Coldwater Creek Plans Growth

Commenting during a conference call to discuss the company's quarterly and full year financial results, Pence reiterated the chain's previously announced plans to increase store expansion plans by 20% for a total of approximately 60 new locations this fiscal year. Coldwater Creek opened seven new stores in the fourth quarter as part of a 48-store expansion in 2004, ending the year with 114 stores in operation. Since then, the chain has added two more in the first quarter as part of a schedule that calls for five new locations in the first quarter. For the rest of the year, the schedule calls for 20 new stores in the second quarter, 25 in the third quarter and 10 in the fourth quarter.

Coldwater Creek traces its roots to the Internet, having begun as an onlineretailer, and Pence pointed out that the electronic segment of the company'sbusiness remains robust. "While customers continue to respond very favorably to our strategic shift to a store-based business model, our direct segment also turned in a solid performance this past year," the Coldwater CEO said. "In particular, Internet sales continued to increase as customers embraced the convenience of online apparel shopping and we grew our email database to more than 2.3 million names," Pence said. He said the company is using its email list to send retail-specific messages featuring news about in-store events, store locations and other information. "Approximately 50% of the customers on our email list live within 30 miles of a Coldwater Creek retail location, so the targeted emails have the potential to be very productive," Pence said.

In its financial statement, Coldwater Creek reported net income for the three months ended Jan. 29 climbed nearly 79% $11.4 million, or 18 cents per diluted share, compared with net income of $6.4 million, or 12 cents per share, in the comparable period a year ago. Net sales for the quarter rose to$204.1 million from $168.8 million in the fiscal 2003 fourth quarter. For the year, net income increased nearly 138% to $29.1 million, or 48 cents per share, compared with net income of $12.3 million, or 22 cents per share, for the fiscal year ended Jan. 31, 2004. Full year sales rose 13.8% to $590.3 million.