1-800-Flowers Ends Fiscal Year in the Black
For the fiscal year ended June 29, multititle marketer 1-800-Flowers.com (Nasdaq: FLWS) netted $12.2 million on revenue of $565.6 million. That’s a turnaround from last year, when the Westbury, NY-based company lost $1.5 million on revenue of $497.2 million.
Online sales rose 22%, to $265.3 million, while telephone sales increased 9%, to $248.9 million. Retail sales declined slightly, to $29.3 million from $30.1 million. In addition to its eponymous gifts brand, 1-800-Flowers includes the Plow & Hearth home decor catalog, the Magic Cabin Dolls and HearthSong children’s gifts books, and the Popcorn Factory food gifts title.
For the fiscal fourth quarter, the company’s net income increased 51%, to $8.3 million from $5.5 million last year. Revenue increased 10%, to $154.8 million from $140.3 million last year.
Mixed 2Q at Excelligence Second-quarter revenue at Excelligence Learning Corp. (NasdaqSC: LRNS) rose 7%, to $23.6 million for the three months ended June 30. Net income fell 26%, however, to $320,000 from $433,000 a year ago. During the quarter just ended, Excelligence recorded an income-tax expense of $238,000, compared with none last year. The Monterey, CA-based marketer of educational supplies, which includes the Discount School Supply catalog and the online-only toy marketer SmarterKids.com, sells to schools, day-care facilities, and consumers. Looking ahead, it expects annual revenue of $105 million-$115 million and EBITDA of $6 million-$10 million.
“Progress” at Geerlings & Wade Wine marketer Geerlings & Wade (NasdaqSC: GEER) it still managed to significantly narrow its second-quarter net loss, to $1.4 million from $2.3 million last year. But the Canton, MA-based company admitted that the loss was larger than expected. Sales, meanwhile, fell 3%, to $6.0 million from $6.2 million last year.
In a statement, chairman/president/CEO Huib Geerlings said, “We continued to make progress on the two primary objectives of our turnaround strategy: revitalizing customer acquisition for our traditional direct marketing business and developing a new sales channel to improve our ability to reestablish revenue growth and profitability in the future.”
Brookstone Catalog Sales Jump on Circ Increases Buoyed by a strong Father’s Day and demand for its proprietary products, cataloger/retailer Brookstone (Nasdaq: BKST) reported a 13% rise in second-quarter sales, to $80.5 million for the quarter ended Aug. 2. Catalog and Web sales for the company’s three brands, Brookstone, Hard-to-Find Tools, and Gardeners Eden, rose 11%, to $14.0 million, on a 13% rise in circulation. The Nashua, NH-based gifts and tools marketer has found that an increasing number of its Web and retail sales are being driven by its print catalog. As a result, it plans to substantially increase the circulation of its flagship title during the second half of the year.