Clothing retailer Talbots Inc announced a net loss of $3.9 million or $0.07 per share on a GAAP basis for the second quarter ended July 29th 2006. This loss includes acquisition related costs and adjustments of approx. $0.14 per share and $0.03 per share of stock option expense.
Total consolidated company sales for the thirteen-week period were $571 million. By brand, retail sales increased to $404 million for Talbots compared to $389 million last year, and were $73 million for J Jill. Consolidated direct marketing sales for the thirteen-week period were $95 million, including catalog and Internet.
Sales for the J Jill brand represent approx. 20% of the total combined company sales volume.
Total Company comparable store sales rose 1.3% for the second quarter. By brand, comparable store sales for Talbots increased 3.0% and were negative 8.2% for the J Jill brand.
Arnold Zetcher, Chairman, President and CEO, said, "Our second quarter results were positively driven by strong sales of our core Talbots brand apparel, which started to gain traction in early April. We saw particularly strong selling trends across all Talbots brand channels throughout June and July, which offset much of the softness in sales of our J Jill brand merchandise during the quarter."
"This is the first period we are reporting operating results as a combined multi-brand specialty retailer, and we are very pleased that second quarter performance exceeded our recent expectations and was better than First Call consensus estimate."
marketing@alchempro.com
