You are given a text that consists of multiple sentences. Your task is to perform abstractive summarization on this text. Use your understanding of the content to express the main ideas and crucial details in a shorter, coherent, and natural sounding text. 
Text: It is now my pleasure to turn the floor over to your host, Bill Rhodes, Chairman, President and CEO.
Sir, the floor is yours.
autozone.com under the Investor Relations link.
Please click on Quarterly Earnings Conference Calls to see them.
As we begin, we want to continue to stress that our highest priority remains the safety and well being of our customers and AutoZoners.
Everyone across the organization takes this responsibility very, very seriously, and I am very proud of how our team has responded.
Since the start of the pandemic, we have reiterated consistently that we could not deliver the kind of results we have without the exceptional efforts of our entire team, especially our store and supply chain AutoZoners.
As our sales volumes have remained at historic all time highs, our AutoZoners continue to go the extra mile and surprise and delight our customers by providing WOW Customer Service, regardless of the myriad of challenges that are thrown their way.
The Assistance Fund is an independent non-profit whose primary mission is to provide assistance to AutoZoners who find themselves in a very difficult place.
We are very fortunate to be able to help our AutoZoners in this way.
To me it's yet another example of our organization living consistent with our values.
We'll also share how inflation is affecting our cost and retails and how we think they will impact our business for the remainder of the fiscal year.
On to our sales results.
Our domestic same-store sales were an impressive 13.6% this quarter on top of last year's very strong 12.3%.
Our team once again executed at an extraordinarily high level and delivered amazing results.
Congratulations again to AutoZoners everywhere.
Our growth rates for retail and commercial were both strong with domestic commercial growth impressively north of 29%.
Commercial set a first quarter record with $900 million in sales.
And now we've delivered $900 million in sales in one quarter, an incredible accomplishment.
On a trailing four quarter basis, we had over $3.5 billion in annual commercial sales versus $2.8 billion a year ago, up 27%.
We also set a record in average weekly sales per store for any quarter, reaching over $14,400 versus $11,500 just last year.
On a two year basis, our sales accelerated from last quarter, exceeding 40%.
Many people want to understand what is driving our tremendous sales growth in commercial.
In short, it is not one thing, and I want to repeat that.
It is not one thing.
It's a host, a whole host of key initiatives we've been working on for several years.
Those initiatives include improved satellite store availability, massive improvements in hub and mega hub coverage and access, the continuing strength of the Duralast brand, leveraging technology to make us easier to do business with and amplifying our execution strength to improve delivery times, enhancing our sales force effectiveness and engaging our store operations team deeper in the business and ensuring that we live consistent with our pledge by being priced right for the value proposition that we deliver.
We continue to execute very well in commercial, and we are extremely proud of our team and their performance.
We're also very proud of our organization's performance in domestic DIY.
We ran a 9% comp this quarter on top of last year's 12.7%.
While our DIY two year stack comp decelerated slightly from our fourth quarter, it's remarkable to reflect on a more than 20% two year comp in this sector of our business.
From the data we have available to us, we continue to not only retain the enormous 10% share gains we built during the initial stages of the pandemic, but modestly build on those gains.
Our performance, considering the amount of time from the last stimulus and the ending of the enhanced unemployment benefits, has substantially exceeded our expectations and raises our expectations on how sustainable these sales gains may be long-term.
Now let's focus on our sales cadence.
Same-store sales increased sequentially from September through November.
However, this acceleration could be deceiving as last year's comp weakened as the quarter progressed.
Given the dynamics of the past 20 months, we like others who benefited from the pandemic, believe it is more instructive to look at two year stacked comps.
On this basis, the monthly results were almost identical and very, very stable.
For Q1, our two year comp was 25.8% and the four week periods of the quarter increased by 26.3%, 26% and 25.3% respectively.
Regarding weather, we experienced warmer than usual weather in the Northeastern United States, while the remainder of the country experienced normal trends.
Overall, we feel weather did not play a material role in our sales results for the quarter.
As we look forward to the winter months, we are encouraged to see forecast estimating a slightly colder than usual winter.
Historically, extreme weather, be that hot or cold, helps drive parts failure.
Regarding this quarter's traffic versus ticket growth in retail, our traffic was up 1%, while our ticket was up 7.5%.
This low-single-digit transaction count growth continues to be a meaningful acceleration from pre-pandemic levels, although it decelerated versus last year as expected due to the elimination of stimulus, the reduce -- the elimination of enhanced unemployment, stay at home orders and the closure of some big box retail automotive service departments last year.
In our commercial business, we saw most of the sales growth come from transaction growth from new and existing customers.
It was encouraging for us to see sales trends remain strong.
And we continue to be pleased with the momentum we are seeing in both domestic businesses heading into the winter months.
During the quarter, there were some geographic regions that did better than others, as there always are.
While last quarter we saw roughly 400 basis point gap in comp performance between the Northeast and Midwestern markets versus the remainder of the country, we did not see that gap this quarter.
In fact, the Northeastern Midwestern markets slightly outperformed.
The market share data suggests that we continue to gain share in most markets across the country.
Now let's move into more specifics on performance for the quarter.
Our same-store sales were up 13.6% versus last year's first quarter.
Our net income was $555 million.
And our earnings per share was $25.69 a share, increasing an impressive 38.1%.
Regarding our merchandise categories in the retail business, our sales floor and hard parts categories grew at a similar rate this quarter.
As Americans get back to driving more, we've seen maintenance and failure-related categories perform well.
We've been especially pleased with our growth rates in select failure-related businesses, like batteries, that have successfully lapped very strong performance last year.
We believe our hard parts business will continue to strengthen as our customers drive more.
Let me also address what we are seeing from inflation and pricing.
This quarter, we saw our sales impacted positively by about 4% year-over-year from inflation, while our cost of goods was up about 2% on a like-for-like basis.
We believe both numbers will be higher in the second quarter as cost increases in many key merchandise categories continue to work their way through the system.
We could see mid-single-digit inflation in retails as rising raw material pricing, labor and transportation costs are all impacting us and our suppliers.
We have no way to say how long this will last, but our industry has been disciplined about pricing for decades, and we expect that to continue.
While we continue to be encouraged with the current sales environment, it remains difficult to forecast near to mid-term sales.
What I will say is that the past three quarter sales have all been consistent on a two year stack comp basis and both our DIY and commercial businesses have been remarkably resilient.
While it's difficult to predict absolute sales levels, we are excited about our growth initiatives, our execution and the tremendous share gains we have achieved in both sectors and are maintaining and/or continuing to grow those gains.
Currently, the macro environment, while more uncertain than normal, is certainly favorable for our industry.
And if these near-term trends fade, we believe that we are in an industry that is positioned for solid growth over the long-term.
For FY '22, our sales performance will be led by the continued strength in our commercial business as we continue executing on our differentiating initiatives.
As we progress through the year, we will as always be transparent about what we are seeing and provide color on our markets and outlooks as trends emerge.
As Bill mentioned, we had a strong second quarter.
Our growth initiatives continue to deliver strong results.
And the efforts of our AutoZoners in our stores and distribution centers have enabled us to take advantage of robust market conditions.
For the quarter, total auto part sales, which includes our domestic, Mexico and Brazil stores, were $3.6 billion, up 16.2%.
Let me give a little more color on sales and our growth initiatives.
Starting with our commercial business, for the first quarter, our domestic DIFM sales increased 29.4% to $900 million and were up 41% on a two year stack basis.
Sales to our DIFM customers represented 25% of our total sales.
And our weekly sales per program were $14,400, up 25% as we averaged $75 million in total weekly commercial sales.
Once again, our growth was broad-based as national and local accounts both grew over 25% in the quarter.
Our execution of our commercial acceleration initiatives is delivering exceptional results as we focus on building a faster growing business.
The disciplined investments we are making are helping us grow share.
And we're making tremendous progress in growing our business in this highly fragmented portion of the market.
We now have our commercial program in approximately 86% of our domestic stores, and we're focused on building our business with national, regional and local accounts.
This quarter, we opened 32 net new programs, finishing with 5,211 total programs.
We continue to leverage our DIY infrastructure and increase our share of wallet with existing customers.
As I said on last quarter's call, in fiscal year '22, commercial growth will lead the way, and our first quarter results reflect this dynamics.
Our growth strategies continue to work as we continue to grow share.
We are confident in our strategies and execution and believe we will continue gaining share.
Delivering quality parts, particularly with our Duralast brand, improved assortments, competitive pricing and providing exceptional service has enabled us to drive double-digit sales growth for the past six quarters.
Our core initiatives are accelerating our growth and position us well in the marketplace.
And notably, our mega hub strategy is driving strong performance and position us for an even brighter future in our commercial and retail businesses.
Let me add a little more color on our progress.
As I mentioned last quarter, our mega hub strategy is giving us tremendous momentum, and we're doubling down.
We now have 62 mega hub locations and we expect to open approximately 16 more over the remainder of the fiscal year.
As a reminder, our mega hubs typically carry roughly 100,000 SKUs and drive tremendous sales lift inside the store box as well as serve as a fulfillment source for other stores.
The expansion of coverage and parts availability continues to deliver meaningful sales lift to both our commercial and DIY businesses, and we are testing greater density of mega hubs to drive even stronger sales results.
By leveraging sophisticated predictive analytics and machine learning, we are expanding our market reach driving closer proximity to our customers and improving our product availability and delivery times.
These assets continue to outperform our expectation, and we would expect to open significantly more than 110 locations we have previously targeted.
In commercial, we are building a meaningful competitive advantage and we continue to have confidence in our ability to create a faster growing business.
On the retail side of our business, our domestic retail business was up 9% and up 21.4% on a two year stack.
The business has been remarkably resilient as we have gained and maintained over three points of market share since the start of the pandemic.
As Bill mentioned, we saw an increase in traffic versus the prior year as our initiatives are continuing to drive tremendous sales and share growth along with a relentless focus on execution by our AutoZoners in our stores and distribution centers.
These initiatives include improving the customer shopping experience, expanding assortment, leveraging our hub and mega hub network and maintaining competitive pricing.
These dynamics along with favorable macro trends and miles driven, a growing car park and a challenging new and used car sales market for our customers have continue to fuel sales momentum in DIY.
And the execution of our AutoZoners who are taking care of our customers gives us a key competitive advantage.
I'm also very pleased with the competitive position of our DIY business and our outlook going forward.
Our in-stock positions, while still below where we would like for them to be, are continuing to improve as our supply chain and merchandising teams have made great progress in a challenging supply chain environment.
We've been able to navigate supply and logistics constraints and have product available to meet our customers' needs.
DIY has been a strong contributor to the growth of our company.
And while comps are difficult because of our strong past performance, the fundamentals of our business remained strong.
Now I'll say a few words regarding our international business.
We continue to be pleased with the progress we're making in Mexico and Brazil.
During the quarter, we opened two new stores in Mexico to finish with 666 stores and one new store in Brazil to finish with 53.
On a constant currency basis, we saw accelerated sales growth in both countries.
We remain committed to our store opening schedules in both markets and expect both to be significant contributors to sales and earnings growth in the future.
With approximately 10% of our store base now outside the U.S. and our commitment to continue expansion in a disciplined way, international growth will be an attractive and meaningful contributor to AutoZone's future growth.
Now let me spend a few minutes on the P&L and gross margins.
For the quarter, our gross margin was down 65 basis points, driven primarily by the accelerated growth in our commercial business where the shift in mix coupled with the investments in our initiatives drove margin pressure, but increased our gross profit dollars by 14.9%.
I mentioned on last quarter's call that we expected to have our gross margin down in a similar range this quarter as we saw in the fourth quarter of last fiscal year where we were down 82 basis points.
However, the team has been focused on driving margin improvements, primarily through pricing actions that offset inflation to drive a better than expected outcome.
As Bill mentioned earlier in the call, we are continuing to see cost inflation in certain product categories along with rising transportation and distribution center costs.
We continue to take pricing actions to offset inflation, and consistent with prior inflationary cycles, the industry pricing remains rational.
We would expect our margins in the second quarter to be down in a similar range as the first quarter.
All of the actions we are taking have resulted in us growing our DIY and DIFM businesses at a significantly faster rate than the overall market, and we're committed to capturing our fair share while improving our competitive positioning in a disciplined way.
We are laser focused on taking care of our existing customers, driving new customers to AutoZone and over time growing absolute gross profit dollars at a faster than historic rate.
Moving to operating expenses.
Our expenses were up 10.4% versus last year's Q1 as SG&A as a percentage of sales leverage of 171 basis points.
The leverage was driven primarily by our strong sales results.
While our SG&A dollar growth rate has been higher than historical averages, we've been focused on maintaining high levels of customer service during a period of accelerated growth and taking care of our AutoZoners during these extraordinary high sales growth times.
We're also investing in IT to underpin our growth initiatives.
And these investments will pay dividends and user experience, speed and productivity.
We will continue to be disciplined on SG&A growth as we move forward and manage expenses in line with sales growth over time.
Moving to the rest of the P&L.
EBIT for the quarter was $754 million, up 22.6% versus the prior year's quarter, driven by strong top-line growth.
Interest expense for the quarter was $43.3 million, down 6.3% from Q1 a year ago as our debt outstanding at the end of the quarter was just under $5.3 billion versus just over $5.5 billion last year.
We're planning interest in the $45 million range for the second quarter of fiscal 2022 versus $46 million in last year's second quarter.
For the quarter, our tax rate was 21.9% versus 22.2% in last year's first quarter.
This quarter's rate benefited 159 basis points from stock options exercised, while last year it benefited 134 basis points.
For the second quarter of fiscal 2022, we suggest investors model us at approximately 23.6% before any assumption on credits due to stock option exercises.
Moving to net income and EPS.
Net income for the quarter was $555 million, up 25.5% versus last year's first quarter.
Our diluted share count of 21.6 million was lower by 9.1% from last year's first quarter.
The combination of higher earnings and lower share count drove earnings per share for the quarter to $25.69, up 38.1% over the prior year's first quarter.
Now let me talk about our cash flow.
For the first quarter, we generated approximately $800 million of operating cash flow.
Our operating cash flow results continue to benefit from the strong sales and earnings previously discussed.
You should expect us to be an incredibly strong cash flow generator going forward.
And we remain committed to returning meaningful amounts of cash to our shareholders.
Regarding our balance sheet, we now have nearly $1 billion in cash on the balance sheet and our liquidity position remains strong.
We're also managing our inventory well, as our inventory per store was up 10% versus Q1 last year.
Total inventory increased 3% over the same period last year, driven by new stores.
Net inventory, defined as merchandise inventories less accounts payable on a per store basis, was a negative $207,000 versus negative $99,000 last year and negative $203,000 last quarter.
As a result, accounts payable as a percent of gross inventory finished the quarter at 129.4% versus last year's Q1 of 114.1%.
Lastly, I'll spend a moment on capital allocation and our share repurchase program.
We repurchased $900 million of AutoZone's stock in the quarter.
As of the end of the fiscal quarter, we had approximately 20.7 million shares outstanding.
At quarter end, we had just over $1 billion remaining under our share buyback authorization and just under $700 million of excess cash.
The powerful free cash we've generated this quarter allowed us to buy back approximately 2.5% of the shares outstanding at the beginning of the quarter.
We bought back over 90% of the shares outstanding of our stock since our buy back inception in 1998, while investing in our existing assets and growing our business.
We remain committed to this disciplined capital allocation approach.
We expect to maintain our long-term leverage target in the 2.5 times area and generate powerful free cash flows that will enable us to invest in the business and return meaningful amounts of cash to shareholders.
To wrap up, we had another very strong quarter, highlighted by strong comp sales, which drove a 25.5% increase in net income and a 38.1% increase in EPS.
We are driving long-term shareholder value by investing in our growth initiatives, driving robust earnings in cash and returning excess cash to our shareholders.
Our strategy is working.
And I have tremendous confidence in our ability to drive significant and ongoing value for our shareholders.
Fiscal 2022 is off to a stellar start, and we continue to be focused on superior customer service and flawless execution.
That and our culture is what defines us.
From July 4, 1979 when our first store opened in Forest City, Arkansas, customer service has been paramount to our success.
At the end of the day, it is why customers come back to us.
Whether they are a seasoned professional or a new DIYer, they trust us.
They trust us to help them with their needs.
We continue to be bullish on our industry, and in particular, on our own opportunities for the new year.
We believe the macro backdrop is in our favor for the foreseeable future.
Our customers across the Americas want to get out, get out and drive,.
and we'll be there when they need helpful advice.
Our team has worked diligently and collaboratively with our suppliers, and together they have done a very good job dealing with the enormous supply chain challenges that exist for all retailers.
While we are not where we'd like to be on our store in-stock levels, we believe we are better than most retailers, and I think our results support that belief.
For the remainder of fiscal 2022, we are launching some very exciting initiatives.
We are focused on further growing share, but as always, doing so on a very profitable basis.
We will be announcing significant expansions to our supply chain to fuel the growth of our domestic and Mexico businesses.
We are also targeting to open 16 more new domestic mega hubs in the U.S. that will enhance our availability and support growth in our retail and commercial businesses.
We will also be leveraging our hub and mega hub strategy further in Mexico.
For the fiscal year, we will open more than 200 new stores throughout the Americas with notable acceleration in our Brazil business.
These capacity expansion investments reflect our bullishness on our industry and our growth prospects.
We are being disciplined yet aggressive.
Our company, our customers, our leadership team, and in particular, our AutoZoners have greatly benefited from Mark's 19 years of remarkable service.
Mark spent the majority of his years with AutoZone leading our merchandising team and has played a critical role leading our supply chain and marketing teams in recent years.
He leaves our organization much, much better than he founded and leaves us well positioned for accelerated growth.
I also want to reiterate how proud I am of our team across the board for their commitment to servicing our customers, and doing so in a very safe manner.
First and foremost, our focus will be on keeping our AutoZoners and customers safe, while providing our customers with their automotive needs.
And secondly, we must continuously challenge ourselves during these extraordinary times to position our company for even greater future success.
We know that investors will ultimately measure us by what our future cash flows look like three to five years from now.
I continue to be bullish on our industry, and in particular, on AutoZone.

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autozone q1 same store sales increase 13.6%; earnings per share increases to $25.69.
autozone 1st quarter same store sales increase 13.6%; earnings per share increases to $25.69.
q1 earnings per share $25.69.
domestic same store sales, or sales for stores open at least one year, increased 13.6% for quarter.

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