RVI steadies comps after shedding Value City
By Staff -- Home Textiles Today, 3/27/2008 2:23:00 PM
Columbus, Ohio – Multi-format merchandiser Retail Ventures Inc. posted 2007 sales of $3.04 billion, down 0.8% from 2006 – and shaved a bit by the fact that the company disposed of its Value City discount store division on Jan. 22, 11 days shy of the full fiscal year.
Comparative-store sales were up 0.3% for the year – but that figure does not include Value City results, where revenues had been drying up for several years.
The remaining divisions, the DSW footwear unit and the Filene’s Basement off-price chain, combined for $1.87 billion in 2007 sales, a gain of 9.4%.
For the fourth quarter, combined DSW and Filene’s sales of $452.0 million were off 1.5% from the year-prior period.
While DSW showed a 1.7% decline in same store sales for the quarter and a drop of 0.8% for the year, Filene’s Basement has thrived in a tough economic climate, with a 4Q comp gain of 4.8% capping a 3.6% gain for the full year.
