We delivered a same-store sales increase of almost 19% to the third quarter last year, with notable growth acceleration in October.
1, our distinctive portfolio of banners; two, our connected commerce presence; three, data analytics capability; four, financial flexibility; and five, scale.
For example, we've made significant progress differentiating our banner value propositions with distinctive marketing campaigns and unique product assortments, delivering 14% sales growth in bridal and over 30% growth in fashion.
Our expected cumulative four-year savings is now over $400 million through the end of fiscal '22.
One example of how we're doing this is our data-driven labor model that enables us to dynamically plan staffing needs; store-by-store, hour-by-hour, delivering a 75% improvement in productivity compared to this time two years ago.
And we've improved inventory turns 50% by defining our product assortment more precisely by banner and by providing a much broader range of fulfillment options.
Our research indicates that roughly 25% of shoppers finished their holiday shopping before Black Friday this year, up from 17% a year ago.
And we've expanded curbside delivery to more than 800 stores.
We're offering ship from store at 1,850 stores, five times more than last year.
And we're offering buy online pick up in store at 2,100 locations.
This year, we're building on that foundation, increasing the capacity of our distribution centers again, nearly 25% more than last year, and adding a nationwide fleet of local distribution centers with our ship-from-store capability.
We've seen a 60% decrease in new employee turnover during their first two months at a time when turnover continues to top the headlines across retail.
In fact, a jewelry consultant with at least one year of tenure achieves on average, 60% more sales than a new team member.
While both appeal to bridal customers, almost 30% of New Zales customers are on a self-purchase journey, up 400 basis points compared to two years ago, and 64% of new Kay customers are on a milestone or gifting journey to celebrate special moments in the lives of those they love, which is 700 points higher than two years ago.
We just launched this line at the end of September, and it has already delivered more than $2 million in merchandise sales ahead of expectations.
James Allen is our digital bridal mega store, the company that continues to pioneer the way that customers shop for engagement rings online, setting new standards for custom design and selection with over 300,000 natural and lab-created diamonds.
This portfolio is designed not only to give accessible luxury customers a wide range of options but also to compete even more effectively with independent jewelers who make up more than 65% of the specialty jewelry category, and it's beginning to work as the integrated mix we've envisioned.
Jared's average transaction value this quarter was up 35% versus the third quarter two years ago through increased custom design and higher quality merchandise that includes larger stones and precious metals like platinum.
James Allen had 50% more customer transactions this quarter than two years ago, again, demonstrating our ability to attract and close highly discriminating bridal customers online.
And Diamonds Direct offers customers a differentiated accessible luxury experience, which is currently generating a median annualized revenue of approximately $18.5 million per store over the last 12 months.
We remain confident that our services strategy is a $1 billion opportunity on Signet's path to $9 billion in total revenue.
In addition, we've simplified our ESA offerings, which, along with these other improvements, has helped us nearly triple our attachment rate online compared to this time two years ago and has lifted our overall attachment rate across channels by 60 basis points.
We're micro-targeting customers using populations of 3,000 or fewer people.
Significantly, this year, 90% of our team share that they feel a sense of pride in what we are accomplishing and 82% believe wholeheartedly that Signet is a great place to work.
Second, we achieved a trailing 12-month leverage ratio of 2.1 times.
In Q3, we achieved total sales of $1.5 billion, growth of approximately $237 million over last year.
Compared to two years ago, sales are up $350 million with few -- with 423 fewer stores.
So substantially, all merchandise categories and banners demonstrated growth supported by a roughly 50% increase in advertising to strategically drive earlier shopping and reduce reliance on traditional fourth quarter profitability.
We delivered approximately $576 million this quarter in gross margin or 37.4% of sales.
This is a 380 basis point improvement to last year, and a 630 basis point improvement to two years ago.
Moving on, SG&A was approximately $471 million or 30.6% of sales.
This rate is 70 basis points higher versus a year ago from investments in both advertising and labor as we anniversary the reopening of stores after the COVID shutdown.
Compared to two years ago, we leveraged 380 basis points.
We leveraged 300 basis points, reflecting changes in our cost structure.
Non-GAAP operating profit was $105 million compared to $46.8 million last year and a loss of $29.3 million two years ago.
Third quarter non-GAAP diluted earnings per share of $1.43 compares to the prior year of $0.11 and a non-GAAP loss per share of $0.76 two years ago.
Looking deeper into our financial health, overall liquidity of $2.7 billion includes $1.5 billion of cash at quarter end.
Working capital efficiency improved approximately 40% to last year, net of cash through strategic reduction of inventory, collaboration with vendors on payment terms, and the sale of our in-house receivables.
We ended the quarter at $2.1 billion.
Even with a 15% increase in holiday receipts compared to last year, inventory was down $26 million and sell-down and clearance inventory was lower by roughly 14 points.
The cumulative result of these actions was a 50% improvement in inventory turn to last year.
As a result, consignment inventory was lower by $315 million, which has effectively doubled its productivity over the last two years.
The $2.7 billion of liquidity at quarter end supports our capital priorities.
We continue to expect capital expenditures in the range of $190 million to $200 million for fiscal '22.
As mentioned earlier, the trailing 12-month adjusted leverage ratio of 2.1 times is nearly half that of pre-pandemic levels.
We reinstated our common dividend earlier this year and this quarter, we repurchased for approximately $41 million.
We have roughly $185 million remaining under the current share repurchase authorization.
We expect fourth quarter total sales in the range of $2.4 billion to $2.48 billion and same-store sales in the range of 6% to 9%.
We expect non-GAAP EBIT of $280 million to $317 million.
Lastly, we have raised cost savings expectations for fiscal '22 to $100 million to $115 million.
For fiscal '22, we expect approximately 75 closures across the fleet and 85 openings, primarily in highly productive Banter by piercing Pagoda format.

Summary:
One example of how we're doing this is our data-driven labor model that enables us to dynamically plan staffing needs; store-by-store, hour-by-hour, delivering a 75% improvement in productivity compared to this time two years ago.
In Q3, we achieved total sales of $1.5 billion, growth of approximately $237 million over last year.
Third quarter non-GAAP diluted earnings per share of $1.43 compares to the prior year of $0.11 and a non-GAAP loss per share of $0.76 two years ago.
Looking deeper into our financial health, overall liquidity of $2.7 billion includes $1.5 billion of cash at quarter end.
We reinstated our common dividend earlier this year and this quarter, we repurchased for approximately $41 million.
For fiscal '22, we expect approximately 75 closures across the fleet and 85 openings, primarily in highly productive Banter by piercing Pagoda format.