Okay and Stacy, I think for the back half of the year, our expectation for both brands is really an improvement driven by really two things. First of all, I think our new leadership at both brands did not influence the product in the spring season and I do expect them to have a positive influence beginning in the fall and they definitely own the fall season and I think both brands look terrific.

And the second is the evolution of the Ann Taylor brand has really been a significant initiative and we do expect consumers to respond favorably to the brand’s new direction. I really believe that Ann Taylor is about to turn the corner as we head into the third quarter.

And regarding color I do think that color continues to be important in both brands for the fall season. It’s not as bright obviously as we have been and fashion trends would indicate that it shouldn’t be. I think it’s more flattering, beautiful, mid-range colors of pinks and berries and blues and purples that are softer and a mix of soft and medium tones. The color assortment in both divisions still approaches 30% to 40% of both fall assortments so I think we’re in a good place and we get a little bit more colorful as we head into holiday.

Stacy Pak – SP Research

Thank you.

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Betty Chen, Wedbush Morgan.

Betty Chen - Wedbush Morgan

Thank you. Good morning and congratulations on managing in this tough environment everyone. I was wondering, Kay, if you can talk a little bit about the component of the comp store sales because I know you had mentioned earlier that traffic was good, so could you talk a little bit about was it the AUR under pressure, but it sounds like we actually saw some good full price selling, so if you can talk about that by division, that would be helpful. And then how should we expect that to evolve into the back half and potentially help drive better merchandise margin.

Kay L. Krill

Let me just take that first and then Mike can pipe in. For the Ann Taylor division I think about a third of our comp issue was really self-inflicted with a product assortment that was not as compelling or relevant as it needed to be. There were some styles that were strong and those items were clearly more fashionable.

As far as the AUR it was down in the quarter in both divisions really largely reflecting a shift in mix. In the Ann Taylor division what performed was clearly more in the tops and a little bit more relaxed segment which is a lower AUR than the suits and more refined separates.

And in LOFT, AUR was also lower due to mix because the casual product, be it bottoms and tops and the more weakened category of dresses were lower AUR products that sold better. As we head into the back half of the year, I expect the AUR to be more positive because we are up against a highly promotional environment in the back half of last year where the AURs were significantly depressed and we are not buying our inventory and we’re not planning the AURs at all to be that depressed going into the back half.

Michael J. Nicholson

In terms of the metrics by division, in terms of traffic, how I’d think about it is Ann’s traffic was down in the high teens and LOFT’s traffic was down about 10% year on year and then, if you look under the covers at Ann during the quarter there was more pressure on transactions than there was on DPT. At LOFT, I would say transactions were down in the low to mid-teens with DPT down about 10%.

Betty Chen - Wedbush Morgan

That’s very helpful. Thank you. And then I was wondering if you can a little about the LOFT factory stores, how they’ve been trending so far, any sort of early learnings that you can gauge from how they’re tracking with the customers.

Kay L. Krill

The new business has really done fairly well in this environment and we’re monitoring it closely. I will say that what it started out to be was more of a balance between relaxed business and casual and we have seen the casual component of it to be much stronger and we have evolved the assortments accordingly and that has helped the business dramatically.

So we are still monitoring the concept and we’re pleased with the results.