INDUSTRY NEWS

The holiday outlook at Ross is shiny and bright. Ross Stores, Inc. reported a sales increase of 12 percent in the four weeks ended November 28, 2009, over the four weeks ended November 29, 2008. Same store sales for the month rose 8 percent.

Overall, 2009 proved to be a good year for Ross, as sales for the 10 months ended November 28, 2009 were up 10 percent over same period sales in 2008—totaling $5.839 billion. Same store sales for the period increased 5 percent on top of a 2 percent gain in the same period in 2008.

“November sales outperformed our expectations as business strengthened in the second half of the month,” noted vice chairman, president and CEO Michael Balmuth. “Shoes, dresses and home continued to be the strongest merchandise categories while the Southwest and Northwest were the top performing regions.”

However, Balmuth took a cautious tone looking forward: “While we are pleased with our healthy start to the holiday season, most of the pre-Christmas shopping period is still ahead of us. As a result, we believe it is prudent to maintain our current forecast for comparable store sales gains of 6 to 7 percent in December and 4 to 5 percent in January. Based on these targets and our ahead-of-plan sales in November, we now project that earnings per share of the fourth quarter ending January 30, 2010 will be at the high end to slightly better than our previous guidance range of $0.88 to $0.94.”

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