SPTN
#Chuck, you might be on mute.
Sure.
Let me start with the first part.
I think we are very scientific and practical.
I mean, we\
No.
As I said, it's blended.
I mean, there's investment in both retail and distribution.
Probably a little tilted for retail, but not overly.
Yes.
It's expected to be relatively [positive], potential charge of the inflation rates come through as they've been trending.
But it's not expected to be material one way or the other based on the current inflation rates that we have.
No, I mean, we've announced a couple, that we've closed one so far, and we've announced another one in the process of closing, it may close this week or it may ---+ I think it closed earlier this week.
But beyond that, it's really a question and we talked before and highlighted, <UNK>, that in the fourth quarter we sold a store to our customer.
And we're not looking to actively shrink the base.
But we need to evaluate sort of where different stores are and how they're performing.
And if there's always been an interest from a customer in a particular market where a store is underperforming, we take that in consideration.
But we're not necessarily looking to close a particular number for the year.
But we've guided with what we've already known and with the possibility that there's always another store or 2 during the course of the year.
We don't have a set plan that it's 5 stores or 2 stores or 7 stores, in that sense.
Well, I mean, I'll the answer the second part of the question first.
And I don't have it handy.
But there certainly was in Q3, and we highlighted it on the third quarter earnings call, particularly in light of the hurricanes that have hit, we experienced a lot of disruption in that regard and certain pricing changed significantly.
At that point in time, I think if you go back and look at our commentary, we thought that it might settle down some as we got towards the end of November.
But it didn't actually play out that way.
And so we've seen the trends somewhat continue in some regards with respect to the wholesale portion of the business, it gets built into the pricing and passed along, retailers are cost to us on the inbound side.
With the retail portion of the business, we sometimes have challenges in passing it along if there is significant movement, particularly in fresh categories where we're estimating in one region setting our pricing accordingly, and it comes in higher because the demand for drivers is so much.
I would say that the impacts of the fourth quarter, that we would ---+ if we were to call out anything, would probably be in the mid-6 figures.
But it's an estimate because we're going off of where we projected the rate to come in versus where it actually came in.
And it doesn't necessarily mean that if it hadn't spiked up that we wouldn't have been able to pass on a greater portion of that.
So we wanted to highlight it that it is a headwind and a headwind that is continuing.
But we didn't want to try to carve it out so much because there is some variability in estimating that figure.
We don't disclose them by region.
But I would say Michigan, which is probably the hardest hit by some of the pricing activity we've seen, would be the one that we felt the biggest impact in.
But it's also one of the ones that's bouncing back the most in first quarter.
So in total, our gallons were up because we've opened a couple, at least 1, I guess, 1.5 facilities at this point.
And then in the comps, it's a little bit down.
No, we do take title.
We do own the inventory.
I mean, that ---+ when you look at our working capital commitment, the military is in that because we do take ownership for that inventory.
So yes, we've always had them, I mean, historically the military has LIFO, and it's a LIFO charge or a LIFO credit if there's a LIFO credit.
And I think the impact is somewhere around $1 million last year.
So that was a big number for us in the fourth quarter in the military group.
Yes.
It's our sort of internal projections as to how many rate hikes there may be during the course of the year and also the timing of when those rate hikes occur.
So as much as we built a plan, and we follow along as to where the experts expect rate hikes to occur and how many rate hikes during the year, but that doesn't always necessarily align with what those experts predict.
And so at the levels that we're at now, 100 basis points during the course of the year can translate to $6 million to $7 million if they were all front-end loaded.
So just giving a little bit wider range than what we've had in the past puts us in a position that if rate hikes occur as we anticipate, we'll probably close it to the middle of that range.
If they happen earlier than we expect, we would trend towards the higher end of the range.
And if they occur later than we expect, and/or we're more profitable, trends towards the low end of the range.
So that's basically how it's just set up.
But as the Fed continues to raise rates, we just need to give ourselves a little more flexibility so that we don't get caught one way or the other in giving you folks some direction as to how we think things will play out.
And I mean, Chuck, we've consistently been share repurchasers every year, and it ebbs and flows.
We ---+ I think you could expect we'll continue to be share repurchasers where it's ---+ where it opportunistically makes sense as <UNK> said.
So yes, I get it's always a balance, I guess.
We expect to do some level of share repurchase, and we expect to pay down some level of debt.
