“Overall, we built a competitive pro sales and service model, which is creating a flywheel effect that will enable us to grow Pro sales at 2x the pace of the market.”

In context

“mall- to medium-sized Pro, who is our core customer. In our most recent survey, nearly 70% of PROs reported healthy project backlogs, but given the uncertain macro environment, they're feeling a little less confident. Although Pros may be a bit cautious in this environment, our ability to deliver a positive pro sales comp in the third quarter is a reflection that our strategy is working. We're making progress with the investments we've made over the last several years to improve our service offering, including increasing loyalty through our MVP Pro rewards, developing a world-class CRM platform, improving job site delivery, enhancing service levels in our stores, creating a more seamless online experience and a number of merchandising initiatives that Bill will discuss later in the call. Overall, we built a competitive pro sales and service model, which is creating a flywheel effect that will enable us to grow Pro sales at 2x the pace of the market. Let's now turn to online sales, which declined 4% in the quarter as the same pressures in DIY bigger ticket categories impacted digital sales. Now let's talk about what we're doing to manage this unique environment. In store operations, we've made foundational improvements to associate productivity that enable us to effectively align labor to demand while continuing to serve our customers. During the quarter, we leveraged these new capabilities to reduce operating expenses while enhancing the customer experience for both Pro and DIY customers at the same time. Joe will provide more detail on these initiatives and our improved customer service scores later in the call. I'm pleased that our disciplined focus on expense management across the organization contributed to a 46 basis point inc”