Bed Bath & Beyond (BBBY) Q4 2021 Earnings Call Transcript

Bed Bath & Beyond (BBBY)
Q4 2021 Earnings Call
Apr 13, 2022, 8:15 a.m. ET

Contents:

• Prepared Remarks
• Questions and Answers
• Call Participants

Prepared Remarks:

Operator

Welcome to the Bed Bath and Beyond fiscal 2021 fourth quarter earnings conference call. My name is John. I'll be your operator for today's call. [Operator instructions] Please note the conference is being recorded.

And I will now turn the call over to Susie Kim, head of Investor Relations.

Susie Kim -- Vice President of Investor Relations

Thank you, and good morning, everyone. Welcome to our fiscal 2021 fourth quarter earnings call. Joining us today are Mark Tritton, our president and CEO; and Gustavo Arnal, our chief financial officer. Before I begin, let me remind you that our fiscal 2021 fourth quarter earnings release and slide presentation can be found in the Investor Relations section of our website at bedbathandbeyond.com and as exhibits to our related Form 8-K.

This conference call on the slides we refer to may contain forward-looking statements, including statements about or references to our outlook regarding the company's performance, our internal models, and our long-term objectives. All such statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from what we say during the call today. Please refer to our most recent periodic SEC filings for more detail on these risks and uncertainties, including the Risk Factors section in our annual report on Form 10-K and our quarterly reports on Form 10-Q. The company undertakes no obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements.

Additionally, the information we will discuss today contains certain financial measures that exclude amounts or are subject to adjustments that have the effect of excluding amounts that are included in the most directly comparable measure, prepared in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles. For reconciliation to the most comparable measures presented in accordance with GAAP, please refer to the table in our earnings release available on our website and included as an exhibit to our Form 8-K filed today. It is now my pleasure to turn the call over to Mark.

Mark Tritton -- Chief Executive Officer

Thank you, Susie, and good morning, everyone. As we close the first year of our comprehensive transformation, we're disappointed that our near-term results demonstrated a dislocation between our short-term operations versus our long-term strategy. Sales and gross margin during the fourth quarter did not reflect our team's hard work and execution against our long-term transformational efforts. Our business has been impacted by extraordinary macroeconomic factors, such as the derailing of the global supply chain, continued disruptions from the Omicron variant, unprecedented inflation, rising interest rates, and a turbulent geopolitical landscape which have also weighed on consumer confidence.

Internally, these factors have exposed more short-term to medium-term vulnerabilities that we did not see at this stage of our transformation as we completely rebuild the foundation of our business. There have been operational deficits in our near-term execution, and as we enter fiscal 2022, we are focused on stabilizing our business while navigating the headwinds that still persist. The core issues remain embedded in pervasive supply chain challenges, which led to fourth quarter comparable sales of minus 12%, and adjusted gross margins of 28.8%. Specifically, the lack of available inventory, which impacted us last quarter, has proved to be a continuing impediment.

Despite our overall inventory levels, product not available for sale or held at ports indices remain at above normal highs. Sales through the fourth quarter suffered an impact of approximately $175 million or a high single-digit deficit as a result of the ongoing lack of in-stock and available to sell merchandise in our Bed Bath banner. This level of pressure continued toward the end of the quarter and throughout March. For perspective on a traditional November through January basis used by many of our retail peers, our quarterly comparable sales would have been only down high single-digits.

Furthermore, through our own data tracking analysis, industry trends have continued to worsen since February as macro market volatility and overall consumer uncertainty has surged. Our now-available-to-sell inventory remained high at 30% across key categories compromising our traffic generating recovery strategies. For example, our initial projections had anticipated recovery in Q4, driven by a return to a more normalized secular strategy. However, major items advertised in that circular were affected by out of stocks and therefore, were unable to proceed as planned.

We will continue to align marketing resources with in-stock availability, and redirect our strategies to other avenues such as postcards and doorbuster events which have seen relative success. Although, these do not mirror the traffic generating power of our circular. In line with our strategy, we continue to increase our structurally healthier merchandise margins to our own brands, as well as more efficient pricing and promo optimization. However, historically high freight and shipping costs, and unexpected port related fees as part of those costs had a significant negative impact on overall gross margins for the quarter.

Excluding these escalating supply chain costs, our adjusted gross margin would have been 32.4%. Taking a step back. 2021 marked the first year of our multi-year transformation. Amidst the macroeconomic environment, we have been charting a new course for our group by reconstructing our operating model to drive greater long-term efficiency and effectiveness.

Our recent financial performance even further underscores the need for our long-term strategy, and in this first year, I'm encouraged that we achieved all of our transformational milestones to set the foundation for our future. This was no small feat. Firstly, we fortified our product offering through the launch of eight new owned brands. Collectively, we exited 2021 at a run rate of approximately 25% in penetration of our brands, exceeding our 20% goal for the year and compared to only 10% in 2020.

Through our brands, we introduced a new suite of products to differentiate Bed Bath and Beyond, while also creating new opening price points to remain competitive, especially now in light of inflation pressures. Furthermore, we continue to deliver improvements with our customer connections in both digital and in-stores. We enhanced our digital first Omni-always commitment through the enablement of cost business shopping on our website as well as the launch of our own marketplace. Our physical store footprint also improved as we initiated 131 store remodels, of which we completed approximately 80, and optimized our fleet by closing more than 200 underperforming stores program to date.

Through expanded partnerships with Uber and DoorDash for same day delivery and earlier BOPIS opportunities, the combination of our digital and stores channel has been a powerful enabler for the future of our Omni-always customer promise. In fiscal '22, we will build on these foundations we established in '21. Inventory, pricing, and traffic will continue to be the key areas of focus in the near-term as we navigate the volatility of the current operating environment. Our year to transformation milestones will support these efforts, including the core of our product.

pillar will be clearly on unlocking inventory currently held in transit so that we can again fulfill customer demand in full. Additionally, we're going to continue building on the work we've done with our supply chain infrastructure. Following the opening of our first four regional distribution centers in Pennsylvania in very late 2021, work on our second distribution center for the West Coast is well underway and slated for opening in late 2022. The modernization of our operational foundation will be important tailwinds as we emerge from the current environment and protect us in a completely different way in the future.

2022 will also see some significant changes to our marketing offering. We will launch a new loyalty program that will span all our banners and fulfill our goal to create a compelling value and engagement proposition for our customers. We will also begin to see our digital channel evolve further. This week, we soft launch the Moment Ad Network, our retail media platform that builds on our authority in the home and baby markets.

Customers and suppliers will be able to connect in a new way across our digital properties as they engage with our business for each important life moment. Our strategic imperative remains to rebuild our authority and creating a home and family for all generations, from infancy through adulthood, even into retirement. We'll continue building brand awareness and strength through partnerships and organic investments. Last week, we announced the exciting launch of our Kroger collaboration on their website, expanding the reach of both Bed Bath and Beyond and buybuy BABY to Kroger's extensive customer network.

We are currently working on our initial shop in shop concepts for Kroger, which remains slated for this year. I'm also pleased to announce that we will be opening 20 to 25 new buybuy BABY stores this year in line with our previously outlined plans to capture the opportunity we are seeing in this key space. In addition to incubating new offerings within our Harmon banner. Of course, our Bed Bath and Beyond store remodel program remains underway with a further 130 to 150 locations planned for this year, taking our remodel total to well over 200 by year-end.

We will share updates on our transformation as the year progresses. I'd like to take a moment to address buybuy BABY, as this is a firsthand example, our ability to stabilize and optimize businesses without encumbering forces. Buybuy BABY achieved approximately $1.4 billion in sales for fiscal 2021, growing double-digits versus last year, with an adjusted EBITDA margin in the mid-single digits. The actions we took in 2021 to recover and drive our baby business proved successful, and we look forward to unlocking additional value from this banner as we announced a few weeks ago.

At this time, we do not have an update on the work that has already been underway by our board and management team to define how we unlock further value. We will update you all on material developments as they arise. We will not be commenting further on this work today. Now on to Gustavo to cover our financial results in more detail.

In addition to addressing it, our outlook for fiscal 2022. Gustavo?

Gustavo Arnal -- Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer

Thank you, Mark, and good morning, everyone. As Mark said, we remain focused on our transformational plans. However, we are not pleased at all with our short-term results. While the macroeconomic environment will never be fully predictable, 2021 showed us a need to improve how we anticipate and manage volatility.

Our fragile legacy systems are a limitation but still, we need to compensate and correct accordingly. For fiscal fourth quarter, which covers the period ending February 26, reported net sales continued to reflect the impact from planned non-core banner divestitures completed last year, as well as our ongoing store fleet optimization program. For the quarter, total net sales were $2.5 billion, which included a comp sales decline of 12% versus last year and down 8% in comp versus 2019. Sales were negatively impacted by approximately $175 million, or a high single digit deficit as a result of the continued low levels of in-stock and available to sell merchandise in our Bed Bath banner.

These dynamic did not improve as the quarter progressed. By channel, store comp sales were down 8%, while digital sales declined 18% versus COVID fueled growth of 86% last year. Despite a normalization in digital demand from prior peaks, our digital channels still represented 41% of total net sales. Overall penetration continues to be nearly double 2019 levels, which we have largely maintained all year.

By banner, Bed Bath and Beyond comparable sales decreased 15% versus last year, and 9% versus 2019. Buybuy BABY continue to deliver strong results with comp growth of low single-digits on the quarter, fueled by mid-teens growth in stores. This resulted in double-digit growth for the full year on top of solid overall growth last year. And now moving on to gross margin performance.

Adjusted gross margin was 28.8%, 400 basis points lower than last year, even 40 basis points from product cost increases, net of own brand mix, pricing, and promotional optimization, as well as a 360 basis points primarily related to transition port fees, freight, and shipping inflation. Freight and shipping cost increases were significantly higher than expected, 170 basis points. Container rate and inbound freight rates moved unpredictably higher in late January and February, in part given the spike in oil prices as the year started. Further, given the significant portion of inventory that has been suggested at ports, warehouses or DCs, we will charge for the first time unexpected -- related the mortgage fees.

This led to an additional unanticipated impact of 100 basis points. And lastly, warehouse related inventory adjustments of 90 basis points were reflected as we finalize the year, which we do not expect to continue in this magnitude moving forward. Excluding the supply chain cost escalations in the quarter, Q4 adjusted gross margin was 32.4%. SG&A dollar expense was in line with our internal plans, although slightly higher as a rate of sales due to a lower revenue base.

With the sales and gross margin performance, we reported an EBITDA loss of $30 million. These led to adjusted EPS of negative $0.92. Looking ahead, as you all know, the importance of pricing has been a critical theme for us as we've been navigating the current environment. Given a lower margin profile, just 1% of pricing and promo optimization equates to approximately 100 basis points of gross margin and accordingly, significant EBITDA dollars.

Therefore, although we have been managing our promotional cadence acutely with regular price sales improving versus last quarter and last year, it was still not enough to offset the volatile supply chain environment. Pricing and cost recovery will be key to show our resilience in the near-term, and as we've demonstrated previously, we are implementing strategies to recover from current conditions sustainably. Turning to our balance sheet and cash flow. Cash and liquidity remain solid during the fourth quarter.

We generated approximately $280 million of operating cash flow. We continued with our planned transformational investment of approximately $120 million. These critical investments supported store remodels, supply chain, and IP systems reformation. This led to positive free cash flow of approximately $160 million.

In Q4, we executed approximately $230 million in share buybacks, or approximately $14 million shares. As planned, we complete our $1 billion repurchase program inclusive of approximately $40 million of share repurchase in March. As a result, we have taken our total share count from $126 million shares to $80 million shares for a reduction of approximately 37%. Our cash and investment balance remains healthy at $0.5 billion with total liquidity at quarter end of $1.4 billion.

I will now share our outlook commentary for fiscal 2022. Due to the volatility and macro uncertainty of the current operating environment, we're providing qualitative parameters related to where we currently are in the first quarter and the fiscal year. This has been informed by both current trends as well as broad operating expectations for the full year. At this point in the first quarter, we continue to see challenging sales and traffic trends in our business due to lack of inventory availability as well as a change in market patterns.

Additionally, we're seeing an emerging uncertainty related to consumer sentiment based on market and retail indicators that show a distinct slowdown in consumer demand. Quarter-to-date, comp sales are running negatively in approximately a 20% range. We anticipate many of the operating dynamics we experienced in the fourth quarter, both industry wide and internal, to continue in the first quarter. As such, adjusted gross margin will reflect inflation headwinds that will not be fully offset by pricing in the near-term.

In terms of SG&A as announced last quarter, we have initiated an expense reduction plan across fleet optimization, fixed costs, and discretionary spending. With these, we expect lower SG&A spend versus prior year despite inflation. But still, rate deleverage will occur given our mid-term sales decline. We will continue to manage our cost and expense structure responsibly and prudently.

Adjusted EBITDA will likely be negative for the first quarter due to the factors I have just discussed. For the full year, we anticipate a sequential recovery in comps by the second half of the year, driven by a normalization in supply chain conditions, both within our own capabilities and in the broader macroeconomic environment. Turning to gross margins, we're expecting modest gross margin expansion for the full year. Gross margins in the second half of the year are anticipated to improve year-on-year as comparisons ease and supply chain conditions improve.

Adjusted SG&A expense is expected to be approximately flat to last year with our planned $100 million optimization aiming to offset inflationary pressures. These dynamics should lead to adjusted EBITDA above prior year in the second half of 2022. Our balance sheet and cash flow assumptions include capex of approximately $400 million, with more than half associated with transformational investments, including the remodel and new store openings Mark discussed earlier. As noted, we have completed our $1 billion share repurchase program.

Capital allocation for further share repurchases and debt reduction will be assessed in the second half of the year, given our outlook. We continue to remain focused on navigating the near-term while investing in our foundational transformation through IT and supply chain capabilities, as well as business growth and investments to execute our strategy. I will now turn the call over to Mark for some closing remarks.

Mark Tritton -- Chief Executive Officer

Thank you, Gustavo. Transformations are complex and often non-linear, but achieving a strategy of this scale amid the current macro economic environment has made it even more difficult to deliver results commensurate with our efforts. The friction in these moments is real, and we're operating in a retail and consumer industry as challenges I have personally seen in my career outside of that critical COVID time frame. However, we remain steadfastly dedicated to our customer, our brand, and our strategy.

Even after the peak of COVID, we continue to see 35 million customers cherish our differentiated banners across Bed Bath and Beyond, Buybuy BABY, Harmon, and Decorist. We have a digital reach that saw more than 875 million visits throughout the year, further enabled by a powerful fleet of more than 900 evolving stores. Fiscal 2021 was a year of reformation and establishment of key capabilities still employed across our core strategic pillars. While operational execution may have temporarily thwarted our short-term efforts, our long-term strategic execution continues to build sequential momentum.

By the end of 2022, we will have structural capabilities to bring us closer to industry standards and greatly improve our proficiency to renew our business for long-term growth and profitability. The core tenets of our strategy are sound, and we will improve our operational deficits by learning from our experiences and leveraging the strengths of our teams, who I think for their dedication and resilience, we will now take questions.

Questions & Answers:

Operator

[Operator instructions] And our first question is from Simeon Gutman from Morgan Stanley.

Hannah Pittock -- Morgan Stanley -- Analyst

Hi. Thanks for taking the question, and this is actually Hannah Pittock on for Simeon. Is there any commentary you can give us on the fourth quarter and quarter to date on traffic versus ticket trends as well as like units per basket versus price per unit? And within those metrics where you see the most upside over the next quarter or two in the most downside impacts.

Mark Tritton -- Chief Executive Officer

Yeah. Thanks, Hannah. We did see strength in our conversion rates at store level and in digital. We did see strength in terms of the average in retail.

Some of that was associated with the cost increases that we did implemented and in line with industry inflation. And we did see some positive signs in terms of the basket in Q4. That coming into Q1 has been a little suppressed based on some of the dynamics that we're currently seeing. But that gives us confidence that when we can get our inventory in place, and we can get our communication aligned that we have a good outreach with our existing AMP customer base with good indicators there.

Hannah Pittock -- Morgan Stanley -- Analyst

Got it. Thank you.

Operator

Go ahead, Justin. Your line is open.

Justin Kleber -- Robert W. Baird and Company -- Analyst

Thanks, guys. Can you hear me?

Mark Tritton -- Chief Executive Officer

Yeah. Sorry. Who's on the line?

Justin Kleber -- Robert W. Baird and Company -- Analyst

-- yeah, it's just Justin Kleber, Blair. Thanks for taking the question. Mark, just first for you. That $175 million impact you cited from inventory being trapped upstream.

I guess, how do you measure that figure? Are you looking at cart abandonment online? Just trying to understand how -- if you would have actually sold that inventory if it was on hand?

Gustavo Arnal -- Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer

Hey, Justin, Gustavo here. We -- it's -- we estimate this the same way we did in the third quarter. We look at loss sales at the store level. We know our in-stock in key items are significantly lower than they've been historically, and we could calculate week-by-week, category-by-category, and store-by-store how much we've lost on that.

Similarly, on digital sales, we can track all of the out-of-stock views and the lost sales from those transactions. And keep in mind that when we do these estimates, we trimmed down, we assume that there's going to be some transference as customers don't find what they were looking for, but anyway, compensate for a different item.

Justin Kleber -- Robert W. Baird and Company -- Analyst

OK. And then just one question. I'm curious what you guys are seeing in your wedding registry business. I know the DEC mentioned that you're the number five retailer in baby registry.

So specific to weddings, just how do registry creates maybe compared to the last year? And are you doing anything different within that business to capitalize on the expected wedding boom here in 2022? Thank you.

Mark Tritton -- Chief Executive Officer

Yeah, we're seeing an uptick in wedding and baby creates. We actually have adjusted our outreach in the way that we were investing in this key business. I think that we see upward trends in wedding that everyone's expecting and want to capitalize on that. So early indicators through the back end of Q4 on creates bodes well.

And again, we just need to get our inventory into stock to be able to facilitate that.

Justin Kleber -- Robert W. Baird and Company -- Analyst

All right. Thank you, guys.

Operator

Our next question is from Michael Lasser from UBS.

Michael Lasser -- UBS -- Analyst

Good morning. Thanks for taking my question. So, Mark, you talked a lot about the transformation, plan, and all the actions -- that has taken up until this point, yet traffic remains a key source of weakness. What is the plan for improving traffic from here, especially as Bed Bath and Beyond key customer demographic has really been aging.

It's -- resonated well with the baby boomer demographic over time?

Mark Tritton -- Chief Executive Officer

Yeah. We actually have a multifaceted customer in our target there, Michael, and we have been working with that. Again, we have to get base inventory into in line to be able to facilitate that. But we actually have got been increasing our numbers in our loyalty cluster, which ensures that the customers don't get more sticky and they purchase a higher rate.

That's actually multi-generational that we've been attracting. Registry will be key tool in that. And we're also working with an outreach to our lapsed customers, and customers where we're creating a high degree of change in the individual market. So a complete revision of our marketing and brand strategy to create an expanded profile on the customer base, but also a deeper, more personalized engagement with existing customers.

Operator

[Audio gap] from Steven Forbes from Guggenheim.

Steven Forbes -- Guggenheim Partners -- Analyst

Good morning, Mark, Gustavo. I wanted to focus on the banner level margin performance. Mark, you mentioned buybuy BABY mid-single digit EBITDA for the full year. I was wondering how consistent that banners profitability was throughout the year, given the challenges that was -- that were noted.

And more importantly, right, where the profitability of that banner is running today or where it was in the fourth quarter?

Gustavo Arnal -- Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer

Hey, Steve, Gustavo here. Look, we're not going to get into profitability by banner, by quarter at this stage. But I can tell you, we're very happy with the financial performance of buybuy BABY. As we said, we finished the year $1.5 billion -- $1.4 billion in revenue, growing double-digits with mid-single digit EBITDA margin.

The full world profitability of the business is very attractive. We're keenly focused on gross margin, as you may imagine, and a part of their own gross margin of this business have been fairly consistent throughout the year. And our fourth quarter performance day was definitely in line with that plan.

Operator

[Audio gap] from William Reuter from Bank of America.

William Reuter -- Bank of America Merrill Lynch -- Analyst

Good morning. I have one question. In terms of your outlook for freight improving in the back half of the year, I can't remember your contracting strategy. Are you contracting for this year? And have you entered into agreements that will lock in some lower costs year-over-year?

Mark Tritton -- Chief Executive Officer

We're working actively as always on the reduction of our costs, William. We're not going to comment on individual contract negotiations at this time. But we also have a lot of supply chain cost improvement that we can build in through the maturation of our supply chain transformation, which we said is a multiyear transformation, and we haven't had that benefit to-date. We've done all the establishment work, but we haven't had that transparency into -- at actualizing.

So, there's both internal benefits and negotiated benefits that we'll be working on throughout 2022.

Gustavo Arnal -- Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer

And as we flow the product out of the warehouses, we would not expect to see port-related fees beyond the second quarter or so.

William Reuter -- Bank of America Merrill Lynch -- Analyst

Thank you.

Operator

[Audio gap]

Mark Tritton -- Chief Executive Officer

I'm sorry, what was that?

Susie Kim -- Vice President of Investor Relations

Operator, we're having a hard time hearing you.

Operator

We now have a question from Jason Haas from Bank of America.

Jason Haas -- Bank of America Merrill Lynch -- Analyst

Great. Good morning. Thanks for taking my question. So you have a large shareholder that put out a letter advocating for a pivot in the strategic, I guess, path for the company and also advocating for potential sale of the buybuy BABY unit.

I think they put out -- they think buybuy BABY is worth several billion dollars. So I'm curious what your thoughts are on, if there's a need for a change in the strategic strategy and just what you think of that valuation for buybuy BABY?

Mark Tritton -- Chief Executive Officer

Yeah. Thanks, Jason. Firstly, I think upon entering this company in late 2019, it was really clear that the business had been underinvested in and required a full-scale transformation, and full scale investment in the business. And we outlined a robust plan, and it had to be robust because the level of work required to return us to a level of competition with our -- the competitive retail market.

I think the supply chain moment really exemplifies where other retailers are able to cope better than we are at this moment in time in this pivot because of that underinvestment. So a robust transformation plan, we cannot survive unless we implement that appropriately. And so technology, supply chain, assortment planning, pricing, the way we cost and where we source from, all these have been undertaken robustly. First year completed, benefit is not yet generated clearly.

So, the strategy remains in place, and we're always looking at our strategy with our Board and are open to ways that we can finish that to improve. But we have to master a number of fundamentals through this transformational plan. So that stays as is. What we now have is that we have been talking to the street and maybe some time around buybuy BABY, as an opportunity that is not showing its true value to a shareholder.

And how do we unlock that? And so the work began, and in January, our Board agreed to create a strategic committee solely focused on what is the best way of unlocking the value of the buybuy BABY asset, which is a growth accelerator asset. And as we've shared today, is performing very well, performing consistently and has a good, consistent profitability level. That work is in flight. We won't be commenting on that, but we look forward to sharing more.

Operator

Next question is from Jonathan Matuszewski from Jefferies.

Jonathan Matuszewski -- Jefferies -- Analyst

Great. Good morning. Thanks for taking my question. Just wanted to ask about the trends when comparing Bed Bath versus buybuy BABY.

How much of a delta do you think is tied to a more domestic supply chain for buybuy BABY relative to maybe just a varying degree of demand across categories? And I guess relatedly, how did the in-stock rates look at a banner like buybuy BABY relative to core Bed Bath? Thanks so much.

Mark Tritton -- Chief Executive Officer

Yeah. Thanks, Jonathan. Great question. I think there's a key differentiator first in the status of the business versus its LY trajectory.

So in the year prior, we had execution issues, but also to -- we had a lessening demand in baby. I think parents were much more reticent to be out in stores, and were shopping for basic needs rather than once. We saw that pivot in the fourth quarter and throughout 2022 -- 2021, actually. Our stores really bounced back with double-digit growth, which makes up for a more profitable outcome.

Then the flip side of that is product availability. And to your point, yes, there is more of a domestic source base currently in own -- in baby versus Bed Bath & Beyond, which helped enable it, but it also has key categories like apparel, which we don't have in Bed Bath that really turned back on in the second half. They were in stock and they're more domestic currently in availability, so that worked in its favor. So, some LY crossing -- the borders there that helped as well as a differentiated merchandise mix, and therefore supply chain model.

Operator

And our final question is from Seth Basham from Wedbush.

Seth Basham -- Wedbush Securities -- Analyst

Thanks a lot, and good morning. My question is around your customer count. At your Analyst Day, you talked to 40 million customers. Today, Mark, you talked to 35 million.

So, you're down double-digits. And I'm just trying to understand what's driving that? It was simply the COVID bump where you've got a lot of new customers online that aren't sticky, or there are other issues that you think are emerging that are leading customers to defect, so to speak?

Mark Tritton -- Chief Executive Officer

Yes, I think it's a great question, Seth. I think a couple of inferences there. I think you're right. I think during the COVID moment, we definitely saw in '20 and '21 a onetime customer that was searching digitally and that's affected our customer count in the short-term.

I think second to that is that, we had store closures. And inside of that, we're able to retain customers and have transference rate, but our overall penetration and the face to the customer was very different, and we expected some of that. I think what we're seeing is a stabilization of that base and we're really now investing in 2022 in those customers, both current and future, things like our loyalty program and getting back into our proper cadence with our marketing outreach is part of that solution. But there's no doubt that during the early COVID moment, we were closed, right? So, others were opened and some trip consolidation went on in that period.

So, we're recovering out of that and we have plans to fortify that 35 million and make them stickier and build more new customers across multi-generations.

Gustavo Arnal -- Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer

And to Mark's point of being stickier, a larger proportion of our customers now are omni, shopping both online and in-store. And the frequency of shopping is much higher than when it was a store-only customer, and with a larger ticket basket. So – and that's where the loyalty program is focused on.

Susie Kim -- Vice President of Investor Relations

Operator, I think we're still having issues hearing you. I can speak for you. I think that is all the time we have today for calls. We're available following today's call.

If you have any questions, please feel free to follow up with us. Thank you so much for listening today.

Operator

[Operator signoff]

Duration: 39 minutes

Call participants:

Susie Kim -- Vice President of Investor Relations

Mark Tritton -- Chief Executive Officer

Gustavo Arnal -- Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer

Hannah Pittock -- Morgan Stanley -- Analyst

Justin Kleber -- Robert W. Baird and Company -- Analyst

Michael Lasser -- UBS -- Analyst

Steven Forbes -- Guggenheim Partners -- Analyst

William Reuter -- Bank of America Merrill Lynch -- Analyst

Jason Haas -- Bank of America Merrill Lynch -- Analyst

Jonathan Matuszewski -- Jefferies -- Analyst

Seth Basham -- Wedbush Securities -- Analyst

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