BJ's Wholesale Club Announces Second Quarter EPS Of $0.84

BJ’s Wholesale Club, Inc. (NYSE: BJ) today reported net income for the second quarter ended July 30, 2011 of $45.7 million, or $0.84 per diluted share. These results significantly exceeded the Company’s guidance for net income in the range of $40.5 to $42.5 million and earnings in the range of $0.74 to $0.78 per diluted share. For the second quarter of 2010, the Company reported net income of $35.8 million, or $0.67 per diluted share.

For the first half of 2011, net income was $79.4 million, or $1.47 per diluted share. For the first half of 2010, net income was $61.9 million, or $1.16 per diluted share.

Laura Sen, BJ’s president and chief executive officer, said, “BJ’s outperformance of 10% versus our guidance reflected favorable merchandise margins, higher gas profitability and expense savings that exceeded plan. We are very excited about our positive sales momentum for the second quarter and first half of 2011. It is clear that our members are doing more of their weekly food shopping with us. And I believe that we have tremendous opportunities to further grow our business.”

As previously announced, net sales for the second quarter of 2011 increased by 11.0% to $2.98 billion and comparable club sales increased by 7.8%, including a contribution from sales of gasoline of 4.0%. Excluding the impact of gasoline, merchandise comparable club sales increased by 3.8%.

The Company provided the following additional information regarding comparable club sales for the second quarter (all comparisons are to the comparable, prior year period):

• Comparative Club Sales by Geographic Region

		Thirteen Weeks Ended July 30, 2011
		ComparableClub Sales		Impact ofGasoline Sales		MerchandiseComparable ClubSales
New England		7.8%		4.9%		2.9%
Upstate New York		10.9%		6.2%		4.7%
Metro New York		4.8%		1.3%		3.5%
Mid Atlantic		7.2%		3.7%		3.5%
Southeast		11.4%		5.9%		5.5%
Total chain		7.8%		4.0%		3.8%

• Competition and cannibalization had an estimated negative impact of approximately 1.6%.
• Excluding the impact of gasoline, member traffic was approximately flat, following a 4% increase in last year’s second quarter. The average transaction amount increased by approximately 3% following a 1% decline in last year’s second quarter.
• Sales of food increased by approximately 5% for the second year in a row, driven primarily by an 8% increase in perishable foods. On a two-year stacked basis, comparable club sales of perishable foods increased by approximately 16%. General merchandise sales increased by approximately 1% for the second quarter, following a slight decrease in last year’s second quarter.
• Departments with the strongest comparable club sales increases included beauty care, computer equipment, coffee, cookies, dairy, deli, lawn & garden, meat, prepared foods, produce, salty snacks and summer seasonal. Departments with weaker sales versus last year included books, televisions, toys and video games.

Other Information

BJ’s management is not conducting a conference call in connection with its Q-2 earnings announcement. As announced on June 29, 2011, BJ’s Wholesale Club has entered into a definitive agreement to be acquired by Leonard Green & Partners and CVC Capital Partners.

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