Joel Anderson: Yes. Brad, it’s a question you’re asking. It’s probably on a lot of people’s mind. I’ll turn this over to Ken here in a second. But just look, this is normally where we wouldn’t want to give any guidance on ’23, and we tend to save all that for March or maybe a little bit of ICR listen, I know you’re all trying to kind of figure out your models and you have to also realize we have to get through Q4. But maybe I can help you a little bit on the top line. Think about that. And Ken, maybe you can think about a scenario that would help them to think about the bottom line. But I think our largest input to top line growth is new stores, and we wouldn’t expect to be below 200 next year. And so I think that’s in the range as we’re thinking about it. We’ll certainly have full line of sight to the new store program as we get to March and our year-end call, but Ken help them think about a scenario of how to think about the bottom line.
Ken Bull: Yes, sure. And thanks, Brad, for the question. As Joel mentioned, obviously, we’re going to get through the holiday season and we’ll provide guidance as we normally do on our March call. And again, this is not guidance, but in a scenario format. So in a scenario, say, of a 3% comp for next year. Based on what we know today, Brad, we believe that operating margins should be up slightly, and that’s versus our fiscal ’22 guidance that we’re providing. Now that does include some puts and takes that we’ve spoken about before. There are some headwinds that we would expect next year around areas like higher incentive compensation, the cost management strategies that we initiated this year, primarily in the back half of the year that we’ve spoken about that have done, helped us significantly from a profitability standpoint, we’re going to be anniversarying those.
And some of those we’re carrying forward and some of those, we can’t. So there will be a slight headwind there. And inflation. We’re seeing increases in certain operating areas of the business, especially coming on here late in the year. But as you know, we always look and we do a pretty good job of mitigating a lot of those increases based on our Gale negotiations and other cost management strategies that we can put into place. So that’s, again, just a scenario of what we would see next year if it was a, say, a 3% comp.
Joel Anderson: Thanks, Brad.
Operator: And our next question will come from David Bellinger with MKM Partners.
David Bellinger: I appreciate the commentary around Five Below and the lift you’re getting in that respect, but average ticket this quarter was still down. It was up 20% looking back to 2019, but down on a year-over-year basis. Did that acceleration you saw through the Q3 period in terms of comp, did that have to do more with sort of this quick shift to value? And are you seeing those lower price points? Are they moving at a faster velocity than, call it, $5 and higher?
Joel Anderson: David, you were asking that through the quarter. Did it — ask me that question again? I’m trying to follow it.
David Bellinger: So the improvement you saw throughout Q3 and an acceleration, did that have to do more with some of your lower priced items just turning quicker and selling better? Or are you still being that lift from items that are $5 and higher?
Joel Anderson: Well, I think it’s if I had to categorize it, it’s probably roughly one third, one third, one third, meaning one third of it is coming from Five Beyond, one third of it is coming from strategic price increases we made to combat inflation and then one third of it is coming from sales mix shift, right? So I think that’s…
Ken Bull: Yes. David, if you’re referring to kind of the typical average unit retail increases there. That’s where that’s coming from — you that mix.
Joel Anderson: It’s probably about 1/3 — each one of those components make up the average unit retail changes.
Ken Bull: But from an overall improvement in the business. It’s really coming from across the board in terms of a product perspective.
Operator: And our next question will come from Michael Lasser with UBS.
