Fourteen new stores opened last year and an extra selling week contributed to push the top line up 3% in the final quarter to $1,794,828,000 from $1,746,503,000, despite a 3.6% decline in comp store sales. Net income also improved, increasing 7% to $168,167,000 from $157,653,000. Holiday shopping patterns reverted to a pre-pandemic cadence, ASO said, with less pull-forward of demand into Oct., a strong acceleration into Thanksgiving weekend, then a lull in early Dec. before a surge Christmas week. Ticket increased by 1%, but transactions declined by 5%.

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