Question-and-Answer Session
Operator
(Operator Instructions) Our first question comes from William Chappell - SunTrust Robinson Humphrey.
William Chappell - SunTrust Robinson Humphrey
On the outlet stores, can you maybe give us a little more color on how your thinking’s changed just in the past three months and from that standpoint are we getting too late in the year to really do anything dramatic for the calendar 2008?
Jeffrey Siegel
As Chris said, we’re in the process of evaluating it which we’re doing right now. We are not too late to take action to fix whatever is wrong in 2008. And I have to say that the stores were doing fairly well up through the end of May and actually through the first week of June, but since the first week in June traffic has been off, the outlet mall traffic as we’ve talked to a number of operators in outlet malls, the traffic is off, and our business is considerably worse. It was heading in the right track but now it’s not. I can’t say much more.
William Chappell - SunTrust Robinson Humphrey
Any update in July?
Jeffrey Siegel
It has stayed weak in July. It stayed weak in July and it’s continuing to stay weak.
William Chappell - SunTrust Robinson Humphrey
With that in mind it sounds like you won’t get recoup the full benefit that you had hoped on that side of the business. What about on the bakeware/dinnerware business? How is that progressing for this year?
Jeffrey Siegel
They’re two separate things. Bakeware is a separate division from dinnerware. I think you mean the dinnerware and glassware.
William Chappell - SunTrust Robinson Humphrey
Exactly.
Jeffrey Siegel
The dinnerware and glassware business is definitely making progress. It certainly will not, other than the Mikasa part of it, be profitable this year. It’s taken us longer than we thought, more than anything else because of the economy, but we believe we have the right team in place, we seem to be winning battles every day for getting placement next year which we’re working on now. We have very, very high hopes for that division. And putting the two together, the Mikasa business with the Pfalzgraff business and other brands makes it a very, very powerful division.
William Chappell - SunTrust Robinson Humphrey
As you look to the fall with no longer having guidance, what can you do with the mindset that the consumer maybe or likely will be weak for the holiday season? Are you at a stage where you can cut back orders and hold the profitability or are you still kind of at the mercy of the retailers until we get to September/October?
- To read the full transcript on Seeking Alpha, click here »
