PetSmart Inc. (PETM)
Q3 2009 Earnings Call Transcript
November 18, 2009 4:30 p.m. ET

Executives

David Cohen - Vice President of Investor Relations and Treasury
Bob Moran - President and Chief Executive Officer
Chip Molloy - Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer

Analysts

Matthew Fassler - Goldman Sachs
Alan Rifkin - Analyst
Michael Lasser - Analyst
Tricia Dillon - Analyst
David Mann - Analyst
Peter Benedict - Analyst
Mike Baker - Analyst
Christian Buss - Analyst
Daniel Hofkin - Analyst
Mitch Kaiser - Analyst
David Strasser - Analyst

Presentation

Operator

Good day, ladies and gentlemen, and thank you for standing by. And welcome to the PetSmart third quarter 2009 analyst conference call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. Later, we''ll conduct a question-and-answer session and instructions for audio questions will be given at that time. If anyone who require any assistance during the program, please press star then zero on your touchtone telephone for a live operator. As a reminder, this conference is being recorded.

I would now like to introduce your host for today''s conference, Mr. David Cohen, Vice President of Investor Relations and Treasury. Mr. Cohen, you may begin.

David Cohen

Good afternoon and welcome to PetSmart''s conference call to announce our results for the third quarter of fiscal 2009. With me on the call today are Chief Executive Officer and President, Bob Moran, as well as Chip Molloy, Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer.

Bob will kick-off the call with an overview of our third quarter results and then Chip will take you through the financial review of the quarter, as well as our earnings guidance. Bob will provide a review of the operations of the business, and finally, we''ll take your questions.

Please keep in mind, everything we cover during today''s call, including the question-and-answer session, is subject to the Safe Harbor Statement for forward-looking information you''ll find in today''s news release. Thanks.

And I will now turn the call over to Bob.

Bob Moran

Thanks, Dave, and good afternoon everyone. I''m pleased to report our results for the third quarter with strong EPS growth and positive comparable store sales. I am proud of the dedication of our 46,000 plus associates who are driving impactful execution and expense management and strategic alignment throughout the organization.

Our ability to deliver positive comp sales, while still battling a challenging retail environment, and a difficult inflationary comparison continues to show the strength of the PetSmart brand and the loyalty of our customers, even in tough times. For the third quarter earnings per share were $0.31 and comparable store sales, where sales in stores opened at least a year, remained in positive territory with growth up 0.3%. Comp transaction, which we use as a proxy for traffic, declined 0.9%.

Overall, we are pleased with our performance for the third quarter and feel that we are well positioned to improve these trends going forward. Throughout the year, we have remained focused on aligning the efforts of our organization while working on leveraging customer insights, improving merchandising capabilities and most importantly, engaging our customers.

As we shared with you on our recent Analyst Day, we have made significant progress in each of these areas, and I will update you with more details in a few moments. Before doing so, I''ll turn the call over to Chip, who will provide more details on our financial performance for the quarter as well as our outlook for the remainder of the year.

Chip Molloy