梅西百貨 (M) 2021 Q4 法說會逐字稿

Good morning, and welcome to Macy's, Inc. Fourth Quarter 2021 Earnings Conference Call. Today's hour-long conference is being recorded.

早上好，歡迎來到梅西百貨公司 2021 年第四季度收益電話會議。今天長達一小時的會議正在錄製中。

I would now like to turn the call over to Mike McGuire, Head of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

我現在想將電話轉給投資者關係主管 Mike McGuire。請繼續。

Thank you, operator. Good morning, everyone, and thanks for joining us to discuss our fourth quarter and full year 2021 results. With me on the call are Jeff Gennette, our Chairman and CEO; and Adrian Mitchell, our CFO. Jeff and Adrian have prepared remarks that they'll share. After which, we'll provide time for questions. (Operator Instructions) As a reminder, today's call is scheduled for 90 minutes. Along with our press release, we have posted a slide presentation on the Investors section of our website, macysinc.com.

謝謝你，接線員。大家早上好，感謝您加入我們討論我們的第四季度和 2021 年全年業績。與我通話的還有我們的董事長兼首席執行官 Jeff Gennette；和我們的首席財務官 Adrian Mitchell。傑夫和阿德里安準備了他們將分享的評論。之後，我們將提供提問時間。 （操作員說明）提醒一下，今天的通話時間為 90 分鐘。除了我們的新聞稿，我們還在我們網站 macysinc.com 的投資者部分發布了幻燈片演示。

In addition to information from our prepared remarks, the presentation includes additional facts and figures to assist your analysis of Macy's. Also note that given the pandemic's impact on 2020 results, unless otherwise noted, the comparisons that we'll speak to this morning will be versus 2019 as we feel that benchmarks our performance more appropriately.

除了我們準備好的評論中的信息外，演示文稿還包括其他事實和數據，以幫助您分析梅西百貨。另請注意，鑑於大流行對 2020 年結果的影響，除非另有說明，否則我們今天上午將要進行的比較將與 2019 年進行比較，因為我們認為這對我們的表現進行了更恰當的衡量。

We noted in our press release this morning that on Wednesday, March 9 at 9:00 a.m. Eastern Time, Adrian will be participating in a fireside chat at the UBS Global Consumer and Retail Conference. This event will be webcast on our Investor Relations website, so please mark your calendars.

我們在今天上午的新聞稿中指出，美國東部時間 3 月 9 日星期三上午 9 點，阿德里安將參加瑞銀全球消費者和零售大會的爐邊談話。此活動將在我們的投資者關係網站上進行網絡直播，因此請標記您的日曆。

Keep in mind that all forward-looking statements are subject to the Safe Harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These forward-looking statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from the expectations and assumptions mentioned today. A detailed discussion of these factors and uncertainties is contained in our filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

請記住，所有前瞻性陳述均受 1995 年《私人證券訴訟改革法案》的安全港條款的約束。這些前瞻性陳述存在可能導致實際結果與預期和假設存在重大差異的風險和不確定性今天提到的。我們向證券交易委員會提交的文件中包含對這些因素和不確定性的詳細討論。

In discussing the results of our operations, we will be providing certain non-GAAP financial measures. You can find additional information regarding these non-GAAP financial measures as well as others used in our earnings release and on our presentation on the Investors section of our website.

在討論我們的運營結果時，我們將提供某些非公認會計原則的財務措施。您可以找到有關這些非公認會計原則財務指標以及我們的收益發布和我們網站投資者部分的演示文稿中使用的其他信息的更多信息。

And as a reminder, today's call is being webcast on our website. A replay will be available approximately 2 hours after the conclusion of this call, and it will be archived on our website for 1 year.

提醒一下，今天的電話會議正在我們的網站上進行網絡直播。本次通話結束後大約 2 小時將提供重播，並將在我們的網站上存檔 1 年。

With that, I'll turn the call over to Jeff.

有了這個，我會把電話轉給傑夫。

Thanks, Mike, and good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining us. As we kick off 2022, I'm proud to say that Macy's, Inc. today is a stronger, more agile and financially healthier company than we were before the pandemic. We delivered strong results in the past quarter and year. We continue to make good progress on the transformation of our company and build momentum. And we are much better positioned for long-term success.

謝謝，邁克，大家早上好。感謝您加入我們。在 2022 年開始之際，我很自豪地說，與大流行之前相比，今天的梅西百貨是一家更強大、更敏捷、財務更健康的公司。我們在過去一個季度和一年中取得了強勁的業績。公司轉型繼續取得良好進展，蓄勢待發。我們更有利於取得長期成功。

Our business has changed dramatically since 2019 when we began to lay the groundwork for our Polaris strategy. We stayed focused on that plan, and we have delivered. We are now more digitally led and customer-centric in our planning and execution. We have also demonstrated the value of an integrated company, meeting customer expectations for a more seamless shopping experience across digital and store offerings. Digital has been a particular priority for us.

自 2019 年我們開始為 Polaris 戰略奠定基礎以來，我們的業務發生了巨大變化。我們一直專注於該計劃，並且我們已經交付。現在，我們在規劃和執行方面更加以數字化為主導並以客戶為中心。我們還展示了綜合公司的價值，滿足客戶對跨數字和商店產品的更無縫購物體驗的期望。數字化一直是我們的一個特別優先事項。

This morning, I will walk through our 2021 performance highlights, and Adrian will share the details of our financial results, which exceeded our expectations every quarter. Then I'll discuss the outcome of the Board's recent review of our operating structure and how we are enhancing shareholder value. From there, I'll review the specific initiatives we are accelerating to enable sustainable sales growth and strong and stable margins in the future. Adrian will wrap up with details on our financial outlook for 2022 and beyond.

今天早上，我將介紹我們 2021 年的業績亮點，Adrian 將分享我們每個季度都超出預期的財務業績細節。然後我將討論董事會最近審查我們的運營結構的結果以及我們如何提高股東價值。從那裡，我將回顧我們正在加速的具體舉措，以實現可持續的銷售增長和未來強勁而穩定的利潤率。 Adrian 將詳細介紹我們 2022 年及以後的財務前景。

Let me start with the performance highlights. Comparable owned plus licensed sales for the fourth quarter increased 6.1% versus 2019. This performance reflects strong November and December holiday sales that exceeded our expectations as well as softer sales in January. Total company AUR was up 11.5% for the fourth quarter and for the full year, was up over 11%. For the year, comparable owned plus licensed sales increased 3% compared to 2019. For the year, we generated $984 million more in adjusted EBITDA than 2019, growth of 42%. Our full year adjusted EBITDA margin was 13.6%, and a rate we have not achieved since 2014. As a result, we achieved adjusted diluted EPS of $5.31 for the full year, up 82% versus 2019.

讓我從性能亮點開始。與 2019 年相比，第四季度可比自有加特許銷售增長了 6.1%。這一業績反映了超過我們預期的強勁 11 月和 12 月假日銷售以及 1 月銷售疲軟。第四季度公司總 AUR 增長 11.5%，全年增長超過 11%。今年，與 2019 年相比，可比自有加特許銷售增長 3%。今年，我們的調整後 EBITDA 比 2019 年增加 9.84 億美元，增長 42%。我們全年調整後的 EBITDA 利潤率為 13.6%，這是自 2014 年以來我們從未達到的比率。因此，我們全年實現調整後攤薄每股收益 5.31 美元，比 2019 年增長 82%。

With reduced debt and ample cash, our balance sheet is healthy, and we are in a stronger financial position. This enables us to navigate challenges that lie ahead while meeting our capital allocation goals to deliver shareholder returns through modest yet predictable dividends, strong returns on invested capital and meaningful share repurchases. We completed our current $500 million share repurchase program during the past quarter. And I am pleased to announce that our Board has authorized a new $2 billion program. Additionally, we have announced a 5% increase in our dividend after reinstating it during 2021.

由於債務減少和現金充裕，我們的資產負債表很健康，我們的財務狀況也更強勁。這使我們能夠應對未來的挑戰，同時實現我們的資本分配目標，通過適度但可預測的股息、強勁的投資資本回報和有意義的股票回購來為股東帶來回報。我們在上個季度完成了當前 5 億美元的股票回購計劃。我很高興地宣布，我們的董事會已授權一項新的 20 億美元計劃。此外，我們宣佈在 2021 年恢復股息後將股息增加 5%。

These accomplishments are the result of our focus of our organization has placed on the Polaris strategy, efforts that I have spoken to you about frequently over the past 2 years. This transformation strategy has evolved as the external environment changed and new opportunities arose, and the actions we took have led to a stronger, digitally-led retail business.

這些成就是我們組織將重點放在北極星戰略上的結果，這是我在過去 2 年中經常與您交談的努力。隨著外部環境的變化和新機遇的出現，這種轉型戰略也在不斷發展，我們採取的行動已經促成了一個更強大、以數字化為主導的零售業務。

Here are just a few highlights of what we've accomplished. Number one, we have modernized our digital platform and now offer an engaging and convenient experience with the power to meet customers whenever and however they choose to shop. In 2019, our digital team worked as a siloed organization. Today, it is fully integrated. We have a scaled platform, operating the #2 website in our categories in the nation with 39% digital penetration, an increase of 9 percentage points versus fourth quarter of 2019.

以下是我們所取得成就的幾個亮點。第一，我們已經對我們的數字平台進行了現代化改造，現在提供了一種引人入勝且方便的體驗，能夠隨時隨地與客戶會面，讓他們選擇購物。 2019 年，我們的數字團隊作為一個孤立的組織工作。今天，它已完全集成。我們擁有一個規模化的平台，以 39% 的數字滲透率運營著全國排名第二的網站，與 2019 年第四季度相比增長了 9 個百分點。

Number two, in 2019, our store strategy was largely focused on the highest quality A and B malls, while accelerating the closure of stores in C and D malls. Today, the consumer is increasingly more omnichannel, and we are focused on establishing a more appropriate footprint in markets to drive sustainable and profitable omnichannel growth. Given this, as we said on our last call, we have delayed most of the remaining closures we earmarked in 2019 in order to maintain a physical presence in many markets while we scale up our off-mall format stores.

第二，2019年我們的門店戰略主要集中在最高品質的A和B商場，同時加速關閉C和D商場的門店。今天，消費者越來越多渠道，我們專注於在市場上建立更合適的足跡，以推動可持續和盈利的全渠道增長。鑑於此，正如我們在上次電話會議上所說，我們已經推遲了 2019 年指定的大部分剩餘關閉時間，以便在擴大非商場形式商店的同時在許多市場保持實體存在。

In addition to being in place for discovery and shopping, our stores are also fulfillment hubs, supporting our digital operations through Buy Online, Pickup in Store, curbside pickup and Same-day Delivery. Keeping these cash-positive stores open also helps us to fund the investments we're making to reposition our fleet over the next several years.

除了用於發現和購物之外，我們的商店還是履行中心，通過在線購買、店內取貨、路邊取貨和當日送達來支持我們的數字化運營。保持這些現金積極的商店營業也有助於我們為未來幾年重新定位我們的車隊所做的投資提供資金。

Number three, in 2019, we were over-indexed on occasion-based apparel, had less disciplined buying behavior and our approach to promotions was overly complicated for customers, all of which was driving high levels of markdowns and low inventory productivity. Today, our pricing is simpler and clearer, allowing our customers to better understand the value they are receiving. Today, we offer a more balanced, curated merchandise assortment that reflects our disciplined purchasing behavior with new categories, products and brands that inspire our customers' style across the value spectrum from off-price to luxury. And today, we remain best positioned based on the health of inventory and multi-category and multichannel capabilities to pivot with greater agility in response to changing customer trends.

第三，在 2019 年，我們在基於場合的服裝上指數過高，購買行為不那麼自律，我們的促銷方式對客戶來說過於復雜，所有這些都導致了高水平的降價和低庫存生產力。今天，我們的定價更加簡單明了，讓我們的客戶能夠更好地了解他們所獲得的價值。今天，我們提供了一個更加平衡、精心策劃的商品分類，反映了我們嚴謹的購買行為，新的類別、產品和品牌在從低價到奢侈品的價值範圍內激發了我們客戶的風格。而今天，我們仍然基於庫存的健康狀況以及多類別和多渠道能力保持最佳定位，從而以更大的敏捷性應對不斷變化的客戶趨勢。

Number four, in 2019, the spread between customer acquisition levels and customer attrition levels was narrow. In 2021, we flipped that dynamic. While also benefiting from recovery driven demand, our initiatives have led to an accelerated rate of customer acquisition that far outweighed the rate of attrition.

第四，在 2019 年，客戶獲取水平和客戶流失水平之間的差距很小。 2021 年，我們顛覆了這一動態。在受益於復蘇驅動的需求的同時，我們的舉措加快了客戶獲取速度，遠遠超過了流失率。

Number five, in 2019, we had just created a new integrated team to reimagine our supply chain that previously segregated store and digital inventories and relied on a distribution network that lacked efficiency. Today, as a result of our investments, we have a more modern supply chain network that is agile, data-driven and increasingly automated. We've seen the results of this work pay off throughout 2021 from increased speed of delivery to operational efficiency and to better inventory utilization.

第五，在 2019 年，我們剛剛創建了一個新的整合團隊，以重新構想我們以前將商店和數字庫存分開並依賴缺乏效率的分銷網絡的供應鏈。今天，由於我們的投資，我們擁有了更現代化的供應鍊網絡，該網絡更加靈活、數據驅動且自動化程度越來越高。我們已經看到這項工作的成果在整個 2021 年都得到了回報，從提高交付速度到提高運營效率和提高庫存利用率。

And finally, we have invested in advanced technology and data science throughout our operations, enabling us to increase productivity and profitability of the entire business. To best realize our strategic goal of building profitable lifetime customer relationships, we successfully built a new enterprise data and analytics organization that is helping us to embed data and analytics into everything we do. We have already seen improvements in our efforts around personalization and pricing.

最後，我們在整個運營過程中投資於先進技術和數據科學，使我們能夠提高整個業務的生產力和盈利能力。為了最好地實現我們建立可盈利的終生客戶關係的戰略目標，我們成功地建立了一個新的企業數據和分析組織，幫助我們將數據和分析嵌入到我們所做的一切中。我們已經看到我們在個性化和定價方面的努力有所改進。

In short, we are a different Macy's, Inc. today than we were in 2019; more agile, more profitable and more relevant to our customers. That said, as we enter 2022, we see both headwinds and tailwinds ahead that together encourages us to offer a more measured outlook for the year.

簡而言之，與 2019 年相比，我們今天是不同的梅西百貨公司；更靈活、更有利可圖並且與我們的客戶更相關。也就是說，隨著我們進入 2022 年，我們看到了前方的逆風和順風，這共同鼓勵我們為今年提供更謹慎的展望。

Now I'd like to take you one level deeper into the work we've done to achieve our performance this past year across customers, merchandising, digital initiatives and stores. First, customers. Our customer focus is paying off. 44 million customers shopped with our Macy's brand in 2021, up 1% from 2 years ago. They bought more and combined with higher AURs, spent more on each visit. We are adding new customers with 7.2 million new customers in the fourth quarter, an 11% increase compared to Q4 2019, with 58% coming in through digital. Nearly 30% of these new customers were dormant over the past 12 months who are now reengaged.

現在，我想帶您更深入地了解我們在過去一年中為實現我們在客戶、商品銷售、數字計劃和商店方面的表現所做的工作。第一，客戶。我們以客戶為中心正在得到回報。 2021 年，有 4400 萬客戶使用我們的梅西百貨品牌購物，比兩年前增長 1%。他們購買更多並結合更高的 AUR，每次訪問花費更多。我們在第四季度增加了 720 萬新客戶，與 2019 年第四季度相比增長了 11%，其中 58% 是通過數字渠道進入的。在過去 12 個月中，這些新客戶中有近 30% 處於休眠狀態，現在又重新參與進來。

For the full year, new customers increased 26% over 2019 to 19.4 million. This trend reversal and customer acquisition is an important marker for us and a strong indication of the increasing relevance of the brand. We will continue pursuing our strategies to build on this momentum.

全年，新客戶比 2019 年增長 26%，達到 1940 萬。這種趨勢逆轉和客戶獲取對我們來說是一個重要標誌，也有力地表明了品牌的相關性不斷提高。我們將繼續推行我們的戰略，以鞏固這一勢頭。

Let's turn to merchandising. Through our data-driven merchandising approach and our team's agility and creativity, we successfully navigated supply chain challenges, ensuring we had a strong assortment for the holiday season. We placed bets on categories like fragrances, fine jewelry, home decor, men's outerwear, toys, sleepwear and watches, which all performed well in the quarter. Bloomingdale's, which helps us reach affluent consumers, continued to see strength in luxury throughout the quarter with strong performance from handbags, fine jewelry, men's shoes and contemporary, fragrances and home.

讓我們轉向商品銷售。通過我們以數據為導向的營銷方法以及我們團隊的敏捷性和創造力，我們成功應對了供應鏈挑戰，確保我們在節日期間擁有豐富的商品種類。我們押注香水、高級珠寶、家居裝飾、男士外套、玩具、睡衣和手錶等類別，這些類別在本季度均表現良好。幫助我們接觸富裕消費者的 Bloomingdale's 在整個季度繼續看到奢侈品的實力，在手袋、高級珠寶、男鞋和現代、香水和家居方面表現強勁。

In addition to enhancing the shopping experience of our core customers, we also focused on new offerings to further attract the under-40 shopper. In the fall season, we added a curated selection of brands, products and categories to 160 Macy's stores that appeal specifically to this younger, more diverse customer. These brands include COTTON ON, Steve Madden, Michael Kors and Levi's as well as our new private brands, And Now This and Oak. We are pleased with our customer response and the results we've seen to date. This in-store strategy aligned well with the digital strategy to attract the under-40 customers that we rolled out in the spring through our contemporary sitelet. At Bloomingdale's, brands geared towards the under-40 customer had a record year. Our private brand AQUA and various luxury brands outperformed in both sales and margin in 2021.

除了提升核心客戶的購物體驗外，我們還專注於新產品以進一步吸引 40 歲以下的購物者。在秋季，我們為 160 家梅西百貨商店添加了精選的品牌、產品和類別，專門針對這個更年輕、更多樣化的顧客。這些品牌包括 COTTON ON、Steve Madden、Michael Kors 和 Levi's 以及我們的新自有品牌 And Now This 和 Oak。我們對客戶的反應和迄今為止所看到的結果感到滿意。這種店內策略與我們在春季通過現代網站推出的吸引 40 歲以下客戶的數字策略非常吻合。在 Bloomingdale's，面向 40 歲以下客戶的品牌創下了創紀錄的一年。我們的自有品牌 AQUA 和多個奢侈品牌在 2021 年的銷售額和利潤率均表現出色。

This brings me to our digital initiatives. Today, our profitable digital platform is more modern and engaging, thanks to our redesigned app experience, personalized homepages, curated sitelets and improved search function. Aided by the shift in consumer preferences, the growth of our digital business continued in 2021. Sales remained strong, and we saw healthy levels of conversion for Macys.com at 4.2%, a 13% increase compared to 2019.

這讓我想到了我們的數字計劃。今天，得益於我們重新設計的應用體驗、個性化的主頁、精選的站點和改進的搜索功能，我們盈利的數字平台更加現代化和吸引人。得益於消費者偏好的轉變，我們的數字業務在 2021 年繼續增長。銷售額保持強勁，我們看到 Macys.com 的轉化率為 4.2%，與 2019 年相比增長了 13%。

During the fourth quarter, Macy's app had the largest quarterly gain in downloads across our peer set with an 81% increase in downloads over the third quarter of 2021. Today, our Macy's and Bloomingdale's digital teams operate more efficiently within a single back-end structure while each nameplate retains separate dedicated site merchandising and customer-facing benefits. Compared to 2019, Bloomingdale's digital sales grew 51% during 2021 with traffic increasing 28%.

在第四季度，梅西百貨的應用程序在我們的同行中獲得了最大的季度下載量，與 2021 年第三季度相比，下載量增長了 81%。今天，我們的梅西百貨和 Bloomingdale 的數字團隊在單一後端結構中更高效地運作而每個銘牌都保留了單獨的專用站點銷售和麵向客戶的好處。與 2019 年相比，Bloomingdale 的數字銷售額在 2021 年增長了 51%，流量增長了 28%。

Lastly, stores, a critical part of our integrated omnichannel ecosystem. The role of stores has evolved with customer shopping habits. The interplay between our digital and physical assets is critical, and we remain focused on sustainable omnichannel sales growth. During the quarter, 58% of our omnichannel markets, representing 80% of our sales, had growth above 2019 levels, and half of these grew by at least 10%. For the year, we grew sales in 52% of our omnichannel markets versus 2019.

最後，商店是我們綜合全渠道生態系統的重要組成部分。商店的角色隨著顧客的購物習慣而演變。我們的數字資產和實體資產之間的相互作用至關重要，我們仍然專注於可持續的全渠道銷售增長。在本季度，我們 58% 的全渠道市場（占我們銷售額的 80%）的增長高於 2019 年的水平，其中一半增長了至少 10%。今年，與 2019 年相比，我們在全渠道市場的銷售額增長了 52%。

Now to the macroeconomic environment that we see in 2022. First, tailwinds. We believe the consumer demand will remain healthy as the job market improves and wages continue to rise. We expect demand to increase, particularly as people return to the office and to social events. International tourism remains a tailwind, particularly beyond 2022. This past year, international tourism was down 50% from 2019 levels, with the fourth quarter strengthening before Omicron weighed on consumer sentiment.

現在來看我們在 2022 年看到的宏觀經濟環境。首先，順風。我們相信隨著就業市場改善和工資繼續上漲，消費者需求將保持健康。我們預計需求會增加，尤其是當人們返回辦公室和參加社交活動時。國際旅遊業仍然是順風順水，尤其是在 2022 年之後。過去一年，國際旅遊業比 2019 年的水平下降了 50%，第四季度在 Omicron 打壓消費者信心之前有所加強。

With headwinds, we expect inflationary cost pressures, both for us and consumers, uncertainty of industry promotional behavior, supply chain disruptions, competition for talent, lapping of stimulus packages and potential COVID variants. But we are confident that our financial health and operational agility put us in a stronger position to navigate the dynamic environment and challenges we expect in 2022.

面對逆風，我們預計我們和消費者都會面臨通脹成本壓力、行業促銷行為的不確定性、供應鏈中斷、人才競爭、刺激方案的實施和潛在的 COVID 變體。但我們相信，我們的財務健康和運營敏捷性使我們處於更有利的位置，以應對我們預計在 2022 年面臨的動態環境和挑戰。

Let me now pass it to Adrian for additional color on our Q4 results.

現在讓我將它傳遞給 Adrian，以便為我們的第四季度結果增加色彩。

Thank you, Jeff, and good morning, everyone. We're excited about the momentum we gained through Polaris in 2021 and are focused on maintaining that momentum over the course of the coming year. Our top priority remains driving shareholder value through a combination of strong performance and the strategic allocation of capital. Our ambition for Macy's, Inc. is even bolder now given a much healthier business and our increased confidence and conviction in our Polaris strategy.

謝謝你，傑夫，大家早上好。我們對 2021 年通過 Polaris 獲得的勢頭感到興奮，並專注於在來年保持這種勢頭。我們的首要任務仍然是通過結合強勁的業績和戰略性的資本配置來推動股東價值。鑑於業務更加健康，我們對 Polaris 戰略的信心和信念增強，我們對 Macy's, Inc. 的抱負更加大膽。

With this context, I will walk through a summary of our fourth quarter performance against our 5 value creation metrics: sales, gross margin, inventory productivity, expense management and capital allocation.

在此背景下，我將根據我們的 5 個價值創造指標對我們第四季度的業績進行總結：銷售額、毛利率、庫存生產力、費用管理和資本分配。

First, sales. We generated $8.7 billion in net sales during the quarter, up $328 million or 3.9% from the fourth quarter of 2019. Comparable sales on an owned plus licensed basis increased by 6.1% despite the approximately 125 basis point headwind from the Friends and Family shift we mentioned on our last call.

第一，銷售。我們在本季度產生了 87 億美元的淨銷售額，比 2019 年第四季度增加了 3.28 億美元或 3.9%。儘管我們的朋友和家人轉變帶來了大約 125 個基點的逆風，但自有加許可基礎上的可比銷售額增長了 6.1%在我們上次通話中提到。

Holiday sales were stronger than expected. Yet with the emergence of the Omicron variant, tempered consumer sentiment contributed to weaker January sales than we had anticipated. To a lesser degree, the absence of the 2021 government stimulus payouts was also a factor. The overall softness in the month of January appeared to be industry-wide and temporary in nature.

假日銷售強於預期。然而，隨著 Omicron 變體的出現，緩和的消費者情緒導致 1 月份的銷售額低於我們的預期。在較小程度上，缺乏 2021 年政府刺激支出也是一個因素。 1 月份的整體疲軟似乎是全行業的，而且是暫時的。

Now on to gross margin. Gross margin for the quarter was 36.5%, down 30 basis points from the fourth quarter of 2019. Notably, holiday delivery surcharges, which were essentially nonexistent in 2019, reduced margin by approximately 85 basis points. Merchandise margin increased 160 basis points from the fourth quarter of 2019. Leaner, more productive inventories and lower markdowns were the primary drivers. Our pricing initiatives also helped drive higher full-price sell-throughs and AURs.

現在談談毛利率。本季度毛利率為 36.5%，比 2019 年第四季度下降 30 個基點。值得注意的是，2019 年基本不存在的假日送貨附加費使利潤率下降了約 85 個基點。商品利潤率比 2019 年第四季度增加了 160 個基點。更精簡、更高效的庫存和更低的降價是主要驅動力。我們的定價舉措還有助於推動更高的全價銷售和 AUR。

Versus 2019, full-price sell-throughs improved 660 basis points and full-price AURs increased 10% for the Macy's brand. Including holiday surcharges, delivery expense accounted for 5.9% of net sales, 190 basis points higher than the fourth quarter of 2019, but down from the fourth quarter of 2020.

與 2019 年相比，梅西百貨品牌的全價銷售額提高了 660 個基點，全價 AUR 增長了 10%。包括節假日附加費在內，配送費用占淨銷售額的 5.9%，比 2019 年第四季度高 190 個基點，但低於 2020 年第四季度。

Delivery expense reduction is a top priority for us. Here, our focus is on reducing split shipments and increasing the efficiency of in-store fulfillment. Improving order throughput per labor hour is one initiative that we're working on, and we have been pleased with the improvements we achieved in the fulfillment test stores that we deployed in November. Based on these results, we plan to roll this initiative out to an additional 35 locations before holiday 2022.

降低運費是我們的首要任務。在這裡，我們的重點是減少分批發貨並提高店內履行效率。提高每工時的訂單吞吐量是我們正在開展的一項舉措，我們對我們在 11 月部署的履行測試商店中取得的改進感到滿意。基於這些結果，我們計劃在 2022 年假期之前將該計劃推廣到另外 35 個地點。

Now let's shift to inventory productivity. Our gains in this area have been a vital source of our gross margin achievements, which are driven by the evolution and scaling of data science into our working teams and decision-making. During the critical holiday period, inventory levels remained healthy. And for the full year, the gains we made were impressive no matter which period you compare performance against. Inventory was down 16% versus 2019, while full year sales were almost flat. And versus 2020, inventory was up only 16% on sales growth of more than 40%. As a result, inventory turn improved by 22% compared to 2019.

現在讓我們轉向庫存生產力。我們在這一領域取得的成就一直是我們毛利率成就的重要來源，這是由數據科學在我們的工作團隊和決策中的演變和擴展所推動的。在關鍵的假期期間，庫存水平保持健康。在全年，無論您將業績與哪個時期進行比較，我們取得的收益都令人印象深刻。與 2019 年相比，庫存下降了 16%，而全年銷售額幾乎持平。與 2020 年相比，庫存僅增長 16%，銷售額增長超過 40%。因此，與 2019 年相比，庫存周轉率提高了 22%。

We also saw another quarter of strong expense management discipline. SG&A expenses were $2.4 billion in the quarter, down $80 million or 3.2% versus 2019. SG&A expenses improved as a percent of net sales to 28%, down 210 basis points from the fourth quarter of 2019. This was driven by the expense leverage we gained as sales grew, the continued benefit of permanent Polaris cost savings and the revenue generated by Macy's Media Network, all of which were partially offset by increased labor costs.

我們還看到了另一個季度的強有力的費用管理紀律。本季度 SG&A 費用為 24 億美元，比 2019 年下降 8000 萬美元或 3.2%。SG&A 費用占淨銷售額的百分比提高到 28%，比 2019 年第四季度下降 210 個基點。這是由我們的費用槓桿驅動的隨著銷售額的增長，Polaris 永久節省成本的持續收益以及梅西百貨媒體網絡產生的收入，所有這些都被增加的勞動力成本部分抵消了。

Macy's Media Network exceeded our full year expectations, generating more than $105 million in net revenues that offset SG&A expenses. During the quarter, we also made significant headway in filling open positions, provided premium weekend pay to our colleagues and accelerated the adoption of $15 per hour minimum wage in another 200-or-so stores.

梅西百貨的媒體網絡超出了我們的全年預期，產生了超過 1.05 億美元的淨收入，抵消了 SG&A 費用。在本季度，我們還在填補空缺職位方面取得了重大進展，為我們的同事提供了高額的周末工資，並加速在另外 200 多家商店採用每小時 15 美元的最低工資。

Credit card revenues were $264 million, up $25 million from the fourth quarter of 2019. As a percent of net sales, credit card revenues were up 10 basis points versus 2019 to 3%. Better-than-expected bad debt levels continue to benefit credit card revenues during the quarter.

信用卡收入為 2.64 億美元，比 2019 年第四季度增加 2500 萬美元。信用卡收入占淨銷售額的百分比比 2019 年增長 10 個基點，達到 3%。好於預期的壞賬水平繼續使本季度的信用卡收入受益。

Now for bottom line profitability. Adjusted EBITDA margin was 14.4% or 50 basis points higher than the margin achieved in the fourth quarter of 2019 despite asset sale gains that were $65 million less in 2021. After accounting for interest and taxes, these results generated adjusted diluted EPS of $2.45, up from $2.12 in 2019.

現在是為了盈利。儘管 2021 年資產出售收益減少了 6500 萬美元，但調整後 EBITDA 利潤率比 2019 年第四季度的利潤率高出 14.4% 或 50 個基點。在計入利息和稅收後，這些結果產生了 2.45 美元的調整後稀釋每股收益，上升從 2019 年的 2.12 美元起。

The final value creation metric is capital allocation. We ended the year in a strong cash position. Our full year capital expenditures of $597 million were focused largely on technology-based initiatives, including those that support our digital business, our data science initiatives and the simplification of our technology architecture. We generated $2.3 billion of free cash in 2021, which includes the receipt of the majority of the CARES Act tax refund in January of $582 million.

最終的價值創造指標是資本配置。我們以強勁的現金狀況結束了這一年。我們全年 5.97 億美元的資本支出主要集中在基於技術的計劃上，包括支持我們的數字業務、我們的數據科學計劃和簡化我們的技術架構的計劃。我們在 2021 年產生了 23 億美元的自由現金，其中包括 1 月份收到的大部分 CARES 法案退稅 5.82 億美元。

Our strong free cash flow allowed us to pay off $1.6 billion of debt early. This, coupled with our solid performance, resulted in a year-end leverage ratio of 1.8x, well below our initial target of 2.5x and materially better than pre-pandemic levels.

我們強勁的自由現金流使我們能夠提前還清 16 億美元的債務。再加上我們穩健的表現，年終槓桿率為 1.8 倍，遠低於我們最初的 2.5 倍目標，也大大好於大流行前的水平。

At the same time, we remain committed to returning capital to shareholders. As Jeff referenced, during the quarter, we exhausted the remaining $200 million of share repurchase authorization, repurchasing 7.5 million shares. In total, under the full $500 million authorization, we repurchased 20.5 million shares or more than 6.5% of shares outstanding.

同時，我們仍然致力於向股東返還資本。正如傑夫所說，在本季度，我們用盡了剩餘的 2 億美元股票回購授權，回購了 750 萬股。總的來說，在全部 5 億美元的授權下，我們回購了 2050 萬股或超過 6.5% 的流通股。

Now let me turn it back over to Jeff, and then I will return to discuss our long-term outlook and 2022 guidance.

現在讓我把它交給傑夫，然後我會回來討論我們的長期前景和 2022 年的指導。

Thanks, Adrian. As we discussed on our call last quarter, our Board of Directors undertook a more extensive review of our e-commerce and brick-and-mortar operations to determine the best path forward for Macy's, Inc. to enhance value for our investors. This was additional work to review business and strategy that our Board and management team perform on a regular basis. Throughout this extensive review, the Board and management were focused on 2 core objectives: one, ensuring we deliver for our shareholders in the near, medium and long term; and two, provide the most convenient and seamless shopping experience for our customer across all omnichannel touch points.

謝謝，阿德里安。正如我們在上個季度的電話會議中所討論的那樣，我們的董事會對我們的電子商務和實體業務進行了更廣泛的審查，以確定梅西百貨公司為我們的投資者提高價值的最佳前進道路。這是對我們的董事會和管理團隊定期執行的業務和戰略進行審查的額外工作。在這次廣泛的審查中，董事會和管理層專注於兩個核心目標：第一，確保我們在近期、中期和長期為股東提供服務；第二，在所有全渠道接觸點為我們的客戶提供最便捷、無縫的購物體驗。

In every scenario we considered, we found that the combination of our profitable digital platform with our national footprint will deliver greater value to shareholders than a separation of our digital and physical assets. This was true at both Macy's, Inc. and brand levels. Furthermore, after a comprehensive review, we found that the integrated omnichannel Macy's, Inc. with multiple nameplates from off-price to luxury continues to be the most appealing to our diverse and multigenerational customer base.

在我們考慮的每一種情況下，我們發現將我們盈利的數字平台與我們的全國足跡相結合，將比我們的數字資產和實物資產的分離為股東帶來更大的價值。在梅西百貨和品牌層面都是如此。此外，經過全面審查後，我們發現綜合全渠道的梅西百貨公司（Macy's, Inc.）擁有從低價到奢侈品的多個銘牌，繼續對我們多元化和多代的客戶群最具吸引力。

We conducted the review with the assistance of AlixPartners and our financial and legal advisers. There were no constraints imposed on AlixPartners or our advisers with regard to the options analyzed. This review included a valuation of a separation of the digital business overall as well as the potential merits of a separation of the Macy's or Bloomingdale's digital businesses individually. We analyze revenue growth drivers, unit economics and the financial profiles of our digital and store businesses.

我們在 AlixPartners 以及我們的財務和法律顧問的協助下進行了審查。對於所分析的選項，AlixPartners 或我們的顧問沒有任何限制。該審查包括對整體數字業務分離的估值，以及單獨分離梅西百貨或布魯明代爾數字業務的潛在優點。我們分析收入增長驅動因素、單位經濟性以及我們數字和商店業務的財務狀況。

We also evaluated possible benefits of a third-party investment, considering any need for capital as well as a potential exit path for a financial partner. And we considered whether there would be value in issuing a special equity offering that would track the financial performance of our digital business.

我們還評估了第三方投資的可能收益，考慮了對資金的任何需求以及金融合作夥伴的潛在退出途徑。我們還考慮了發行特別股票發行來跟踪我們數字業務的財務業績是否有價值。

Key to the Board's decision-making were the significant separation and ongoing costs from operating separated businesses, including potential debt separation costs, and for Bloomingdale's business, a significant loss of benefits available to Bloomingdale's through leveraging the scale of Macy's, Inc. Also, another important consideration was our view of the damage to gross margin for both the digital and store businesses due to the potential transfer costs and markdown liability.

董事會決策的關鍵是運營分離業務的重大分離和持續成本，包括潛在的債務分離成本，而對於 Bloomingdale 的業務，Bloomingdale's 通過利用 Macy's, Inc. 的規模而獲得的利益顯著損失。此外，另一個重要的考慮因素是我們認為由於潛在的轉移成本和降價責任而對數字和商店業務的毛利率造成的損害。

We also found that in every alternative scenario we considered, the execution risk for the business and our customers was too high. From that, we determined that Macy's, Inc. has a stronger future as a fully integrated business, with Macy's and Bloomingdale's together and assessing a broad range of brands, price points and customers across digital and stores.

我們還發現，在我們考慮的每個替代方案中，業務和客戶的執行風險都太高了。由此，我們確定梅西百貨作為一家完全整合的企業擁有更強大的未來，梅西百貨和布魯明代爾百貨將共同評估數字和商店中的廣泛品牌、價格點和客戶。

In undertaking this review, we also asked our advisers to pressure test our Polaris strategy. Their findings reaffirmed our confidence in the strategy and boosted clarity on several initiatives that could be accelerated over the next several years to unlock greater value for our investors.

在進行這次審查時，我們還要求我們的顧問對我們的 Polaris 戰略進行壓力測試。他們的調查結果重申了我們對該戰略的信心，並提高了未來幾年可能加速為我們的投資者釋放更大價值的幾項舉措的清晰度。

These initiatives begin with digital. We have a number of new capabilities in the works. First, the marketplace we announced last quarter is expected to deliver incremental value above our $10 billion digital sales target. In addition to our owned and Vendor Direct platforms, this third-party marketplace will allow our teams and partners to expand and enhance our strong digital experience. Through the marketplace, we can dramatically expand our categories, brands and online SKU assortment to respond more quickly to the changing and diverse needs of our customers.

這些舉措始於數字化。我們正在開發許多新功能。首先，我們上個季度宣布的市場預計將提供超過我們 100 億美元數字銷售目標的增量價值。除了我們自有和 Vendor Direct 平台外，這個第三方市場還將允許我們的團隊和合作夥伴擴展和增強我們強大的數字體驗。通過市場，我們可以顯著擴展我們的類別、品牌和在線 SKU 分類，以更快地響應客戶不斷變化和多樣化的需求。

In addition, we continue enhancing our digital platform and launching new offerings. These investments are paying off. And we are pleased with the active user and conversion increases we're seeing across our apps, bloomingdales.com and macys.com.

此外，我們將繼續增強我們的數字平台並推出新產品。這些投資正在獲得回報。我們對我們的應用程序、bloomingdales.com 和 macys.com 看到的活躍用戶和轉化率增長感到滿意。

Beyond digital, we've identified several other focus areas. First, our merchandise categories. We have identified key categories where we will continue to build upon our already strong foundation. Example of these categories include furniture, men's tailored clothing, women's shoes, beauty, dresses and jewelry and watches.

除了數字化之外，我們還確定了其他幾個重點領域。首先，我們的商品類別。我們已經確定了關鍵類別，我們將在我們已經強大的基礎上繼續發展。這些類別的示例包括家具、男士定制服裝、女鞋、美容、連衣裙、珠寶和手錶。

Today, I'm pleased to announce our partnership with Pandora to broaden our already strong assortment in fine jewelry. In November, we launched Pandora in 5 stores. The fine jewelry business in those stores saw an incremental 23 percentage point increase in sales growth over 2019 from the new assortment. Pandora attracts younger customers, and we will now expand to 28 additional locations in 2022.

今天，我很高興地宣布我們與 Pandora 建立合作夥伴關係，以擴大我們已經很強大的高級珠寶系列。 11 月，我們在 5 家門店推出了 Pandora。與 2019 年相比，這些商店的高級珠寶業務在新品類中的銷售額增長了 23 個百分點。 Pandora 吸引了年輕客戶，我們現在將在 2022 年擴展到 28 個額外的地點。

There's new categories like toys. And our partnership with Toys "R" Us has been instrumental in attracting new customers to the Macy's brand. Of the customers that shop Toys "R" Us, 25% were new customers to the Macy's brand, and 93% of these toy customers cross-shopped other categories. We doubled our toy business in 2021, and we are excited for more aggressive growth when we opened Toys "R" Us stores within store in all of our locations during the second half of this year, creating a completely new and immersive experience for our customers.

有新的類別，如玩具。我們與 Toys "R" Us 的合作夥伴關係在吸引新客戶加入 Macy's 品牌方面發揮了重要作用。在購買玩具反斗城的顧客中，25% 是梅西百貨品牌的新顧客，其中 93% 的玩具顧客交叉購買了其他類別。我們的玩具業務在 2021 年翻了一番，今年下半年我們在所有地點的商店內開設了 Toys "R" Us 商店，為我們的客戶創造了全新的沉浸式體驗，我們對更積極的增長感到興奮.

Both Bloomingdale's and Bluemercury are also working with best-in-class categories and brands. During the quarter, Bloomingdale's saw success in its holiday Carousel collection with Giada De Laurentiis. The partnership was a key to Bloomingdale's gifting performance in the fourth quarter. We are excited to announce that next month, Bloomingdale's will unveil its latest Carousel collection with Netflix's Bridgerton.

Bloomingdale's 和 Bluemercury 都在與一流的品類和品牌合作。在本季度，Bloomingdale's 與 Giada De Laurentiis 在其假日 Carousel 系列中取得了成功。合作夥伴關係是布魯明代爾在第四季度的送禮表現的關鍵。我們很高興地宣布，下個月，Bloomingdale's 將與 Netflix 的 Bridgerton 一起推出其最新的 Carousel 系列。

Another focus area is marketing and loyalty. Our Star Rewards loyalty membership is growing every day. Through enhanced personalization capabilities, we can increase engagement that drives positive brand perception, additional visits and purchases. We are testing advanced and AI-driven targeting to help determine the best communication channel, frequency, message and offer for customers. We view personalization as a growth engine for our company in the early innings of development.

另一個重點領域是營銷和忠誠度。我們的 Star Rewards 忠誠會員每天都在增長。通過增強的個性化功能，我們可以提高參與度，從而推動積極的品牌認知、額外的訪問和購買。我們正在測試由人工智能驅動的高級定位，以幫助確定為客戶提供的最佳溝通渠道、頻率、信息和優惠。我們將個性化視為我們公司在發展初期的增長引擎。

Consistent with our digital focus, we have significantly shifted our media mix towards digital marketing. Today, 66% of our total spend is on digital versus 35%, 5 years ago. Over this time, Macy's has experienced a 25% improvement in our return on advertising spend.

與我們的數字重點一致，我們已將我們的媒體組合顯著轉向數字營銷。今天，我們總支出的 66% 用於數字化，而 5 年前這一比例為 35%。在此期間，梅西百貨的廣告支出回報率提高了 25%。

Next, off-mall stores. We see big upside in repositioning our physical store footprint by scaling up our small-format Market by Macy's and Bloomies stores. We opened 3 Market by Macy's stores in 2021 and are seeing encouraging customer response. Sales exceeded our expectations, and we found that these stores are more productive to run and staff and stock with inventory. This new format is also bringing in new customers who are engaging with our curated under-40 brands and products. In 2022, we will open Market by Macy's and Bloomies in additional markets as part of our omni market strategy.

其次，非商場商店。通過梅西百貨和 Bloomies 商店擴大我們的小型市場，我們看到重新定位我們的實體店足蹟的巨大優勢。我們於 2021 年開設了 3 Market by Macy's 商店，並看到了令人鼓舞的客戶反應。銷售額超出了我們的預期，我們發現這些商店的運營效率更高，員工和庫存充足。這種新形式還帶來了新客戶，他們正在與我們精心策劃的 40 歲以下品牌和產品互動。 2022 年，我們將在其他市場開設 Market by Macy's 和 Bloomies，作為我們全方位市場戰略的一部分。

Finally, the shopping experience. One common thread across our Polaris initiatives is the need to build new capabilities to ensure the shopping experience is as convenient and compelling as possible. This will drive growth in our active customer base and increased shopping frequency and spend per visit. Customers shop both online and in stores, so maximizing the combined experience remains key to our success.

最後，購物體驗。我們 Polaris 計劃的一個共同點是需要構建新功能，以確保購物體驗盡可能方便和引人注目。這將推動我們活躍客戶群的增長，並增加購物頻率和每次訪問的消費。客戶在網上和實體店購物，因此最大化綜合體驗仍然是我們成功的關鍵。

We look at our stores as destinations for both discovery and experience as well as fulfillment hubs. So we will continue to invest appropriately in our stores to create a more connected, tech-enabled omni ecosystem.

我們將我們的商店視為發現和體驗的目的地以及履行中心。因此，我們將繼續對我們的商店進行適當投資，以創建一個更加互聯、技術支持的全方位生態系統。

Now I'd like to speak to one of our most valuable assets, the Macy's brand. Starting next month, we're repositioning it with a promise to help our customers express and own their style. Expert in-person advice and personalized data-driven recommendations that help people express their personal style will differentiate us in a cluttered marketplace. This brand transformation is a key step within our Polaris strategy to win with fashion and style.

現在我想談談我們最有價值的資產之一，梅西百貨品牌。從下個月開始，我們將重新定位它，承諾幫助我們的客戶表達和擁有自己的風格。幫助人們表達個人風格的專家面對面建議和個性化數據驅動建議將使我們在混亂的市場中脫穎而出。這一品牌轉型是我們以時尚和風格取勝的 Polaris 戰略中的關鍵一步。

We will also announce details of our new social purpose platform and commitments in a few weeks. Macy's, Inc. has been a strong partner to the local communities in which we operate. But today, as stakeholders' expectations of corporations and of us change, we're prepared to better align how we do our work with the common good. As we transform our business, we see the opportunity to create a social purpose platform that leverages our scale, unique strengths and culture to create more meaningful change in the world.

我們還將在幾週內公佈我們新的社會目的平台和承諾的細節。 Macy's, Inc. 一直是我們經營所在的當地社區的強大合作夥伴。但是今天，隨著利益相關者對公司和我們的期望發生變化，我們已準備好更好地使我們的工作方式與共同利益保持一致。隨著我們業務轉型，我們看到了創建一個社會目的平台的機會，該平台利用我們的規模、獨特的優勢和文化來為世界創造更有意義的變化。

Now I'll pass it on to Adrian for our outlook for 2022 and beyond.

現在，我將把它傳遞給阿德里安，以了解我們對 2022 年及以後的展望。

Thanks, Jeff. We believe that shareholder value will be enhanced through strong performance, driven by the successful execution of our Polaris strategy, combined with the efficient allocation of capital. We will make disciplined risk-adjusted decisions when deploying the cash we generate. Given the ebbs and flows of consumer sentiment and the need to weather unforeseen risks, our first capital allocation priority is maintaining balance sheet strength. By doing so, we preserve the ability to fund investments that foster profitable sales growth and deliver healthy long-term returns. We will fund these types of investments and return excess cash to our shareholders, and we'll deliver direct returns to shareholders through a modest yet predictable dividend and meaningful share repurchases.

謝謝，傑夫。我們相信，在我們北極星戰略的成功執行以及資本的有效分配的推動下，強勁的業績將提高股東價值。在部署我們產生的現金時，我們將做出有紀律的風險調整決策。鑑於消費者情緒的起起落落以及抵禦不可預見風險的需要，我們的首要資本配置優先事項是保持資產負債表的實力。通過這樣做，我們保留了為促進可盈利的銷售增長和提供健康的長期回報的投資提供資金的能力。我們將為這些類型的投資提供資金並將多餘的現金返還給我們的股東，我們將通過適度但可預測的股息和有意義的股票回購為股東提供直接回報。

With that in mind, let me walk you through our updated 3-year outlook. In light of the headwinds and tailwinds that Jeff spoke to earlier, we do believe that the macro environment will continue to offer some challenges. Nevertheless, we remain committed to achieving low double-digit adjusted EBITDA margin annually, and in 2024, expect to be within a range of 11.5% to 12.0%. For sales, we're targeting a low single-digit compound annual growth rate for net sales.

考慮到這一點，讓我帶您了解我們更新的 3 年展望。鑑於傑夫早些時候談到的逆風和順風，我們確實相信宏觀環境將繼續帶來一些挑戰。儘管如此，我們仍致力於每年實現低兩位數的調整後 EBITDA 利潤率，預計到 2024 年將在 11.5% 至 12.0% 的範圍內。對於銷售，我們的目標是實現淨銷售額的低個位數複合年增長率。

We expect our long-term sales growth to be driven in 3 ways. First, the scaling of our digital marketplace, including expanding the depth and breadth of our merchandise categories as well as the replatforming of our core digital platform; second, improving mall-based trends, supported by our investments in omnichannel capabilities and technologies; and third, the expansion of our off-mall stores. As we referenced earlier, the recovery of international tourism to pre-pandemic levels is not anticipated for some time. So there is potential upside should that occur within the next several years.

我們預計我們的長期銷售增長將通過 3 種方式推動。首先，我們數字市場的擴展，包括擴大我們商品類別的深度和廣度以及我們核心數字平台的重新平台化；其次，在我們對全渠道能力和技術的投資的支持下，改善基於商城的趨勢；第三，我們的非商城商店的擴張。正如我們之前提到的，預計國際旅遊業在一段時間內不會恢復到大流行前的水平。因此，如果在未來幾年內發生這種情況，則存在潛在的上行空間。

For gross margin, we're targeting a rate in the high 30s even as digital penetration increases to the low to mid-40s as a percent of net sales. To do this, we're looking to maintain solid merchandise margins, aided by lean inventories as well as additional profitability from our pricing initiatives and the growth of digital marketplace. At the same time, we'll be closely monitoring the promotional environment within the industry, which we recognize has been at historic lows this past year.

對於毛利率，我們的目標是在 30 年代高的毛利率，即使數字滲透率增加到 40 年代中期到 40 年代中期，占淨銷售額的百分比。為此，我們希望在精益庫存以及我們的定價計劃和數字市場增長帶來的額外盈利能力的幫助下，保持穩固的商品利潤率。同時，我們將密切關注行業內的促銷環境，我們認識到過去一年的促銷環境一直處於歷史低位。

In regards to future delivery costs, we've developed several initiatives to mitigate delivery expense while improving our customers' delivery experience. These include optimizing fulfillment algorithms, reducing split shipments through the use of data science and enhancing inventory placement and assortment allocation. In addition, we began rolling out initiatives aimed at increasing item-level profitability for online SKUs this past quarter.

關於未來的交付成本，我們制定了多項舉措來降低交付費用，同時改善客戶的交付體驗。其中包括優化履行算法、通過使用數據科學減少分批發貨以及增強庫存放置和分類分配。此外，我們在上個季度開始推出旨在提高在線 SKU 項目級盈利能力的舉措。

Now let's move on to SG&A. We are targeting to improve SG&A leverage with increased digital sales and a more efficient staffing model in stores. The $900 million in permanent cost savings we realized over the last 2 years will remain a significant benefit to our SG&A leverage. At the same time, 2021's SG&A benefited from a number of open positions that we expect to fill. In 2022, a portion of the savings achieved through our Polaris initiatives will be reinvested to support our colleagues' financial, educational and well-being initiatives.

現在讓我們繼續討論 SG&A。我們的目標是通過增加數字銷售和更有效的商店人員配備模式來提高 SG&A 的影響力。我們在過去 2 年中實現的 9 億美元永久成本節約仍將是我們的 SG&A 槓桿的顯著優勢。同時，2021 年的 SG&A 受益於我們預計將填補的一些空缺職位。 2022 年，我們將通過 Polaris 計劃節省的部分資金進行再投資，以支持我們同事的財務、教育和福利計劃。

Based on this and wage inflation expectations, SG&A as a percent of sales is targeted to be elevated over the next 3 years from 2021 levels, peaking in 2022. Within SG&A, we also expect to continue benefiting from other profit pools, such as Macy's Media Network and additional opportunities that could arise when scaling our digital marketplace.

基於這一點和工資通脹預期，SG&A 佔銷售額的百分比目標是在未來 3 年內從 2021 年的水平提高，並在 2022 年達到頂峰。在 SG&A 中，我們還預計將繼續受益於其他利潤池，例如梅西百貨擴展我們的數字市場時可能出現的網絡和其他機會。

Next, credit card revenues. In the near term, we're targeting credit card revenues as a percent of net sales to be slightly below our historic average of 3%. This reflects our expectation that bad debt within the credit portfolio will migrate to pre-pandemic levels over the next few years and thus, pressure returns. However, in the medium term, we expect proprietary credit card sales penetration to rise, which will offset the increased pressure from bad debt and help facilitate the rebound of credit card revenues to about 3% of net sales by 2024.

其次，信用卡收入。在短期內，我們的目標是信用卡收入占淨銷售額的百分比略低於我們 3% 的歷史平均水平。這反映了我們的預期，即信貸組合中的壞賬將在未來幾年內遷移到大流行前的水平，從而給回報帶來壓力。然而，從中期來看，我們預計自有信用卡銷售滲透率將上升，這將抵消壞賬增加的壓力，並有助於促進信用卡收入到 2024 年反彈至占淨銷售額的 3% 左右。

Now let's turn to our long-term capital allocation plans. We're targeting capital expenditures of approximately $3 billion over the next 3 years. Our spend will be primarily allocated towards our technology architecture, data science applications across our retail operations, digital platform enhancements, fulfillment capabilities in stores and further upstream and our personalization efforts. In 2022, we're targeting approximately $1 billion of capital expenditures.

現在讓我們轉向我們的長期資本配置計劃。我們的目標是未來 3 年的資本支出約為 30 億美元。我們的支出將主要用於我們的技術架構、零售業務中的數據科學應用、數字平台增強、商店的履行能力以及進一步的上游和我們的個性化工作。到 2022 年，我們的目標是大約 10 億美元的資本支出。

At the same time, we also expect to continue to meaningfully monetize our real estate. We have a robust monetization program that has reduced more than $2 billion in asset sale proceeds over the last 6 years. Our plan is to continue the strategic development of our assets to maximize our real estate values while repositioning our physical footprint to provide our customers a seamless and convenient omnichannel experience.

同時，我們也期望繼續有意義地通過我們的房地產貨幣化。我們有一個強大的貨幣化計劃，在過去 6 年中減少了超過 20 億美元的資產出售收益。我們的計劃是繼續戰略發展我們的資產，以最大限度地提高我們的房地產價值，同時重新定位我們的實體足跡，為我們的客戶提供無縫和便捷的全渠道體驗。

After accounting for capital expenditures and asset sale proceeds, we're targeting to generate between $3.2 billion and $3.6 billion of free cash flow over the next 3 years with up to an additional $900 million of incremental debt capacity with strong financial flexibility given our leverage and EBITDA targets. This level of cash generation and cash capacity will continue to support our capital allocation priorities, which are grounded on our commitment to enhance shareholder value.

考慮到資本支出和資產出售收益後，我們的目標是在未來 3 年內產生 32 億美元至 36 億美元的自由現金流，以及高達 9 億美元的增量債務能力，鑑於我們的槓桿和強大的財務靈活性EBITDA 目標。這種水平的現金產生和現金能力將繼續支持我們的資本配置優先事項，這些優先事項基於我們對提高股東價值的承諾。

Those priorities include: first, maintaining a healthy capital structure that is focused on best positioning Macy's, Inc. for access to bank and capital market funding under all economic scenarios; and second, maintaining investment-grade credit metrics with well-laddered debt maturities, which includes targeting an adjusted debt to adjusted EBITDAR leverage ratio of 2.0x or below.

這些優先事項包括：首先，保持健康的資本結構，專注於在所有經濟情景下獲得銀行和資本市場資金的最佳定位 Macy's, Inc.；其次，保持投資級信用指標和良好的債務到期日，其中包括將調整後的債務與調整後的 EBITDAR 槓桿比率設定為 2.0 倍或更低。

Next, we're committed to investing in initiatives that further strengthen our digitally-led capabilities across the enterprise, including investments through our capital planning program as well as other value-creating strategic investments. And lastly, we will return capital to shareholders in the form of a healthy yet modest dividend that increases annually and meaningful share repurchases, absent more attractive investment alternatives. As just mentioned, we announced the first dividend increase today and the authorization of a new open-ended $2 billion share repurchase program. As part of our 3-year outlook, I want to provide more detail on our guidance for fiscal 2022 as well as the first quarter.

接下來，我們致力於投資能夠進一步加強我們在整個企業中以數字為主導的能力的計劃，包括通過我們的資本規劃計劃進行投資以及其他創造價值的戰略投資。最後，我們將以每年增加的健康而適度的股息和有意義的股票回購的形式向股東返還資本，沒有更具吸引力的投資選擇。如前所述，我們今天宣布首次增加股息，並授權一項新的開放式 20 億美元股票回購計劃。作為我們 3 年展望的一部分，我想提供更多關於我們對 2022 財年和第一季度的指導的詳細信息。

We believe 2022 will be a transitional year as we move beyond the recovery and the market begins to normalize. At the same time, we expect high levels of inflation to erode consumer discretionary income. Our 2022 expectations reflect our strategic positioning and the associated risks in what may be a more challenging market. Despite these challenges, we are committed to continuing the discipline we demonstrated in 2021 to drive strong margin performance through our pricing initiatives for merchandise margin, our continued focus on delivery expense mitigation and our SG&A cost discipline.

我們相信 2022 年將是一個過渡年，因為我們已經超越了復甦並且市場開始正常化。與此同時，我們預計高通脹將侵蝕消費者的可自由支配收入。我們對 2022 年的預期反映了我們在可能更具挑戰性的市場中的戰略定位和相關風險。儘管存在這些挑戰，我們仍致力於繼續我們在 2021 年展示的紀律，通過我們的商品利潤率定價計劃、我們繼續關注降低交付費用和我們的 SG&A 成本紀律來推動強勁的利潤率表現。

Now let me provide the details of our full year 2022. For Macy's, Inc., we expect net sales to be flat to up 1% with continued strong AUR performance at more modest levels than we saw during most of 2021. For our owned plus licensed comp sales, we expect a 3-year compound annual growth rate of between 1.1% and 1.4%. That's growth from 2019 results. Digital sales are expected to be approximately 37% of net sales. We expect a gross margin rate between 38.1% and 38.3%, slightly down from last year, largely due to increased digital penetration and expected inflationary cost pressures.

現在讓我提供我們 2022 年全年的詳細信息。對於 Macy's, Inc.，我們預計淨銷售額將持平至 1%，並且 AUR 表現持續強勁，比我們在 2021 年大部分時間看到的水平更為溫和。對於我們擁有的加我們預計 3 年復合年增長率在 1.1% 至 1.4% 之間。這是 2019 年業績的增長。預計數字銷售額約占淨銷售額的 37%。我們預計毛利率在 38.1% 和 38.3% 之間，比去年略有下降，主要是由於數字滲透率的提高和預期的通脹成本壓力。

Credit card revenue of approximately 2.9% of sales is expected. From a rate perspective, SG&A is expected to be in the range of 33.7% to 33.9%. Asset sale gains are expected to be between $60 million and $90 million. Adjusted EBITDA margin is expected to be between 11.0% and 11.5%. Net interest expense is expected to be approximately $190 million for the year. Adjusted diluted earnings per share is estimated between $4.13 and $4.52 and does not include the impact of any share buyback that might occur throughout the year.

預計信用卡收入約佔銷售額的 2.9%。從利率的角度來看，SG&A 預計將在 33.7% 至 33.9% 的範圍內。資產出售收益預計在 6000 萬美元至 9000 萬美元之間。調整後的 EBITDA 利潤率預計在 11.0% 至 11.5% 之間。本年度的淨利息支出預計約為 1.9 億美元。調整後的每股攤薄收益估計在 4.13 美元至 4.52 美元之間，不包括全年可能發生的任何股票回購的影響。

Now a few comments on sales trend within the year. We are targeting strong year-over-year growth in the first quarter, but we expect our quarterly net sales penetration as a percent of annual net sales to more closely align to our pre-pandemic quarterly cadence. Recall that we were still early in the recovery at this point last year and that our results in the first quarter of 2021 were significantly affected by the pandemic. Impacts from the acceleration of the recovery and stimulus payouts more significantly benefited our results in the second and third quarters of 2021. This makes the year-over-year net sales growth in the first quarter of this year more favorable than that in the subsequent quarters.

現在對年內的銷售趨勢進行一些評論。我們的目標是在第一季度實現強勁的同比增長，但我們預計我們的季度淨銷售額滲透率佔年度淨銷售額的百分比將更接近我們大流行前的季度節奏。回想一下，去年此時我們仍處於復蘇初期，我們在 2021 年第一季度的業績受到大流行的嚴重影響。加速復蘇和刺激支出的影響更顯著地使我們在 2021 年第二季度和第三季度的業績受益。這使得今年第一季度的淨銷售額同比增長優於隨後幾個季度.

We also expect between 55% and 60% of our annual adjusted EBITDA, excluding asset sale gains, to be generated in the fall season. Of this, nearly 70% is expected in the fourth quarter. Additionally, outside of the first quarter, the remainder of asset sale gains are modeled in the fourth quarter. With those factors in mind, we expect net sales in the first quarter to be between $5.3 billion and $5.4 billion.

我們還預計，不包括資產出售收益在內，我們年度調整後 EBITDA 的 55% 至 60% 將在秋季產生。其中，預計第四季度將達到近 70%。此外，在第一季度之外，剩餘的資產出售收益在第四季度建模。考慮到這些因素，我們預計第一季度的淨銷售額將在 53 億美元至 54 億美元之間。

For adjusted earnings per share, we expect the first quarter will be between $0.77 and $0.85 compared to $0.39 in 2021. This includes an anticipated benefit of approximately $25 million from asset sale gains and again, does not include any impact from share buybacks. More details on our outlook are included in the presentation posted on our website.

對於調整後的每股收益，我們預計第一季度將在 0.77 美元至 0.85 美元之間，而 2021 年為 0.39 美元。這包括從資產出售收益中獲得的約 2500 萬美元的預期收益，並且不包括股票回購的任何影響。有關我們展望的更多詳細信息，請參見我們網站上發布的演示文稿。

In summary, we are pleased with the results that we generated in 2021 and look forward to building upon our success not only in 2022, but over the next several years. We have proven that we have a highly resilient business, one with further capacity to grow profitably and enhance shareholder value.

總之，我們對 2021 年取得的成果感到滿意，並期待在 2022 年乃至未來幾年的成功基礎上再接再厲。我們已經證明，我們擁有高度彈性的業務，具有進一步盈利增長和提高股東價值的能力。

With that, I'll turn it back over to Jeff for some closing remarks.

有了這個，我會把它交給傑夫做一些結束語。

Thanks, Adrian. Today, Macy's, Inc. is a transformed organization. We are well positioned to compete successfully and profitably in today's market. We operate one of retail's largest e-commerce businesses, integrated with a nationwide footprint of stores and fulfillment centers. We are confident in our path forward as one integrated company, continuing to execute our Polaris strategy and the accelerated initiatives we shared today, allowing us to unlock additional value, acquire new customers and grow market share.

謝謝，阿德里安。今天，Macy's, Inc. 是一個轉型的組織。我們有能力在當今市場上成功競爭並獲得盈利。我們經營著零售業最大的電子商務業務之一，與遍布全國的商店和履行中心相結合。作為一家綜合性公司，我們對前進的道路充滿信心，繼續執行我們的 Polaris 戰略和我們今天共享的加速計劃，使我們能夠釋放額外價值、獲得新客戶並擴大市場份額。

I want to express my gratitude to the entire Macy's, Inc. team for their passion and dedication in serving our customers and delivering strong results. We have a lot of work ahead, but I am excited to put these plans into action and deliver an even bolder and brighter future for our company, our shareholders and our customers.

我要感謝整個 Macy's, Inc. 團隊，感謝他們在為客戶服務和取得優異成績方面的熱情和奉獻精神。我們還有很多工作要做，但我很高興能將這些計劃付諸實施，為我們的公司、股東和客戶帶來更大膽、更光明的未來。

And with that, let's begin the Q&A.

有了這個，讓我們開始問答吧。

(Operator Instructions) We'll take our first question, which comes from Matthew Boss of JPMorgan.

（操作員說明）我們將回答第一個問題，該問題來自摩根大通的 Matthew Boss。

Congrats on another nice quarter. So Jeff, revenue growth exits this year at a positive low single-digit CAGR matches your long-term Polaris plan. So near term, could you speak to momentum that you're seeing in the business, driving your first quarter outlook? And then as we think beyond how are you thinking about the time line and opportunity if we think about international travel, smaller format stores in this digital marketplace model?

恭喜又一個不錯的季度。所以傑夫，今年的收入增長以正的低個位數複合年增長率退出，符合你的長期北極星計劃。在短期內，您能否談談您在業務中看到的推動第一季度前景的勢頭？然後，當我們考慮到國際旅行之外，您如何考慮時間線和機會，在這種數字市場模型中小型商店？

Matt, thanks for your question. So as Adrian just said in his comments, we expect the first quarter on a 1-year stack. So we're now going to be comparing to 2021. It's going to be our best quarter relative to last year. And I think what all of our -- what we should look at is really the penetration of each quarterly business and look at a year like 2019, 2018 to see how we're kind of cadencing the business. So that's how I would just look at -- and to Adrian's comment, we do expect that the other quarters are going to be less than overall growth to '21 than the first quarter is.

馬特，謝謝你的提問。因此，正如阿德里安剛剛在他的評論中所說，我們預計第一季度會有 1 年的籌碼。因此，我們現在將與 2021 年進行比較。與去年相比，這將是我們最好的季度。我認為我們所有人——我們應該關注的是每個季度業務的滲透率，看看像 2019 年和 2018 年這樣的一年，看看我們是如何為業務發展的。所以這就是我的看法——根據阿德里安的評論，我們確實預計其他季度到 21 年的整體增長將低於第一季度。

To the second part of your question, let's talk about the 3 individual pieces you mentioned. First, on international travel. So this is an interesting one because you've heard us say that it needs about 3% to 4% of the total business at Bloomingdale's and Macy's, and that has certainly been our experience pre-pandemic. We got about 50% of it back when you look at 2021. A big chunk of that was basically with an increased digital business to those international zip codes.

對於您問題的第二部分，讓我們談談您提到的 3 個單獨的部分。首先，關於國際旅行。所以這是一個有趣的事情，因為你聽說我們說它需要 Bloomingdale's 和 Macy's 總業務的 3% 到 4%，這當然是我們在大流行前的經驗。當你看到 2021 年時，我們收回了大約 50%。其中很大一部分基本上是隨著這些國際郵政編碼的數字業務增加。

We did see some return in the month of December. Bloomingdale's had more of the affluent international customer coming back more there. It was our best quarter when you look at the 4. But then, you basically saw it go back into -- back to lower levels with Omicron. So we don't expect -- when you think about that 50% that's yet to come, certainly going to be a tailwind. We know it will come, but we're not anticipating seeing that in 2022, and we're looking at future years for that.

我們確實在 12 月份看到了一些回報。 Bloomingdale's 有更多富裕的國際客戶回到那裡。當您查看 4 時，這是我們最好的季度。但是，您基本上看到它回到了 - 回到 Omicron 的較低水平。所以我們不指望——當你考慮到即將到來的 50% 時，肯定會是順風。我們知道它會到來，但我們並不期待在 2022 年看到它，我們正在為此展望未來幾年。

Your question about small format stores, this is one that we've opened in both Bloomies for the Bloomingdale's brand. We did that in Washington, D.C. and the Mosaic mall. And then we've got 5 of them that have opened in Dallas, Fort Worth and Atlanta and encouraging results. And what I'd say there is that everything we've talked about in terms of the retail ecosystem of getting that formula right, where you're looking at the full business being done by customers between digital and where they choose to shop in brick-and-mortar, that's starting to pan out for us in those markets.

您關於小型商店的問題，這是我們在兩個 Bloomies 中為 Bloomingdale 品牌開設的商店。我們在華盛頓特區和馬賽克購物中心做到了這一點。然後我們有 5 家在達拉斯、沃思堡和亞特蘭大開業，結果令人鼓舞。我想說的是，我們在零售生態系統方面所討論的一切都是為了讓這個公式正確，你正在查看客戶在數字化和他們選擇在實體店購物之間完成的全部業務-and-mortar，這開始在這些市場上為我們帶來成功。

And what we've seen is what it really comes down to is we think we have a formula right between offering and value content, very flexible spaces if you've been in one. But what's really important is location, location, location, and getting not only the right off-mall location, but then the right placement of that storefront within that mall with great sight lines, great exterior signing, et cetera. So we're very careful in what we are picking there.

我們所看到的是真正歸結為我們認為我們在提供和價值內容之間有一個公式，如果你一直在一個非常靈活的空間。但真正重要的是位置、位置、位置，不僅要獲得正確的場外位置，還要在該商場內正確放置店面，並具有良好的視線、良好的外部標誌等等。所以我們在那裡挑選的東西非常小心。

We look at that kind of expansion between those nameplates and off-mall in really 3 buckets. We have the densification, which feeds into the omni ecosystem. We've got new markets and what you're going to see there. And we're looking at that for both Bloomies as well as Macy's. And then we've got the replacement strategy where you might see us, and you'll see this in 2022, where we've got a site plan where we're going to open a store, and it's next to a neighborhood store that has been in a very challenged mall. We want to make sure we develop that and have that ready to go to pass off customers versus when we had closed stores in the past where you see those customers attrite. So that's what I'd say about smaller strategies.

我們在真正的 3 個存儲桶中查看這些銘牌和非商場之間的這種擴展。我們有緻密化，它進入了全方位的生態系統。我們有新的市場，你會在那裡看到什麼。我們正在為 Bloomies 和 Macy's 考慮這一點。然後我們有了替換策略，你可能會看到我們，你會在 2022 年看到這個，我們有一個場地計劃，我們要在哪裡開一家商店，它就在附近的一家商店旁邊一直在一個非常具有挑戰性的商場。我們希望確保我們開發了這一點，並準備好讓客戶流失，而不是過去我們關閉商店時，您會看到這些客戶流失。這就是我要說的關於較小策略的內容。

And the last question is on marketplace. And that is, we're gearing up our team right now, so hiring up, very excited about the talent we're able to get. We've got our tech team working with our Mirakl, which is our tech partner right now, syncing up that. And we're working with our merchant teams right now about the new categories that we're going to start with. So as we mentioned on our last call, expect marketplace to add a lot of incremental value, and that starts in August of this year.

最後一個問題是關於市場的。也就是說，我們現在正在為我們的團隊做準備，所以招聘，對我們能夠獲得的人才感到非常興奮。我們已經讓我們的技術團隊與我們的 Mirakl 合作，這是我們現在的技術合作夥伴，正在同步這一點。我們現在正在與我們的商家團隊合作，討論我們將要開始的新類別。因此，正如我們在上次電話會議中提到的，預計市場會增加很多增量價值，這將從今年 8 月開始。

We will now move on to our next question from Lorraine Hutchinson of Bank of America.

我們現在將繼續討論美國銀行的 Lorraine Hutchinson 提出的下一個問題。

I just wanted to focus on CapEx for a minute. How much is included in that $3 billion for this fleet transformation that you're talking about? And then how should we think about the pacing of the share buyback program?

我只想專注於資本支出一分鐘。您所說的這次機隊轉型的 30 億美元中包含了多少？那麼我們應該如何考慮股票回購計劃的節奏呢？

Thanks very much for your question, Lorraine. So with regards to CapEx, we do have right now, a smaller portion of our capital around the new store rollout. This is one thing that we want to make sure that we're continuing to prove ourselves into. As Jeff mentioned a bit earlier, we feel really good about the performance of these stores. We feel that we have the formula rights. We're highly focused on location, location, location. But as we continue to think about the scaling of those stores, we'll continue to update our capital plans.

非常感謝你的問題，洛林。因此，關於資本支出，我們現在確實有一小部分資金用於新店的推出。這是我們要確保我們繼續證明自己的一件事。正如 Jeff 之前提到的，我們對這些商店的表現感到非常滿意。我們覺得我們擁有配方權。我們高度關注地點、地點、地點。但隨著我們繼續考慮擴大這些商店的規模，我們將繼續更新我們的資本計劃。

Where we're spending a lot of our dollars in terms of the $3 billion is really around the omnichannel capabilities. And those things are things like personalization and the data science across our entire operation, our fulfillment infrastructure upstream and downstream, our digital marketplace. Those are the kinds of things that we're actually focused on in terms of our capital spend.

就 30 億美元而言，我們花費大量資金的地方實際上是全渠道能力。這些東西就像我們整個運營、我們上游和下游的履行基礎設施、我們的數字市場的個性化和數據科學。這些是我們在資本支出方面實際關注的事情。

And then your second question is really around share buybacks. We have $2 billion authorized, and we view that as very much open-ended. And as we think about the deployment of that excess cash, we're really focused on what's in the best interest of our shareholders. And so as we've talked about before, our first priority is really maintaining a healthy balance sheet. The next priority is investing in high-return initiatives, including strategic opportunities that will allow us to accelerate our Polaris strategies. And absent more attractive investments, we'll certainly return capital to shareholders in the form of dividends and a meaningful share buyback program. But the timing is very much open-ended for us, but we'll be very opportunistic about the $2 billion authorization.

然後你的第二個問題實際上是關於股票回購。我們有 20 億美元的授權，我們認為這是非常開放的。當我們考慮部署多餘的現金時，我們真正關注的是什麼最符合我們股東的利益。正如我們之前所說，我們的首要任務是真正保持健康的資產負債表。下一個優先事項是投資於高回報計劃，包括使我們能夠加速 Polaris 戰略的戰略機遇。如果沒有更有吸引力的投資，我們肯定會以股息和有意義的股票回購計劃的形式向股東返還資本。但時間對我們來說是非常開放的，但我們會對 20 億美元的授權非常投機取巧。

We'll move on to our next question from Omar Saad of Evercore.

我們將繼續討論來自 Evercore 的 Omar Saad 的下一個問題。

Sorry about that. Jeff, quickly -- quick follow-up on the study you guys did on the e-comm business, looking at the possibility of separating it. It doesn't sound like it was a close call at all, was it? And then a quick follow-up on sales. It seems like it's all macro issues kind of dampening the outlook for 2022. Any company-specific or sector-specific trends? Have you seen fashion and apparel sales peak? Or is it really all the macro inflation issues that are kind of guiding to -- tempering the guidance?

對於那個很抱歉。傑夫，快速——快速跟進你們對電子商務業務所做的研究，研究將其分離的可能性。這聽起來根本不像是一個接近的電話，是嗎？然後快速跟進銷售情況。似乎所有宏觀問題都在抑制 2022 年的前景。任何特定於公司或特定行業的趨勢？你見過時裝和服裝的銷售高峰嗎？還是真的所有宏觀通脹問題都在指導——調整指導？

So let me take the first question on kind of the e-commerce study that we did with the really kind of business review and shareholder value. So just to kind of reiterate, we had 2 big main objectives in this. And one was how we going to deliver shareholder value in the medium and long term. And the second one, as we said, we really want to respect the customer, the omnichannel behavior of the customer at all touch points. Was it a close call to your question? I would just tell you that it was a very unconstrained, and it was a really comprehensive review. We have very strong advisers. We've been working with the Board on this for many, many months. We brought in AlixPartners , as you know, in that October time frame. And we just went through every single scenario and basically came around to that one integrated Macy's at both Inc. and the brand levels deliver greater value than a separation of digital and physical assets.

因此，讓我提出第一個問題，關於我們對真正的商業審查和股東價值進行的電子商務研究。因此，重申一下，我們在這方面有兩個主要目標。其中之一是我們將如何在中長期內為股東創造價值。第二個，正如我們所說，我們真的想尊重客戶，尊重客戶在所有接觸點的全渠道行為。你的問題很接近嗎？我只想告訴你，這是一個非常不受約束的，而且是一個非常全面的審查。我們有非常強大的顧問。我們已經在這方面與董事會合作了很多很多個月。如您所知，我們在 10 月份的時間範圍內引入了 AlixPartners。我們剛剛經歷了每一個場景，基本上都是在兩家公司整合梅西百貨，品牌層面提供的價值比數字資產和實物資產的分離更大。

And I would just kind of hook on 4 things that were really key to our decision. The first one is, as Adrian described, was just our free cash flow. We are not capital-constrained to be able to invest in the business and in the digital elements of our business. That's one. The second one is just the high separation costs that come with separating digital and stores. As well as, number three, would be the ongoing costs from operations of having separated business. And then just the last one would be the executional risk to the customer, to our brands and what would happen with that.

而且我會在 4 件事情上對我們的決定非常關鍵。正如阿德里安所說，第一個只是我們的自由現金流。我們不受資金限制，能夠投資於業務和業務的數字元素。那是一個。第二個是分離數字商店和商店帶來的高昂分離成本。第三，將是分離業務的運營成本。最後一個就是對客戶、對我們品牌的執行風險以及隨之而來的後果。

Because of the extensiveness of this review, it did give us an opportunity to say, okay, what in the Polaris strategy is working? What should we shed? What should we pick up, and really, just being clear-eyed about what our opportunities are on that.

由於這篇評論的廣泛性，它確實讓我們有機會說，好吧，Polaris 戰略中的什麼是有效的？我們應該擺脫什麼？我們應該接受什麼，實際上，只是清楚我們的機會是什麼。

So we are, as we mentioned, accelerating a number of initiatives within that. First one, obviously, is one that was already in the works, which is digital and what we're doing with the marketplace. So $10 billion in digital, more to come in marketplace. New and expanded categories. So we can go into a lot of conversation about that, but let me just suffice it there, but the opportunity to go into new categories or expand the ones that we're existing. Big opportunity with data-driven personalization. And now that we've got 70% of our business being tied to our loyalty programs just gives us a lot of flexibility to move away from broad-based promotion and really personalizing our message all the way through the customer journey.

因此，正如我們所提到的，我們正在加速其中的一些舉措。顯然，第一個已經在工作中，它是數字化的，也是我們在市場上所做的。因此，100 億美元的數字化產品，更多的產品進入市場。新的和擴展的類別。所以我們可以就此進行很多對話，但我就足夠了，但有機會進入新的類別或擴展我們現有的類別。數據驅動的個性化帶來巨大機遇。現在，我們 70% 的業務都與忠誠度計劃相關聯，這為我們提供了很大的靈活性，可以擺脫基礎廣泛的促銷活動，並在整個客戶旅程中真正個性化我們的信息。

And then the fourth one that Matt asked about earlier is really off-mall, small format so -- and opportunities for that. I would love for Adrian to kind of weigh in on this because there are things that came up out of this that I'd love him to comment about. So just talk about it.

然後馬特早些時候問的第四個是真正的非商場，小格式所以 - 和機會。我希望阿德里安能夠參與其中，因為我希望他能對此發表評論。所以只是談談它。

Thank you, Jeff. One key thing that was really important from this work that Jeff described is just the fact that our strategy is durable. And it's important to acknowledge that today, we're in just a much different competitive position than we were even just 2 years ago. We're financially a much stronger business. We have a healthier balance sheet. And we're more efficient in how we think about our capital structure.

謝謝你，傑夫。 Jeff 描述的這項工作中真正重要的一個關鍵是我們的策略是持久的這一事實。重要的是要承認，今天我們所處的競爭地位與兩年前完全不同。我們在財務上是一個更強大的企業。我們擁有更健康的資產負債表。而且我們在思考資本結構方面更有效率。

And this is really evidenced by the $3 billion that we're planning to invest in capital spend over the next 3 years, in addition to the target of $3 billion of free cash flow that we're also expecting over that same time period. So the net of it is we got through the research with our advisers was, we're not capital constrained, as Jeff alluded to earlier. And the accelerated initiatives that Jeff highlighted are initiatives that we can pursue now and into the future.

我們計劃在未來 3 年內投資 30 億美元的資本支出，這確實證明了這一點，此外，我們還期望在同一時期實現 30 億美元的自由現金流目標。因此，我們通過與顧問的研究得到的結果是，正如傑夫之前提到的那樣，我們沒有資金受限。 Jeff 強調的加速舉措是我們現在和未來都可以推行的舉措。

Yes. Omar, your second question really kind of about the macro trends. What I'd say, what's interesting right now is just that the dormant categories that were all the way through the pandemic, they're very strong right now and to be expected. And they haven't fully rebounded to the levels that they were in 2019. So when you think about women's shoes and dresses and men's tailored clothing, which are all strengths for the Macy's and Bloomingdale's brands, those are going to continue. They're giving us great strength right now, but that will continue. But what I'm encouraged by was the brands and the categories that were strong all the way through the pandemic just continue to be strong at a good pace. That would be brands like -- or that would be categories like fragrances and home store, both in big ticket as well as in soft comp. Big ticket was not -- there was never a demand issue. There was a supply chain issue that's starting to really improve.

是的。奧馬爾，你的第二個問題確實是關於宏觀趨勢的。我想說的是，現在有趣的是，在大流行期間一直處於休眠狀態的類別，它們現在非常強大並且可以預期。而且它們還沒有完全反彈到 2019 年的水平。所以當你想到女鞋、連衣裙和男裝定制服裝時，這些都是梅西百貨和布魯明戴爾品牌的強項，這些都會繼續下去。他們現在給了我們很大的力量，但這種情況會繼續下去。但令我感到鼓舞的是，在大流行期間一直表現強勁的品牌和品類繼續保持強勁勢頭。這將是品牌之類的 - 或者是香水和家居商店等類別，無論是大票還是軟商品。大票不是 - 從來沒有需求問題。有一個供應鏈問題開始真正改善。

Fine jewelry was dormant -- or excuse me, was quite strong through the pandemic, continued strong, fine watches, sleepwear. So we're continuing to watch the apparel areas, they're still down, but they're getting better. And casual and athleisure was always good. The dress categories are picking up. So we expect that's going to be the momentum going forward. Emerging categories are coming up. Obviously, everybody knows we're in a denim cycle right now. That definitely has been strong for us.

高級珠寶處於休眠狀態 - 或者對不起，在大流行期間非常強大，持續強勁，高級手錶，睡衣。所以我們繼續關注服裝領域，他們仍然在下降，但他們正在變得更好。休閒和運動總是很好。服裝類別正在增加。因此，我們預計這將成為前進的動力。新興品類正在興起。顯然，每個人都知道我們現在正處於牛仔週期中。這對我們來說絕對是強大的。

And then new categories for us, things like toys, which we really didn't have a strong business. We doubled our business in 2021. We expect to double it again in '22. So I would tell you that that's kind of the movement of what's going on at the FOB level. I think the thing we're watching carefully is what continues on the supply chain, what continues on with inflation and as we lap the stimulus package and really looking at that demand that we're up against. So that's all factored into our guidance.

然後是我們的新類別，比如玩具，我們真的沒有強大的業務。我們的業務在 2021 年翻了一番。我們希望在 22 年再次翻一番。所以我會告訴你，這就是 FOB 級別正在發生的事情的一種變化。我認為我們正在仔細觀察的是供應鏈上的情況，通貨膨脹的情況以及我們實施刺激方案並真正關注我們面臨的需求時。所以這一切都納入了我們的指導。

We will now move on to our next question from Kimberly Greenberger of Morgan Stanley.

我們現在將繼續討論摩根士丹利的金伯利格林伯格提出的下一個問題。

Great. And I want to extend my great appreciation for all of the detailed guidance and the outlook, it's very helpful. I had a question -- my couple of questions are really about the outlook for 2022 and beyond. I'm wondering, Adrian, if you can just start with SG&A, for example. It looks like at the midpoint of your revenue guidance and the midpoint of your SG&A guidance, we're looking at about $8.3 billion of SG&A here in 2022. How should we think about varying your SG&A either up or down, if you were to beat your sales guidance or come in short of your sales guidance? Maybe you can just help us think about the variability there.

偉大的。我想對所有詳細的指導和展望表示非常感謝，這非常有幫助。我有一個問題——我的幾個問題實際上是關於 2022 年及以後的展望。我想知道，Adrian，例如，您是否可以從 SG&A 開始。看起來在您的收入指導和 SG&A 指導的中點，我們在 2022 年看到大約 83 億美元的 SG&A。如果您要擊敗，我們應該如何考慮上下調整您的 SG&A您的銷售指導或缺少您的銷售指導？也許您可以幫助我們考慮那裡的可變性。

And then on the quarters for 2022, obviously, with Q1 exhibiting the greatest year-over-year growth. Adrian, does the guidance imply that, that total revenue could be down year-over-year in the second and third quarter?

然後是 2022 年的季度，顯然，第一季度的同比增長是最大的。 Adrian，該指引是否暗示第二季度和第三季度的總收入可能會同比下降？

And then I'm not sure if you were, Jeff, would like to share just any overarching philosophy or strategy when you look at inventory management. It looks like you've got really super lean levels here coming out of the fourth quarter. As I look back to the fourth quarter of 2019, inventory was about 20% higher. Is there -- do you feel comfortable running with inventory at this level compared to 2019? Or at some point this year, would you look to at least close a piece of that gap?

然後我不確定您是否願意，傑夫，當您查看庫存管理時，是否願意分享任何總體理念或策略。從第四季度開始，您似乎已經達到了非常精益的水平。當我回顧 2019 年第四季度時，庫存增加了約 20%。與 2019 年相比，您是否覺得在這個水平上運行庫存很舒服？或者在今年的某個時候，您是否希望至少縮小這一差距？

Thank you, Kimberly. So let me just start a little bit talking about our outlook. And as we think about our long-term targets, what we would say is that we believe they're achievable and that they also reflect the momentum that we've already achieved and that we're building at Macy's. Now as it relates to the P&L, and I'll highlight a bit more around the SG&A, which is a key part of your question, as we look at 2021 and move into 2022, we feel that we've built a track record and are building a lot more confidence and conviction around the strategies that we're executing and also what's in the Q.

謝謝你，金伯利。所以讓我開始談談我們的前景。當我們考慮我們的長期目標時，我們想說的是，我們相信它們是可以實現的，它們也反映了我們已經實現的勢頭，以及我們正在梅西百貨建立的勢頭。現在它與損益表有關，我將更多地強調 SG&A，這是您問題的一個關鍵部分，當我們展望 2021 年並進入 2022 年時，我們覺得我們已經建立了一個良好的記錄和正在圍繞我們正在執行的策略以及 Q 中的內容建立更多的信心和信念。

So look, we exceeded top and bottom line expectations every quarter in 2021. We expanded merchandise margins every quarter. And a lot of this was driven by new capabilities around inventory productivity and our pricing disciplines. And we created SG&A leverage as sales grew this year. And we learned a lot about that. And as we think about 2022, we do expect to see an elevation in SG&A. But peeking in 2022, we expect SG&A leverage as we move beyond 2022 into the out years. So a lot of that really results in a healthy level of adjusted EBITDA margin, which we're committed to having at low double-digit levels, and at the same time, being able to generate strong free cash flow in order to support a lot of our investments in the business as well as returning value back to our shareholders.

所以看，我們在 2021 年每個季度都超出了頂線和底線預期。我們每個季度都擴大了商品利潤率。其中很大一部分是由圍繞庫存生產力和我們的定價規則的新功能推動的。隨著今年銷售額的增長，我們創造了 SG&A 槓桿。我們從中學到了很多。當我們想到 2022 年時，我們確實預計 SG&A 會有所提升。但展望 2022 年，我們預計在 2022 年之後進入未來幾年時，SG&A 的槓桿作用。因此，其中很多確實導致了調整後 EBITDA 利潤率的健康水平，我們致力於將其保持在兩位數的低水平，同時能夠產生強大的自由現金流以支持很多我們對業務的投資以及將價值返還給我們的股東。

With regards to the quarters, to your point, if you think about where we were in the first quarter of last year, we're still very much dealing with the pandemic. And so we do expect that our first quarter will be stronger relative to our outer quarters of Q2 through Q4. Now we took a very measured approach in terms of how we approach those additional quarters.

關於季度，就您而言，如果您考慮一下去年第一季度的情況，我們仍在努力應對大流行。因此，我們確實預計我們的第一季度將比第二季度到第四季度的外部季度更強勁。現在，我們就如何處理這些額外的季度採取了一種非常謹慎的方法。

As Jeff mentioned a bit earlier, we certainly recognized the headwinds with regards to inflation, which could impact discretionary spending for consumers, potential tightening consumption if employment gains start to revert, just a number of factors on the headwind side that really have to be balanced with the potential tailwinds that Jeff mentioned earlier around greater demand in areas like apparel with back to work as well as going out for social events and potential upside in international tourism. So very much a measured view.

正如傑夫早些時候提到的那樣，我們當然認識到通脹方面的不利因素，這可能會影響消費者的可自由支配支出，如果就業增長開始恢復，則可能會出現緊縮消費，只是逆風方面的一些因素確實需要平衡傑夫早先提到的潛在順風是圍繞服裝等領域的更大需求，如重返工作崗位以及外出參加社交活動和國際旅遊業的潛在上行空間。所以非常有衡量的觀點。

And so the key thing to your point about Q2 through Q4 is we also have to consider that the second and third quarter sales were strong last year, and that was heavily driven by the recovery and driven by the stimulus packages. So this makes our year-over-year comparisons in those quarters much more modest as we think about the entire year and the quarterly cadence throughout the year. But I would reiterate that we view our quarterly cadence to be more consistent with our pre-pandemic levels than what we've seen as we migrated through the pandemic.

因此，關於第二季度到第四季度的關鍵問題是，我們還必須考慮到去年第二季度和第三季度的銷售強勁，這在很大程度上受到了經濟復甦和刺激計劃的推動。因此，當我們考慮全年和全年的季度節奏時，這使得我們在這些季度的同比比較更加溫和。但我要重申，我們認為我們的季度節奏與大流行前的水平相比，我們在大流行中遷移時所看到的水平更加一致。

And then lastly, in terms of inventory, we've seen a very healthy level of inventory productivity in 2021. And we expect to have those gains as we look forward in 2022 and beyond. The data science is a very key part of that, really understanding where demand is by channel and by market, being able to better align our inventory to where that demand is, using the data science to better forecast not only our sales demand, but also the necessary receipts, all the way down to an item level. The data science is giving us a lot more confidence in our ability to maintain a healthy level of inventory productivity moving forward, including as we're expanding into new categories, both with our owned categories as well as marketplace categories.

最後，在庫存方面，我們在 2021 年看到了非常健康的庫存生產力水平。我們預計在 2022 年及以後的展望中會獲得這些收益。數據科學是其中非常關鍵的部分，真正了解各渠道和市場的需求，能夠更好地調整我們的庫存與需求的位置，使用數據科學更好地預測我們的銷售需求，以及必要的收據，一直到項目級別。數據科學讓我們對保持健康水平的庫存生產力向前發展的能力更有信心，包括我們正在擴展到新的類別，包括我們擁有的類別和市場類別。

And we'll take our next question from Paul Lejuez of Citigroup.

我們將向花旗集團的 Paul Lejuez 提出下一個問題。

Curious, as you think about the sales CAGR over the next several years through '24, how are you thinking about the breakdown between transactions versus ticket? And how will pricing factor into that? Curious just how you're thinking about how to build on the AUR gains from this year.

好奇，當您考慮到 24 年的未來幾年的銷售複合年增長率時，您如何看待交易與機票之間的細分？定價將如何影響這一點？很好奇你是如何考慮如何在今年 AUR 收益的基礎上再接再厲。

So as we think about our sales CAGR for the next several years, we're very much focused on low single-digit growth in terms of the top line. When you look at 2022 on a stack looking back to 2019, what you see is that we're up about 1.1% to 1.4%. Now when we think about the combination of things that are driving that, number one is the importance of having active customers that are shopping more frequently and that are expanding their spend, not just in the core categories that you've known Macy's for, for a long time, but also new categories that we're expanding to within our business as well.

因此，當我們考慮未來幾年的銷售複合年增長率時，我們非常關注收入的低個位數增長。當您回顧 2019 年的 2022 年時，您會看到我們上漲了約 1.1% 至 1.4%。現在，當我們考慮推動這一趨勢的因素時，第一是擁有更頻繁購物並擴大支出的活躍客戶的重要性，而不僅僅是在您認識梅西百貨的核心類別中，很長一段時間，但我們也在業務範圍內擴展到新的類別。

So we do expect, as we move forward, that AURs will certainly be a dimension of that, but much more modest levels than what we saw in 2021. But importantly, getting the frequency of customer purchases, getting them to expand into new categories, keeping the active customer file increasing, those are kind of the key drivers that's going to support our low single-digit growth in the upcoming years.

因此，我們確實預計，隨著我們的前進，AUR 肯定會成為其中的一個維度，但比我們在 2021 年看到的水平要溫和得多。但重要的是，獲得客戶購買的頻率，讓他們擴展到新的類別，保持活躍的客戶檔案增加，這些都是支持我們未來幾年低個位數增長的關鍵驅動因素。

We will now move on to next question from Oliver Chen of Cowen.

我們現在將轉到 Cowen 的 Oliver Chen 提出的下一個問題。

Jeff and Adrian, congrats on a great quarter. With the digital business near and longer term, what's the interplay going to be with margins as you think about the bottom line as well as gross margin? And you also mentioned replatforming. That sounds like a major opportunity. Would love your thoughts on some of the key priorities there as well as how you're driving differentiation in the marketplace. And as we look beyond to augmented reality and rethinking the mall virtually, on how you're approaching the metaverse as well.

傑夫和阿德里安，恭喜你取得了出色的成績。隨著數字業務的近期和長期發展，當您考慮底線和毛利率時，利潤率與利潤之間的相互作用是什麼？你還提到了平台重構。這聽起來像是一個重大機會。希望您對那裡的一些關鍵優先事項以及您如何推動市場差異化的想法。當我們超越增強現實並以虛擬方式重新思考購物中心時，您也將如何接近元宇宙。

You want to go with repositioning and I'll go with marketplace. Yes. Oliver, let me just say with marketplace, we're currently in the stages we're not ready to announce how we're approaching the categories. But I would tell you that the merchants are looking at kind of tangential categories to existing content digitally that we have either through owned inventory or through VDF. And obviously, when you look at the breadth of offering that we have, we still have a lot of categories that we're not in, where customers accept Macy's as a trusted resource for that.

你想要重新定位，我會選擇市場。是的。奧利弗，讓我對市場說一下，我們目前處於尚未準備好宣布我們如何接近這些類別的階段。但我會告訴你，商家正在以數字方式查看現有內容的切線類別，我們通過自有庫存或通過 VDF 擁有這些內容。顯然，當您查看我們提供的產品的廣度時，我們仍然有很多我們不屬於的類別，客戶接受梅西百貨作為值得信賴的資源。

So that's guiding kind of when you think about the road map of how we're looking at this, we're looking at what that -- what the introductions will look like over the next number of years, but kind of expect kind of tangential categories is how we will launch in August of 2022.

所以當你考慮我們如何看待這個的路線圖時，這就是一種指導，我們正在研究那個——未來幾年的介紹會是什麼樣子，但有點期待有點切線類別是我們將在 2022 年 8 月推出的方式。

Oliver, as it relates to gross margin, we expect to have higher levels of digital penetration over time. And the offsetting to that are really 2 key things. One is around the increased improvement in our retail margins driven by our pricing initiatives as well as how we're managing our inventory productivity as well as the initiatives that we're pursuing with regards to delivery expense. So we have a number of initiatives that's getting a lot of traction coming out of last year, entering into this year around reducing the number of split shipments, reducing the distance that our inventory and orders are relative to delivering into our customers. So we're pretty excited about the traction we're seeing there. And that's one of the reasons that we provided an outlook of elevated gross margin in future years into the (inaudible).

奧利弗，因為它與毛利率有關，我們預計隨著時間的推移會有更高水平的數字滲透。對此的抵消確實是兩件關鍵的事情。一是圍繞我們的定價計劃以及我們如何管理庫存生產力以及我們在交付費用方面所採取的計劃推動我們的零售利潤率不斷提高。因此，我們從去年開始採取了一些舉措，這些舉措得到了很大的關注，今年開始圍繞減少分批發貨的數量，減少我們的庫存和訂單相對於交付給客戶的距離。因此，我們對在那裡看到的牽引力感到非常興奮。這就是我們提供未來幾年毛利率上升前景的原因之一（聽不清）。

As we think about differentiated experiences with regard to replatforming, this is really an extension of the work that we've done with regards to our mobile apps. As we've talked about a bit earlier, the refreshing of our mobile assets resulted in higher conversion and just a better experience for our customers since we launched it in October. And our expectation around the broader replatforming of our website is very similar. We want to be able to manage a healthy level of conversion, AOV, help our customers navigate through our sites seamlessly and in a very convenient manner, having it connected to our store experience as part of our omnichannel strategy.

當我們考慮關於平台重構的差異化體驗時，這實際上是我們在移動應用程序方面所做工作的延伸。正如我們之前談到的，自 10 月推出以來，我們的移動資產的更新帶來了更高的轉化率和更好的客戶體驗。我們對我們網站更廣泛的平台重構的期望非常相似。我們希望能夠管理健康水平的轉換，AOV，幫助我們的客戶以非常方便的方式無縫地瀏覽我們的網站，將其與我們的商店體驗聯繫起來，作為我們全渠道戰略的一部分。

So it's really continuing the things that you heard us talk a lot about in 2021, which is around differentiated experience, new features, easy way to navigate the website. And we believe that those kinds of investments and experiences will be accretive to the brand.

因此，它確實延續了您在 2021 年聽到我們經常談論的內容，圍繞差異化體驗、新功能、輕鬆瀏覽網站的方式。我們相信，這些投資和體驗將為品牌增值。

Okay. And a quick follow-up on pricing and the pricing environment. What do you think about the customers' appetite for increases in elasticity? And how might you be sharing that with vendors as we think about inflation more broadly as well as cost inputs and demand?

好的。并快速跟進定價和定價環境。您如何看待客戶對增加彈性的需求？當我們更廣泛地考慮通貨膨脹以及成本投入和需求時，您如何與供應商分享這一點？

Yes. Oliver, it's a great question, and it's a different story depending on what category you're in and what brands you're in and what the actual item is, whether or not it is a key item, the opening price, whether or not it is fashion. So all of them have different rules. What I'd say is that where we have done this, we sought the most in big ticket because big ticket, based on the supply chain challenges and just production, we were dealing with price increases really in the very beginning of '21 all the way through.

是的。奧利弗，這是一個很好的問題，根據你所在的類別和你所在的品牌以及實際項目是什麼，它是否是關鍵項目，開盤價，是否是一個不同的故事這是時尚。所以他們都有不同的規則。我想說的是，在我們這樣做的地方，我們在大票中尋求最多，因為大票，基於供應鏈的挑戰和只是生產，我們在 21 年一開始就在處理價格上漲的問題。通過。

And what we found is that you get into like some of the sectionals and some of the price points for the larger big-ticket items, we could pass on, we basically -- those cost increases led to higher retail prices and higher tickets. Customers accepted those. As you get into kind of the opening price mattress or sofa business, something that might have been $500, $499 1 year by -- with the cost increases to make the same margin, it might have needed to have gone to $549 or $599, in those cases, the customers pushed back. So we've made those adjustments. We're looking at all of the kind of the architecture within each of the businesses.

我們發現，你會進入一些大件商品的部分和一些價格點，我們可以傳遞，我們基本上 - 這些成本增加導致更高的零售價格和更高的票價。客戶接受了這些。當您進入某種開盤價床墊或沙發業務時，1 年可能是 500 美元、499 美元——隨著成本的增加以保持相同的利潤，它可能需要達到 549 美元或 599 美元，在這些情況下，客戶推回。所以我們做了這些調整。我們正在研究每個業務中的所有類型的架構。

So we've got that -- in bulk of our categories, we've had those learnings, and we're building that into our private brand sourcing to be able to mitigate the cost there for where we don't believe a customer will take an additional ticket or higher ticket in those areas when we think about our -- your question about our brand partners, working with each of them. So if it's the bulk of the business, which in many of our brands are fashion, we're really focused on how do we put more make, more embellishment, more fashion into those goods, those sometimes and often can carry higher tickets. But if it's a basic commodity, basic tank, tee, short, we are working -- we could be working short. We could be having the same ticket. But then we're mitigating based on what we do with our pricing science. So we might have lower POS.

因此，我們已經掌握了這一點——在我們的大部分類別中，我們已經獲得了這些經驗，我們正在將其構建到我們的自有品牌採購中，以便能夠在我們不相信客戶願意的地方降低成本當我們考慮我們的 - 您對我們的品牌合作夥伴的問題時，在這些領域採取額外的票或更高的票，與他們每個人一起工作。因此，如果它是大部分業務，在我們的許多品牌中都是時尚，我們真的專注於我們如何在這些商品中加入更多的製作、更多的裝飾、更多的時尚，這些商品有時並且經常可以帶來更高的票價。但如果它是基本商品，基本坦克、T 卹、短褲，我們正在努力——我們可能正在努力。我們可能有同一張票。但隨後我們會根據我們對定價科學所做的工作進行緩解。所以我們可能有較低的POS。

We certainly were able to get more margin on the back end when we marked those goods down. We're not doing it at a national level anymore, we're doing it at a localized level. And we have the opportunity to look at dynamic pricing and what the unit ownership at a particular SKU with at a store level, what the outdate is, what that sell-through is, that's going to generate a different hard markdown price than you might get in another store that is either fulfilling more robustly to demand or they're selling through with customers that are coming into those stores.

當我們將這些商品降價時，我們當然能夠在後端獲得更多利潤。我們不再在國家層面做這件事，而是在地方層面做。我們有機會查看動態定價以及特定 SKU 在商店級別的單位所有權，過時是什麼，銷售量是多少，這將產生與您可能得到的不同的硬降價價格在另一家商店中，要么更強勁地滿足需求，要么他們正在與進入這些商店的顧客一起銷售。

So we just have much more science and data analytics that are helping us in all of our pricing decisions that are mitigating some of the effects of where we are having higher tickets. To the question that Adrian answered earlier from Paul, we do expect more modest AUR increases in 2022. We were up a little over 11% in '21. We expect it to be more in the 5% range across all of our categories in '22.

因此，我們只有更多的科學和數據分析來幫助我們做出所有定價決策，從而減輕我們獲得更高票價的一些影響。對於 Adrian 早些時候從 Paul 那裡回答的問題，我們確實預計 2022 年的 AUR 增長會更加溫和。我們在 21 年增長了 11% 以上。我們預計在 22 年我們所有類別的 5% 範圍內都會更多。

We will now move on to our next question from Michael Binetti of Credit Suisse.

我們現在將繼續討論來自瑞士信貸的邁克爾比內蒂的下一個問題。

Maybe -- you gave some thoughts on tourism for the year. Would you help us understand what tourism was relative to 2019 levels as you look at third quarter and fourth quarter, just so we can kind of understand the trend there?

也許——你對今年的旅遊業提出了一些想法。當您查看第三季度和第四季度時，您能否幫助我們了解相對於 2019 年水平的旅遊業，以便我們能夠了解那裡的趨勢？

And then I guess first quarter seems like it, to us, leaves a little bit of room for outperformance on the sales side. You just did -- your fourth quarter sales, retail sales were almost 4% above the fourth quarter of '19. But your first quarter guidance is a little over 3% below first quarter of 2019. I'm just trying to think about how you guys framed the upside, downside in the near term here in the first quarter?

然後我想第一季度對我們來說似乎是在銷售方面留下了一點表現的空間。你剛剛做到了——你的第四季度銷售額，零售額比 19 年第四季度高出近 4%。但是您的第一季度指導比 2019 年第一季度低 3% 多一點。我只是想想想你們是如何在第一季度的短期內確定上行和下行的？

Michael, let me take the first question. And I'll have Adrian take the second one. So with tourism, what I'd say is that the only quarter that was any different, so quarters 1 through 3 was over a 50% drop. And quarter 4 was slightly better, particularly at the Bloomingdale's brand. So pretty consistent. And as I mentioned on the earlier question, we -- what we did see was we saw a mix change within that international tourism business. More of it went to digital. Generally, it's about 12% of the business is digital. And it was 33% in '21 that was digital, to be expected.

邁克爾，讓我回答第一個問題。我會讓阿德里安拿第二個。所以對於旅遊業，我想說的是唯一一個不同的季度，所以第 1 到第 3 季度下降了 50% 以上。第 4 季度的情況稍好一些，尤其是在 Bloomingdale 的品牌中。所以相當一致。正如我在前面的問題中提到的，我們確實看到了國際旅遊業務的混合變化。更多的是數字化。一般來說，大約 12% 的業務是數字化的。 21 年 33% 是數字化的，這是意料之中的。

So what I'd say is that we're looking very carefully at any signs. We know it by country. We know it by store. Obviously, we're very connected with what's going on with tourist bureaus and advanced travel plans, what that looks like, what bookings look like on hospitality. Clearly, this affects -- there's like 30 doors in the Macy's chain and the number in the Bloomingdale's chain that are disproportionately affected by it. So we're watching it very, very carefully.

所以我想說的是，我們正在非常仔細地觀察任何跡象。我們知道它的國家。我們通過商店了解它。顯然，我們與旅遊局和高級旅行計劃的情況非常相關，這是什麼樣的，酒店預訂是什麼樣的。顯然，這會影響 - 梅西百貨連鎖店中有 30 扇門，而布盧明代爾連鎖店中的門數受到了不成比例的影響。所以我們正在非常非常仔細地觀察它。

And as mentioned, we do believe it's going to come back. But we were 50% down in aggregate. We don't have that built into our planning for '22 if any of that were to come back. We're expecting more of that to come back in '23 and beyond.

如前所述，我們確實相信它會捲土重來。但我們總共下降了 50%。如果其中任何一個要回來，我們沒有將其納入我們的 22 年計劃。我們期待更多的東西會在 23 年及以後回來。

So Michael, thank you for your question. As it relates to the momentum coming out of Q4, we were able to perform in Q4 primarily because of our competitive position, our inventory position, which we spoke to a lot in 2021 in terms of just inventory availability. And as we came into looking at our forecast and our guidance for 2022, including the first quarter, we really just had to be very measured and thoughtful in how we thought about that cadence, that quarterly cadence throughout the year.

所以邁克爾，謝謝你的問題。由於它與第四季度的勢頭有關，我們能夠在第四季度表現出色，主要是因為我們的競爭地位，我們的庫存狀況，我們在 2021 年就庫存可用性進行了很多討論。當我們開始審視我們對 2022 年（包括第一季度）的預測和指導時，我們真的必須非常謹慎和深思熟慮地思考這一節奏，即全年的季度節奏。

As Jeff mentioned a bit earlier, we really had to think about the evolution of potential headwinds balanced with the potential tailwinds that we've seen even more recently with the geopolitical uncertainty, with shifts in demand, with continued wage inflation and increases. So this makes our year-over-year comparisons more modest than what we would have seen in 2021. But yet, we actually expect to have growth as we look at our comparisons relative to 2019. So those are the kinds of things that we consider that really factored into how we thought about the first quarter and also the subsequent quarters for 2022.

正如傑夫早些時候提到的那樣，我們確實必須考慮潛在逆風的演變與我們最近看到的潛在順風與地緣政治不確定性、需求變化、工資持續上漲和增長之間的平衡。因此，這使得我們的同比比較比我們在 2021 年看到的更為溫和。但是，當我們查看與 2019 年的比較時，我們實際上預計會有增長。所以這些是我們考慮的事情這確實影響了我們對 2022 年第一季度以及隨後幾個季度的看法。

And Michael, just to add to what Adrian said, when you look at the first quarter of '21, it really was that March stimulus drop that happened in March and the effect that, that had on our business. So when you think about it as a comparison between that and '19, think about it that way.

邁克爾，只是為了補充阿德里安所說的話，當您查看 21 年第一季度時，確實是 3 月份的刺激措施下降發生在 3 月份，並且對我們的業務產生了影響。因此，當您將其視為與 '19 之間的比較時，請以這種方式考慮。

We will now move on to our next question from Carla Casella of JPMorgan.

我們現在將繼續討論摩根大通的 Carla Casella 提出的下一個問題。

This is Mike on for Carla. And congrats on the quarter. Just wanted to ask a question about leverage. Given that it's come down quite well ahead of schedule, I was just kind of curious, were there any noteworthy updates in regards to your conversations with the rating agencies? And should we kind of expect that the debt pay down, at least in the top line of the gross debt-to-EBITDA metric, is kind of put on pause for now as you kind of focus on other capital allocation priorities?

這是邁克為卡拉準備的。並祝賀本季度。只是想問一個關於槓桿的問題。鑑於它比計劃提前了很多，我只是有點好奇，你與評級機構的對話有什麼值得注意的更新嗎？我們是否應該期望債務償還，至少在總債務與 EBITDA 指標的最高線中，由於您專注於其他資本配置優先事項而暫時暫停？

Thank you for your question. To your point, we're just very pleased with the efforts that we've taken to delever the balance sheet. As I mentioned a bit earlier, the #1 priority for us is to maintain a healthy balance sheet. And as you know, we paid down the $1.3 billion of senior note in August of last year. And on an accelerated basis, we paid off the $294 million note in October that was actually due in January. When you think about the performance that we've had in 2021, we ended the year with a 1.8x leverage ratio, which is well under our target of 2.5x.

謝謝你的問題。就您而言，我們對我們為去槓桿化資產負債表所做的努力感到非常滿意。正如我之前提到的，我們的第一要務是保持健康的資產負債表。如您所知，我們在去年 8 月償還了 13 億美元的優先票據。在加速的基礎上，我們在 10 月份還清了 2.94 億美元的票據，該票據實際上應在 1 月份到期。當您考慮我們在 2021 年的表現時，我們以 1.8 倍的槓桿率結束了這一年，這遠低於我們 2.5 倍的目標。

So going forward, our focus is to make sure that leverage ratio remains below 2x or at 2x or below. So we'll just continue to pay debt as it matures and continue to have constructive dialogue with the rating agencies with regards to the health of our balance sheet and our capital structure.

因此，展望未來，我們的重點是確保槓桿率保持在 2 倍以下或 2 倍或以下。因此，我們將繼續償還到期的債務，並繼續與評級機構就我們資產負債表的健康狀況和資本結構進行建設性對話。

We will now move on to our next question from Chuck Grom of Gordon Haskett.

我們現在將繼續討論 Gordon Haskett 的 Chuck Grom 提出的下一個問題。

I apologize for the near-term question, but I'm just curious, you spoke to January being softer. And I guess I was just curious if you're seeing any noticeable change in spending patterns by income cohorts in light of some of these inflationary pressures and the lapped stimulus, the end of child tax credits, et cetera?

對於近期的問題，我深表歉意，但我只是好奇，你對一月份的態度比較溫和。而且我想我只是好奇，鑑於這些通脹壓力和重疊的刺激措施、兒童稅收抵免的結束等等，你是否看到收入群體的支出模式有任何明顯變化？

Chuck, no difference really when you look -- when I looked at the slowdown between January and November, December when you look at it by customer cohort. So obviously, if we look at all of our segmentation. And there were some aberrations based on weather in parts of the country. But when you look at it at an income level or you look at it by spend type, not a lot of differences.

查克，當您查看時，實際上並沒有什麼不同——當我查看 1 月至 11 月之間的放緩時，當您按客戶群查看時 12 月。很明顯，如果我們查看所有的細分。根據該國部分地區的天氣情況，存在一些異常情況。但是，當您從收入水平或支出類型來看時，差別不大。

We will now move on to our next question from Dana Telsey of Telsey Advisory Group.

現在，我們將繼續討論 Telsey 諮詢集團的 Dana Telsey 提出的下一個問題。

Congratulations on the results. As you think about the new customer number, which was a great increase in 2021, how are you thinking about that new customer target for 2022? And then just following on just delivery expense mitigation, how are you thinking about that over the next 2 or 3 years?

祝賀結果。當您考慮到 2021 年大幅增加的新客戶數量時，您如何看待 2022 年的新客戶目標？然後僅僅關注降低交付費用，您如何看待未來 2 或 3 年？

Let me take the customer, and I'll have Adrian take the second part, Dana. So I think the real focus that we have right now on customers is taking that 19.4 million customers that came into the brand in 2021 and getting a second and third and fourth purchase from them. And so really working through all of our personalization technique and seeding content that could be of interest to these customers to make sure that they're not one and done. We do have -- because you've got the bulk of them that are coming in via digital, a majority of them now are younger and more diverse. So making sure that we get a second purchase out of them and using our data and analytics technology and personalization to see that content. So that's a big focus of ours.

讓我來接客戶，我會讓 Adrian 接下第二部分，Dana。因此，我認為我們現在對客戶的真正關注是吸引 2021 年進入該品牌的 1940 萬客戶，並從他們那裡獲得第二次、第三次和第四次購買。因此，我們通過我們所有的個性化技術和播種這些客戶可能感興趣的內容來真正地工作，以確保他們不是一個人並且已經完成了。我們確實有——因為你有大部分是通過數字方式進入的，現在他們中的大多數人更年輕、更多樣化。因此，請確保我們從他們那裡獲得第二次購買，並使用我們的數據和分析技術以及個性化來查看該內容。所以這是我們的一個重點。

Obviously, when you've got new initiatives coming in, we're going to get new customers. One of the big opportunities for us with marketplace was the front of new customers that will come in through that. So -- but when I think about one of our biggest opportunities overall in terms of our loyalty program, it's personalization. So looking at those, all those new customers coming in and making sure we have great offers for them to stay with us.

顯然，當你有新的計劃進來時，我們就會得到新的客戶。對我們來說，市場的一大機遇是新客戶的前沿將通過它進來。所以——但是當我考慮到我們忠誠度計劃方面的最大機遇之一時，它就是個性化。所以看看那些，所有這些新客戶進來，並確保我們有很好的優惠讓他們留在我們身邊。

Dana, as it relates to delivery expense, we just strived to achieve greater efficiency as it relates to delivery expense. And this is really important because the growth of our digital business is just so paramount to the enterprise.

Dana，因為它與交付費用有關，我們只是努力提高與交付費用有關的效率。這真的很重要，因為我們的數字業務的增長對企業來說非常重要。

Now as a bit of context, in 2021, we did increase digital penetration to 39%, which was up about 9 percentage points over the fourth quarter of 2019. And so given this pace of increased digital penetration, we have a number of initiatives that we're pursuing to mitigate the delivery expense increases over time.

現在作為一個背景，在 2021 年，我們確實將數字滲透率提高到 39%，這比 2019 年第四季度提高了約 9 個百分點。因此，鑑於數字滲透率的這種增長速度，我們有一些舉措我們正在努力減輕隨著時間的推移而增加的交付費用。

Let me just give you a couple of examples. One is just really managing the number of packages that a customer receives with their order. And this is really about reducing the number of split shipments. And the kinds of initiatives that we put in place is really consolidating slow-moving items into one location so that we can actually minimize any excess packages when actually selling these fast-movers.

讓我舉幾個例子。一是真正管理客戶通過訂單收到的包裹數量。這實際上是為了減少拆分發貨的數量。我們採取的舉措實際上是將慢速商品整合到一個位置，以便在實際銷售這些快貨時，我們實際上可以最大限度地減少任何多餘的包裹。

The other piece is really around how we think about where the inventory should be located. So as we think about inventory allocation and our replenishment strategies, we're using data science to just better align where the demand is by channel and location across the country with where we're actually placing the appropriate level of inventory all the way down to an item level.

另一部分實際上是關於我們如何考慮庫存的位置。因此，當我們考慮庫存分配和補貨策略時，我們正在使用數據科學來更好地調整全國各地渠道和位置的需求與我們實際放置適當庫存水平的位置一個項目級別。

The third thing that we're doing is really looking at true item-level profitability, we call it [dead] net profit. And we look at this very actively within the organization to really understand how our buying decisions and how customers respond to some things like return rates impact the profitability of those individual items. And by managing that effectively, we can also help mitigate some of the complexity in terms of delivery expense within the supply chain as well.

我們正在做的第三件事是真正關注真正的項目級盈利能力，我們稱之為[死]淨利潤。我們在組織內部非常積極地看待這一點，以真正了解我們的購買決策以及客戶對退貨率等某些因素的反應如何影響這些單個項目的盈利能力。通過有效管理，我們還可以幫助減輕供應鏈中交付費用方面的一些複雜性。

So the sum of it is we're using a lot of analytics to really de-average the business, look at what's happening with our products to really understand ways to continue to mitigate delivery expense as digital penetration increases within our business.

因此，總而言之，我們正在使用大量分析來真正降低業務平均水平，看看我們的產品正在發生什麼，以真正了解隨著我們業務中數字化滲透率的提高，繼續降低交付費用的方法。

And we'll move on to our final question from Blake Anderson of Jefferies.

我們將繼續 Jefferies 的 Blake Anderson 提出的最後一個問題。

Just wanted to ask on the promotional environment, and apologies if we missed it. But for fiscal 2022, I know you mentioned you continue to expect AUR growth of 5% to 6%. Did you -- have you talked about how much you may be baked in for conservatism on the promotional environment, if that picks up at all?

只是想問一下促銷環境，如果我們錯過了，我們深表歉意。但是對於 2022 財年，我知道您提到您繼續預計 AUR 增長 5% 到 6%。你 - 你有沒有談到你可能會因為促銷環境的保守主義而受到影響？

So I would just say that we've got -- we do expect the promotional environment to heat up. But what I'd say is that I think everybody has learned the value of leaner inventories. And we're all buying a lot closer to lag than ever before. So to Kimberly's earlier question, when you look at the amount of our book stock versus the expected demand, we do expect the stock-to-sales ratio to be very favorable to margin expansion. So we're also looking to -- we've certainly seen some of the issues with having cluttered stores and too much content and really curating those and be more aggressive about the edit in our stores is really helping overall sell-throughs and for the offer for the customer, for the clarity of that.

所以我只想說我們已經 - 我們確實希望促銷環境升溫。但我想說的是，我認為每個人都已經了解了精簡庫存的價值。而且我們都比以往任何時候都更接近滯後。因此，對於金佰利早先的問題，當您查看我們的賬面庫存量與預期需求之間的關係時，我們確實預計庫存與銷售比率將非常有利於利潤率擴張。因此，我們也在尋求——我們當然已經看到了一些問題，即商店雜亂無章，內容過多，真正策劃這些問題，在我們的商店中更積極地編輯確實有助於整體銷售和為了清楚起見，為客戶提供報價。

So we do expect that we're going to be able to bring the inventory level in consistent with the demand we expect. And we're going to basically continue to leverage the lower base that we've gained over the past couple of years. So even when the promotional environment, if and when it increases, we will be ready for it.

因此，我們確實希望我們能夠使庫存水平與我們預期的需求保持一致。我們將基本上繼續利用我們在過去幾年中獲得的較低基數。因此，即使在促銷環境的情況下，如果它增加了，我們也會做好準備。

And I think one of the other big tools of that is really everything we've learned through our data science and all of our pricing initiatives will help us with whatever the demand, how that changes, we're going to be ready for maximizing the margin for the customer at the right time.

我認為其他重要工具之一就是我們通過數據科學學到的一切，我們所有的定價計劃都將幫助我們滿足任何需求，無論需求如何變化，我們都將準備好最大化在正確的時間為客戶提供保證金。

And it appears we have no further questions over the audio at this time, sir. I'd like to turn the conference back for any additional or closing remarks.

看來我們目前對音頻沒有進一步的問題，先生。如果有任何補充或結束語，我想把會議轉回去。

Thanks, everybody, for your attention and your interest in Macy's, Inc. Have a great day.

感謝大家對 Macy's, Inc. 的關注和關注。祝您有美好的一天。

Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes today's conference call. Thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect.

女士們，先生們，今天的電話會議到此結束。感謝您的參與。您現在可以斷開連接。