Jodi Taylor, CFO, The Container Store
[Unintelligible – 00:36:51] Aram, this is Jodi. I think as it relates to the opening price point conversation, we really do that. That is really what good-better-best-exceptional is. It is showing an opening price point with our store on high-quality item and working the way up the ladder to the really exceptional product that yet has a higher retail. I think that is what we believe is our merchandising strategy. I am not sure I exactly fully understand the question.
Then of course during this fourth quarter, elfa is on sale most of this quarter at 30% off. That is still for us a very, very strong gross margin because of our ownership of that company and really goes back to what we talked about in our opening remarks. It just is another testament to the pricing power that we have here in our business.
Aram Rubinson, Wolfe Research LLC
I appreciate that. I am sorry for the quote but thank you and have a good new year.
Melissa Reiff, President, COO and Director, The Container Store
Hey, you, too.
Jodi Taylor, CFO, The Container Store
Thank you.
Operator
Our next question comes from the line of Dan Binder with Jefferies. Please go ahead with your question.
Dan Binder, Jefferies LLC
Good evening. I just wanted to drill down a little bit more into the comp quarter to date to the extent that you can. As we consider weather, incremental comp promotions year-over-year that maybe we did not have last year, and then just the core initiatives, just given the rough change in the pace of comp, I was wondering if you could break down how much did those three elements you thought contributed to the change?
Jodi Taylor, CFO, The Container Store
Dan, this is Jodi. I know Melissa walked through a long list of the things we have done that we believe have contributed to the shift in trend that we have seen. It is impossible to quantify and say this much is because of this; this much is because of that. We really do believe it is sort of 100 things done well and different and a combination of coming together to provide us with an improving trend, and one of the things that we had said previously coming to fruition.
Dan Binder, Jefferies LLC
Okay. What about maybe just focusing on the weather side of it, I know you do not talk really a lot about the monthly comps but it seemed like December was probably unusually soft last year. Have you tried to figure out if that run rate now is sort of a real truth measure of what the end of line run rate could be over the balance of the quarter?
Jodi Taylor, CFO, The Container Store
I am not sure that is an accurate statement, Dan. This is Jodi again. If you ask from a weather perspective, there was poor weather all the way through into February. With us having the annual elfa sale going on, it was certainly more impactful to us than a lot of folks. To answer your other question, I think the strong consumer demand that we have seen at the start of the elfa sale is a positive and it is certainly part of the explanation in terms of the improvement in results and of course, weather. I would not say to you that I thought weather was worse in December than the other months. I don’t believe that to be accurate.