Monro announced its financial results, which underscored a decrease in sales, but an improvement from approximately 300 of the company’s small or underperforming stores, for its second quarter which ended Sept. 24.
“While our topline results do not fully reflect the good work of all of our teammates, we continued to make progress on our overall strategy in the second quarter,” said Mike Broderick, president and chief executive officer of Monro. “Led by approximately 10% growth in our small or underperforming stores, comparable store sales increased by approximately 1%, with momentum building as the quarter progressed. Our partnership with American Tire Distributors allowed us to reposition our tire assortment to give our customers the right tire at the right price. Supported by strong performance in our tire category as well as improving trends in our service categories, we are seeing positive signs that the consumer deferral cycle might be coming to an end. The strengthening sequential demand that we saw in the second quarter has continued into fiscal October, with our preliminary comparable store sales up 3.7%.”
According to Monro, sales for the second quarter of the fiscal year ending March 25, 2023 (“fiscal 2023”) decreased 5.1% to $329.8 million, as compared to $347.7 million for the second quarter of the fiscal year ended March 26, 2022 (“fiscal 2022”). The company said the total sales decline of $17.9 million was due to the divestiture of the company’s wholesale tire and distribution assets in the first quarter of fiscal 2023. Not all bad news, though – as sales from new stores increased by $8.1 million, primarily from recent acquisitions.
Monro also said operating income for the second quarter of fiscal 2023 was $23.5 million, or 7.1% of sales, as compared to $34.5 million, or 9.9% of sales in the prior year period. The company said net income for the second quarter of fiscal 2023 was $13.1 million, as compared to $21.0 million in the same period of the prior year.
During the second quarter of fiscal 2023, the company also closed six stores. Monro said it ended the quarter with 1,297 company-operated stores and 80 franchised locations.
