Five Below Inc (FIVE) 2022 Q4 法說會逐字稿

Good day, and welcome to the Five Below Fourth Quarter 2022 Earnings Conference Call. (Operator Instructions) Please note, this event is being recorded.

美好的一天，歡迎參加 2022 年第四季度低於五歲以下的收益電話會議。 （操作員說明）請注意，正在記錄此事件。

I would now like to turn the conference over to Christiane Pelz, Vice President of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

我現在想將會議轉交給投資者關係副總裁 Christiane Pelz。請繼續。

Thank you, Gary. Good afternoon, everyone, and thanks for joining us today for Five Below's Fourth Quarter 2022 Financial Results Conference Call. On today's call are Joel Anderson, President and Chief Executive Officer; and Ken Bull, Chief Operating Officer and Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer. After management has made their formal remarks, we will open the call to questions.

謝謝你，加里。大家下午好，感謝今天加入我們，參加 Five Below 的 2022 年第四季度財務業績電話會議。參加今天電話會議的有總裁兼首席執行官喬爾·安德森 (Joel Anderson)；首席運營官兼首席財務官兼財務主管 Ken Bull。在管理層發表正式評論後，我們將開始提問。

I need to remind you that certain comments made during this call may constitute forward-looking statements and are made pursuant to and within the meaning of the safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 as amended. Such forward-looking statements are subject to both known and unknown risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from such statements. Those risks and uncertainties are described in the press release and our SEC filings.

我需要提醒您，在本次電話會議中發表的某些評論可能構成前瞻性陳述，並且是根據經修訂的 1995 年《私人證券訴訟改革法》的安全港條款並在其含義範圍內作出的。此類前瞻性陳述受到已知和未知的風險和不確定性的影響，這些風險和不確定性可能導致實際結果與此類陳述存在重大差異。這些風險和不確定性在新聞稿和我們提交給美國證券交易委員會的文件中有所描述。

The forward-looking statements made today are as of the date of this call, and we do not undertake any obligation to update our forward-looking statements. If you do not have a copy of today's press release, you may obtain one by visiting the Investor Relations page of our website at fivebelow.com.

今天作出的前瞻性陳述截至本次電話會議之日，我們不承擔任何更新前瞻性陳述的義務。如果您沒有今天新聞稿的副本，您可以通過訪問我們網站 fivebelow.com 的投資者關係頁面獲得一份。

I will now turn the call over to Joel.

我現在將把電話轉給喬爾。

Thank you, Christiane, and thanks, everyone, for joining us on our fourth quarter 2022 earnings call. As we stated at the ICR conference in January, we were pleased with our holiday performance, which was at the high end of our guidance despite the impact of snowstorms leading up to Christmas. The season played out as we had expected with an improved inventory position and more targeted digital marketing, helping fuel sales as our Save the Holidays campaign resonated with customers looking for value.

謝謝 Christiane，也感謝大家加入我們的 2022 年第四季度財報電話會議。正如我們在 1 月份的 ICR 會議上所說，我們對我們的假期表現感到滿意，儘管在聖誕節前受到暴風雪的影響，但我們的假期表現仍處於我們指導的高端。這個季節正如我們預期的那樣結束，庫存狀況得到改善，數字營銷更有針對性，幫助推動銷售，因為我們的“拯救假期”活動引起了尋求價值的客戶的共鳴。

Results for both the holiday period and the quarter overall were driven by transactions, our proxy for traffic, which demonstrates the effectiveness of the value and how we delivered, especially important in this inflationary environment. We finished the quarter with a strong January, resulting in total fourth quarter sales of $1.1 billion or growth of 13%, a comparable sales increase of 1.9% and earnings per share of $3.07. Needs-based items continue to be popular as demonstrated by outperformance in our candy, seasonal and create worlds.

假期和整個季度的結果均由交易推動，交易是我們的流量代表，它證明了價值的有效性以及我們如何交付，在這種通貨膨脹的環境中尤為重要。我們以強勁的 1 月份結束了本季度，第四季度總銷售額為 11 億美元或增長 13%，可比銷售額增長 1.9%，每股收益為 3.07 美元。基於需求的項目繼續受歡迎，我們的糖果、季節性和創造世界的出色表現證明了這一點。

Our customer is clearly looking for value and convenience and the flexibility of our model allows us to quickly respond and bring them the products they want. We started 2022 knowing it was going to be a challenging year, given the extraordinarily strong (inaudible) results of fiscal 2021, but we did not expect inflation to be as high as it was and across so many key areas. Five Below is a resilient retailer and we quickly pivoted and adjusted to the new operating environment. I could not be prouder of how the organization rallied to deliver sales over $3 billion and 11.2% operating profit margin for the year despite these headwinds, and I want to thank them for their commitment to executing with excellence.

我們的客戶顯然正在尋找價值和便利，而我們模型的靈活性使我們能夠快速響應並為他們提供他們想要的產品。鑑於 2021 財年的異常強勁（聽不見）的業績，我們在 2022 年開始時就知道這將是充滿挑戰的一年，但我們預計通貨膨脹率不會像現在這樣高，並且會橫跨這麼多關鍵領域。 Five Below 是一家有彈性的零售商，我們迅速調整併適應了新的運營環境。儘管有這些不利因素，但我為該組織如何團結一致實現了超過 30 億美元的銷售額和 11.2% 的營業利潤率感到無比自豪，我要感謝他們對卓越執行的承諾。

Now let me summarize the major accomplishments of fiscal year 2022. One, starting with product. We are a merchandise-driven company, and we are passionate about sourcing an incredible trend-right assortment for our customers at outstanding value. We stay on top of hot trends and swiftly move to capitalize on them, while creating fun for our customers with events like Sunday Squish Day or exclusive squishmallows.

現在讓我總結一下2022財年的主要成就。第一，從產品開始。我們是一家以商品為導向的公司，我們熱衷於以卓越的價值為我們的客戶採購令人難以置信的潮流商品。我們緊跟熱門趨勢並迅速行動以利用它們，同時通過 Sunday Squish Day 或獨家 squishmallow 等活動為我們的客戶創造樂趣。

In 2022, we were up against (inaudible) trends from 2021 and successfully lapped those by finding amazing value products in Hello Kitty, Funko and Marvel Collectibles as well as other licensed products such as Kendall and Kylie crossbody bags. The flexibility of our model in our 8 worlds is unique and enables swift recognition and introduction of trend-right and relevant products to our customers, and we have honed our expertise and discipline to effectively manage the constant cycling of these trends. Number two, new stores. They remain a key growth engine with the opportunity for 3,500 plus Five Below locations nationwide. In 2022, we opened 150 new stores, including 48 in the fourth quarter, with a total ending store count of 1,340. We are seeing continued strong new performance, demonstrating how effective our model is with an industry-leading less than 1-year payback.

2022 年，我們與 2021 年的（聽不清）趨勢相抗衡，並通過在 Hello Kitty、Funko 和 Marvel Collectibles 以及其他授權產品（如 Kendall 和 Kylie 斜挎包）中找到超值產品，成功地超越了這些趨勢。我們的模型在我們的 8 個世界中的靈活性是獨一無二的，能夠迅速識別並向我們的客戶介紹符合趨勢的相關產品，並且我們磨練了我們的專業知識和紀律，以有效地管理這些趨勢的不斷循環。第二，新店。他們仍然是一個關鍵的增長引擎，有機會在全國范圍內開設 3,500 多個“五個以下”地點。 2022 年，我們新開了 150 家門店，其中第四季度為 48 家，期末門店總數為 1,340 家。我們看到了持續強勁的新業績，證明了我們的模型在不到 1 年的行業領先投資回報率方面的有效性。

Number three, the Five Beyond prototype. Since the reveal of our new store prototype at the March Investor Day, featuring the store within a store Five Beyond section, we successfully converted nearly 250 stores in 2022 or almost 20% of our store fleet into this format. Number four, digital and data. We created a data science team and began using tokenization tools to gather sales data to communicate with our customers more effectively as well as to better target new customers. We have improved our ability to meet our customers where they are, whether it be TikTok, Instagram or Snapchat, among other social media platforms. We are still in the early stages of this journey, and see great future potential to increase loyalty.

第三，五超越原型。自從我們的新店原型在 3 月的投資者日揭曉以來，我們在 2022 年成功地將近 250 家商店或近 20% 的商店車隊轉變為這種模式。第四，數字和數據。我們創建了一個數據科學團隊，並開始使用標記化工具來收集銷售數據，以便更有效地與客戶溝通並更好地瞄準新客戶。我們提高了與客戶會面的能力，無論是 TikTok、Instagram 還是 Snapchat 以及其他社交媒體平台。我們仍處於這一旅程的早期階段，並且看到了提高忠誠度的巨大未來潛力。

Number five, brand awareness. Our overall brand awareness continues to grow as we densify across markets, increasing by 8 percentage points in 2022, to 67%. We believe part of the strong growth is due to our new and burgeoning data analytics capabilities, giving us more customer insights and fueling more effective digital marketing, and we expect our brand awareness will continue to increase over the coming years.

第五，品牌意識。隨著我們在各個市場的密集化，我們的整體品牌知名度繼續提高，到 2022 年提高 8 個百分點，達到 67%。我們認為，強勁增長的部分原因是我們新的和蓬勃發展的數據分析能力，為我們提供了更多的客戶洞察力並推動了更有效的數字營銷，我們預計我們的品牌知名度將在未來幾年繼續提高。

Number six, crew. In 2022, we opened our annual associate engagement survey to all Five Below crew members, including full-time and part-time across our stores, ship centers and Wild Town. Our engagement scores landed us in the top quartile of Gallup's overall company database, which includes thousands of companies across multiple industries. We are very proud with the level of engagement of our crew, and we will continue to focus on hiring outstanding crew members and building engaged teams.

第六名，船員。 2022 年，我們向所有五歲以下船員開放了年度員工敬業度調查，包括我們商店、船舶中心和 Wild Town 的全職和兼職員工。我們的參與度得分使我們在蓋洛普的整個公司數據庫中名列前四分之一，該數據庫包括多個行業的數千家公司。我們對船員的敬業度感到非常自豪，我們將繼續專注於聘請優秀的船員和建立敬業的團隊。

While achieving these milestones, we also built out our capabilities in distribution both for e-commerce and stores. We completed our five-node distribution center network with the opening of our Indianapolis location, leading to greater efficiencies and opportunity for improved operations for the chain. Additionally, we rolled out BOPIS across our chain in September and are pleased with the initial customer response and see a big opportunity to continue to grow. These are examples of how we are evolving into a true omnichannel experience (inaudible) the customers where and how they want to shop.

在實現這些里程碑的同時，我們還建立了電子商務和商店的分銷能力。隨著我們在印第安納波利斯的位置的開放，我們完成了我們的五節點配送中心網絡，從而提高了效率並有機會改善連鎖店的運營。此外，我們於 9 月在整個連鎖店推出了 BOPIS，並對最初的客戶反應感到滿意，並看到了繼續發展的巨大機會。這些是我們如何發展成為真正的全渠道體驗（聽不清）的例子，客戶可以在哪里以及如何購物。

Now let me turn to 2023 and where we are with our Triple Double vision. We moved swiftly from strategy to execution. We reconfigured our team. We adjusted and hired new leadership. All of this was done to support 5 new strategic pillars, which are: one, store expansion; two, store potential; three, product and brand strategy; four, inventory optimization; and five, crew innovation. We are looking at each of these 5 through the lens of customer relevancy and using technology to drive results of focusing on unleashing the power of data and analytics.

現在讓我談談 2023 年以及我們的三重願景。我們迅速從戰略轉向執行。我們重新配置了我們的團隊。我們調整併聘請了新的領導層。所有這些都是為了支持 5 個新的戰略支柱，即：一是門店擴張；二、儲勢；三、產品和品牌戰略；四、庫存優化；五是船員創新。我們正在通過客戶相關性的鏡頭來審視這 5 個中的每一個，並使用技術來推動專注於釋放數據和分析的力量的結果。

Allow me to give you a brief overview of each one. Given that new stores continue to be the key growth engine at Five Below, store expansion is unsurprisingly the first pillar. As we said at our Investor Day last year, we are expanding our reach to put Five Below anywhere. We have refocused resources to accelerate our store growth and reach a milestone of 200 new stores this year. For example, we overhauled our real estate review process to make it more efficient. And we also expanded our view the types of centers in which we can locate a Five Below store.

請允許我簡要介紹一下每一個。鑑於新店仍然是 Five Below 的主要增長引擎，門店擴張無疑是第一支柱。正如我們在去年的投資者日所說的那樣，我們正在擴大我們的影響力，將“低於五個標準”放在任何地方。我們重新調整了資源以加速我們的店鋪增長，並在今年達到了 200 家新店的里程碑。例如，我們徹底改革了房地產審查流程，以提高效率。我們還擴展了我們可以在其中找到“五人以下”商店的中心類型。

In addition to our traditional focus on suburban power centers, we are now accelerating urban as well as semi rural stores and are testing alternative venues. We are excited to get back to growing our new store base again.

除了我們傳統上對郊區電力中心的關注之外，我們現在正在加速城市和半農村商店的建設，並正在測試替代場所。我們很高興能重新開始擴大我們的新店群。

Moving on to our second pillar, store potential. With average unit volume or AUV of $2.4 million and a stated goal of getting closer to $3 million, we know we have a fantastic opportunity to increase AUVs throughout the chain. We are driving comp store growth through the continued conversion of our fleet to the Five Beyond prototype as well as introducing new product categories and services throughout the store.

繼續我們的第二個支柱，存儲潛力。平均單位體積或 AUV 為 240 萬美元，既定目標接近 300 萬美元，我們知道我們有一個絕佳的機會來增加整個鏈條的 AUV。我們通過繼續將我們的車隊轉換為 Five Beyond 原型以及在整個商店引入新的產品類別和服務來推動商店的增長。

Our goal is for Five Beyond everywhere, and we already announced plans to convert 400 more stores to the new format in 2023. Customers who buy a Five Beyond item defined as $6 and above, continue to spend over twice as much as those who buy only Five Below items, illustrating how powerful a driver these store conversions and Five Beyond products are to maximizing the productivity of our stores. Some examples of other store changes in the prototype are new offerings of ear piercing and helium balloons, which we tested throughout 2022, and are now rolling out to over 500 stores.

我們的目標是無處不在的 Five Beyond，我們已經宣布計劃在 2023 年將 400 家以上的商店轉換為新格式。購買定義為 6 美元及以上的 Five Beyond 商品的顧客的消費繼續是只購買的顧客的兩倍多以下五個項目說明了這些商店轉化率和 Five Beyond 產品對最大限度地提高商店生產力的強大推動力。原型中其他商店變化的一些例子是耳洞和氦氣球的新產品，我們在整個 2022 年進行了測試，現在正在推廣到 500 多家商店。

Customers love the convenience and value of our ear-piercing services, our snarky helium balloon assortment and the one-stop shopping we offer for parties and guests. Our third pillar is product and brand strategy. Product is at the core of who Five Below is.

客戶喜歡我們的穿耳服務的便利和價值、我們的狡猾的氦氣球分類以及我們為聚會和客人提供的一站式購物。我們的第三個支柱是產品和品牌戰略。產品是以下五個人的核心。

Our merchants are relentless about scouring the globe to pursue value, trends, wow and newness, that will never change. As we've seen in the past, our growing scale opens up even more incredible opportunities to source amazing products across categories our customers will love.

我們的商人不懈地搜尋全球以追求永遠不會改變的價值、趨勢、驚喜和新鮮感。正如我們在過去看到的那樣，我們不斷擴大的規模開闢了更多令人難以置信的機會，可以採購我們客戶喜愛的各種類別的驚人產品。

As we continue to open locations and expand Five Beyond conversions to 400 stores in 2023, we are bringing our brand to more and more people. Our aided brand awareness in mature markets like Philadelphia, is around 70%. And in newer markets opened less than 2 years, our brand awareness has grown to 50%. With top specialty retailers in the '80s, we see an opportunity to increase brand awareness in all of our markets.

隨著我們在 2023 年繼續開設門店並將 Five Beyond 轉換擴展到 400 家門店，我們正在將我們的品牌帶給越來越多的人。我們在費城等成熟市場的輔助品牌知名度約為 70%。在開業不到 2 年的新市場中，我們的品牌知名度已增長到 50%。憑藉 80 年代的頂級專業零售商，我們看到了在我們所有市場中提高品牌知名度的機會。

The Five Below brand will continue to be amplified with increased digital marketing supported by customer data analytics to retain existing customers and attract new customers. The fourth pillar is focused on inventory optimization. The focus of this pillar is to further enable the scale required for the Triple Double strategy, while continuing to leverage inventory as an asset to drive sales and maximize profits. We have made many improvements to our systems and infrastructure over the last several years. We've implemented new systems for retail merchandising, inventory ordering and distribution management, all while increasing ship center capacity and capabilities, but we still have a huge opportunity to make further strides, particularly on the movement and levels of inventory. With our five-node DC network, we know we can better optimize the efficiency of the current systems and processes to better utilize our new configuration.

Five Below 品牌將通過客戶數據分析支持的數字營銷不斷擴大，以留住現有客戶並吸引新客戶。第四個支柱側重於庫存優化。該支柱的重點是進一步實現三雙戰略所需的規模，同時繼續利用庫存作為資產來推動銷售和利潤最大化。在過去的幾年裡，我們對我們的系統和基礎設施進行了許多改進。我們已經為零售商品、庫存訂購和分銷管理實施了新系統，同時提高了船舶中心的容量和能力，但我們仍有巨大的機會取得更大的進步，特別是在庫存的流動和水平方面。通過我們的五節點 DC 網絡，我們知道我們可以更好地優化當前系統和流程的效率，以更好地利用我們的新配置。

For 2023, our initiatives include a new upgraded merchandise planning system. Our job now is to integrate all these capabilities and leverage the resulting benefits to optimize inventory, forecasting, ordering, replenishment and flow with a goal of improving turns and end-to-end visibility.

2023 年，我們的舉措包括全新升級的商品規劃系統。我們現在的工作是整合所有這些功能並利用由此產生的好處來優化庫存、預測、訂購、補貨和流程，以提高周轉率和端到端的可見性。

The fifth pillar is crew innovation. Five Below would not be the company we are today without our crew, whether it's in the stores, ship centers or Wild Town. We want to create amazing experiences from crew to customer. I'll focus on our store associates as they are key to bringing Five Below live for our customers so they can let go and have fun. Our store managers, especially are critical to the success of the store, instilling the Five Below way and the values into all our associates.

第五個支柱是船員創新。如果沒有我們的船員，五人以下就不會是我們今天的公司，無論是在商店、船舶中心還是 Wild Town。我們希望創造從船員到客戶的奇妙體驗。我將重點關注我們的店員，因為他們是為我們的客戶帶來 Five Below 直播的關鍵，這樣他們就可以放手享受樂趣。我們的商店經理對商店的成功尤其重要，他們向所有員工灌輸以下五種方式和價值觀。

With plans to hire thousands of new managers over the next several years, we know we need our store managers fully engaged. As our culture ambassadors, they are key to our future success, and we are developing strategies and plans to ensure they have the tools and training they need to drive engagement and model our values.

我們計劃在未來幾年聘用數千名新經理，我們知道我們需要我們的商店經理充分參與。作為我們的文化大使，他們是我們未來成功的關鍵，我們正在製定戰略和計劃，以確保他們擁有推動參與和塑造我們價值觀所需的工具和培訓。

Speaking of our crew, let me spend a couple of minutes sharing my thoughts on our executive team. We have made some significant enhancements in the last 60 days and will positively impact our go-forward momentum, drive success at scale and grow with discipline. First, we added Amit Jhunjhunwala to our executive ranks as our CIO, reporting directly to me. There is nothing we do that technology doesn't impact. Amit is a seasoned technologist, joining us from Adidas, where he was their CIO North America. We also announced earlier this week the promotion of Ken Bull, the Chief Operating Officer. This is a great opportunity for us to further leverage Ken's deep knowledge of the entire organization and put him in a role to make a broader impact on delivering our growth goals. With the addition of a new CFO later this year, who will report directly to me, Ken's new role positions him to increase his focus on important building blocks, our Triple Double growth vision across talent, systems, processes, including direct responsibility or inventory optimization pillar.

說到我們的工作人員，讓我花幾分鐘分享一下我對我們的執行團隊的看法。在過去的 60 天裡，我們取得了一些顯著的改進，這將對我們的前進勢頭產生積極影響，推動大規模成功並有紀律地發展。首先，我們將 Amit Jhunjhunwala 添加到我們的高管隊伍中作為我們的 CIO，直接向我匯報。我們所做的一切都會受到技術的影響。 Amit 是一位經驗豐富的技術專家，從阿迪達斯加入我們，在那裡他是他們的北美首席信息官。本週早些時候，我們還宣布晉升首席運營官 Ken Bull。這是一個很好的機會，我們可以進一步利用 Ken 對整個組織的深入了解，讓他發揮作用，對實現我們的增長目標產生更廣泛的影響。隨著今年晚些時候新首席財務官的加入，他將直接向我匯報，Ken 的新角色使他更加關注重要的組成部分，即我們在人才、系統、流程方面的三雙增長願景，包括直接責任或庫存優化支柱。

In summary, we are pleased with the results in the fourth quarter as well as the progress we made on our strategic initiatives throughout the year. We enter fiscal 2023 from a position of strength and we have evolved our operating structure to enable our teams to execute the long-term growth initiatives that underpin our Triple Double goals.

總而言之，我們對第四季度的業績以及我們全年在戰略計劃方面取得的進展感到滿意。我們從強勢地位進入 2023 財年，我們已經改進了我們的運營結構，使我們的團隊能夠執行支持我們三雙目標的長期增長計劃。

With that, I will turn it over to Ken to review the financials in more detail.

有了這個，我將把它交給 Ken 來更詳細地審查財務狀況。

Thanks, Joel, and good afternoon, everyone. Before I provide my review of the fourth quarter and year, I wanted to let you all know how excited I am for my new role.

謝謝，喬爾，大家下午好。在我對第四季度和年度進行回顧之前，我想讓大家知道我對我的新角色有多麼興奮。

As COO, it will give me the opportunity to drive continued success of Five Below as we execute the Triple Double vision. We've achieved incredible growth and success in the 17-plus years I've been with the company and looking forward, there is a large runway for expansion and an opportunity to increase productivity and to drive the brand to new heights. My new role allows us to sharpen leadership focus and narrow span of control as we execute the initiatives that underpin the Triple Double vision. Specifically, I'm now responsible for the inventory optimization pillar and have oversight of merchandise planning and allocation, data and analytics, strategy, communications and legal teams. I will continue as CFO until we appoint my successor, who I am confident will benefit from the talent and strong discipline of our current financial organization.

作為首席運營官，這將使我有機會在我們執行三雙願景時推動 Five Below 的持續成功。在我為公司工作的 17 多年裡，我們取得了令人難以置信的增長和成功，並且展望未來，有廣闊的擴張跑道和提高生產力並將品牌推向新高度的機會。我的新角色使我們能夠在執行支撐三重願景的舉措時加強領導重點和縮小控制範圍。具體來說，我現在負責庫存優化支柱，並監督商品規劃和分配、數據和分析、戰略、溝通和法律團隊。在我們任命我的繼任者之前，我將繼續擔任首席財務官，我相信他將受益於我們當前財務組織的才能和嚴格的紀律。

Now on to the financial discussion. I will review the fourth quarter and fiscal 2022 results and then discuss full year and first quarter fiscal 2023 guidance. Our sales in the fourth quarter of 2022 were $1.12 billion, up 13% from the fourth quarter of 2021 and above the high end of our guidance range. We ended the quarter with 1,340 stores, a year-over-year increase of 150 stores or 12.6%. We also converted nearly 250 stores to the new Five Beyond format since our Investor Day at the end of March, and we continue to be pleased with the performance of our new and converted stores. Comparable sales increased 1.9% for the fourth quarter of 2022, also above the high end of our guidance range and against a 3.4% comp increase in the fourth quarter of 2021.

現在進行財務討論。我將回顧第四季度和 2022 財年的業績，然後討論全年和第一季度的 2023 財年指引。我們在 2022 年第四季度的銷售額為 11.2 億美元，比 2021 年第四季度增長 13%，高於我們指導範圍的上限。我們在本季度結束時擁有 1,340 家門店，同比增加 150 家或 12.6%。自 3 月底的投資者日以來，我們還將近 250 家商店轉換為新的 Five Beyond 格式，我們繼續對新商店和轉換商店的表現感到滿意。 2022 年第四季度可比銷售額增長 1.9%，也高於我們指導範圍的上限，而 2021 年第四季度的可比銷售額增長 3.4%。

The comp increase for the fourth quarter was driven by a 2.8% increase in comp transactions, partially offset by a 0.9% decrease in comp average ticket. We were pleased to see comp transactions turn positive in the fourth quarter. As Joel mentioned, our strong holiday execution and performance were the key drivers of our comp performance, coupled with accelerated momentum and favorable weather in January.

第四季度的補償增長是由補償交易增加 2.8% 推動的，部分被補償平均票價下降 0.9% 所抵消。我們很高興看到補償交易在第四季度轉為正數。正如 Joel 所提到的，我們強大的假期執行力和業績是我們 comp 業績的關鍵驅動因素，再加上 1 月份的加速勢頭和有利的天氣。

Gross profit increased 14% to $452.4 million from $396.9 million reported in the fourth quarter of 2021. Gross margin finished at 40.3%, increasing approximately 50 basis points from 39.8% last year. The increase in gross margin was driven primarily by cost management strategies and distribution and freight expenses, partially offset by higher-than-expected shrink.

毛利潤從 2021 年第四季度報告的 3.969 億美元增長 14% 至 4.524 億美元。毛利率為 40.3%，比去年的 39.8% 增長了約 50 個基點。毛利率的增長主要受成本管理策略以及分銷和運費的推動，部分被高於預期的收縮所抵消。

On an annual basis, shrink for 2022 was approximately 30 basis points higher than what we experienced in 2021. SG&A as a percentage of sales for the fourth quarter of 2022, decreased approximately 80 basis points to 20.2% from 21% in the fourth quarter of 2021, due to lower incentive compensation and cost management strategies which were partially offset by deleverage of fixed costs and higher marketing expenses. Operating income increased 20.4% to $225.8 million. Operating margin increased approximately 130 basis points to 20.1% of sales from 18.8% of sales in the fourth quarter of 2021. The effective tax rate for the fourth quarter of 2022 was 24.8% compared to 25.1% in the fourth quarter of 2021.

按年計算，2022 年的收縮率比我們 2021 年高出約 30 個基點。SG&A 佔 2022 年第四季度銷售額的百分比從 2022 年第四季度的 21% 下降約 80 個基點至 20.2% 2021 年，由於較低的激勵薪酬和成本管理策略被固定成本的去槓桿化和較高的營銷費用部分抵消。營業收入增長 20.4% 至 2.258 億美元。營業利潤率從 2021 年第四季度佔銷售額的 18.8% 增加了約 130 個基點至佔銷售額的 20.1%。2022 年第四季度的有效稅率為 24.8%，而 2021 年第四季度為 25.1%。

Net income for the fourth quarter increased 22.2% to $171.3 million from $140.2 million, and EPS grew 23.3% to $3.07 per diluted share versus $2.49 per diluted share last year. For fiscal 2022, total net sales were $3.08 billion, an increase of 8%. Comparable sales decreased 2% versus the 30.3% comparable sales increase of 2021. This comparable sales decrease was driven by a 1.9% decrease in comp average ticket and relatively flat comp transactions.

第四季度淨利潤從 1.402 億美元增長 22.2% 至 1.713 億美元，每股收益增長 23.3% 至 3.07 美元，而去年同期為 2.49 美元。 2022 財年，總淨銷售額為 30.8 億美元，增長 8%。可比銷售額下降了 2%，而 2021 年可比銷售額增長了 30.3%。這種可比銷售額下降的原因是平均票價下降 1.9% 以及相對平穩的交易交易。

Gross profit for the full year increased 6% to approximately $1.1 billion. Gross margin decreased by approximately 60 basis points to 35.6%, driven primarily by deleverage of occupancy expenses on the negative comp. SG&A as a percentage of sales for the year increased 160 basis points to 24.4% from 22.8% in 2021, due primarily to higher marketing expenses and deleverage of fixed costs on the negative comp. Operating income of $345 million decreased 9.2% in 2022 compared to last year. Operating margin of 11.2% decreased approximately 210 basis points from last year's operating margin of 13.3%, driven by the gross margin and SG&A deleverage just discussed. Our effective tax rate for the year was 24.7% compared to 24% in 2021.

全年毛利增長 6% 至約 11 億美元。毛利率下降約 60 個基點至 35.6%，這主要是由於負成本的佔用費用去槓桿化所致。 SG&A 佔全年銷售額的百分比從 2021 年的 22.8% 增加了 160 個基點至 24.4%，這主要是由於營銷費用增加以及固定成本的去槓桿化。與去年相比，2022 年營業收入為 3.45 億美元，下降 9.2%。受剛剛討論的毛利率和 SG&A 去槓桿化的推動，11.2% 的營業利潤率比去年的 13.3% 的營業利潤率下降了約 210 個基點。我們今年的有效稅率為 24.7%，而 2021 年為 24%。

The increase in the effective tax rate for the year was due primarily to a lower tax benefit from share-based accounting. Diluted earnings per share was $4.69 for fiscal 2022, a decrease of 5.3% versus diluted earnings per share of $4.95 for fiscal 2021.

本年度實際稅率的增加主要是由於股份制會計的稅收優惠減少。 2022 財年攤薄後每股收益為 4.69 美元，較 2021 財年 4.95 美元的攤薄後每股收益下降 5.3%。

Diluted EPS included a $0.04 benefit from share-based accounting in 2022 and a $0.06 benefit in 2021. We ended the year with approximately $400 million in cash, cash equivalents and short-term investment securities and no debt. We made share repurchases of approximately $40 million or 247,000 shares for the year. Inventory at the end of the year was $527.7 million as compared to $455.1 million at the end of 2021. Pending inventory on a per store basis increased approximately 3% year-over-year, which, as expected, was a significant moderation. We strategically pulled forward inventory throughout the year in order to be in a good in-stock position, especially for the all-important holiday season, and we were very pleased with the results. The combination of improving global supply chains and our inventory disciplines contributed to this outcome.

稀釋後的每股收益包括 2022 年 0.04 美元的基於股份的會計收益和 0.06 美元的 2021 年收益。到年底，我們的現金、現金等價物和短期投資證券約為 4 億美元，沒有債務。我們全年回購了大約 4000 萬美元或 247,000 股股票。與 2021 年底的 4.551 億美元相比，與 2021 年底的 4.551 億美元相比，年底的庫存為 5.277 億美元。每家商店的待處理庫存同比增長約 3%，正如預期的那樣，這是一個顯著的放緩。為了保持良好的庫存狀態，我們全年戰略性地提前庫存，尤其是在最重要的假日季節，我們對結果非常滿意。改善全球供應鍊和我們的庫存紀律相結合促成了這一結果。

With respect to CapEx, we spent approximately $252 million in gross CapEx in fiscal 2022, excluding tenant allowances. This reflected opening 150 new stores and completing nearly 250 conversions to the new Five Beyond format, opening a new Indiana distribution center and investments in systems and infrastructure. Our CapEx spend was higher than we had initially forecasted, due primarily to accelerated purchasing of store fixtures and equipment for both conversions and new store openings in 2023.

關於資本支出，我們在 2022 財年的資本支出總額約為 2.52 億美元，不包括租戶津貼。這反映了開設 150 家新店並完成了近 250 次向新的 Five Beyond 格式的轉換，開設了新的印第安納配送中心以及對系統和基礎設施的投資。我們的資本支出高於我們最初的預測，這主要是由於為 2023 年的轉型和新店開業加速了商店固定裝置和設備的採購。

Now I'd like to turn to our guidance. For the year, we are providing a range of potential results that reflects the uncertainty of the macroeconomic and consumer environment. On the high end, we assume a continuation of the current backdrop. While on the low end, we assume some degradation from intensifying consumer pressures. Fiscal 2023 includes a 53rd week, which is expected to add approximately $40 million in sales and approximately $0.08 in EPS.

現在我想談談我們的指導。今年，我們提供了一系列反映宏觀經濟和消費環境不確定性的潛在結果。在高端，我們假設當前的背景會持續下去。在低端，我們假設消費者壓力加劇會導致一些退化。 2023 財年包括第 53 週，預計將增加約 4000 萬美元的銷售額和約 0.08 美元的每股收益。

My remarks will refer to the 53-week year unless otherwise noted. For 2023, sales are expected to be in the range of $3.49 billion to $3.59 billion, an increase of 13.3% to 16.8%. The comparable sales increase is expected to be in the range of 1% to 4%.

除非另有說明，否則我的評論將指的是 53 週的一年。 2023 年銷售額預計在 34.9 億美元至 35.9 億美元之間，增長 13.3% 至 16.8%。可比銷售額增幅預計在 1% 至 4% 之間。

We plan to open 200 new stores and expect to end the year with 1,540 stores or unit growth of approximately 15%. The majority of new stores will be in existing markets. We are entering one new state, Vermont, and expect to finish 2023, operating in 43 states. We expect to open approximately 1/3 of our new stores in the first half of 2023, compared to over 40% in the first half of 2022. This slower store opening cadence in 2023, is primarily due to landlord-related and permitting delays.

我們計劃開設 200 家新店，並預計年底將有 1,540 家店或單位增長約 15%。大多數新店將位於現有市場。我們正在進入一個新的州，即佛蒙特州，預計到 2023 年在 43 個州開展業務。我們預計將在 2023 年上半年開設約 1/3 的新店，而 2022 年上半年這一比例超過 40%。2023 年開店節奏放緩主要是由於房東相關和許可延遲。

For the full year, the midpoint of our guidance assumes slight leverage in operating margin, though the quarterly cadence will vary. In 2023, we expect significant leverage from freight expenses that will be largely offset by lapping lower than average incentive compensation and certain one-time cost management strategies we put in place last year.

對於全年，我們的指導意見的中點假定營業利潤率有輕微的槓桿作用，但季度節奏會有所不同。到 2023 年，我們預計運費的顯著槓桿作用將在很大程度上被低於平均水平的激勵薪酬和我們去年實施的某些一次性成本管理策略所抵消。

With our strong cash balance and healthy free cash flow generation, combined with higher year-over-year interest rates, we are assuming a significant increase in interest income this year. We expect a full year effective tax rate for 2023 of approximately 25%, which does not include any potential impact from share-based accounting. Net income is expected to be in the range of $295 million to $323 million, representing a growth rate of approximately 12.8% to 23.6% over 2022.

憑藉我們強勁的現金餘額和健康的自由現金流產生，再加上同比利率較高，我們預計今年的利息收入將大幅增加。我們預計 2023 年全年有效稅率約為 25%，這不包括股份制會計的任何潛在影響。淨收入預計在 2.95 億美元至 3.23 億美元之間，比 2022 年增長約 12.8% 至 23.6%。

Diluted earnings per share are expected to be in the range of $5.25 to $5.76, implying year-over-year growth of 11.9% to 22.8%. On a 52-week comparative basis, growth for diluted earnings per share is implied to be 10.2% to 21.1%. This guidance does not include any potential future impact from share repurchases.

每股攤薄收益預計在 5.25 美元至 5.76 美元之間，意味著同比增長 11.9% 至 22.8%。在 52 週的比較基礎上，每股攤薄收益的增長率預計為 10.2% 至 21.1%。本指南不包括股票回購的任何潛在未來影響。

With respect to CapEx, we plan to spend in total, approximately $325 million in 2023 in gross CapEx, excluding the impact of tenant allowances. This reflects the opening of 200 new stores, 400 conversions, expansions to our distribution centers in Georgia and Arizona and investments in systems and infrastructure.

關於資本支出，我們計劃在 2023 年總計支出約 3.25 億美元的資本支出總額，不包括租戶津貼的影響。這反映了我們在佐治亞州和亞利桑那州開設了 200 家新店、400 家改建店、擴建配送中心以及對系統和基礎設施的投資。

For the first quarter of 2023, net sales are expected to be in the range of $723 million to $735 million, an increase of 13.1% to 14.9%. We plan to open approximately 25 new stores in the first quarter this year as compared to 35 stores opened in the first quarter last year and are assuming a first quarter comp sales increase in the range of 2.5% to 4% versus a 3.6% comp decrease last year.

2023 年第一季度，淨銷售額預計在 7.23 億美元至 7.35 億美元之間，增長 13.1% 至 14.9%。我們計劃在今年第一季度開設約 25 家新店，而去年第一季度開設了 35 家門店，並假設第一季度的銷售額增長 2.5% 至 4%，而銷售額下降 3.6%去年。

We expect operating margin of 5.7% to 6.2% in the first quarter of 2023 or deleverage of approximately 70 basis points at the midpoint, driven primarily by a more normalized level of marketing in the first quarter this year. Diluted earnings per share for the first quarter of fiscal 2023, are expected to be $0.59 to $0.65 versus $0.59 in diluted earnings per share in the first quarter of 2022.

我們預計 2023 年第一季度的營業利潤率為 5.7% 至 6.2%，或中點去槓桿化約 70 個基點，這主要是受今年第一季度更為正常的營銷水平推動。 2023 財年第一季度的攤薄後每股收益預計為 0.59 美元至 0.65 美元，而 2022 年第一季度的攤薄後每股收益為 0.59 美元。

The first quarter of 2022 had a $0.03 benefit to EPS from share-based accounting. We are expecting differences in year-over-year leverage and operating margin results across the remaining 3 quarters. While it remains our practice to provide guidance for the current quarter and full year, I will provide some directional comments on how we are currently thinking about quarters 2 through 4.

2022 年第一季度，股份制會計為每股收益帶來 0.03 美元的收益。我們預計剩餘 3 個季度的同比槓桿率和營業利潤率結果會有所不同。雖然為當前季度和全年提供指導仍然是我們的慣例，但我將就我們目前對第二季度至第四季度的看法提供一些方向性評論。

For the second quarter, we currently expect modest operating margin deleverage as higher incentive compensation is only partially offset by lower freight expenses. For the back half of the year, we currently expect operating margin leverage, driven by lower freight costs offset in part by higher incentive compensation and lapping certain one-time cost management strategies. We expect higher year-over-year leverage in the third quarter versus the fourth quarter. For all other details related to our results and guidance, please refer to our earnings press release.

對於第二季度，我們目前預計營業利潤率將適度去槓桿化，因為較高的激勵薪酬僅部分被較低的運費所抵消。對於今年下半年，我們目前預計運營利潤率將受到較低運費的推動，部分原因是較高的激勵補償和採用某些一次性成本管理策略。我們預計第三季度的槓桿率將高於第四季度。有關我們的結果和指導的所有其他詳細信息，請參閱我們的收益新聞稿。

And with that, I would like to turn the call back over to the operator for the question-and-answer session. Operator?

有了這個，我想把電話轉回給接線員進行問答環節。操作員？

(Operator Instructions) Our first question comes from Simeon Gutman with Morgan Stanley.

（操作員說明）我們的第一個問題來自摩根士丹利的 Simeon Gutman。

I wanted to focus on the 1% to 4% comp guidance range. Can you talk -- can you share with us if it's balanced between price and units? Does it mean more heavily one side or the other? I don't know if you can compare it to what '22 looked like? And if you're seeing any sensitivity to higher price items (inaudible)?

我想關注 1% 到 4% 的薪酬指導範圍。你能談談——如果價格和單位之間保持平衡，你能和我們分享一下嗎？這是否意味著一側或另一側更重？我不知道你是否可以將它與 22 年的樣子進行比較？如果您發現對高價商品有任何敏感性（聽不清）？

In terms of the second part of that, Simeon, we're really not seeing any sensitivity higher to lower priced items. It's been pretty balanced. We continue to be pleased with the Five Beyond rollout and that penetration continues to increase, and there really hasn't been any pushback. So that's been really good.

關於第二部分，Simeon，我們真的沒有看到對低價商品有任何更高的敏感性。一直很平衡。我們繼續對 Five Beyond 的推出感到滿意，並且滲透率繼續增加，而且確實沒有任何阻力。所以這真的很好。

And then on the other end of it, we really pushed $1 items at holiday, and that was successful as well. So I think the customer appreciated the balance between both. As far as the guide goes, from 1 to 4, it's -- the sensitivity isn't any more towards price versus transactions at all. And I think it's more, Simeon, about -- if you just take at the midpoint, that indicates slight leverage over last year, which is actually about 50 basis points lower than what we had originally said at ICR.

然後在它的另一端，我們真的在假期推出了 1 美元的商品，這也很成功。所以我認為客戶欣賞兩者之間的平衡。就指南而言，從 1 到 4，它是——對價格與交易的敏感性完全不同。而且我認為更多，西蒙，關於 - 如果你只取中點，這表明比去年略有槓桿作用，實際上比我們最初在 ICR 上所說的低約 50 個基點。

And I think the upper end reflects continuation of the trends we're seeing today. But I think in this environment today, I think it's prudent that we continue at a wider range as we deal with unknowns like the banking issue most recently.

而且我認為高端反映了我們今天看到的趨勢的延續。但我認為在今天的這種環境下，我認為謹慎的做法是我們繼續擴大範圍，因為我們最近處理了像銀行問題這樣的未知數。

The next question is from Matthew Boss with JPMorgan.

下一個問題來自摩根大通的 Matthew Boss。

Congrats on a nice quarter. So Joel, can you speak to recent performance from your new store cohorts and maybe elaborate on the flexibility across your eight worlds to maneuver the assortment between need-based versus discretionary purchases?

祝賀一個不錯的季度。那麼喬爾，你能否談談你的新店群最近的表現，並可能詳細說明你在八個世界中的靈活性，以在基於需求的購買與隨意購買之間進行分類？

And then, Ken, on the cost structure and your ability to find continued efficiencies in the model, should we think of 3 comps as the right level of comp needed to leverage SG&A? Or could you actually pivot and lever on a lower level of comp, if needed?

然後，Ken，關於成本結構和您在模型中找到持續效率的能力，我們是否應該將 3 comp 視為利用 SG&A 所需的正確 comp 水平？或者如果需要的話，你真的可以在較低級別的補償上進行調整和槓桿化嗎？

Yes. Look, I think the flexibility, Matt, is it's not limited in just consumables. I think we've been demonstrating that for many, many years. In the past, we've tended to talk about trends, whether it be spinners or squishmallows or poppers, anything like that. And those constantly show up in different categories. And the customer knows like hey, I should go to Five Below because they'll probably have that trend. In the last 12 months, we've really seen it be all about consumables.

是的。看，我認為靈活性，馬特，它不僅限於消耗品。我認為我們多年來一直在證明這一點。過去，我們傾向於談論趨勢，無論是紡紗機、南瓜糖還是爆米花，諸如此類。那些不斷出現在不同的類別中。客戶知道，嘿，我應該去 Five Below，因為他們可能會有這種趨勢。在過去的 12 個月裡，我們確實看到了一切都與消耗品有關。

And in our world, that's candy, snack (inaudible), and the merchants did a great job of, as that area was picking up, we increased our assortment, kept ourselves full. And that's just what we do, no matter what the trend might be. The new cohort, look, all signs have been very positive. The fact that we've accelerated the number of conversions up to 400 this year is just a great example that we're not seeing any signs that what we shared at the Investor Day shouldn't continue regarding the comp profile of mid-single digits for conversions. And then, Ken, you want to talk leverage?

在我們的世界裡，那是糖果、零食（聽不清），商家做得很好，隨著那個地區的回暖，我們增加了種類，讓自己吃飽了。這就是我們所做的，無論趨勢如何。新隊列，看，所有跡像都非常積極。事實上，我們今年將轉換次數增加到 400 只是一個很好的例子，我們沒有看到任何跡象表明我們在投資者日分享的內容不應該繼續關於中個位數的補償配置文件用於轉換。然後，肯，你想談談槓桿作用嗎？

On the leverage, yes. Matt, your question around the comp and the leverage -- the comp point for leverage. You're right. Historically, we talked about 3%. There's been a lot of noise over the last few years. So it's hard to really kind of decipher based on the most recent activity. But Joel mentioned it before, if you just look at '23 now, again, there's a few things going on this year that are not normalized, right? We're getting back to a normal -- more normalized incentive compensation and we're lapping some of these one-time cost management strategies. But even with that, you'll notice that like a 2.5% comp, which is the midpoint of our range that we guided to, we are getting slight leverage. I think the bigger part of that is as we move forward, our expectations are that we should see greater leverage as we move forward into out years and potentially at a 3% or lower comp as we start to leverage on those investments we've made over the years like distribution and corporate overhead in areas like that. So I do think we have the ability to lever at a lower than a 3% comp or slightly lower than the 3% comp.

在槓桿上，是的。馬特，你關於補償和槓桿的問題——槓桿的補償點。你說得對。從歷史上看，我們談到了 3%。在過去的幾年裡，有很多噪音。因此，很難根據最近的活動進行真正的破譯。但 Joel 之前提到過，如果你現在只看 23 年，今年有一些事情沒有正常化，對吧？我們正在恢復正常——更加規範化的激勵薪酬，我們正在採用其中一些一次性成本管理策略。但即便如此，你會注意到，就像 2.5% 的補償，這是我們指導的範圍的中點，我們正在獲得輕微的槓桿作用。我認為其中更大的一部分是隨著我們的前進，我們的期望是，隨著我們進入未來幾年，我們應該看到更大的槓桿作用，並且當我們開始利用我們所做的這些投資時，可能會看到 3% 或更低的補償多年來，諸如此類領域的分銷和公司管理費用。所以我確實認為我們有能力以低於 3% 的補償或略低於 3% 的補償進行槓桿化。

The next question is from Seth Sigman with Barclays.

下一個問題來自巴克萊銀行的 Seth Sigman。

Ken, congrats to you. I just wanted to follow up on the composition of comps. With transactions driving the comps now, it's obviously quite different than we're seeing with a lot of other retailers, also interesting given some of the inherent ticket drivers in your business. Can you just give us a little bit more context on what is driving transactions? And then perhaps, what are some of the offsets to that?

肯，恭喜你。我只是想跟進comp的組成。隨著交易現在推動競爭，這顯然與我們在許多其他零售商那裡看到的完全不同，考慮到您業務中的一些固有票務驅動因素，這也很有趣。您能否為我們提供更多有關推動交易的背景信息？然後也許，對此有哪些抵消？

Yes. I think the 2 biggest ones for us is, I mentioned in my prepared remarks, everything we've done around data and analytics, we have a much better, robust tokenization that we haven't had in past years. So we really utilize that for marketing, and that proved well to drive transactions. And then secondly, the new cohort that Matt was talking about, as we continue on these conversions, we're immediately seeing a lift in sales and it's primarily through transactions. So those are 2 areas that are really driving transactions and it clearly came through in Q4 for us.

是的。我認為對我們來說最大的兩個是，我在準備好的發言中提到，我們圍繞數據和分析所做的一切，我們擁有過去幾年沒有的更好、更強大的標記化。所以我們真的利用它進行營銷，事實證明這很好地推動了交易。其次，馬特正在談論的新群體，隨著我們繼續進行這些轉換，我們立即看到銷售額的提升，這主要是通過交易實現的。所以這些是真正推動交易的 2 個領域，並且在第四季度對我們來說很明顯。

The next question is from John Heinbockel with Guggenheim.

下一個問題來自 John Heinbockel 和 Guggenheim。

So Joel, 2 related questions. Number one, what would you say, Michael's 2 or 3 priorities are product-wise for '23? And then I know the tech world has been a pretty big drag in the last, I don't know, 12 to 15 months. What's your prognosis on that in terms of what you can do to improve that? Or just maybe that category getting better naturally?

所以喬爾，2 個相關問題。第一，你會怎麼說，邁克爾的 2 或 3 個優先事項是 23 年的產品明智的？然後我知道科技界在過去的 12 到 15 個月裡一直是一個很大的拖累，我不知道。就您可以做些什麼來改善它而言，您對此有何預測？或者只是該類別自然會變得更好？

Yes. Well, listen, Michael's got a couple of priorities. One, it's really all been around our version of consumables. The focus on all the teams to in some cases, grow the space dedicated to consumables, improve the in-stock associated with consumables. It's been area #1 of his focus.

是的。好吧，聽著，邁克爾有幾個優先事項。第一，它真的都圍繞著我們的消耗品版本。在某些情況下，所有團隊的重點是增加消耗品專用空間，增加與消耗品相關的庫存。這是他關注的第一領域。

The second one has been around Five Beyond. And we have learned a lot in our journey on Five Beyond, what types of items sell, what don't sell, what kind of quantities to buy and et cetera, et cetera. So that is an area where he's really leaned in to make a big difference on that.

第二個是圍繞 Five Beyond。我們在 Five Beyond 的旅程中學到了很多東西，賣什麼類型的東西，不賣什麼，買什麼數量等等等等。所以這是一個他真正傾向於在這方面做出重大改變的領域。

And then the third one is really just about the $1 to $2, $1 to $3 product. In this recessionary time, this time of high inflation, if we can continue to really focus on that low price point and deliver value, that's the third area. So that's where he's focusing. And then the tech world, we're already starting to see it improve, and some of it's probably lapping softness. But it has been an area that has been soft, as you just called out, John. And I think you're going to see in our refresh coming up here in a month, some new product, a much more focus on trend and novelty and that's really starting to resonate well with the customer, and they brought in some new product that we haven't carried before. So I think when you see the reset coming up here, you'll be surprised. And as Michael always does, we adapt when something is not doing so well.

然後第三個實際上就是 1 美元到 2 美元，1 美元到 3 美元的產品。在這個經濟衰退時期，這個高通脹時期，如果我們能夠繼續真正專注於低價位並提供價值，那就是第三個領域。所以這就是他關注的地方。然後是科技界，我們已經開始看到它有所改善，其中一些可能是研磨柔軟度。但正如你剛才所說，約翰，這是一個一直很軟的領域。我想你會在一個月後的更新中看到一些新產品，更加關注趨勢和新穎性，這真的開始引起客戶的共鳴，他們帶來了一些新產品我們以前沒有帶過。所以我想當你看到這裡出現重置時，你會感到驚訝。正如邁克爾一貫做的那樣，當事情做得不太好時，我們會適應。

The next question is from Chuck Grom with Gordon Haskett.

下一個問題來自 Chuck Grom 和 Gordon Haskett。

Congrats, Ken. Just a couple of quick ones for me. A year ago, you guys guided fiscal '22 to an EPS range of, I think, $5.20 to $5.70. You subsequently had a lower a couple of times and eventually did the $4.69 that you're reporting today. So I guess I'm curious if that history played any role in how you guys guided '23? And then more near term, Ken, can you remind us why you're expecting 75 basis points of margin compression here in the first quarter on a pretty healthy comp?

恭喜，肯。對我來說只是幾個快速的。一年前，你們指導 22 財年的 EPS 範圍，我認為是 5.20 美元到 5.70 美元。您隨後有幾次更低的價格，最終達到了您今天報告的 4.69 美元。所以我想我很好奇這段歷史是否對你們如何指導 23 年發揮了任何作用？然後更近期，Ken，你能提醒我們為什麼你期望第一季度的利潤率壓縮 75 個基點嗎？

You want to take the first one?

你想拿第一個嗎？

Yes. I mean, look, Chuck, it obviously weighed in. We wanted to keep the range wide. I think on one hand, it does feel like '23, we're going into the first year where we're controlling a lot of our destiny and kind of getting back to what Five Below does. I mean if you think about it, we've been stuck at in the last 4 years, averaging 150 new stores opening. So it's a big jump now to 200. It's kind of signal or should signal to you all that we can control that side of it.

是的。我的意思是，查克，你看，它顯然有分量。我們想保持寬廣的範圍。我認為，一方面，感覺確實像 23 歲，我們將進入第一年，我們將控制我們的很多命運，並有點回到 Five Below 所做的事情。我的意思是，如果你仔細想想，我們在過去 4 年裡一直停留在平均 150 家新店開張的水平。所以現在是 200 的一個大躍進。這是一個信號，或者應該向大家發出信號，表明我們可以控制它的那一側。

But the other side of it, it's not lost on us, there's still macro uncertainty out there, and we wanted to be prudent enough to really widen that lower end. But I think in all cases, the message we are trying to get to all of you is we have the negative comps behind us, and now it's back to growth, growth both in terms of new stores and growth in terms of the existing stores and that will come via the conversions, they'll come through our merchants and what they do. And then the third area will be our marketing continues to get better. And then Ken?

但另一方面，我們並沒有迷失方向，仍然存在宏觀不確定性，我們希望足夠謹慎以真正擴大下限。但我認為在所有情況下，我們試圖向大家傳達的信息是我們已經擺脫了負面影響，現在又回到了增長，新店增長和現有店面增長以及這將通過轉化來實現，它們將通過我們的商家及其所做的事情來實現。然後第三個領域將是我們的營銷繼續變得更好。然後肯？

Yes. And then, Chuck, on the deleverage and the operating margin for the first quarter, it's about 70 basis points. It's primarily driven by increased marketing. If you recall, we really dialed that back really throughout '21 and even into the beginning of 2022. We really didn't see those increases until the back half of last year. So we're up against that. But that's the key driver of that deleverage in Q1.

是的。然後，查克，關於第一季度的去槓桿化和營業利潤率，大約是 70 個基點。它主要是由增加的營銷驅動的。如果你還記得的話，我們真的在整個 21 年甚至到 2022 年初都將其撥回。直到去年下半年我們才真正看到這些增長。所以我們反對這一點。但這是第一季度去槓桿化的關鍵驅動因素。

The next question is from Scot Ciccarelli with Truist.

下一個問題來自 Scot Ciccarelli 和 Truist。

I guess I have a follow-up question on ticket versus transactions. Can you help square for us the rollout of Five Beyond, where you're obviously selling higher ticket items versus the decline in average ticket you experienced in 4Q? Is that some sort of signal that maybe Five Beyond is not generating the traction, I guess, that was expected at this point?

我想我有一個關於票證與交易的後續問題。你能幫助我們調整 Five Beyond 的推出嗎？在第四季度，你顯然銷售了更高價的商品，而平均票價下降了？這是否是某種信號，表明 Five Beyond 沒有產生牽引力，我想，這是此時預期的？

No. I'm not sure I would expect that at all. We continue to see ticket increase, about $0.10 a year or so.

不，我不確定我是否會這樣期待。我們繼續看到門票增加，大約每年 0.10 美元左右。

Yes, on an overall basis, yes. Yes.

是的，總體而言，是的。是的。

Yes. But go ahead.

是的。但是繼續吧。

And Scot, Five Beyond is a small portion of that increase. There's other things that are driving that. Obviously, customer preference, we had some strategic price increases and things like that. I think on an overall basis, when you look inside ticket, we see the increases in AUR, but really the -- any -- if there's any reduction in ticket that's coming from UPT, which I don't think is dissimilar from what you're probably hearing from other retailers, and that's kind of the pressure that consumers are under now given increasing prices, tougher environment for them. And so you see those tickets either staying the same on an overall basis or going down. So AUR is going up, you're seeing declines. We're pretty much similar to that over the last few quarters, and I think we've spoken about it that we've seen with our customers.

而 Scot，Five Beyond 只是這一增長的一小部分。還有其他因素在推動它。顯然，客戶偏好，我們有一些戰略性的價格上漲等等。我認為總體而言，當你查看票務內部時，我們會看到 AUR 增加，但實際上 - 任何 - 如果來自 UPT 的票務有任何減少，我認為這與你的情況沒有什麼不同可能從其他零售商那裡聽到，這就是消費者現在面臨的壓力，因為價格上漲，環境更加艱難。因此，您會看到這些門票總體上保持不變或下降。所以 AUR 正在上升，你看到下降。我們與過去幾個季度的情況非常相似，我想我們已經談到了我們與客戶看到的情況。

Yes. And as I said on the previous question, we wouldn't be accelerating our conversions into the Five Beyond prototype if we were seeing any concerns whatsoever.

是的。正如我在上一個問題中所說的那樣，如果我們看到任何問題，我們就不會加速向 Five Beyond 原型的轉換。

The next question is from Michael Lasser with UBS.

下一個問題來自瑞銀的 Michael Lasser。

It's a 2-parter on the guidance. Number one, given that you did 200 models last year, 400 models this year and you're getting a mid-single-digit comp lift from those remodels. So you'll have essentially touched somewhere between 1/3 of the chain, presumably giving you, call it, 150 to 200 basis points of comp contribution in 2023. So is it reasonable to think outside of that, you'd be comping -- your guidance implies that you'll be comping more like maybe down line to 2. And my follow-up question in that regard is if indeed you do have a negative comp, the macro proves to be more precarious than what you thought. How low can your comp be and you still hit the low end of your EPS guidance for this year?

這是指南中的 2 部分。第一，假設你去年做了 200 個模型，今年做了 400 個模型，你從這些改造中獲得了中個位數的補償提升。所以你基本上會觸及鏈條的 1/3 之間的某個地方，大概會給你，稱之為 2023 年 150 到 200 個基點的補償貢獻。所以在這之外思考是否合理，你會補償 - - 你的指導意味著你會更像是下線到 2。我在這方面的後續問題是，如果你確實有一個負面的補償，宏觀證明比你想像的更不穩定。你的薪酬有多低，你仍然達到了今年 EPS 指導的低端？

Yes. And that first part of that, Michael, I think that I wouldn't -- I still wouldn't put a negative, and I think it's more like to say, we would have probably been closer to a low single-digit comp guide, which is traditionally where we've always been. And maybe with the uncertainty we would have went 0 to 3, and I think your range of about 100 basis points, 150 might be a little high. I think that would be if they're at the absolute high of the mid-single digits that we gave you before, but that wasn't contemplated in the guide. So if you take 100 basis points for the conversions and traditional guide of low single digits, I think that's why you see us up more at 4% instead of 1% to 3% or 0% to 3%.

是的。而第一部分，邁克爾，我認為我不會 - 我仍然不會否定，我認為更像是說，我們可能更接近一個低個位數的補償指南，這是我們一直以來的傳統做法。也許由於不確定性，我們會變成 0 到 3，我認為你的範圍大約是 100 個基點，150 可能有點高。我認為如果它們處於我們之前給你的中間個位數的絕對高點，那將是，但指南中沒有考慮到這一點。因此，如果您將 100 個基點用於低個位數的轉換和傳統指南，我認為這就是為什麼您會看到我們在 4% 而不是 1% 到 3% 或 0% 到 3% 時上漲更多。

Yes. And then, Michael, your question around relating EPS with the lowest comp, I mean, the guide that we provided, that's where we feel, right, at a 1 comp, that's where we land at the low end of the EPS.

是的。然後，邁克爾，關於將 EPS 與最低 comp 相關聯的問題，我的意思是，我們提供的指南就是我們感覺的地方，對，在 1 comp 時，這就是我們落在 EPS 低端的地方。

The one thing I'll add to what Joel mentioned, at the low end, we're assuming some type of kind of intensifying difficult environment for the consumer. If that were to happen, we would -- there would probably be a negative impact on both stores and the results of conversions and existing stores. So it could be a scenario where you do get list, but just not as much as you expect based on the environment. But you never know where that's going to land at the end of the day, but that's kind of where -- or what we were thinking about when we provided that guidance.

我要添加到喬爾提到的一件事，在低端，我們假設消費者面臨某種加劇困難的環境。如果發生這種情況，我們會 - 可能會對商店以及轉換結果和現有商店產生負面影響。因此，這可能是您確實獲得列表的場景，但根據環境的不同，可能不如您預期的那麼多。但是你永遠不知道一天結束時它會到達哪裡，但這就是那種地方——或者我們在提供該指導時所考慮的內容。

The next question is from Edward Kelly with Wells Fargo. .

下一個問題來自富國銀行的愛德華凱利。 .

My question is on store growth. Joel, you mentioned that getting back to sort of like the run rate that you would sort of hope to. But if I take a step back and look at (inaudible) this year, it's probably about 15%, I guess. Can you just talk about the process changes that you're making? And then as we look forward, can you ramp the number of stores that you're opening such that you're looking at, at least this level of square footage growth or more only because I think at the Investor Day in the end where you planned probably for, I think, for better growth there?

我的問題是關於商店的增長。喬爾，你提到回到有點像你希望的運行率。但如果我退後一步，看看今年（聽不清），我猜大概是 15%。您能談談您正在進行的流程更改嗎？然後，正如我們期待的那樣，你能否增加你正在開設的商店數量，至少是這種水平的平方英尺增長或更多，因為我認為在最後的投資者日你我認為可能是為了那裡更好的增長而計劃的？

No, it's a great question, Ed. And it's about 15% growth. I think there's 2 things. One, we need to and are planning to get back to a more 50-50 first half, second half. So I think '23 is the last of the years of like getting the engine back going. And you saw it last year, too, we were more heavily back-end weighted. And so this year, as we've gotten back to 200, you go back to what we said at the Investor Day, being more in the -- I think we said 500 to 600 in '24 and '25, that's still on track if you add the 2 years together, and we see no reason the number doesn't continue to go upward from here.

不，這是一個很好的問題，埃德。大約增長了 15%。我認為有兩件事。第一，我們需要並且正在計劃在上半場和下半場恢復到 50-50。所以我認為 23 年是讓引擎重新運轉的最後幾年。你去年也看到了，我們對後端的重視程度更高。所以今年，當我們回到 200 時，你回到我們在投資者日所說的，更多的是——我認為我們在 24 年和 25 年說了 500 到 600，這仍然在正軌上如果將 2 年加在一起，我們認為這個數字沒有理由不從這裡繼續上升。

Landlord delays are really starting to diminish. Supply chain issues are diminishing. And -- and it also, I mean, we haven't had any disruption in the retail industry for 3 years, and there's been several announced bankruptcies. That's all a positive for us to start to get going again. That clearly wasn't there before. And that was a big major holdup for us from that perspective. So I feel really good about us getting back to that run rate again.

房東延誤確實開始減少。供應鏈問題正在減少。而且 - 而且，我的意思是，我們的零售業已經 3 年沒有受到任何干擾，並且有幾家公司宣布破產。這對我們重新開始來說都是積極的。這顯然是以前沒有的。從這個角度來看，這對我們來說是一個很大的障礙。所以我對我們再次回到那個運行率感到非常高興。

(inaudible) had a question around the process, the real estate.

（聽不清）對流程、房地產有疑問。

Well, yes. I mean look, we've -- the process -- we streamlined it in several different ways to be able to execute more leases in a faster time line more per month. We're expanding the types of centers we're going into. I talked about that a little bit in my prepared remarks. We've been so heavily weighted to suburban power centers. We've got many more urban in the mix, more rural. We're starting to do more grocery-anchored centers. We opened some of our first outlet stores last year, and we'll continue to test new venues.

嗯，是。我的意思是看，我們已經 - 這個過程 - 我們以幾種不同的方式簡化了它，以便能夠在更快的時間線中每月執行更多的租賃。我們正在擴大我們進入的中心類型。我在準備好的發言中談到了這一點。我們一直非常重視郊區電力中心。我們有更多的城市，更多的農村。我們開始做更多以雜貨店為中心的中心。我們去年開設了一些首批直銷店，我們將繼續測試新的場所。

The next question is from Kate McShane with Goldman Sachs.

下一個問題來自高盛的 Kate McShane。

We wondered if you could maybe quantify some of the share gains you saw during the quarter? And if you think some of the closeouts you were able to take advantage of helped you during the quarter as well?

我們想知道您是否可以量化您在本季度看到的一些股票收益？如果您認為您能夠利用的一些收尾在本季度也對您有所幫助？

Yes. I mean closeouts were good, but they weren't overly material to our overall performance. I think some of the stuff we did around trends was much more important. I called out Squishmallows as an example. The Kylie and Kendall bags were phenomenal, did great.

是的。我的意思是收尾很好，但它們對我們的整體表現並不過分重要。我認為我們圍繞趨勢所做的一些事情更為重要。我以 Squishmallows 為例。 Kylie 和 Kendall 的包非常棒，做得很好。

We are, though, opportunistic on closeouts. But honestly, Kate, they weren't a big piece of penetration for the quarter from that perspective. I think our share gains more came from the conversions and marketing. Those really were where we saw the 2 biggest drivers for the quarter.

不過，我們對收尾持機會主義態度。但老實說，凱特，從這個角度來看，它們並不是本季度的一大突破。我認為我們的份額收益更多來自轉化和營銷。這些確實是我們看到本季度兩個最大驅動因素的地方。

The next question is from David Bellinger with ROTH MKM.

下一個問題來自 ROTH MKM 的 David Bellinger。

And Ken, congrats. Can you guys talk about potentially the longer-term opportunity you have within the collectibles category? We came across some in-store events around Pokemon trading cards over some weekends. So should we expect more of that? And could these events or further expansion in collectibles open Five Below up to some type of new set of customers, maybe an older set of customers with more spending power?

肯，恭喜。你們能談談您在收藏品類別中潛在的長期機會嗎？我們在某些週末遇到了一些圍繞口袋妖怪交易卡的店內活動。那麼我們應該期待更多嗎？這些事件或收藏品的進一步擴張能否將 Five Below 開放給某種類型的新客戶群，也許是具有更強消費能力的老客戶群？

Yes. Look, it's a great question. Glad you guys noticed it. It means you're out in the stores. I always love that. Prior to the pandemic, we did a lot of events in our stores. And the events just kind of disappeared for 3 years. But at the end of the day, it's really about creating experiences. And the collectibles create a great experience in our stores. Kids were having fun trading them and just gathering is kind of back happening again. Ear piercing is another good one. That's attracted (inaudible) surprisingly male, which we did not expect when we originally thought about that. But I think it's -- because our store is such a safe zone for boys and girls, and we've seen a lot of boys in there doing ear piercing.

是的。看，這是一個很好的問題。很高興你們注意到了。這意味著你在商店裡。我一直很喜歡。在大流行之前，我們在商店裡舉辦了很多活動。這些事件就這樣消失了 3 年。但歸根結底，這實際上是關於創造體驗。收藏品在我們的商店中創造了很好的體驗。孩子們在交易它們時玩得很開心，只是聚會又回來了。耳洞是另一個好方法。令人驚訝的是，這吸引了（聽不清）男性，這是我們最初想到的時候沒有預料到的。但我認為這是——因為我們的商店對男孩和女孩來說是一個安全區，我們看到很多男孩在那裡打耳洞。

So any one of those is just another thing about celebrating the rituals and milestones are growing up and creating experiences and collectibles has been a good one, and I think you'll continue to see more of those for sure.

因此，其中任何一個都只是慶祝儀式和里程碑的另一件事，它們正在成長，創造經驗和收藏品一直是一件好事，我想你肯定會繼續看到更多這樣的東西。

The next question is from Karen Short with Credit Suisse.

下一個問題來自瑞士信貸的 Karen Short。

Congrats on a good quarter. Two questions just combined. So would you just be able to give a little bit of cadence on puts and takes on gross margin as we progress throughout the year? And then on CapEx as a percent of sales, is this -- with your guidance for '23, is that the kind of the right run rate to think about going forward?

祝賀一個好的季度。兩個問題結合在一起。那麼，隨著我們全年的進展，您能否稍微調整一下看跌期權和毛利率？然後在資本支出佔銷售額的百分比上，這是——根據你對 23 年的指導，這是未來考慮的正確運行率嗎？

Thanks, Karen. In terms of the -- you asked for, I believe, gross margin cadence as we go through on a year-over-year basis. First quarter, we don't really see any type of material move either way, it looks like relatively flat. And then it should continue to grow as we move through the year. Gross margin really driven by those lower freight costs that we're seeing versus last year because if you remember, we did have high freight costs, and the team has done a great job in terms of renegotiating newer contracts. So you'll see growth in gross margin as we move through the year by quarter.

謝謝，凱倫。就您要求的而言，我相信，我們逐年經歷的毛利率節奏。第一季度，我們並沒有真正看到任何類型的材料向任何方向移動，它看起來相對平穩。然後它應該會隨著我們這一年的推移而繼續增長。與去年相比，我們看到的那些較低的運費確實推動了毛利率，因為如果你還記得的話，我們確實有很高的運費，而且團隊在重新談判新合同方面做得很好。因此，隨著我們按季度逐年移動，您會看到毛利率的增長。

And then CapEx as a percent of sales, you do see the growth year-over-year, '23 versus '22. A lot of that's driven by the increase in the number of new stores, right, 50 more stores opening in '23 and also about 150 more conversions, which is driving that. I would expect that to be relatively similar as we move forward into out years, I mean more to come on that, probably less in '24 from a DC perspective, there's a little bit of that going on in '23 as we expand Georgia and Arizona. But I think you could expect to see either consistent with what we're looking at in '23 or maybe even a little bit less as a percent of sales as we move forward into '24.

然後資本支出佔銷售額的百分比，你確實看到了同比增長，23 年與 22 年相比。這在很大程度上是由新店數量的增加推動的，正確的，23 年新開的 50 家店以及大約 150 次轉化，這推動了這一點。我希望隨著我們進入未來幾年，情況會相對相似，我的意思是更多，從 DC 的角度來看，24 年可能會更少，23 年隨著我們擴大佐治亞州和亞利桑那。但我認為你可以期望看到與我們在 23 年看到的一致，或者隨著我們進入 24 年，銷售額的百分比可能會更低一些。

Yes, I'd expect (inaudible).

是的，我希望（聽不清）。

Yes. Yes.

是的。是的。

The next question is from Michael Montani with Evercore ISI.

下一個問題來自 Evercore ISI 的 Michael Montani。

Just wanted to ask on marketing spend, if you could give some additional color where you see that coming in for the full year in terms of bps of headwind and then also incentive comp. Where was that in CY '22 so we know kind of way of the cycle? And then lastly, if you could share any ocean freight bps of tailwind based on current spot?

只是想問一下營銷支出，如果你能給出一些額外的顏色，你會看到全年的逆風 bps 和激勵補償。在 CY '22 中它在哪裡，所以我們知道某種循環方式？最後，您是否可以根據當前現貨分享任何順風的海運 bps？

So Michael, on the marketing, on a full year basis, we're probably up. You're talking 10, 15 basis points on an overall basis, some shifts there in some of the quarters, but that's on an overall basis. And then from an incentive comp perspective, we mentioned that as we kind of move through some of these quarters and the way we book incentive comp and keeping in mind that last year being '22 was obviously, a lower amount of incentive comp, this year is more normalized, that's probably about tens of basis points in SG&A of deleverage that we're up against on a full year basis.

所以邁克爾，在營銷方面，在全年的基礎上，我們可能會起來。你說的是總體上 10、15 個基點，某些季度會有一些變化，但這是總體上的。然後從激勵補償的角度來看，我們提到，當我們經歷這些季度中的一些時，以及我們預訂激勵補償的方式，並記住去年是 22 歲顯然是今年激勵補償的數量較少更加正常化，這可能是我們全年面臨的去槓桿化 SG&A 的數十個基點。

The next question is from Krisztina Katai with Deutsche Bank.

下一個問題來自德意志銀行的 Krisztina Katai。

My congratulations as well to you, Ken. So you talked about increased focus on data and analytics, and you are ramping back up marketing again. So can you just talk about leveraging the data to even adjust your marketing tactically if you have to, and just overall, how are you measuring the effectiveness, whether it is bringing you a new consumer or driving greater transactions with existing consumers?

我也祝賀你，肯。所以你談到了對數據和分析的更多關注，並且你正在再次加強營銷。那麼，您是否可以談談利用數據甚至在必要時在戰術上調整您的營銷，總的來說，您如何衡量有效性，無論是為您帶來新消費者還是推動與現有消費者的更多交易？

Yes. Great question. And Krisztina, recall for everybody. Last year was the first year we put tokenization in. So it's the first time we've actually been able to track at the customer level. And so now with this year, we'll start to have year-over-year statistics on it. And as far as the marketing goes, we're actually looking at both. Can we bring in new customers and can we get existing customers to not lapse or to purchase more frequently?

是的。很好的問題。還有Krisztina，給大家回憶一下。去年是我們進行標記化的第一年。所以這是我們第一次真正能夠在客戶層面進行跟踪。所以現在從今年開始，我們將開始有關於它的年度統計數據。就營銷而言，我們實際上正在關注兩者。我們能否引入新客戶，能否讓現有客戶不流失或更頻繁地購買？

And I think it depends whether we're talking about a new store or we're talking about an existing store, or we're talking about a converted store in terms of which tactic we're more after. But we now have the data, and this will be the first year we'll have year-over-year data on it. And so we'll only get smarter as we get through this year and then into the following year. Hopefully, that gives you some insight.

而且我認為這取決於我們是在談論新店還是在談論現有商店，或者我們在談論轉換後的商店，這取決於我們更追求哪種策略。但我們現在有了數據，這將是我們獲得同比數據的第一年。因此，我們只會在今年和下一年變得更聰明。希望這能讓您有所了解。

This concludes our question-and-answer session. I would like to turn the conference back over to Joel Anderson for closing remarks.

我們的問答環節到此結束。我想將會議轉回給 Joel Anderson 作閉幕詞。

Thank you, operator, and thank you, everybody, for joining us this afternoon. Like I said at the beginning, we are really pleased with our results and are excited to get back to growing and get back to being a high-growth retailer, playing offense like we always do, being nimble to trends and what's changing. And you know what, we'll stay focused on value. And I look forward to seeing you all and speaking again after Memorial Day on our Q1 call. Thank you, and have a great day.

謝謝接線員，也謝謝大家今天下午加入我們。就像我在一開始所說的那樣，我們對我們的結果非常滿意，並且很高興能夠恢復增長並恢復成為高增長零售商，像我們一貫的做法一樣進攻，對趨勢和正在發生的變化保持敏捷。你知道嗎，我們將繼續專注於價值。我期待著在陣亡將士紀念日之後在我們的 Q1 電話會議上見到大家並再次發言。謝謝你，祝你有美好的一天。

The conference has now concluded. Thank you for attending today's presentation. You may now disconnect.

會議現已結束。感謝您參加今天的演講。您現在可以斷開連接。