Question-and-Answer Session
Operator
Your first question comes from David Mann - Johnson Rice & Company
David Mann - Johnson Rice & Company
Linda, in terms of the efforts that you’re taking to reduce costs, can you highlight perhaps any areas that you think there’s the greatest opportunity and what percentage comp might you need under this sort of heightened cost control structure to lever your SG&A costs?
Linda Farthing
David let me respond first by saying we’re not giving any kind of guidance in terms of comps. In terms what we have done from a cost cutting standpoint, we have actually had some reductions in staff. We have had a reduction in hours in stores but we’re being very cautious to make sure we continue to have the service level that a customer expects from a Stein Mart store. But I’m not going to give you a specific comp number at this point in time and to let you also know we are continuing to evaluate where we have additional opportunities so this is a work in process.
David Mann - Johnson Rice & Company
Very good. In terms of the tests that you’ve highlighted which of those do you think has the opportunity to impact performance the quickest and which of those will take some time and are very much in a very pilot stage?
Linda Farthing
The area we’re already getting positive response is in the what I’ll call?we have various names for it, but it’s really an updated missy customer. We’ve had great response there already. We feel good about that. We have a lot of opportunity in accessories that will take time. The addition of the children’s to the 40 doors that will give us additional volumes opportunity but again its 40 doors and we are going to evaluate that very carefully. The tests in terms of improvement in processes, those tests will take a little longer.
David Mann - Johnson Rice & Company
And just for quantification the updated missy area, what percentage of the mix might that represent similarly accessories and then lastly how big is home and what direction?how much smaller do you think you can take that?
Linda Farthing
I’m going to turn part of that over to Bill and then I’ll pull it back and kind of summarize.
Bill Moll
On thinking percentages David, it’s a good question, I’d say in the?it’s probably in the 5% range in the updated missy that Linda talked about but we have to remember that what we have going on in the store right is the first piece of this. If you walk into our stores in the attitudes area which is what we’re starting to set up, it is a casual led by denim. There are career and related separates that will be in here in June that will take that to a different level and once again as Linda said, it’s a test so we’re working through that. I think that the jewelry part which is in the very early parts of the test, the initial results are exciting and I think there’s nice dollars that will come out of that in both enhanced service and how we can show the product better to the consumer. The home part, a lot of the space is coming from home and to be totally honest with you as we redo the home world, by deemphasizing parts of furniture and home décor we’ll see where that goes because we do have a very healthy and I think good home entertainment and giftable parts of that. And the pet business which is a nice niche business. So I can’t give you total percentages because I don’t really have them right now. I think that these movements you will see in the stores as the seasons unfold to show nice growth and nice potential.
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