During the call, Farthing didn't pull any punches. "We wereunable to drive sales, resulting in our worst third quarter compperformance in recent history," she said. She said that consumers,affected by the economy, warm temperatures and the housing slump,have slowed their clothing purchases.

It's not going to get any easier, either, she said. The companywill have deep discounts to get rid of excess inventory, to keep itoff of next year's balance sheets. Worse, the comp sales areprojected lower in the fourth quarter. "Management expects acomparable stores sales decrease of approximately 10% for thecurrent November month ending Dec. 1, and if this trend continues,comparable store sales would also decline approximately 10% for thefourth quarter," the company said in its financial resultsstatement Thursday.

Eight new stores opened in the third quarter, one store wasrelocated and two stores were closed. The company completed its2007 store-opening program with four stores that opened inNovember, bringing the year's total to 14 new stores. Two storeswere closed during the year and two were relocated. "After carefulreview, we have decided to focus our efforts on the productive ofthe existing store network, and accordingly have scaled back ournew store openings," said Farthing. "While this is still a work inprogress, we plan to open significantly fewer stores in 2008 thanwe opened in 2007." She refused to be specific when analysts askedabout new stores or store closing plans during the call.