Home Depot (HD) Q3 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

Home Depot (HD 0.94%)
Q3 2023 Earnings Call
Nov 14, 2023, 9:00 a.m. ET

Contents:

• Prepared Remarks
• Questions and Answers
• Call Participants

Prepared Remarks:

Operator

Greetings and welcome to The Home Depot's third-quarter 2023 earnings conference call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. A brief question-and-answer session will follow the formal presentation. [Operator instructions] As a reminder, this conference is being recorded.

It is now my pleasure to introduce your host, Isabel Janci. Please go ahead.

Isabel Janci -- Vice President, Investor Relations

Thank you, Kristine, and good morning, everyone. Welcome to Home Depot's third-quarter 2023 earnings call. Joining us on our call today are Ted Decker, chair, president, and CEO; Ann-Marie Campbell, senior executive vice president; Billy Bastek, executive vice president of merchandising; and Richard McPhail, executive vice president and chief financial officer. Following our prepared remarks, the call will be open for questions.

Questions will be limited to analysts and investors. And as a reminder, please limit yourself to one question with one follow-up. If we are unable to get to your question during the call, please call our Investor Relations Department at 770-384-2387. Before I turn the call over to Ted, let me remind you that today's press release and the presentations made by our executives include forward-looking statements as defined in the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995.

These statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from our expectations and projections. These risks and uncertainties include but are not limited to the factors identified in the release and in our filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Today's presentation will also include certain non-GAAP measures. Reconciliation of these measures is provided on our website.

Now, let me turn the call over to Ted.

Ted Decker -- Chairman, President, and Chief Executive Officer

Thank you, Isabel, and good morning, everyone. Sales for the third quarter were $37.7 billion, down 3% from the same period last year. Comp sales declined 3.1% from the same period last year, and our U.S. stores had negative comps of 3.5%.

Diluted earnings per share were $3.81 in the third quarter, compared to $4.24 in the third quarter last year. The third quarter was in line with our expectations. Similar to the second quarter, we saw continued customer engagement with smaller projects and experienced pressure in certain big-ticket discretionary categories. In addition, lumber and copper and wire deflation and storm-related overlaps negatively impacted results in the quarter. Billy will discuss these and other business trends shortly. During the third quarter, our Pro customer outperformed our DIY customer.

While internal and external surveys suggests that Pro backlogs are lower than they were a year ago, they are still healthy and elevated relative to historical norms. With only one quarter left in the year, we believe the endpoints for previous guidance range are no longer likely outcomes. As a result, and as we announced in this morning's press release, we narrowed our guidance range for fiscal 2023. Richard will take you through the details in a moment.

As we've discussed, this year reflects the period of moderation. However, we are confident in our ability to navigate through this unique environment. We remain very excited about our strategic initiatives and are committed to investing in the business to deliver the best interconnected shopping experience, capture wallet share with the Pro, and grow our store footprint. As we discussed at the investor conference in June, we continue to invest in focus on creating a frictionless interconnected shopping experience for our customers. We are pleased with the progress we are making. Homedepot.com is one of the largest retail websites in the United States, and our digital app is one of the most highly rated in all of retail. And yet we believe there's still opportunity to reduce pain points across the shopping journey.

Our teams are identifying areas of improvement like better communication throughout the shopping journey and easier returns process and the ability to seamlessly and intuitively make changes to an order once placed. For our Pros, we're investing in a multitude of initiatives. We remain focused on building out our unique ecosystem of products and services. As a result, we are evolving our organizational structure and recently elevated Ann-Marie Campbell to senior executive vice president, better aligning our outside sales and service business in the global stores organization. Pro is one of our biggest growth opportunities, and this organizational change will allow us to better serve them by leveraging our full ecosystem of expertise, product assortment, fulfillment, and operations.

Our merchants, store and MET teams, supplier partners and supply chain teams did an outstanding job delivering value and service to our customers throughout the quarter, and I'd like to close by thanking them for their dedication and hard work. In addition, The Home Depot is proud to have tens of thousands of veteran servicemembers and military spouses in orange aprons. Last week, we announced that The Home Depot Foundation surpassed the goal of $500 million invested in veterans causes and also increased the total commitment to $750 million by 2030. And with that, I'd like to turn the call over to Anne.

Ann-Marie Campbell -- Executive Vice President, U.S. Stores and International Operations

Thanks, Ted, and good morning, everyone. Let me start by saying that I'm very excited about my new role and the alignment it will create between the outside sales and services business and the global store organization. As you heard at our investor conference in June, capturing a greater share of the Pros' wallet is one of our largest growth opportunities. It represents roughly $475 billion in addressable market, and today, we have relatively little share. The beauty of The Home Depot is that we have unique competitive advantages: our convenience stores, our leading brands, our engaged associates, our expansive fulfillment options that are on maps and that can be leveraged for the benefit of our customers, and that's exactly what we aim to do.

To do that, our new organizational structure will create stronger momentum with our teams to drive success with the Pro. Hector Padilla will focus on improving the experience for Pros shopping our stores. His 29-year tenure and knowledge of our store operations and new Pro capabilities will be instrumental in achieving our goals. And Chip Devine, our head of outside sales, brings nearly 30 years of distribution experience. He will work on building out capabilities to better serve more complex product needs.

Ultimately, we must focus on removing friction within our operations so our customers have a great experience every single time, no matter how they choose to shop with us, whether in the aisles of our stores, picking up product at the store, receiving product at their job site with a sales associate, or digitally. We know that most of our Pros use many of these capabilities across our ecosystem when shopping with us. For us, we are building trust and a partnership that lasts for decades and across generations. This means we have to work hard to deliver a great experience regardless of their point of interaction. As you know, we have identified additional growth opportunities with the Pro, which requires us to invest in new capabilities and functionalities across the business. Think about the initiative we are undertaking with the complex Pro.

This customer interacts differently. They are accustomed to interacting with their suppliers in a different way than our traditional business model. Pros working on complex projects want to reserve product, use trade credit, and have product delivered to their job site in a staged manner. While these capabilities exist in the market today, we are incorporating them in our full ecosystem to serve Pro customers in a way no one else can. I could not be more excited about the opportunity that lies ahead.

And for the in-store experience, over the last several years, we have talked about the importance of in-stock and, ultimately, on-shelf availability ,or OSA. Having the right products in stock in the right quantity and on the shelf available for purchase is critical. And we've implemented several initiatives to help us do this more effectively and efficiently. In the past, we've talked about GSR, or get stores right. GSR drives productivity by using our proprietary space allocation model coupled with tenured field merchandising teams to determine which categories to invest in on a store-by-store basis. More recently, we have talked to you about our rollout of Sidekick and computer vision.

Using machine learning technology, computer vision helps our associates quickly find D-power-sized products in the overhead, and Sidekick helps direct associates to key bays where OSA is low or outs exist. Today, these tools have been deployed across all U.S. stores. And while early days, they have driven meaningful improvement in our on-shelf availability. The beauty of these initiatives is that they also drive productivity.

They make it easier for associates to restock product, have a greater depth of high-velocity product, and ensure we remain in stock with more product on the shelf and available for sale. As a result, we enable our associates to focus on the most important task and allocate more time to deliver a better shopping experience. These are just a few examples of the many different types of initiatives that can drive significant value for customers, our associates, and our shareholders. Despite a challenging year, our amazing associates have remained engaged and ready to serve our customers, and I want to thank them for all they do. With that, let me turn the call over to Billy.

Billy Bastek -- Executive Vice President, Merchandising

Thank you, Ann. Good morning, everyone. I want to start by also thanking all of our associates and supplier partners for their ongoing commitment to serving our customers and communities. As you heard from Ted, during the third quarter, our sales were in line with our expectations.

However, we did have some unfavorable impacts from core commodity deflation and storm-related overlaps. We saw a continuation of a trend that we have been observing throughout the year with softness in certain big-ticket discretionary-type purchases. Instead of engaging in larger projects, customers continue to take on smaller projects. Turning to our department comp performance for the third quarter. Our building materials department posted a positive comp, and seven of our remaining 13 merchandising departments posted comps above the company average including plumbing, appliances, hardware, outdoor garden, millwork, tools, and paint. During the third quarter, comp transactions decreased 2.7% and comp average ticket decreased 0.3%.

Excluding deflation from core commodities, we experienced comp average ticket growth primarily driven by demand for new and innovative products. Deflation from core commodity categories negatively impacted our average ticket growth by approximately 60 basis points during the third quarter, driven by deflation in lumber and copper. During the third quarter, we continued to see a decline in lumber prices relative to a year ago. As an example, on average, framing lumber was approximately $420 per 1,000 board feet, compared to approximately $545 in the third quarter of 2022, representing a decrease of over 20%. Big-ticket comp transactions or those over $1,000 were down 5.2% compared to the third quarter of last year. We continue to see softer engagement in big-ticket discretionary categories like flooring, countertops, and cabinets.

However, we saw big-ticket strength in pro-heavy categories like roofing, installation, and portable power. Turning to total company online sales. Sales leveraging our digital platforms increased approximately 5% compared to the third quarter of last year. We continued to invest in the digital experience across our website and app and released a variety of enhancements in the third quarter. These range from simple improvements to help customers track orders to more complex things like updating our search and recommendation algorithms.

For those customers that transacted with us online during the third quarter, nearly half of our online orders were fulfilled through our stores. During the third quarter, we hosted our annual Labor Day appliance and Halloween events and were pleased with the results. In appliances, we were encouraged with the customers' engagement during the event. And 2023 was another record sales year for our Halloween program, both in-store and online, as our customers continue to add to their collection with our unique and exclusive product assortment.

As we turn our attention to the fourth quarter, we intend to continue this momentum with our annual holiday Black Friday and gift center events. In our gift center, we continue to lean into brands that matter most for our customers with our assortment of Milwaukee, Ryobi, Makita, DeWalt, Ridgid, Husky, and more. We will have something for everyone, whether it's our wide assortment of cordless Ryobi tools, DeWalt Atomic Drill and Impact kits, or our new Milwaukee M18 Forge batteries. These new M18 Forge batteries will be a game changer for our Pro customer, providing the most powerful, fastest charging, and longest life of any battery on the Milwaukee M18 platform. This quarter, I'm also excited to announce the addition of Wago to our powerhouse assortment of Pro brands including Milwaukee, USG, Custom Building Products, Leviton, and QEP, to name a few. It is these strategic vendor relationships that make us the product authority in home improvement, and the addition of Wago will help extend our position. Wago is one of the top requested most innovative programs in the wire connector segment that features a releasable lever lock wire connector that speeds up installation and saves space in tight applications.

We recently launched a number of SKUs in our stores which are exclusive to The Home Depot in the national big-box retail channel. Our merchandising organization remains focused on being our customers' advocate for value. This means continuing to provide a broad assortment of best-in-class products that are in stock and available for our customers when they need it. We will also continue to lean into products that simplify the project, saving our customers time and money. That's why I am so excited about the innovation we continue to bring to the market. With that said, I'd like to turn the call over to Richard.

Richard McPhail -- Executive Vice President, Chief Financial Officer

Thank you, Billy, and good morning, everyone. In the third quarter, total sales were $37.7 billion, a decrease of approximately $1.2 billion, or 3% from last year. During the third quarter, our total company comps were negative 3.1% with comps of negative 2.1% in August, negative 3.4% in September, and negative 3.7% in October. Comps in the U.S.

were negative 3.5% for the quarter with comps of negative 2.5% in August, negative 3.8% in September, and negative 4.1% in October. In local currency, Mexico and Canada posted comps above the company average. It is important to note that adjusting for storm-related overlaps and some seasonal shifts, monthly comps were relatively consistent across the quarter. In the third quarter, our gross margin was 33.8%, a decrease of approximately 20 basis points from the third quarter last year, which was in line with our expectations. During the third quarter, operating expense as a percent of sales increased approximately 120 basis points to 19.4% compared to the third quarter of 2022. Our operating expense performance during the third quarter reflects our previously executed compensation increases for hourly associates, as well as deleverage from our top-line results. Our operating margin for the third quarter was 14.3%, compared to 15.8% in the third quarter of 2022.

Interest and other expense for the third quarter increased by approximately $30 million to $438 million. In the third quarter, our effective tax rate was 23.3%, down from 24.4% in the third quarter of fiscal 2022. Our diluted earnings per share for the third quarter were $3.81, a decrease of 10.1% compared to the third quarter of 2022. During the third quarter, we opened seven new stores, bringing our total store count to 2,333.

Retail selling square footage was approximately 242 million square feet. At the end of the quarter, merchandise inventories were $22.8 billion, down $2.9 billion, or 11%, compared to the third quarter of 2022, and inventory turns were 4.3 times, flat to one year ago. Turning to capital allocation. After investing in our business and paying our dividend, it is our intent to return excess cash to shareholders in the form of share repurchases. During the quarter, we invested approximately $670 million back into our business in the form of capital expenditures.

And during the quarter, we paid approximately $2.1 billion in dividends to our shareholders, and we returned approximately $1.5 billion to shareholders in the form of share repurchases. Computed on the average of beginning and ending long-term debt and equity for the trailing 12 months, return on invested capital was approximately 38.7%, down from 43.3% in the third quarter of fiscal 2022. Now, I'll comment on our guidance for fiscal 2023. As you heard from Ted, with one quarter remaining in fiscal 2023, we no longer expect the endpoints of our previous guidance range as likely outcomes, and therefore, we are narrowing our guidance for 2023. We expect fiscal 2023 sales and comp sales to decline between 3% and 4%.

We are targeting an operating margin between 14.2% and 14.1% for the year. Our effective tax rate is targeted at approximately 24.5%. We expect interest expense of approximately $1.8 billion, and we are anticipating between a 9% and 11% decline in diluted earnings per share compared to fiscal 2022. In addition, as you heard from Anne, we continue to focus on driving productivity in the business. We have taken a number of actions that will help us realize the previously announced $500 million in annualized cost savings in 2024 and are fully confident that we will deliver on this commitment. We also remain focused on meeting the needs of our customers with our leading product authority in home improvement, strong in-stock levels, and knowledgeable associates. We will continue to prudently invest to strengthen our competitive position and leverage our scale and low-cost position to outperform our market and deliver shareholder value.

Thank you for your participation in today's call. And, Kristine, we are now ready for questions.

Questions & Answers:

Operator

Thank you. We will now be conducting a question-and-answer session. [Operator instructions] Our first question comes from a line of Simeon Gutman with Morgan Stanley. Please proceed with your question.

Simeon Gutman -- Morgan Stanley -- Analyst

Hey, good morning, everyone. In thinking about inflections and when we might see one, looking at the spread maybe between DIY and Pro, is the story of this quarter that maybe DIY is stabilized but the Pro is getting a little bit worse? And then, if that's right, and feel free to correct if that's wrong, you know, would that mean that it could take a little longer then for the Pro sort of normalizing to play out, and actually, the overall comp could get a little worse before it gets better?

Ted Decker -- Chairman, President, and Chief Executive Officer

Morning, Simeon, thanks for the question. I would say Pro and consumer, you know, it had the narrowest performance gap in some time, so they both performed reasonably well. You know, if you step back and look at the quarter, we -- we feel really good about the third quarter, and we narrowed our -- our comp guidance for the year because of that. And in fact, if you look at the performance of the business overall this year, if you look at the seasonality of Q1 and Q2, were pretty smooth in that minus 3% comp through the first three quarters of this year. And that's normalized for weather and storms and commodity price deflation.

And then, our regional businesses are also pretty consistent. We've seen the least variability in regions, and as I said, the narrowest gap between Pro and consumer. We had really good seasonal sell-through. And as prices have settled with abating deflation, we feel -- feel pretty good about that. And our operations are increasingly getting back to normal.

The supply chain is operating very well. Our inventory positions are better. Our in-stock rates are much better, as Ann took you through all the things we're doing in the store to improve on-shelf availability. Our value propositions, as Billy mentioned, are in great shape, and product innovation is better than it's ever been, and the wage investments are paying off. Our attrition is way down. And with that attrition being down, our associates have had more -- more time in the store, their ability to serve customers has improved.

So, all of that really is what delivered that consistent comp throughout the year. But, you know, to answer your specific question, as we sit here feeling really good about the operations, the, you know, share shift of PCE from pre-COVID to today, you know, has not completely reverted. And we're still not exactly sure where, you know, that reverts to. The asset class for home improvement is worth 15-odd trillion dollars more than it was pre-pandemic. And we know now that the Fed, it definitely has a higher for longer monetary posture, and that's going to continue to pressure durable goods and financing or -- or motivation for larger home improvement projects. So, as we said, you know, we see great engagement -- engagement in seasonal goods, engagement with smaller projects.

It's that the larger projects are -- are a bit down at the moment. So, that's what we're watching. I mean, we're not obviously talking about 2024 today, but you know, lots of good news in the operations of the business. Great news with still a very resilient customer. I mean, we just came off of a 4.9% GDP in Q3 driven by the consumer.

But as you know, we're -- we're looking at it this year this period of moderation for home improvement spend but couldn't feel better about -- about the business in our operations overall.

Simeon Gutman -- Morgan Stanley -- Analyst

Thanks for that. And then, and maybe the follow-up, you mentioned GDP. Given that home prices seem to be pretty sticky even with pretty weak turnover and may not get -- get any better, how should we -- should we think about GDP -- should we revert to GDP as maybe a better proxy for how the business could do?

Richard McPhail -- Executive Vice President, Chief Financial Officer

Simeon, this is Richard. You know, we have tried to take the most thoughtful approach possible in over the last few years of what the drivers of the business are and those things that indicate to us, you know, how we have settled back out of the pandemic period. And that's why we focused on share of PCE. Like Ted said, we're not going to talk about 2024 today. There is an underlying kind of layer of economic activity that supports the business.

But as Ted pointed out, number one, we still haven't reverted all the way back to -- to 2019 levels of PC share. And the Fed's stance of higher for longer has had and could have increasing pressure on the outlook for durables and housing-related spend. So, like Ted said, that's what we're watching at the moment. And we will -- we'll talk about 2024 when we get to our call next quarter.

Simeon Gutman -- Morgan Stanley -- Analyst

Thank you.

Operator

Our next question comes from the line of Zach Fadem with Wells Fargo. Please proceed with your question.

Zach Fadem -- Wells Fargo Securities -- Analyst

Hey, good morning. Richard, considering all the ins and outs of your cost base this year with wage investments, you've got the legal settlement in Q1, plus the cost saves next year, is it fair for us to assume your operating margins can expand in 2024? Or is there a certain level of comp that you will need to see to hold this 14%-plus margin?

Richard McPhail -- Executive Vice President, Chief Financial Officer

Morning, Zach, thanks for that question. You know, margin expansion is largely a function of top-line growth. there is a point there in the low positive comp digits where you see expense turn from deleverage to leverage. We're not going to take on 2024 guidance today.

What -- what we have done is we have put in place measures and, in fact, now have essentially completed actions that will provide us with a $500 million cost buffer heading into 2024. And so, regardless of the outlook, that provides some buffer in -- in margin.

Zach Fadem -- Wells Fargo Securities -- Analyst

Got it. And then, you mentioned that you would reinvest the legal settlement gain from Q1. So, first of all, any color on what this reinvestment actually is or what it would look like? And then, is it fair to say the investment will be largely in Q4, or was there part of that in Q3?

Richard McPhail -- Executive Vice President, Chief Financial Officer

We've had -- we've had part of that spent throughout the year. I think it is still a correct assumption that that favorability will be fully offset by the end of the year. And so, I really point you to our guidance as the best jumping-off point for your modeling.

Zach Fadem -- Wells Fargo Securities -- Analyst

Got it. Thanks for the time.

Richard McPhail -- Executive Vice President, Chief Financial Officer

Thanks, Zach.

Operator

Our next question comes from the line of Scot Ciccarelli with Truist. Please proceed with your question.

Scot Ciccarelli -- Truist Securities -- Analyst

Good morning, everyone. So, in some other retail verticals or a lot of other retail verticals, we're seeing a return to pre-COVID purchasing patterns, where you probably see more activity purchasing activity on weekends and around holidays and events with frankly bigger lulls in between. So, the questions are, one, are you seeing a similar general pattern? And two, assuming that is the case, are there ways for you guys to take advantage of that pattern from an operational standpoint to improve productivity? Thanks.

Billy Bastek -- Executive Vice President, Merchandising

Yeah, thanks for the -- for the question, Scott. It's Billy. Listen, as it relates to you know, different fluctuations in customer patterns and so forth, we haven't seen that. It's been very consistent throughout the quarter and, as Ted mentioned in his prepared remarks, really throughout the year when you account for some of the weather and some of the bathtub effect we saw in the first half. So, we haven't seen that.

As it -- listen, as it relates to promotional activity whatsoever, we have events in our stores that we love to execute and drive excitement for our customers. But from a promotional activity standpoint, it's really reverted back to pre-COVID times. It's -- you know, our pricing has certainly, as Ted mentioned, settled over the last several months. The environment certainly stabilized, so, you know, we operate in a very -- we operate in a very rational market and promotional environment, as I said, just as a return to kind of pre-pandemic times.

Ted Decker -- Chairman, President, and Chief Executive Officer

And we will always -- Scot, we will always focus on EDLP. I mean we have events during, you know, certain seasons that there are a lot of fun. They're engaging for the associates, they're engaging for our customers. But day in and day out, 12 months a year, we strive to be an EDLP retailer with great values every day.

Scot Ciccarelli -- Truist Securities -- Analyst

Got it, thanks. And then, just -- just a quick follow-up. On the big ticket discretionary, is there any specific areas where you actually seeing a positive inflection, or are they all still trending, call it, mid-single-digit negative?

Billy Bastek -- Executive Vice President, Merchandising

No, we -- we called out in my prepared remarks categories like portable power and so forth where we have seen great engagement. And candidly, you know, we're thrilled with the innovation that we continue to partner with our supplier base on that we bring to the market. And where we continue to see innovation, we continue to see great engagement with both the Pro and the consumer.

Scot Ciccarelli -- Truist Securities -- Analyst

Got it. Thanks, guys.

Operator

Our next question comes from the line of Chris Horvers with J.P. Morgan. Please proceed with your question.

Chris Horvers -- JPMorgan Chase and Company -- Analyst

Thanks. Good morning, everybody. So, a couple of follow-ups to prior questions. My first one is with the gross margin decline in the third quarter.

Can you talk a little bit about what drove that? You were lapping storm-related demand and you had some commodity deflation, so I'd thought that those would be positive. So, is that fair, and what were the offsets that -- that drove it lower?

Richard McPhail -- Executive Vice President, Chief Financial Officer

Thanks for the question, Chris. You know, I'll go back to Billy's comments, and Ted mentioned this as well. I think the most important observation we've made is that the worst of the inflationary environment is behind us. And as a result, as Billy said, retail prices are settling in the market.

Some prices are settling at levels higher than 2022, others are settling lower. But we're seeing some stabilization there that -- that Billy can talk about. Specific to the quarter and gross margin, there are some timing differences as some prices settled ahead of anticipated product and transportation cost benefits that will come through as we turn through our inventory. But those are -- I'd really sort of consider those timing. For the full year, our view on gross margin hasn't changed, and we expect to see slight pressure year over year.

But, Billy, maybe just talk about kind of the, you know -- the settling of prices.

Billy Bastek -- Executive Vice President, Merchandising

Yeah, I mean as you -- as you mentioned the, you know, the inflation environment seems to be behind us. Prices absolutely settled in, and again, I reiterate what I said, you know, work in a very rational market. And the other thing I'd add is this is no different than any other time frame. Frankly, we have a portfolio approach to how we take on whether it's lumber deflation that we've talked a lot about throughout the year or other, you know, ins and outs as it relates to the P&L.

So, very normalized environment, rational, and really a stabilization that we've seen across the board as it relates to pricing.

Chris Horvers -- JPMorgan Chase and Company -- Analyst

Got it, got it, got it, got it. So, that -- that makes sense. And then, on the -- on the variable cost side, you talked about a low single-digit leverage point historically and the 500 million of cost savings next year. You've had -- at the same time, you've had negative transactions for quite some time now.

So, can you talk about, you know, where we are in terms of the -- how -- how labor can maybe become -- how it becomes less variable over time maybe in the context of, you know, the percentage of stores on minimum staffing levels? And, you know, if -- if there is negative comps in '24 or over the next six months, you know, is the flexibility that you get from the 500 million offset by the fact that you'll be -- you could be having still negative transactions and less flexibility?

Richard McPhail -- Executive Vice President, Chief Financial Officer

Chris, thanks for the question. There's a lot of kind of 2024 conjecture built into that answer. I'll tell you that, right? So, I think when you're talking about changes in the nature of our labor model, the degree of -- of change in transactions really isn't material enough to say that changes the nature of our labor model.

Chris Horvers -- JPMorgan Chase and Company -- Analyst

Got it. Sounds good. Thanks very much.

Operator

Our next question comes from the line of Michael Lasser with UBS. Please proceed with your question.

Michael Lasser -- UBS -- Analyst

Good morning. Thank you so much for taking my question. You talked about the promotional environment discounting being very rational. If the cycle or the downturn for home improvement remains protracted and extended, under what conditions would you expect that discounting will be more intense than it was in 2019 across the industry? And if that were to be the case, would Home Depot choose to remain true to the everyday low price and the portfolio approach that it has, or would it look to protect market share and participate in some of that activity?

Ted Decker -- Chairman, President, and Chief Executive Officer

Morning, Michael. Yes, we will stay committed to -- to EDLP. And our promotional cadences, as we said earlier, the Black Friday, you know, appliances, and gift center, and -- and, you know, some spring events for -- for seasonal garden items to get traffic in stores, those -- those have -- have been, you know, the playbook for years and years, right, Billy?

Billy Bastek -- Executive Vice President, Merchandising

That's right.

Ted Decker -- Chairman, President, and Chief Executive Officer

And -- and we don't see us going away from that. In fact, we've -- we've stayed truer to reductions of promotions when you think of -- of categories like ceiling fans that I remember with constantly on and off, you know, 10% and 20% off; paint, which was a promotional category, where, you know, fives and 10s, and then, it went to 10 and 20s, We've backed off all of that in -- on the margin. We prefer to be even less promotional than we are today. If you had a -- a protracted downturn in the market, I mean for sure, we're going to be competitive, and for sure, we are going to protect our share. But when you think of the nature of a -- of a large home improvement projects, certainly one done by a Pro, you know, the labor component is such a big piece of that job. I mean just take paint, for example.

You know, if you're painting your -- your living room for, you know, $500, the paint in that job is going to be less than $100, and in it's your -- your labor bill, either your opportunity cost as a consumer or the Pro doing the job for you. So, you know, being super aggressive to -- to take $10 off the $100 component of a $500 job, I don't think really moves the needle. And that's why our -- our bias, our starting position would be no, we wouldn't -- we wouldn't chase a lot of price in that dynamic.

Michael Lasser -- UBS -- Analyst

Thank you. Very helpful. My follow-up question is, historically, Home Depot has under-promised and over-delivered in just about all facets. Is it -- is it realistic to think that you took the same approach when building this $500 million of -- of net cost savings for next year such that there could be upside to that number?

Richard McPhail -- Executive Vice President, Chief Financial Officer

That -- well, that that cost number was really more a function of having built capacity to handle the explosion in our volume during COVID, and then, the sort of other side of that hill where we pulled capacity in many forms back. And so, it was the right thing to do regardless of the environment. It does happen to provide a buffer for our operating margin as we move into 2024.

Michael Lasser -- UBS -- Analyst

OK, thank you very much, and have a great holiday.

Richard McPhail -- Executive Vice President, Chief Financial Officer

You too.

Operator

Our next question comes from the line of Steven Zaccone with Citi. Please proceed with your question.

Steve Zaccone -- Citi -- Analyst

Thank you. Good morning, everyone. Thanks for taking my question. Congrats, Ann, on the new role.

I wanted to focus on the Pro side of the business. So, the commentary about growing with the complex Pro, in the past, there's been a focus on the flatbed distribution centers and the rollout on a regional basis. Is that still very much the strategy for the next couple of years? And as you zoom out and think about the opportunity with the complex Pro, what are the top priorities within those next one to two years?

Ann-Marie Campbell -- Executive Vice President, U.S. Stores and International Operations

Steven, thank you. Thank you so much for the kind words there. You know, Chip is in the room, and he has been intimately, you know, knowledgeable about that. And so, I'm going to throw it over to Chip, and he'll talk a little bit about some of the capabilities that we continue to leverage and some of the functionalities and capabilities that we will continue to build.

Chip Devine -- Senior Vice President, Outside Sales

Yeah, thank you, Steven. We are going to continue certainly our march down to the expansion of our outside sales teams and continue to grow the complex Pro as it was mentioned in the earlier marks. The connectivity into the store is an important part of this asset build as well. Our Pros shop in our stores every single day, and connecting that ecosystem to our flatbed delivery systems is part of that.

So, as we look and expand into different markets as we move forward from where we currently are, we will continue to evaluate the best opportunity to expand those distribution assets as well to support our growth in Pro.

Steve Zaccone -- Citi -- Analyst

OK, thanks. I wanted to revisit Simeon's question about inflection because I know it's a -- it's a challenging backdrop to predict. But I guess, as you think about the business, what are the key building blocks to take the business from this period of moderation to a more stable market backdrop when you talked about low single-digit market growth? You know, I'm curious if you could opine on, is it really PCE shift, you know, is it rates. Just -- just any -- any help you provide will be helpful.

Thank you.

Ted Decker -- Chairman, President, and Chief Executive Officer

Yeah, Steven, for that, you know, we're always looking at a balance between ticket and transactions. And, you know, what was -- what was interesting during the COVID period, we had inflation. So, we had -- we had AUR up, and we had had ticket up, also driven by basket size, but the engagement was so high, you really didn't have elasticities. You had -- you had driving ticket and transactions, and that's what led to the 25% comp. As inflation has abated in, primarily, commodities, and those prices have come down, you've seen, you know, a fall-off in ticket.

And you didn't -- you didn't get the elasticity, you know, initially that you'd expect, and that was because people were still powering through projects. And now, it's a mix of, you know, what's -- what's the -- the level of -- of response from pricing versus pull forward versus, you know, the Fed's stance and higher interest rates. So, that -- that's all the dynamic that's muddying the traditional ticket and transaction dynamic. But what's healthy for us, you know, is a solid comp, you know, equally balanced between ticket and transactions, and that's -- that's what we'd be looking for. And now, we -- we've said, you know, prices have essentially leveled. Our -- our ticket, you know, was down modestly.

And if you take out commodity, our ticket would have been up for the quarter. And then, transactions, you know, we're still working through a bit of that PCE shift, pull forward, you know, whatever that dynamic might be. But, you know, we'd be looking for -- for growth in each in a nice balance going forward.

Steve Zaccone -- Citi -- Analyst

Very helpful. Thanks, guys.

Operator

Our next question comes from the line of Brian Nagel with Oppenheimer. Please proceed with your question.

Brian Nagel -- Oppenheimer and Company -- Analyst

Hi, good morning. Thanks for taking my question. The question I have, I think Michael may have asked previously just about price actions, but I guess maybe to expand that a bit further. So, we've been discussing now this trend in weakness in bigger ticket for a while.

I mean, obviously, a very unique demand backdrop. But again, from your perspective, particularly as you look toward '24, are there other levers that Home Depot could pull, you know, to potentially spur better demand within -- within big ticket other than -- other than price?

Ted Decker -- Chairman, President, and Chief Executive Officer

Well, the No. 1 way that we're focused to -- to drive demand is with the complex Pro. So, it's -- it's -- that is our key strategy, and that's what we're focused on. It's a $200 billion space.

As we've defined the 950 split evenly Pro in consumer and at the 475 that's Pro, there's 200 billion that is, you know, larger pros, more complex spend that we're building out the capabilities to serve that -- that demand. And that, Brian, you know, is what we're, you know, very very focused on and think for years and years that is going to be a driver of our business as we take share in that sort of $200 billion white space.

Brian Nagel -- Oppenheimer and Company -- Analyst

Yeah, thanks, Ted. Got it. And then, my second -- my follow-up, a much quicker. We obviously -- you narrowed your guidance for the balance of the year.

We talked about trends in the fiscal third quarter, but any commentary on sales trends early here in fiscal Q4?

Richard McPhail -- Executive Vice President, Chief Financial Officer

Our performance in the first two weeks is on track to achieve our full-year 2023 guidance.

Brian Nagel -- Oppenheimer and Company -- Analyst

Very good. I appreciate it. Congrats again.

Richard McPhail -- Executive Vice President, Chief Financial Officer

Thank you.

Operator

Our question comes from the line of Peter Benedict with Baird. Please proceed with your question.

Peter Benedict -- Robert W. Baird and Company -- Analyst

Hey, guys, thank you for taking the question. Another one on average ticket here. So, pre-COVID average ticket around $67. I think now it's kind of trending closer to $90, so up 35%.

Richard, just wondering if you have any perspective on kind of a like-for-like SKU inflation component there versus the big-ticket mix. It sounds like your like-for-like inflation is -- seems to be stabilizing. I know there's innovation that can make things not like for like, but just curious as you think about the big-ticket exposure there and what -- what -- what could potentially play out there, you know, how big of a deal is that? Thank you.

Richard McPhail -- Executive Vice President, Chief Financial Officer

Thank you for the question. I think there are -- there are a few answers to that. First of all, we have seen inflation abate and really kind of settle on a like-for-like basis across the portfolio. I think it's interesting, you see some -- you know, we've seen different dynamics in big ticket over the years as we've had lumber inflation and deflation, in particular, skewing those results in big ticket.

But, Billy, maybe you talk a little bit about trends there.

Billy Bastek -- Executive Vice President, Merchandising

Yeah, I mean, and I just -- you know, Ted's response back to Brian on unique categories like drywall, where we have capabilities, roofing, installation, portable power, where we've added innovation, we continue to see great both Pro and consumer reaction to just the innovation and things we're seeing. Ad it relates to big ticket, you know, obviously, you've seen some deferral and so forth as we talked about. And certainly, you know, the pull forward is probably still playing a part in that as we continue to get further away from, you know, the pandemic. So, we'll watch that closely.

We don't see anything -- as I mentioned, stabilized pricing, a rational environment. And we don't see anything, you know, differing from -- from what we've seen over the last, you know, multiple months now.

Peter Benedict -- Robert W. Baird and Company -- Analyst

OK, thanks for that, guys. I just -- I guess turning to maybe leverage and the pace of buyback. And if we stay in this environment of, let's call it, moderation in demand, how do you think about just maybe balancing your buyback approach leverage? I mean you're still operating below the two times. Is there anything that prevents you from kind of moving up to that two times, or are you -- just kind of curious, your latest thoughts around those -- those topics.

Thank you.

Richard McPhail -- Executive Vice President, Chief Financial Officer

Thank you. You know, we've -- we've maintained a position very close to that two times debt to EBITDA leverage ratio, and we intend to do so in the foreseeable future. We will also, you know, really maintain consistency with respect to capital allocation. We invest in the business first.

We pay our dividend. And then, as we determine excess cash, we flow that to our shareholders in the form of repurchases. To your point, to date, we've repurchased $6.5 billion. There's really no change in our stance.

And so, I think that's -- that's the important takeaway there.

Peter Benedict -- Robert W. Baird and Company -- Analyst

OK, thanks so much. Good luck.

Operator

Our next question comes from a line of Michael Baker with D.A. Davidson. Please proceed with your question.

Mike Baker -- D.A. Davidson -- Analyst

OK, thanks. Just thinking about the fourth quarter, if we take the midpoint of the implied guidance, it does suggest a little bit of a deceleration, yet you know, it does seem like your business has been consistent. Is that just a function of -- you know, am I reading too much into that, or do we expect a deceleration? And maybe a second part of that, as you said, Halloween was really strong historically [Audio gap] to your trimmer tree or your holiday decorating business. I think it's like in 10 of the last 14 years, your fourth-quarter comp has been better than the third quarter.

Why should this year be different than that? Thanks.

Richard McPhail -- Executive Vice President, Chief Financial Officer

Thanks for the question. You know, we -- we -- the narrowing of the range is truly what it is. We -- we saw the extreme points of that range become less likely, and so we felt it would be helpful for our investors for us to narrow that range. There has been an assumption all year, from the beginning of the year, that our guidance reflected a reversion of our share of PCE from the pandemic time period back to 2019 levels.

Our prior guidance range assumed that that share would continue to revert throughout the year. We've seen that reversion gradually and steadily, and our current range still has that assumption built in for Q4 that we're largely reverted but not all the way back. So, there is some -- some notion of that in our guidance.

Mike Baker -- D.A. Davidson -- Analyst

OK, so sounds like it's -- like you said, it's just a function of getting to -- to the middle of the range. If I could ask one other question. You talked a little bit about -- about storms and seasonality. I think a lot of retailers have said it's been a warm fall.

How does that impact you? Do you need it to get cold and, you know, as we go through the fourth quarter to -- to drive your business? How should we think about that? Thanks.

Billy Bastek -- Executive Vice President, Merchandising

It's been a little warmer, obviously, but not a big impact. We started to see -- where the weather is normalized, we started to see some of that fall clean-up and fall business really really take off. You know, haven't seen obviously snow and so forth. So, you know, it's kind of right in line with what we'd say is a little more normalized year where you see the weather act a little more flawless.

You've seen, you know, the -- the categories and businesses that you'd expect to trend up -- trend in that -- in that positive direction.

Mike Baker -- D.A. Davidson -- Analyst

Appreciate it. Thanks for -- thanks for taking the time.

Billy Bastek -- Executive Vice President, Merchandising

Thank you.

Operator

Our next question comes from the line of Steven Forbes with Guggenheim. Please proceed with your question.

Steve Forbes -- Guggenheim Partners -- Analyst

Good morning. Ted -- or maybe for Ann, just a follow-up on Pro sales, really focusing on the Dallas market versus the chain average. Can you -- can you update us on how that market is performing? And then, maybe just comment on any behavioral differences that you're noting between Pro markets based on the maturity of your strategic initiatives. Focus on the complex pro, I mean can you -- are you -- are you seeing and being able to analyze very, like, predictable behavioral changes?

Ann-Marie Campbell -- Executive Vice President, U.S. Stores and International Operations

Yeah, I'll start off by just saying that the capabilities and functionalities that Hector and Chip has been working on over the last several years is certainly going to help us engineer a great deal of momentum and success with the Pro. And you know, Chip, you know, I'll throw it over to you again because of how intimately you are knowledgeable about that. But there is this -- the Pro ecosystem is what we're focused on now, and not the in-store side or the come -- not only the in-store side but the complex Pro. And as we build out these capabilities and we see the effectiveness of these capabilities, we're going to continue to leverage those.

And, Chip, you know, I'll throw it over to you to kind of give a little bit more details on Dallas.

Chip Devine -- Senior Vice President, Outside Sales

Yeah, thanks, Ann. And, Steven, yes, absolutely, where we built capabilities inclusive of assets -- distribution assets and where we've expanded our sales force, we've seen meaningful impact and growth. Our outside sales team is the best-performing cohort of all Pro. So, we're going to continue, as I mentioned before, to invest in that and then add assets, where necessary, in the appropriate markets.

Steve Forbes -- Guggenheim Partners -- Analyst

Thank you. Maybe just a quick follow-up for Richard or Billy. All the ticket conversations here, any way to just sum up how the quarter for big ticket progressed relative to expectations? It sounds like it performed better than expected. You have sort of stabilization in multiyear big-ticket comp trends.

I would imagine that wasn't the expectation, but any -- any way to help us frame on how the quarter progressed for big ticket versus internal plan?

Billy Bastek -- Executive Vice President, Merchandising

Yeah, I think -- you know, listen, it was -- it was largely how we -- we planned it. We -- you know, I called out, you know, some great interaction from our consumers as it relate to appliances. Having said that, we were in a better inventory position there. So, we saw some tailwind from just our better inventory position as it relates to that.

But it largely played out exactly how we had thought it would, really, again, back to the prior comment to a very balanced year across the board when you -- when you account for some of the weather shifts early on and then what we -- what we were lapping with the hurricane. Very balanced across the -- across the board and across the regions.

Richard McPhail -- Executive Vice President, Chief Financial Officer

I think it's important, though, thematically just to sort of repeat the point, this -- this stance by the Fed of -- of higher for longer, you know, is sort of coming across in surveys. You know, there is -- there is a deferral of larger projects. And so, if you just want to zoom all the way back to the true macro here and the forces on ticket that we're watching, that's probably the largest macro force.

Billy Bastek -- Executive Vice President, Merchandising

That's right.

Steve Forbes -- Guggenheim Partners -- Analyst

Thank you.

Isabel Janci -- Vice President, Investor Relations

Christine, we have time for one more question.

Operator

Thank you. Our final question comes from the line of Dean Rosenblum with Bernstein. Please proceed with your questions.

Dean Rosenblum -- AllianceBernstein -- Analyst

Hey, guys, thanks so much for taking my call, my question. My question is about the Pro and really just understanding the performance of the Pro relative to the comp overall and then splitting that out between store sales to Pro versus complex project sales to Pro. Or just to make sure I'm understanding, you put up a -- call it a negative three comp. DIY and Pro very close to one another, U.S.

slightly worse than Canada and Mexico. So, I'm assuming, you know, U.S. Pro, call it, down two, 2.5. And then, can you just either verify or correct that? And then, can you characterize Pro sales in the store relative to Pro sales outside of the store through the outside sales force and the CFCs? Thanks.

Richard McPhail -- Executive Vice President, Chief Financial Officer

Well, I'm taking the last part first. It's an ecosystem like Ann said. We're actually not -- we don't have goals or targets with respect to the separation of store and delivered sales. The point is actually lifting all sales, and that's what we've seen consistently in every market where we've rolled out capabilities.

You know, originally, we worried, OK, our delivered sales going to begin to cannibalize the store; the opposite has proven true. And so, we are progressing in a way that we're pleased. With respect to your first question, factually, the Pro did outperform the consumer in Q3, albeit at the narrowest margin we've seen in quite some time. If you actually normalize for commodity impact, the -- the Pro was essentially flat for the quarter.

Dean Rosenblum -- AllianceBernstein -- Analyst

OK, great, thanks. And I guess my follow-up would be when you guys measure big project versus small projects, can you just clarify for us how you are determining what constitutes a big project versus a small? Is it like transaction size over a thousand bucks? And if you could clarify that for us, that'd be great.

Richard McPhail -- Executive Vice President, Chief Financial Officer

We infer from category sales and from class sales. You know, when you -- when you look at categories that are more likely to sell at higher volumes in larger projects, kitchens, flooring, millwork to an extent, we are doing some inference. We also ask our customers what they're seeing and what kind of projects they're working on. We use external survey data that tells us that the nature of projects is kind of shifting from larger to smaller, and so it's a triangulation.

Dean Rosenblum -- AllianceBernstein -- Analyst

That's great. That's super helpful. Thank you so much, guys. Good luck in the fourth quarter.

Ted Decker -- Chairman, President, and Chief Executive Officer

Thank you.

Operator

Ms. Janci, I'd like to turn the floor back over to you for closing comments.

Isabel Janci -- Vice President, Investor Relations

Thanks, Kristine, and thank you, everyone, for joining us today. We look forward to speaking with you on our fourth-quarter earnings call in February.

Operator

[Operator signoff]

Duration: 0 minutes

Call participants:

Isabel Janci -- Vice President, Investor Relations

Ted Decker -- Chairman, President, and Chief Executive Officer

Ann-Marie Campbell -- Executive Vice President, U.S. Stores and International Operations

Billy Bastek -- Executive Vice President, Merchandising

Richard McPhail -- Executive Vice President, Chief Financial Officer

Simeon Gutman -- Morgan Stanley -- Analyst

Zach Fadem -- Wells Fargo Securities -- Analyst

Scot Ciccarelli -- Truist Securities -- Analyst

Chris Horvers -- JPMorgan Chase and Company -- Analyst

Michael Lasser -- UBS -- Analyst

Steve Zaccone -- Citi -- Analyst

Chip Devine -- Senior Vice President, Outside Sales

Brian Nagel -- Oppenheimer and Company -- Analyst

Peter Benedict -- Robert W. Baird and Company -- Analyst

Mike Baker -- D.A. Davidson -- Analyst

Steve Forbes -- Guggenheim Partners -- Analyst

Dean Rosenblum -- AllianceBernstein -- Analyst

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