The company, which operates 73 restaurants, has leases signedfor 60% of the restaurants planned for 2008. Its plans for theremainder of 2007 include finishing the year with 11 new McCormick& Schmick's Seafood Restaurants and one Boathouse. It openedone new restaurant in Santa Ana, CA during the second quarter andplans to open five in the third quarter. The new locations in thethird quarter will be in the Chicago suburbs of Schaumburg and OakBrook, IL, as well as in Dayton, Cleveland and Austin.

Doug Schmick, chairman and CEO, pointed out during theconference call that the second quarter results marked the 16thconsecutive quarter of comparable restaurant sales growth. Hecredited "a more favorable mix of premium seafood offerings" andother factors, including daily printed menus that "enabled us todrive performance in a difficult cost environment."

"Over the last six quarters, I think it's fair to characterizethe commodities environment as tough," he said. Seafood prices, inparticular, have gone up about 5% to 7%, Schmick said. "We werehoping for a little relief in the second quarter, but it did notmaterialize."