Leslie's Q3 2025 Earnings Call Transcript

Quartr
Provided by Quartr
August 6, 2025

Key Takeaways

  • Negative Sentiment: Net sales declined 12.2% year over year in Q3, driven by cooler weather patterns and heightened competitive pricing, resulting in lower store traffic and share loss.
  • Positive Sentiment: Conversion rates improved by approximately 70 basis points overall and by over 550 basis points after in-store water testing, reflecting stronger execution and sales effectiveness.
  • Positive Sentiment: The Pro segment exceeded expectations with pro partner contracts up 12% year over year, surpassing the full-year goal and bolstering growth in that channel.
  • Positive Sentiment: Inventory was reduced by 9.6% year over year, and the company now expects to cut at least $20 million in inventory by year-end, supporting improved cash flow and debt reduction.
  • Neutral Sentiment: Ongoing transformation initiatives include a same-day delivery pilot with Uber, a revamped loyalty program, and an operational review to optimize assets and reduce costs for long-term profitable growth.
AI Generated. May Contain Errors.
Earnings Conference Call
Leslie's Q3 2025
00:00 / 00:00

There are 11 speakers on the call.

Operator

Thanks again everyone. Good afternoon, everyone, and welcome to the Fiscal Third Quarter twenty twenty five Earnings Conference Call for Leslie's. And as a reminder, this call is being recorded and will be available for replay later today on the company's Investor Relations website.

Operator

I would now like to turn the call over to Elizabeth Eisleben, Senior Vice President, Investor and Public Relations. Please go ahead, ma'am.

Speaker 1

Good afternoon, and thank you for joining us to discuss our fiscal third quarter ended June 28. I'm joined today by Jason McDonnell, our Chief Executive Officer and Tony Iskander, our Interim Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer. Following their prepared remarks, we will open the call to address your questions. As a reminder, our comments today may include forward looking statements, which are subject to risks and uncertainties. Actual results may differ materially from those discussed.

Speaker 1

Please refer to our most recent 10 ks, 10 Q and other SEC filings for more information. Additionally, we will reference certain non GAAP financial measures. A reconciliation of these measures to the most directly comparable GAAP measures can be found in our earnings press release and on our Investor Relations website. Now, I will turn the call over to Jacob.

Speaker 2

Thanks, Elizabeth. I want to begin by thanking our entire team for their hard work and resilience during what proved to be a challenging third quarter. As we faced persistent macro pressures, unusual weather patterns across key markets and an increasingly competitive landscape, the team responded with urgency, focus and a relentless commitment to transform Mosley's. Before we discuss our third quarter performance and actions we're taking to accelerate our transformation, I want to welcome Amy College, who joined Leslie's last month as our Chief Merchandising and Supply Chain Officer. In addition to her significant retail, merchandising and general management experience, Amy brings a unique blend of strategic vision and operational expertise that I am confident will help us accelerate our progress and position Leslie's for long term profitable growth.

Speaker 2

As you saw from our preliminary results from the fiscal third quarter, we faced significant challenges in both our top and bottom line that were below our expectations. The much cooler temperatures and significant precipitation across our top geographies disrupted the peak pool season, resulting in quarterly sales down 12% compared to the prior year quarter. In addition, later in the quarter, we saw heightened competitive pressure in certain categories. I will discuss these in more detail shortly. As customers delayed pool openings, we saw a meaningful reduction in our residential traffic in stores of nearly 11% in the quarter.

Speaker 2

Moving to our third quarter results, as mentioned in prior quarters, we are aiming to perform while we transform. During this quarter, our team acted with urgency to offset headwinds we faced as a result of the softer top line and mitigate the bottom line impacts where possible, including making tough but necessary decisions around cost control and strategically deferring select investments to protect our financial performance. As I mentioned briefly at the start of this call, we had significant headwinds to retail traffic and residential sales in the quarter. With that said, through the expertise of our store team and improvement in reliability, we continue to deliver growth on conversion rate, which improved approximately 70 basis points versus the prior year period. In addition, utilizing our AccuBlue water test technology, after a water test is performed in store, conversion rate increased by more than five fifty basis points versus the prior year period.

Speaker 2

While sales were challenged through targeted efforts on growth and expansion, we are improving our customer proposition with the Pro segment. I am confident that our team's disciplined approach to enhancing relationships with existing Pro customers, while also expanding to new customers can help us return to growth in this business. Importantly, the team has already surpassed their full year goal for new pro partner contracts, increasing our total pro partner contracts by 12% in the first March compared to the prior year period. As we look at our top line in more detail, it is important to look at both category and regional performance to fully understand the impact that weather had in the quarter. Specific to category performance, chemical sales, including both core and specialty chemicals were down nearly 15% as a direct result of the cooler temperatures experienced across much of The United States.

Speaker 2

For instance, with pool water temperatures below 70 degrees, this has a direct impact on the chemical needs of a pool. Specifically, the demand for specialty chemicals such as algaecide is significantly reduced. In the quarter, algaecide and water clarifiers were down 2219% respectively. Moving to regional performance, the impact of cooler temperatures was most evident in the non Sunbelt markets, predominantly in our North region. Historically, the North represents a large portion of our third quarter sales due to the concentration of peak demand in this region.

Speaker 2

Of note, during the two weeks surrounding Memorial Day weekend, which is historically the height of the season for this region, sales were down approximately 30% as temperatures were below average. With the start of what is historically peak season being disrupted in most areas of the country, the pricing dynamics in our industry changed late in our third quarter. We believe the aggressive pricing action on key SKUs late in the quarter was a result of competitors working to reduce excess inventories on hand throughout the industry. This had a direct impact on our residential sales as we closed the quarter and we believe led to residential share loss. With all that said, the unique industry dynamics at play this season related to weather and the inventory levels in the market clearly highlighted price value opportunities in some of our categories.

Speaker 2

Therefore, we are acting with urgency and conducting deep customer research to thoughtfully address these opportunities while working to recapture and grow Lez's share. Now shifting to transform and our strategic initiatives underway. As we have said before, we are acting with urgency to transform our business. We remain centered on four strategic pillars customer centricity, convenience, asset utilization and cost optimization. Despite top line challenges in the quarter, we are beginning to see encouraging signs that the foundational changes we making are beginning to take hold.

Speaker 2

Let me walk you through some of our early progress under each pillar, as well as additional opportunities we have identified to help accelerate profitable growth in our business. Starting with our pillars of customer centricity and convenience. As we introduced last quarter, we are moving forward with the launch of same day delivery service with our Uber partnership. Our team has been working diligently on the technology integration and are excited for our test market to go live, furthering our transformation as an omni channel retailer. With a firm commitment to improve customer experience and Leslie's overall value proposition, we successfully launched our enhanced pool parks loyalty program in the third quarter.

Speaker 2

Through the program enhancements, we are improving our targeted marketing efforts as well as personalized communications to build deeper relationships with our customers. We expect this tiered program to help increase share of wallet with existing customers while attracting new pool owners to Leslie's. Importantly, the introduction of tiers provides a cost savings while allowing us to reinvest in marketing initiatives to drive traffic and incentivize customers to increase their loyalty with Leslie's. In addition to our longer term customer centricity pillar, we recognize the urgency with which we must act and improve traffic trends at Leslie's. As the experts in pool care, coupled with our focus on personalization, we are providing custom offers on our quality products, while highlighting our free water testing capabilities through our AccuBlue technology.

Speaker 2

This includes leveraging the expertise of our store team members, as well as our zero party data capability to connect directly with customers to increase traffic. Further, through our detailed customer work, which includes a mix of qualitative and quantitative research on a localized level. We have identified and began implementing regional offers to meet the needs of their specific pool market. I'm pleased with the team's work in this critical area and look forward to sharing more on the improvement of our traffic trajectory. Moving to the next pillar of asset utilization.

Speaker 2

We have seen continued benefits from our local fulfillment centers. We believe they are improving in stock rates and accelerating fulfillment speed, especially in high volume markets. Importantly, they also provide us the flexibility to better manage inventory and reduce working capital. Our team remains committed to optimizing inventory across our asset base, including the continued focus on our never as SKUs that are most critical for serving both residential and professional customers. In stores in the third quarter, we achieved more than 99% in stock levels in our top selling never out SKUs.

Speaker 2

This is a 140 basis point improvement compared with the prior year period and is a key factor in our ability to improve conversion rates. Importantly, while improving in stock rates, we continue to reduce inventory by 9.6% versus the prior year period. Through further progress in the third quarter, we are increasing our previous estimate for inventory reduction this year by $5,000,000 and now expect to end the year at least $20,000,000 lower than the prior year end. We are confident this will help improve cash flow and support our top capital priority of reducing debt. Finally, as we look to optimize all assets and drive efficiency, in the third quarter, we began the process of closing our warehouse in Denver, which we expect to be completed in the coming weeks.

Speaker 2

Once this is closed, we believe we can seamlessly transfer shipping demand to other distribution centers and reduce annual costs by approximately $800,000 As mentioned in our pre release, our comprehensive operational and strategic review includes assessment of all assets across Leslie's footprint. Looking forward, we expect to share more on the optimization of all assets to help improve our omni channel efficiency, including plans to reduce our fixed cost base, which is the primary driver of our deleverage. In addition, this review includes the evaluation of other core and non core assets to help optimize productivity, drive efficiency and maximize profitability. We look forward to sharing more on the optimization of assets to position Leslie's for long term growth. Now on our fourth pillar of cost optimization.

Speaker 2

I'm pleased with the early progress. We have already identified savings in indirect procurement and are continuing to evaluate our entire asset base for further efficiency opportunities. We brought on additional external resources in the quarter that are helping us supplement internal talent and accelerate this critical initiative to identify and remove excess direct and indirect costs from the business. While the quarter presented challenges, we are taking action swiftly and decisively. We remain focused on executing our strategy with discipline, continuing to improve conversion, optimizing inventory and leaning into digital capabilities.

Speaker 2

In addition, our robust strategic and operational review is focused on assessing the performance across our business. Our direct and indirect structure as well as other initiatives we believe helps deliver improvements in working capital and profitability. We are committed to the acceleration of this review and plan to share details on additional actions we're taking following the completion of the review in the coming months. Most importantly, we remain committed to reducing debt and building a stronger Leslie's for long term profitable growth. We expect to share more on each of these areas discussed today, including the corrective actions and expected financial benefits for the business in our November earnings call.

Speaker 2

There is significant opportunity ahead for Leslie's and we look forward to sharing the path forward with enhanced transparency. Now, I will turn the call over to Tony.

Speaker 3

Thanks, Jason, and good afternoon. I want to reiterate what you heard from Jason and express my gratitude to the team for their diligence in the quarter, taking action to mitigate costs despite the difficult sales environment. We reported net sales of $500,000,000 in our third quarter, down 12.2% versus the prior year period, primarily driven by weather related headwinds, reduced traffic and heightened competitive pressure as you heard from Jason. Gross profit was $197,900,000 compared with $228,800,000 in the prior year. Gross margin in the quarter declined 62 basis points year over year, primarily driven by inventory adjustments and occupancy costs, partially offset by improved product margin and lower distribution expenses.

Speaker 3

SG and A was $129,600,000 compared with $131,100,000 in the third quarter of the prior year. The year over year reduction was primarily due to variable expenses associated with lower sales, including store labor and e commerce related fees. On a rate basis, SG and A as a percent of sales were elevated primarily due to a softer top line. Turning to working capital, we ended the quarter with inventory of $273,200,000 which was down approximately $29,000,000 or 9.6% year over year. Our precision inventory strategy and continued investment in analytics coupled with our LFCs are helping to build healthier inventory positioning, which we believe will continue to benefit cash flow.

Speaker 3

As we highlighted in our pre release last week, we paid the revolver balance of $20,000,000 in full subsequent to quarter end. We currently have no borrowings under our revolving credit facility and reducing debt remains our top capital allocation priority. In addition, as Jason mentioned, we are increasing our inventory reduction commitment and now expect to reduce inventory by at least $20,000,000 year over year with additional runway into 2026. Before turning to balance of year expectations, I want to share an update on our cash and liquidity. We ended the quarter with $42,700,000 in cash and after repaying the remaining outstanding balance on the revolver, we remain confident in our ability to execute the transformation of Leslie's and we believe we have sufficient liquidity to enable it.

Speaker 3

Based on year to date performance and current business trends, we now expect full year sales of $1,210,000,000,000 dollars to $1,235,000,000 dollars net loss of $57,000,000 to $65,000,000 adjusted net loss of 31,000,000 to $39,000,000 and adjusted EBITDA in the range of 50,000,000 to $60,000,000 As a reminder, our fiscal twenty twenty five includes a fifty third week and is included in our expectations provided today. We expect capital spend of approximately $30,000,000

Speaker 2

Now I will turn the call back to Jason for closing thoughts. Thanks, Tony. We recognize that we are operating in a tough environment, but I remain confident in our path forward. Our team continues to rise to the challenge, taking ownership, driving change and serving our customers with care. As we move into the final quarter of the fiscal year, we remain focused on executing with discipline, maximizing peak season performance and driving incremental progress across our transformation agenda.

Speaker 2

Thank you for your continued support and time today. We will now open the line for your questions.

Operator

Thank We'll go first this afternoon to Kate McShane of Goldman Sachs.

Speaker 1

Hi, good afternoon. Thanks for taking our question. I wanted to ask a little bit more about what happened when you started to see the promotions pick up in the third quarter. Did you not meet the promotional environment when competitors started to get more aggressive on price? And if you did, just what did that look like?

Speaker 1

And do you have any commentary on what quarter to date trends look like and if you've seen any improvement since the third quarter? Thank you.

Speaker 2

Yes. Thanks, Kate, for the question. Overall in the quarter, as I mentioned, one of the key things that we identified and we saw going through the quarter is the impact of weather in the quarter and obviously the impact of the excess inventories when we have a bit of a disruptive weather season. In the quarter overall on a price per pound basis, we made investments throughout the quarter on mid single digits in price. But we also saw some aggressive pricing still in the marketplace.

Speaker 2

So we have an opportunity for us as we look forward to take a really good look at the strategic pricing approach as to how we look at the business going forward. It's one of those items that we are putting into putting a specific plan against. And I mentioned some of that in my in the prerecorded comments. We've done obviously some good amount of research and discipline in understanding, looking at our zero party data and how do we be more personalized with each one of our customers and then being very local and regional in how we do it. As it goes forward in this quarter so far, we're seeing an improvement in terms of traffic.

Speaker 2

We've actually but that being said, it's not where we need it to be, improvement versus traffic versus quarter three, but it is not where we need it to be. So we are putting those actions in place and looking to try to looking to change the trajectory of our traffic going forward. And the team is very committed to that and acting with urgency and diligence.

Speaker 1

Thank you.

Operator

Thank you. We go next now to Jonathan Matuszewski of Jefferies.

Speaker 4

Great. Good afternoon and thanks for taking my questions. My first one was a follow-up just on Kate's question. I think you mentioned the mid single digit price investment on the chemical side. Wanted to better understand what you're seeing in terms of competitive pressures maybe on the equipment side of the business?

Speaker 4

That's my first question. Thank you.

Speaker 2

Thanks for the question. Yes, from an equipment standpoint, we were down in the quarter, obviously, with traffic being down, as we articulated, specifically on the residential side of the business. From an equipment standpoint, we sort of saw a difference in two areas. From an equipment performance standpoint, one is the is our core equipment basis was down mid single digits. We were where we saw the total equipment being down similar to where we were in residential number was mainly through a lot of the automatic pool cleaners and some of those other areas where we saw some declines.

Speaker 2

So not as challenged as chemicals as we talked about in our pre comments mainly because of weather. But that being said, the traffic obviously did hurt us on some of those core elements in equipment.

Speaker 4

Understood. And then just a question on gross margin. Obviously, of these results are being impacted by the promotional intensity in the industry. But maybe if you could just give us a sense of kind of the recovery in gross margin going forward as we look out to next year. I know you're not ready to provide guidance for the fiscal year, but just buckets that we should think about in terms of helping the trajectory of the current gross margin move towards historical norms over time?

Speaker 4

Thanks.

Speaker 3

Yes. Hey, Jonathan, this is Tony. So a couple of things on that. So one, as we saw and we've talked about in the past, we have a fixed cost deleverage that we deal with in this business. And as sales declined, we saw just a decline in our overall gross margin rate.

Speaker 3

What we're doing now is we've talked a lot over the last several quarters around our asset utilization pillar. Jason made mention of that during our prepared remarks. We do know that we have costs to take out in this business, and we will address those as we continue to assess the overall network of company.

Speaker 2

Yes. So as we articulated earlier is in prior elements, we've had two key pillars that were critical to us in our transformation. One was the asset utilization pillar. The other one is the cost optimization pillar. And what's critical about those items is we believe that we have a significant amount of fixed cost deleverage within the P and L.

Speaker 2

And therefore, we need to make sure that we're putting actions in place to do it. And that's why we mentioned in our prepared remarks the strategic review that we're doing, both with our internal resources but also supplementing with external resources to help build that plan and act on that plan and work quickly to put those actions in place. And we look forward to be sharing that in the November meeting.

Operator

Thank you. We'll go next now to Steven Forbes with Guggenheim.

Speaker 5

Good afternoon, Jason, Tony. Maybe just a higher level question, right? As you look back on the third quarter performance here, I guess, externally, you're looking at the performance versus others that have reported. I think the question, right, is is the like, business executing, I guess, in the field, at the level it should? Or is there opportunity to sort of improve field level execution?

Speaker 5

Like where are the biggest areas to sort of close the market share gap? Or as you sort of said before, is it very much just price value proposition?

Speaker 2

Yes. Thanks for the question. One of the key pieces I'm very pleased with is the team's response to the executional excellence in the marketplace, challenged with some key areas that we were putting in place. So we asked the team to make sure that we drive for a much better in stock performance, and we've been in such a great position all year in terms of our level of in stocks at greater than 99%. Our conversion rates in the stores and then also with water test and post the water test conversion, that's all in the store from an execution standpoint.

Speaker 2

And I feel very good about that as well as I'm really pleased as we continue to monitor NPS scores and how we are connecting with customers and get feedback from customers. I think that's we're doing well there. For us, to your point, Steve, is we for us is we need to make sure that we are doing everything we can to really change the trajectory of our traffic. And we believe the combination of truly the value equation by looking at it as a numerator and a denominator. Obviously, the numerator is how do we make sure that we're communicating the great values that we provide to for Leslie's to our customers in a very meaningful way, such as the expertise that each one of those store members is bringing at store level, the quality of our water testing, our in store experience, the product quality that we have, and at the same time, taking a strategic pricing approach.

Speaker 2

And the strategic pricing approach is where it is maybe more competitive on some SKUs. We're going to take a full basket approach. And that's one of the benefits from an execution standpoint of our field sales team because they can really as we're looking to make sure that we're really competitive on some key SKUs, they can also help in terms of building that basket. So it's a total value proposition and I'm really pleased with the execution. We just have to make sure that we're converting that increase in traffic.

Speaker 5

And maybe following up on that value proposition comment, right, or sort of in a net inflationary environment for goods pretty broadly. Clearly, you made the investment in chemicals right during the quarter pricing wise. But any sort of way to frame up how Leslie's outlook for average unit cost or product cost is going to trend here versus sort of the need for investment? I mean, there other funding mechanisms or is the funding for the investment solely going to be in the back of Leslie's?

Speaker 3

Hey, Steven, it's Tony. There's a couple things in that. So one, I'll go back to some of our strategic pillars, specifically our asset utilization. As we focus in on our fixed cost and the high deleverage that we've seen, we believe that will give us the benefit in certain areas to double and benefit price. It will help the value proposition while we continue to grow the business.

Speaker 2

Thank you.

Operator

We'll go next now to Sean Conan of Bank of America.

Speaker 6

Hi, guys. Thank you for taking my questions. I just wanted to focus on market share a little bit here. So sales were down a little more than we expected even with the weather headwinds and some of that could be geography. But do you think pool owners are just moving away from DIY towards the pro?

Speaker 6

Or are you seeing any changes in buying patterns from the DIY customer?

Speaker 2

Thanks, Sean, for the question. I do not so from a market share standpoint that you're asking in terms of the development of Pro or DIY, I have there's nothing from a marketplace telling me that there's a difference in migration between those two channels necessarily. For us in particular, I'm pleased with the progress the team is making on our pro business. If you remember the last couple of quarters, I mentioned that we were putting a specific focus in that area where we had 100 pro stores out there in the marketplace, and we're making sure that we're going after pro customers in all 1,000 stores. We've increased our pro contracts by about 12%, and the team is making really good efforts with that.

Speaker 2

And then it links to our strategic priorities around building the actually shifting some of the stores to LFCs so that we can make sure that our never outs are good for our pro customer and our in stocks are there. So we feel good there. It's the residential side that we believe is just our is our area of opportunity. And this that's the spot that we are making sure we put the action plans in place with and literally leveraging our pool parks program. We have over 85% of our transactions are through our loyalty program.

Speaker 2

We have the ability to get very customized in terms of our offers. So I'm not seeing a difference in Pro versus DIY there, but I but for us, our actions are clear and one that we're focused on with urgency.

Speaker 6

Okay, got it. And then the guidance implies that 4Q sales are down about 7% at the midpoint. Can you just talk about some of those drivers? And is that where sales are currently trending? Or do you expect them to improve or get worse throughout the summer?

Speaker 3

Sean, it's Tony. So our current expectations for the full year contemplate what we are seeing in the fourth quarter and opportunity that we can capture within the quarter as well. So obviously, we're not pleased with our performance, but we are focused in on the fundamentals that we need to for the balance of the year, many of which Jason mentioned in his prepared remarks.

Speaker 6

Okay. Thank you.

Operator

Thank you. We go next now to Ryan Merkel of William Blair.

Speaker 7

Hey, thanks. I wanted to start with a big picture question. What is your forecast for the pool retail industry sales in 2025? I'm just trying to get a sense of how much share loss there might be this year.

Speaker 3

Yes. Hey, Ryan, it's Tony. Good to talk to you again. So we've looked at a couple of things. So for us, in terms of market share, you heard Jason's comment just a second ago.

Speaker 3

But really, it was we look at the market, we looked at it from both the weather analytics and impact and then the value proposition that Jason mentioned. And we've modeled the expectations for the balance of the year around both of those. What we see in our current business trends and what we're expecting in terms of just pools in general for the proximity to our stores over the next several weeks.

Speaker 7

Okay. So just to clarify, your view is that the industry sales this year are down almost 10%, high single digits?

Speaker 3

No, no, no. If you look ours and you take in the commentary that we've put in based on where we saw weather impacts versus value price proposition, it would be more single digit low single digit mid low to mid single digit decline, not 10% or more.

Speaker 5

Got it.

Speaker 7

Okay. And then you mentioned reducing costs. You're cutting labor hours. How much cost you plan to take out in 2025? And you mentioned closing the DC.

Speaker 7

Are you planning store closures?

Speaker 3

Yes. So we reacted really well. Our team took the opportunity and reacted when we saw sales decline in the quarter similar to Q2 as well. And we are not contemplating store closures in this year and those are not built into our current expectations or guide that we've provided. What we've provided is a very rigorous view of what we expect to achieve for the balance of the year.

Speaker 3

There's the additional 5,000,000 to $10,000,000 that we've talked about in cost optimization and we expect to achieve those beginning next year.

Speaker 7

All right. Thank you. Pass it on.

Operator

Thank you. We'll go next now to Simeon Gutman of Morgan Stanley.

Speaker 8

Hi. This is Lauren Ng on for Simeon. Our first question is around leverage. Your leverage ratio is now in the low double digits. Just curious how this is maybe impacting your ability to execute on the plan you want and any thoughts around there?

Speaker 8

Thank you.

Speaker 3

Yes. Hey, Lauren. A couple of things on that. So we are focused in on our top capital allocation priority, which is reducing our debt. Many of the strategic pillars that we are working with urgency, including our cost optimization and including our network optimization through our asset utilization pillars.

Speaker 3

We are focused on those as you saw during Q3. While we are not pleased with the results, we are pleased with our team's ability to react quick to take out excess costs where we did not need to. We continue to focus in other areas. Jason also provided in his prepared remarks the areas where we've brought in extra help to help achieve these and accelerate these initiatives. And we believe in these initiatives under our four strategic pillars to drive long term growth for the business.

Speaker 2

And I think even building off the prior question and on this question is in regards to us making sure that why we put those four key strategic pillars out there is we need to make sure that we are doing the due diligence and taking this with urgency on the review around some of those key items, especially in the areas of asset utilization and in cost optimization. That being said, also around change in the trajectory in traffic. We understand the importance of improving the flow through from a P and L standpoint to EBITDA as well as the importance obviously to deliver against the top capital priority paying down the debt. We look forward to sharing a roadmap and a view of this in November in our November meeting.

Speaker 3

Yes. And here, Lauren, one thing I would feel on top of that is we continue to maintain sufficient liquidity to meet all of our liabilities. We have like we said, we repaid the $20,000,000 of the revolver subsequent to Q3, And we began the year with $109,000,000 Couple that with a full revolver availability as needed, we believe we have the liquidity we need to execute on this transformation agenda.

Speaker 8

Okay, great. That's helpful. And our follow-up is, curious, are you seeing any supply constraints? And are you getting the inventory you want? Just any color around this.

Speaker 2

We've had minimal in terms of what we've been doing. Anything that you see in regards to the commitments we're making regarding our inventory has been something with the specific efforts that we are making in the market in the field and with our own type of organization of being inventory optimization from an inventory optimization standpoint. So I'm really proud of the teams. The teams have had the challenge of how do we improve in stocks at a great rate, at the same time continue to drive inventory optimization. And as Tony mentioned, we were down in the quarter, think 9.6% in inventory, down $29,000,000 And then in addition, we just moved up our how much inventory reduction we're going to do on the year from 15 to 20.

Speaker 2

That has do that has to do with at Leslie's versus anything external in terms of supplier fill.

Speaker 1

Okay, great. Thank you.

Operator

Thank you. We go next now to Justin Kleber of Baird.

Speaker 1

Hey, guys. Good afternoon. Thanks for taking the First one for me, just

Speaker 9

I know weather was not helpful during the quarter, particularly in these northern markets. So can you comment on how sales performed in these year round markets like the Sunbelt region where weather was presumably less of an issue for you?

Speaker 2

Yes. Thanks for the question. I there's as mentioned in my prepared remarks and as you know, is that the North was obviously much cooler in temperature as you even got through Memorial Day. What we even found in some of the Sunbelt region is we saw cooler temperatures than usual in a variety of different key locations in the Sunbelt as well. So we did get improved performance in some of the key Sunbelt regions.

Speaker 2

That being said, water temperatures were not where they normally were and that did impact chemicals as well in some of those regions as well. So it wasn't enough to offset the challenges in the North. But that being said, the team is working diligently right now to make sure that we're doing everything we can for our customer base. We're reaching out to those lapsed users or those lapsed customers from a Leslie standpoint and we have the capabilities to do it. So that's what we have in action right now and we have those plans in action now.

Speaker 1

Okay. Thanks for that, Jason. And then

Speaker 9

just trying square the implied fiscal 4Q guide with the comments around traffic improving in July. If I back out the extra week from 4Q, the guidance seems to imply a similar level of comp decline. And I wouldn't think weather has been a headwind in July. So I'm just trying to understand, are you planning the business just assuming no change from fiscal 3Q? Or have you not really seen much of a pickup?

Speaker 9

It just was a little bit unclear to me in terms of what you're seeing quarter to date.

Speaker 2

Yes. Just for clarity, one piece I want to make sure, then I'll pass it to Tony, is just from a traffic standpoint so far in the quarter in terms of your question, we're seeing improvements versus the prior quarter. And as I mentioned, it's still an area of change that we need to require. So I want to make sure that that's clear, that's something we're working against. But I'll pass it to Tony for the rest of the question for sure.

Speaker 3

Yes. So to clarify that, if you peel the fifty third week from the guide and you assume midpoint, there is a continued decline year over year, but it is not a continued growth versus Q3 I'm sorry, decline versus Q3 either. Yes, we expect we actually expect it to improve in Q4.

Speaker 9

Okay. Thank you, guys.

Operator

Thank you. And we'll go next now to David Dellinger of Mizuho.

Speaker 2

Hey, guys. Good afternoon.

Speaker 10

Thanks for the question. The first one, even if we look back a few quarters and absent all these weather discrepancies across the country, is there sort of a wide band of store performance where some of the top performing regions versus the bottom performing regions has widened out to some degree. Just help us understand what the potential is for some of these lower rung stores to improve over time and catch up to sort of just the average across the whole chain?

Speaker 2

Hey, good question. One of the things that I'm based on with the team is how we look at the store performance on a perpetual basis. The team does a really good detailed analysis of that as we're working across. In addition, what I'm pleased with is the as I mentioned earlier, the level of store performance and the focus around the key trends of the controllables that the teams are executing against. As part of our strategic review that we are doing, we are obviously looking and reviewing the entire footprint that we have.

Speaker 2

As we think about what the future of Leslie's is from being an omnichannel player, including our stores and our distribution centers to evaluate their performance and to go deep on their performance, especially through this year, as you mentioned. And I look forward to sharing more about that in November as we look at that because asset utilization and making sure we're getting most out of our assets is such a critical element for us to make sure that we're improving our gross margin, obviously improving EBITDA and then paying down the debt. So hopefully that helps. Yes, got it. And then just the next logical question here.

Speaker 2

You mentioned some

Speaker 10

of these inventory optimization, think the $5,000,000 of cost outs coming next year. Just curious as to why we haven't seen a more formal cost cutting program in place. I know you mentioned not touching the store base for now, but is that something we can expect that the Westwood comes out with a more formal cost cutting outlook from here? Yes,

Speaker 2

really good question. I think the first and foremost from a asset base, think it's important, especially on the stores. Stores are critical cash generating assets, and this is such a critical time of the year for us in quarter three and quarter four as we're going through those. As we get to as we are doing this operational and strategic review, some of those obviously, two critical key pillars that we've identified in asset utilization and cost optimization are areas of where we've brought in both actually have a combination of internal resources as well as supplementing with external resources to help and review and then bring some of those thoughts or actions that you're suggesting or mentioning is that we're going to bring some of those forward in the November meeting. So I look forward to sharing those at that time.

Operator

Thank you.

Speaker 1

All right. Thank you all for the time today. That was our last question, I believe both. So we appreciate your support. We recognize it was a challenging quarter and we're working hard to turn around of the business.

Speaker 1

Have a nice afternoon.

Operator

Thank you very much, Ms. Heisleben. Again, ladies and gentlemen, that will conclude today's third quarter twenty twenty five Leslie's conference call. Again, thanks so much for joining us and we wish you all a Goodbye.

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