But the new builds will take us time to implement, and we’ll share more when we have locked that down and can definitively share the difference or the delta that should be expected. But we — there’s opportunity and the teams are working to work with the contractors as well as the permitting companies and the landlords to line everything up so we can capture it.
Mary Meixelsperger: And in terms of unit economics, Kate, with the current construction costs, we continue to see mid-teens returns substantially higher than our weighted average cost of capital and still feel really good about the relative unit economics of the ground up for new builds that we’re doing from a company perspective as well, we’re continuing to see growth in new builds from our franchise partners as well. So any benefit we receive from lower overall capital cost will simply help us to increase that return even further.
Operator: Thank you. The next question goes to Bret Jordan of Jefferies. Bret, please go ahead. Your line is open.
Bret Jordan: Hey, good morning. Could you give us any updates on the non-oil-change offerings? What’s been particularly successful or what you see sort of adding to that product list?
Lori Flees: Sure. On the non-oil-change revenue, really the performance year-over-year is about having a more tenured team in the store that knows how to sell the product and just getting more consistent on how that service is presented and performed. So we continue to see gains as we focus on training, making sure the equipment to do the service is updated in the store and is available to be used. Supply chain, we have had supply chain issues, as you know, over the past several years post-COVID and just getting our supply chain back in line. So we have the right air filters for all the vehicles that we serve, the right cabin air filters, et cetera. And then process execution, so making sure that the team is trained and understands why the service is necessary.
And when we quartile our stores, we know we have opportunity. The top quartile stores perform 50% better from a non-oil-change revenue ticket contribution roughly double or roughly 50% better. And so part of it is how do you do the training and the tools and rise up the back end of our store base to perform like the top quartile. Now the car park is aging, which is a tailwind given many of our OEM recommended services become more relevant with the mileage of the vehicle going up. So really, what we see is visuals, so things like wiper blades, cabin air filters, air filters. Those are the things, where visually we can show the customer that they need to be replaced, that’s just basic process execution in supply chain. And that’s where we see a lot of improvement.
When it comes to OEM services, it’s about the tenure of the team, and it’s about the equipment in the store. And those are the things that we’ve been making sure that our maintenance team, for example, is ahead of. We look for breakdown — we break down the barriers, if you will, to what is preventing us from servicing a vehicle. And when we find those opportunities, we either focus on the training or the things necessary to overcome those barriers. For example, every time a customer comes in, part of our 18-point check is a battery test. And this requires us to use a battery tester, which we put on the vehicle to read the health of the battery. Now we have not been as consistent in testing. And what we’ve learned is that a customer typically doesn’t buy the battery on the spot.
They actually take the advice and then return to us, either because they may have had issues with their battery started, and we were the one to tell them and they had a battery issue or they may go out and determine whether or not our pricing is competitive, which is very competitive. And then they come back to us for just a battery service at another time. We also found that our battery testers need to be placed in a specific part on the battery and the newer vehicles have a plastic casing where that can get in a way with a good test. And so when we find those issues, we update training, and we make sure we have an online training module that goes out that all of our company-operated and franchise operated store, a team members need to go through so that they actually know how to attach those battery testers in some of the newer vehicles.
When I say newer, I mean 5 years or younger, 5 or 6 years or younger. So those are the things that we’re doing on non-oil-change revenue. And I would just say we still — while some of the improvements we’ve made, I would call low-hanging fruit, we still have a lot of opportunity, and it’s just the basic disciplines.
Bret Jordan: Okay. Great. And then on regional performance, was there any dispersion to note and I guess, maybe a spread between softer regions versus stronger regions in the comp?
Lori Flees: Yes. No. This is something that we do look at, obviously, weather can this time of the year can slide volume, car volume around based on regional weather patterns. But in general, we don’t see any significant differences across the U.S. and Canada in terms of performance. We also — we look for demographic demographics around a store, we look for customer patterns, and we see things really staying fairly consistent with the exception of when weather may push or slide out customers from coming in from 1 week to the next. But other than that, no significant or material differences.
Operator: [Operator Instructions] And our next question goes to David Lantz of Wells Fargo. David, please go ahead. Your line is open.
