Question-and-Answer Session
Operator
(Operator Instructions) Your first question comes from Eric Beder – Brean Murray, Carret & Co.
Eric Beder – Brean Murray, Carret & Co.
Could you talk a little bit about what we’re going to see in terms of what we should think about in terms of non-denim product for fall in terms of maybe percentages and maybe some of the items?
Michael F. Buckley
Well, I think as we talked about the mix that’s in our own retail, we’re buying it to be anywhere between 30% and 40% of our initial buys for the season. So, you’re going to see more wovens in there, more knits, a little bit more of a balanced range, there will be some more jackets as well as down going back in to some of the stores. So on the retail side we expect it to be hopefully north of 30% overall net sales wise. On the wholesale side it’s still challenging for us to get the placement that we want so we don’t have any huge expectations in terms of fall and holiday in terms of a big increase in sportswear product.
Eric Beder – Brean Murray, Carret & Co.
In terms of store productivity, is that a function really of the newer stores or is that a function throughout in terms of a way to look at comps and other pieces? How should we think about store productivity versus new stores versus older stores?
Peter F. Collins
Eric, as far as how the stores performed, we talked on the call about how conversion rates continue to improve and that’s the area that Michael talked about, about how we’re making improvements in our planning allocation as well as in the clienteling and training of our store associates. So, while traffic has been down our conversion rates have been up to temper the impact of the decline of traffic.
In the second quarter, basically across the board, remember coming in here we kind of segmented the stores in to three groups, the ’07, ’08 and ’09 stores. The ’07 stores performed better than planned from a sales perspective in Q2 and even a little bit better than they did in Q1. The ’08 stores improved nicely on a trend from Q1 in to Q2 so Q2 was better across the board for those ’08 stores. Then, the ’09 stores did well, they were basically on plan. When I talk about the ’09 stores, I’m referring to the ones that were open the whole quarter in the second quarter of ’09 so those would be the stores we opened in the first quarter of ’09.
- To read the full transcript on Seeking Alpha, click here »
