“Lowe’s Q3 Comp Sales +5.1%” “Sales for the third quarter increased 5.6 percent to $13.7 billion from $13.0 billion in the third quarter of 2013…For the nine month period, sales were$43.7 billion, a 4.6 percent increase over the same period a year ago, and comparable sales increased 3.5 percent” Read the release

 

“Lowe’s earnings, revenue top expectations” by Terri Cullen at CNBC. “The company posted third-quarter earnings of 59 cents per share, up from 47 cents a share in the year-earlier period, on revenue of $13.70 billion. Analysts had expected the company to report earnings of 58 cents a share on $13.55 billion in revenue, according to a consensus estimate from Thomson Reuters.” Read more

 

“Dick’s Q3 Comp Sales +1.1%” “eCommerce penetration for the third quarter of 2014 was 7.3% of total sales, compared to 6.5% in the third quarter last year. In the third quarter, the Company opened 24 new DICK’S Sporting Goods stores, one new Golf Galaxy store and seven new Field & Stream stores.” Read the release

 

“Dick’s Sporting Goods says golf, hunting continue to drag down profits” by Teresa F. Lindeman at Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. “Dick’s said growing demand for women’s and youth sports clothing have rewarded the retailer’s decision earlier this year to shift thousands of square feet of sales space at its stores around the country away from declining sports like golf and toward expanded offerings in those areas.” Read more

 

“Dollar General may have to ax more than 4K stores” by Josh Kosman & James Covert at NY Post. “The Federal Trade Commission may require the country’s No. 1 dollar store chain to divest more than 4,000 stores to win approval of its stalled $9.1 billion merger proposal, two sources close to the situation said Tuesday.” Read more

 

“Wal-Mart scammed into selling PlayStation 4 for $90” by Sarah Whitten at CNBC. “Customers have misused Wal-Mart’s price-match promotion to obtain $400 PlayStation 4 consoles for less than a quarter of the retail price using third-party sellers on Amazon.” Read more

 

It’s official: “Walmart Canada lays off 210 head office, field management employees” at Financial Post. “The retail giant handed out the pink slips earlier Tuesday, with both management and non-management positions affected. It says the positions being eliminated are at the head office and in field management.” Read more

 

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“Staples Plans to Close 170 Stores in North America This Year (Up from 140 Planned in August)” by Chelsey Dulaney at WSJ. “Staples Inc. on Wednesday said its fiscal third-quarter sales fell, as the office-supplies chain accelerates plans to close underperforming stores and spark sales growth online.” Read more (Subscription)

 

“How Disney Turned ‘Frozen’ Into a Cash Cow” by Binyamin Appelbaum at NY Times. “Disney really began to focus on princesses in 2000, after a new executive went to see a “Disney on Ice” show and was struck by how many of the girls in the audience were wearing homemade princess costumes. “They weren’t even Disney products”…The Disney Princess line now makes about $4 billion a year.” Read more

 

“Bentonville dubbed as North Pole for toys” by Kim Souza at The City Wire. “Wal-Mart vendors set up under awnings to display the latest, most sought-after toys for area kids to see and test again this year. “We estimate between 8,000 and 10,000 people visited this year’s event. It was the biggest yet in the five years we have hosted this popular outing,” said Brandi Wardlaw, event coordinator for Downtown Bentonville Inc.” Read more

 

Fortune: 20 great workplaces in retail by Christopher Tkaczyk.  See the list

 

“Here’s what Amazon’s fourth downtown Seattle block might look like” by Marc Stiles at Puget Sound Bus. Journal. See the pics / Read more

 

Chicago Business Journal not a fan of Kmart’s “Jingle Bellies” TV Spot by Lewis Lazare. “The main problem is the new commercial’s near total lack of sex appeal. Watching a line-up of guys in less-than-great shape tap out a jingle on their bellies simply isn’t very exciting or amusing. Or sexy.” See the spot / Read more

 

CNBC: “OK, Home Depot you tricked us … but why?” by Juan Aruego. “The headline was profits of $1.15 per share, which is 2 cents above what analysts expected. The major news outlets (including CNBC) all trumpeted some form of “Home Depot beats estimates.” Unfortunately, that’s not how most analysts saw it. By 8 a.m. EST, at least six analysts had said Home Depot’s profits were just $1.12, a 1-cent miss.” Read more / See the video

 

Heard on Home Depot’s Q3 Earnings Call

 

Comps

* Broad-based growth across our geographies with all three of our U.S. divisions posting mid-single digit comps.

* Every region positively comped in the quarter as did 39 of our top 40 markets.

* Our service businesses had comps above the company average with strength in windows, countertops and water heaters.

* The growth in our pro business continues to be anchored by our large spending Pro which grew at approximately 2x the company average.

* Canadian business posted comps above the company average…making it 12 quarters in a row of positive comps.

* Comps in local currency for our Mexican business were in line with our company average yielding their 44th consecutive quarter of positive comps.

* Total comp transactions grew by 3.1% while comp ticket increased 2.1% for the quarter.

* Transactions for tickets under $50 representing approximately 20% of our U.S. sales were up 1.9% for the third quarter.

* Transactions for tickets over $900 also representing approximately 20% of our U.S. sales were up 5.9% in the third quarter.

 

E-com

* Sales from our online channel grew almost 40% in the quarter and this was particularly impressive as we anniversary growth of over 50% in the same quarter last year.

* Almost 40% of our online orders are picked up in the store using our Buy Online Pick Up In Store and Buy Online Ship to Store capabilities.

* This year we are installing dedicated storage bays in 550 stores to improve the customer experience.

* Almost 40% of our orders through Home Depot.com in the quarter actually culminated in one of our Orange box stores.

* Online deliver from store: we’re in pilot at this point in two stores and the pilot is going well. It’s a very small pilot at this point.

 

Ted Decker’s Q4 Brand Callouts

Everbilt (PL), Kohler, Diablo, Milwaukee, DeWalt & Makita

 

Q&A

* I wouldn’t look for a dramatic departure from any of the strategies that we’ve had in place. (Menear)

* We’re two weeks into November and I must say that I’m impressed with the sales that we’ve reported to date. So if there’s a bias in or forecast I would say it’s a biased to the upside. (Tome)

* As you know we review about a third of the business each year, so while we’ve had these tools in place for a couple of years now, we still haven’t reviewed the entire store utilizing leveraging the new tools. (Decker)

* A newer set of tools that we haven’t talked that much about and I do see promise in the future is in space. (Decker)

* So once you have your demand and your assortment, how do you best get the appropriate micro space facing rate of sale and we have tools for that that we’re starting to use. (Decker)

* The disruptions at the ports in general transportation delays have been pretty difficult the last few weeks but thanks to a lot of hard work our team has been able to land our Black Friday freight. (Holifield)

* You never would’ve thought appliances would be as strong as it is as an online category. (Decker)

* We feel so good about Canada though that we are opening a store in Canada this year. We haven’t opened a store in Canada for a number of years. (Tome)

* If we have a 5% increase in the average ticket for Pros or three more transaction is a $1.2 billion opportunity. (Tome)

 

Read the Home Depot Q3 Earnings Call Transcript via Seeking Alpha

 

***

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