But overall, that is good. And then we are launching our premium lines like we do every year in the holidays. We’re having some very cool items in our WIGU promotion this year. So that should help drive both percentage and dollar margin during the holiday season. So those are kind of the things that I guess I gave you both pluses and maybe a headwind in there in terms of how we look at the margin of fourth quarter.
Nick Setyan: Okay. Thank you. And then just my last question, you guys mentioned that the comps sort of improved as the quarter progressed. Would you mind telling us the month-to-month comp and then how you’re doing in October in terms of sales or sales?
Manny Hilario: I mean, I think in general, I would say the month-to-month differences to us, to be honest with you, weren’t that significant in our business model, so I wouldn’t say that they were that significant from that perspective unless Tyler want to add anything on that?
Tyler Loy: No. I mean they were relatively consistent, but we did see sequential improvements for the quarter. And then in terms of you know October, I think our guidance really kind of lays out how we’re feeling about the fourth quarter relative to October and then the rest of the quarter as well.
Nick Setyan: Okay. Thank you very much.
Manny Hilario: Thanks, Nick.
Operator: The next question comes from Mark Smith with Lake Street Capital. Please go ahead.
Mark Smith: Hi, guys, First question for me, just trying to balance, Manny, you talked about some focus on kind of value here in Q4, that with taking some price increases on the menu. I don’t know if you can quantify price increases, maybe where you’re planning on taking that and how you still send a value message with some of the price increases?
Manny Hilario: So fantastic question, Mark, and probably one that helps us, I guess, really focus on defining the strategy is that, with Happy Hour and the other price points that we have like $39 at Kona Grill, $69 at STK, we really use that level or those price points to really make the brand approachable to a much wider group of demographics. And so it’s really an access to the brand opportunity for us. So we believe that there’s that level of consumer that is sensitive and we want to make sure that we give them an opportunity to still experience the brand. But then the pricing strategy is on the menu in terms of taking prices up is really targeted at the higher end of our demographic groups that will participate on the bigger stakes and on the full dining experience.
So our strategy is really use valley layers to make brand super accessible to everybody. And then when you’re in the restaurant, if you — because there’s still a very — I think there’s a high level of spending on the higher-end demographic that is still intact. And so having the higher price points and having also promotions with items like Huygu [ph] and other stuff that is frankly very pricey, kind of works really well. So it’s a one-two punch, really bringing people in with the messaging, the marketing the positioning that we’re an accessible brand. And then once you’re in, it’s giving the choice to the core customer of the brands to participate on the premium products within the brands.
Mark Smith: Okay. Next question was just private events and your outlook for private events here as you move into kind of holiday season fourth quarter on total results?
Manny Hilario: Yes. I mean, our visibility right now, I mean, we tend to be about 30% to 40% of the books built by this time of the — maybe a little bit higher by today, but we do have a pretty good visibility. All reports right now is that we do have a very strong book coming into the quarter. So I’m actually super pleased about that and now we’re really focusing more around the holidays, which we dominate. So Thanksgiving and Christmas day and also New Year’s Eve. So really focusing on maximizing and really it’s on about managing capacity in those days. So I would say that right now, the events book is really powerful and as always, the challenge is that we do have limited space in some of our restaurants. So it’s always about how you manage the capacity during those four or five weeks in December that really make it happen.
So it’s really about that, but the early demand is strong, and we still haven’t done our full promoting on it yet. So there will be some promotions and marketing that we’ll be doing in the next couple of weeks, that should even further that. So I’m pretty bullish on the event outlook for the quarter.
Mark Smith: Okay. And last question for me is just looking at some of the cost-cutting initiatives. You’ve talked about some. I’m not sure if I picked them up. Can you talk any more in depth about kind of what areas you’re looking at, where you expect this to hit? And then maybe if some of this is outside of the four walls of the restaurant and within kind of corporate overhead?
Tyler Loy: Yes, Mark, this is Tyler. So in terms of cost initiatives, I think, really kind of walking down to the P&L. I think we’re really thinking through scheduling and smart scheduling in the restaurants, making sure that we’re staffed appropriately for volumes by day of week by day part. And then really other operating incentives around operating supplies and some of the costs that I think are embedded in the model that just are not as guest facing and finding out optimization there. And then we talked about it a little bit, but I think really from an overhead perspective, some of the soft costs around travel and some of the soft costs in G&A, just being really thoughtful about those expenses.
Manny Hilario: Yes. I mean I would say on the travel, the big one for us is the cities that we travel to are not exactly in extensive cities to travel into, particularly from a hotel and airfare, so really instituting a lot of discipline around booking flights earlier and really making sure that we get the right rates with hotels, so just being very smart on travel. And we did take some positions that were not critical. We didn’t replace them on the G&A. So there’s been some attrition on G&A and positions that we’ve chosen on the short-term to hold back on and then there’s, other soft things that we kind of — we used to do secret shopper reports every week, every restaurant. We decided to go down to one every two weeks. So we’ve cut some costs out.
So we’ve taken out our — some of our half points in the restaurants, which are those roots, they take pictures and stuff like that. So we’ve trimmed out some of the things that we don’t think impact guest experiences that help out the P&L.
Mark Smith: Great. Thank you.
Operator: Thank you all very much. This concludes our question-and-answer session. I would like to turn the conference back over to Manny Hilario, for any closing remarks.
Manny Hilario: Thank you for your continued interest on The ONE Group. We always appreciate you being here with us to listen to our story and what we’re working on. And particularly in this fourth quarter I look forward to seeing you all in our restaurants. Everyone, have a great day.
Operator: This conference has now concluded. Thank you for attending today’s presentation. You may now disconnect your lines. Have a good day.
