brand, great trend, right, modern furniture across our fleet. So we're excited about that. Some of the other challenges we had in the first half was just selling the seasonal lawn and garden patio furniture, large discretionary item. The pullback from our lower household income customers was evident. I think it was evident across the marketplace.

因此，我們對恢復布羅伊希爾中斷並進入今年下半年感到非常高興，我們的船隊中只有廉價的家具，優質的品質，偉大的品牌，偉大的趨勢，對的，現代家具。所以我們對此感到興奮。我們上半年遇到的其他一些挑戰只是銷售季節性草坪和花園露台家具，這是大型非必需品。家庭收入較低的客戶的退出是顯而易見的。我認為這在整個市場上都很明顯。

We did have to mark down to rightsize that inventory that's now behind us. And as you heard in the opening remarks, we'll be focusing on lower-priced seasonal items. We've adjusted our buys accordingly. We expect to have better sell-through in the back half of the year as we go through Halloween, which is off to a great start and into the holiday season. So we feel very good about that. Freight continues to decline, so the cost of goods.

我們確實必須降價以調整現在庫存的規模。正如您在開場白中聽到的那樣，我們將重點關注價格較低的季節性商品。我們相應地調整了購買量。我們預計，在今年下半年萬聖節期間，銷量將會有所提高，萬聖節將是一個良好的開端，並進入假日季節。所以我們對此感覺非常好。運費持續下降，貨物成本也隨之下降。

Overall, land and net costs are declining in the back half, which gives us more room and margin opportunity going into the back half and the traction we're making on our bargains across all categories, is resonating with the customers as we've increased our value perception. It's a measurement we do to see how we're trending with them and moved it up pretty significantly since the beginning of the year. So we feel a lot better going into the back half. We've got our 5 key action points working and gaining momentum.

總體而言，後半段的土地和淨成本正在下降，這為我們進入後半段提供了更多的空間和利潤機會，而且我們在所有類別的討價還價中所取得的吸引力，隨著我們的增加而與客戶產生了共鳴我們的價值觀。這是我們進行的一項測量，目的是了解我們與他們的趨勢如何，並且自今年年初以來，我們的趨勢顯著提升。所以進入後半場我們感覺好多了。我們的 5 個關鍵行動點正在發揮作用並獲得動力。

Our assortment is in good shape. Our inventory is in good shape. And we're also, as I mentioned earlier, we're flexing to what our customers need. So across all categories, we have some markets that are Pantry stores and we maybe not have had as enough inventory in food and consumables there. We are now having up in those markets for that customer that's searching for it as well as in the low density or rural markets, it's an underserved home store area and we're flexing up with our assortments there so that we're being more relevant for those customers. All of this is playing into the back half and that's what we say when we're playing offense going into the back half. So we feel pretty good about that.

我們的品種狀況良好。我們的庫存狀況良好。正如我之前提到的，我們也正在根據客戶的需求進行靈活調整。因此，在所有類別中，我們有一些市場是食品儲藏室，我們可能沒有足夠的食品和消費品庫存。我們現在在這些市場上為那些正在尋找它的客戶以及低密度或農村市場提供服務，這是一個服務不足的家居商店區域，我們正在那裡調整我們的品種，以便我們更加相關對於那些客戶。所有這些都是在後半場進行的，這就是我們在後半場進攻時所說的。所以我們對此感覺很好。

Our next question is from the line of Krisztina Katai with Deutsche Bank.

我們的下一個問題來自德意志銀行的 Krisztina Katai。

So my first question is, one of your main competitors went out of business last quarter. So I was wondering if you could talk about how that impacted your business during the second quarter. We certainly saw promotions that were targeted to these customers. Can you just speak to any lift in your sales that you saw and just how you see the opportunity in the back half of the year?

所以我的第一個問題是，你們的一個主要競爭對手上個季度倒閉了。所以我想知道您是否可以談談這對您第二季度的業務有何影響。我們當然看到了針對這些客戶的促銷活動。您能否談談您所看到的銷售增長以及您如何看待下半年的機會？

Krisztin, I'll take that. We're tracking very closely to -- I assume you're talking about Bed Bath & Beyond. And just for informational sake, our overlap of stores to their overlap in a 10-mile radiance is about 60%. And so we're seeing a lift in the stores that were close to their stores. In the second quarter, a lot of the things that the customers are shopping are in tabletop appliances and decor. We're also capitalizing on distressed inventory coming out of that closure. We're looking to play a bigger role and back to school, back to campus. We ran our toe event, which had good penetration with customers. And we expect that it will continue to grow this season and into the future. So it's unfortunate when you see company go out of business, but we are here to serve customers the best we can, and we're seizing the opportunity.

克里斯汀，我會接受的。我們正在非常密切地追踪——我假設您正在談論 Bed Bath & Beyond。僅供參考，我們的商店重疊度與 10 英里輻射度內的重疊度約為 60%。因此，我們看到靠近他們商店的商店出現了電梯。在第二季度，顧客購買的很多東西都是桌面電器和裝飾品。我們還利用了因關閉而產生的不良庫存。我們希望發揮更大的作用，回到學校，回到校園。我們舉辦了腳趾活動，在顧客中得到了很好的滲透。我們預計本季度和未來它將繼續增長。因此，當您看到公司倒閉時，這是不幸的，但我們會盡力為客戶提供最好的服務，並且我們正在抓住機會。

Great. And then just as my follow-up, just on the sequential improvement in the top line. Obviously, you're guiding to a low teens decrease in the third quarter and high single digits in the fourth quarter. So I was wondering if you can talk to one, is that generally in line with your quarter-to-date that you are seeing? Is that a fair assumption? And two, maybe just what would be the biggest variance in performance relative to the second quarter to get us to negative high single digits by the fourth quarter.

偉大的。然後就像我的後續行動一樣，只是關於營收的連續改善。顯然，您預計第三季度將出現低兩位數的下降，而第四季度將出現高個位數的下降。所以我想知道您是否可以與某人交談，這通常與您所看到的季度至今一致嗎？這是一個公平的假設嗎？第二，也許與第二季度相比最大的業績差異是什麼，才能讓我們在第四季度達到負高個位數。

I'll give a little bit of color on that. Yes, I mean, as usual, we don't give specific quarter-to-date comps, but our guidance for the quarter is reflective of what we've seen year-to-date. And obviously, in any given month, there are promotional cadence changes and so on that may have impacted that particular month relative to the quarter as a whole. But our guidance is consistent with what we've seen quarter-to-date.

我會對此進行一些說明。是的，我的意思是，像往常一樣，我們不會給出具體的季度至今的比較，但我們對本季度的指導反映了我們今年迄今為止所看到的情況。顯然，在任何特定月份，促銷節奏等都會發生變化，這可能會影響該特定月份相對於整個季度的影響。但我們的指導意見與我們本季度迄今所看到的一致。

I think some of the things that are impacting the sequential change in Q2 to Q3 and Q1 are the abatement of the United Furniture headwind that we've talked about, which was fairly significant in Q1. We're still there in Q2 and now it's essentially gone. It was also, as you recall, the tax refund adverse impact in Q1, a little bit of that in Q2. And then I think another significant factor is always the year-over-year promotional cadence. And again, we did have to clear through a lot of seasonal inventory in Q2, which gives us a little bit of a comp benefit but at a significant gross margin rate impact.

我認為影響第二季度、第三季度和第一季度連續變化的一些因素是我們討論過的聯合家具逆風的減弱，這在第一季度相當重要。我們在第二季度仍然存在，但現在它基本上消失了。正如您所記得的那樣，第一季度的退稅負面影響，第二季度的一點影響。然後我認為另一個重要因素始終是逐年促銷節奏。再說一次，我們確實必須在第二季度清理大量季節性庫存，這給我們帶來了一點競爭優勢，但對毛利率產生了重大影響。

So that effect is abating a little bit. So overall, we feel comfortable with that we'll see some modest improvement in Q3 and then more significantly in Q4. Q4 is our easiest comparison on both a 1-year and a multiyear basis. So that will help us then, but we're also expecting more of a year-over-year -- or less of year-over-year promo headwind in Q4 than we've seen in the earlier quarters.

所以這種影響正在減弱一些。因此，總體而言，我們感到滿意的是，我們將在第三季度看到一些適度的改善，然後在第四季度看到更顯著的改善。第四季度是我們最簡單的一年期和多年期比較。因此，這將對我們有所幫助，但我們也預計第四季度的促銷逆風會比前幾個季度出現更多同比或更少。

The next question comes from the line of Daniel Silverstein with Credit Suisse.

下一個問題來自瑞士信貸銀行的 Daniel Silverstein。

Just kind of similar to the last question, with respect to achieving a sequential improvement in comps in 2H, what do you guys have planned in terms of driving customer traffic and engagement in an environment where big ticket is still pressured, anything beyond the family and friends, sales, events, planned to get customers in front of the new product?

與上一個問題類似，關於在 2H 中實現比較的連續改進，在大額門票仍然面臨壓力的環境中，你們在推動客戶流量和參與度方面有什麼計劃，除了家庭和朋友、銷售、活動、計劃讓客戶看到新產品嗎？

Yes, I'll take that one, Daniel. The first half, we're making great progress on our bargains penetration. And as you know, bargains are closeouts, anything off-price, things that we source from all over the world, factory direct, distressed retailers, distressed vendors and that amount of bargain penetration is up substantially going in the third quarter, nearly 30% of the assortment, and it's resonating with our customers. It's hard to move a value index with customers and to move it significantly like we did in Q2, gives us momentum and reasons to believe going into the back half.

是的，我要那個，丹尼爾。上半年，我們在討價還價滲透方面取得了很大進展。如你所知，便宜貨就是清倉，任何打折的東西，我們從世界各地採購的東西，工廠直銷，陷入困境的零售商，陷入困境的供應商，而第三季度的討價還價滲透率大幅上升，接近30%的品種，並引起了我們客戶的共鳴。像我們在第二季度所做的那樣，很難與客戶一起改變價值指數並大幅改變它，這給了我們動力和理由相信進入後半段。

And keep in mind, when I joined the company back in late 2018, that penetration of bargains was high single digits and dropped to even lower than that during COVID. So we're making progress there. Now the key thing that we are doing going forward is communicating this unmistakable value better than ever before. So we've added comp ticket pricing in store, which in many cases, takes the need to promo out of the equation. And looking at social influencers on YouTube and everything else, and they're seeing this incredible value and it's starting to -- the word is starting to get out. Our bargain and caps have grown significantly, and this is high-quality products.

請記住，當我在 2018 年底加入該公司時，特價商品的滲透率高達個位數，甚至比新冠疫情期間還要低。所以我們正在那裡取得進展。現在我們正在做的關鍵事情是比以往更好地傳達這一明確無誤的價值觀。因此，我們在商店中添加了免費門票定價，這在許多情況下消除了促銷的需要。看看 YouTube 和其他網站上的社交影響者，他們看到了這種令人難以置信的價值，而且這個詞開始傳播開來。我們的討價還價和上限顯著增長，這是高質量的產品。

So communicating more, increasing our messaging, both on dot-com, social influencers and our campaigns with Broyhill back and Baby and Pet and all these things are just going to drive that messaging even more so in the back half. In addition to that, the relevance of our stores, where they're at, we haven't flexed inventory and assortments and pricing as effectively as we should have in the past. That all is changing as we enter into the back half of the year.

因此，更多的溝通，增加我們的信息傳遞，無論是在網絡、社會影響力人物還是我們與布羅伊希爾回歸、嬰兒和寵物的活動上，所有這些事情只會在後半部分推動信息傳遞更加如此。除此之外，我們商店的相關性，無論它們在哪裡，我們都沒有像過去那樣有效地調整庫存、品種和定價。當我們進入下半年時，一切都在發生變化。

We're having up in the pantry areas where we know consumers shop the pantry for food and consumables, and that's more needed now than ever and we're upping our inventories with new freshness fear of missing out, Accent Furniture, new Broyhill collections, modern styles, all these things hitting the back half of the year and the fall in those rural areas that are underserved.

我們在食品儲藏室區域設立了辦事處，我們知道消費者在食品儲藏室購買食品和消費品，現在比以往任何時候都更需要，我們正在增加我們的庫存，因為擔心會錯過新的新鮮度，Accent Furniture，新的Broyhill 系列，現代風格，所有這些事情都發生在下半年以及那些服務不足的農村地區的秋季。

We're wrapping this all together and easy to shop omni-channel experience that where we have a lead against other off-price peers. And we're investing in that infrastructure, we just redid the landing page. We treat it as an e-influence, shopping experience where they can do everything online. We've got the ease of delivery, pickup in store, financing all of that online and so we feel pretty good about where we are, a lot of new freshness, a lot of bargains penetration.

我們將這一切整合在一起，提供易於購物的全渠道體驗，這使我們領先於其他低價同行。我們正在投資該基礎設施，我們剛剛重新設計了登陸頁面。我們將其視為一種電子影響力、購物體驗，他們可以在網上做所有事情。我們的送貨、店內取貨、在線融資都很方便，所以我們對自己的現狀感覺非常好，有很多新的新鮮感，有很多便宜貨滲透。

Our goal is to be 1/3 of bargain penetration in the assortment by the end of the year. We're almost there now and whereas we focus on that and bringing more bargains there, we'll think that number will just go up and we'll get more aggressive about the messaging, so they know that we're back as a value player.

我們的目標是到今年年底，該產品類別中的討價還價滲透率達到 1/3。我們現在就快到了，雖然我們專注於這一點並在那裡帶來更多的便宜貨，但我們會認為這個數字只會上升，我們會更加積極地傳達信息，所以他們知道我們作為一個價值回來了玩家。

And just a follow-up on the higher bargain/closeout penetration. Is there a big product margin delta on those sales versus company average, let's say?

這只是更高的討價還價/清倉滲透率的後續行動。比方說，這些銷售額與公司平均水平相比是否存在很大的產品利潤差？

Yes. It's a good question. Yes, the bargain penetration is margin accretive to the rest of the box. It's NBO and requires less product markdowns, and that's why it's appealing to us and is resonating with the customer as well. It's just an easy sell quality product at a great discount.

是的。這是一個好問題。是的，討價還價的滲透會增加盒子中其他部分的利潤。它是 NBO，需要較少的產品降價，這就是它對我們有吸引力並引起客戶共鳴的原因。這只是一種易於銷售的優質產品，而且折扣很大。

Thank you. That does conclude today's teleconference and webcast. A replay of this call will become available. You can access to replay until September 12 by dialing toll free 877-660-6853 and enter replay confirmation 13740499#. The toll number is 201-612-7415, replay confirmation 13740499#.

謝謝。今天的電話會議和網絡廣播到此結束。將可以重播此通話。您可以在 9 月 12 日之前通過撥打免費電話 877-660-6853 並輸入重播確認 13740499# 來觀看重播。長途電話201-612-7415，重播確認13740499#。

You may now disconnect and have a great day. We thank you for your participation.

您現在可以斷開連接並度過愉快的一天。我們感謝您的參與。