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Earnings Calls: 
Gap Inc Earnings Call, Fourth Quarter 2008
Author: 123jump.com Staff
123jump.com
Last Update: 5:00 AM ET March 06 2009


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The clothing retailer reported sales of $4.1 billion, compared with $4.7 billion in 2007 as comparable store sales decreased 14%, compared with a decrease of 3% last year. The firm''s ability to drive healthy margins and achieve cost savings helped it deliver earnings growth of 16%.

 
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And in 2008 they grew, they were healthy and they were a driver to our year-over-year improvement in merchandise margin.

Janet Kloppenburg (JJK Research): Why did you make the decision to invest in Old Navy when it might be early as opposed to Gap, where there has been a solid team in place for two years and you have seen some measurable success?

Glenn Murphy: Assuming that we are going to be in the value pressure we are under right now we believe that our outlet business should be called upon during these times to go out and compete on behalf of the company.

That is the reason why we have multi-dimensional brands inside the and we are not talking about hundreds of millions of dollars here in this first half but we would feel that we are not taking advantage of the opportunity in the marketplace right now.

Old Navy was in a place that we were not happy about 12 and 9 months ago. There has certainly been a big swing to the product we see today that is very much appropriate.

We have been getting some reads and January was one of those difficult months, but we did the best we could; we came up with a very good marketing message. And it is the brand that we have to reinvigorate first.

That does not mean Gap is not getting any marketing; it is just not getting a fully integrated campaign. And a lot of people measure marketing by television, so possibly Gap will go back to television?

We feel that the media and the mediums they are using right now to communicate their message is appropriate for that brand.

But right now we recognize the missed opportunity with Old Navy. We are in a position now with this campaign to get it back up and change the trajectory of the comp that it's been on.

It does not have enough inventory to positive comp out of the gate, but change the trajectory is key for us. And allow it on behalf of the total company to go and participate in this increasing value segment.

Richard Jaffe (Stifel Nicolaus & Company, Inc.): Could you talk through just brand specific how you are seeing the good news amid all the tough economic news?

Glenn Murphy: This business and the people in this business performed at the level they performed last year.

In this tough environment we were able to grow EPS by 28%. We not only grew cash flow by a billion dollars but obviously now have $2 billion on our balance sheet.

So it is recognized internally we have a very strong foundation. This is the first thing that I always bring people back to.

Every business, you have got to find out the small wins, the little moments in which you do really well. In 2008 we gave ourselves some flexibility. We are now not in a position where we are making decisions to generate extra cash.

We are not in a position because our balance sheet is under stress. We are not in a position because we have $2 or $3 billion of debt. We are in control of our own destiny.

At the end of the day we do not want to be known as a company that can just singlehandedly manage AUC, SG&A, rod, distribution costs, inventory - that is not what we signed up for.

And now we have got to prove that we can bring customers inside our stores and start driving the top line of our business and, make smart investments to position Athleta for the future, more investments in online for the future, franchise business for the future, international business for the future.

But the core North American business has to start performing, and all the brand presidents know that.

They do not have to listen to this call to be put on notice; they know very clearly from me every day they have to get that business on the top line in incremental gross margin dollars going because none of us signed up just to be in charge of managing SG&A and costs.
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