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Lowe’s Reports Fourth Quarter and 2014 Sales Increases

Lowe’s Companies reported net earnings of $450 million for the quarter ended January 30, 2015, a 47.0 percent increase over the same period a year ago. Diluted earnings per share increased 58.6 percent to $0.46 from $0.29 in the fourth quarter of 2013. For the fiscal year ended January 30, 2015, net earnings increased 18.0 percent from the same period a year ago to $2.7 billion, and diluted earnings per share increased 26.6 percent to $2.71. Sales for the fourth quarter increased 7.6 percent to $12.5 billion from $11.7 billion in the fourth quarter of 2013, and comparable sales for the quarter increased 7.3 percent. Comparable sales for the U.S. business increased 7.4%. For the fiscal year, sales were $56.2 billion, a 5.3 percent increase over the same period a year ago, and comparable sales increased 4.3 percent on a consolidated basis and for the U.S. business.

“I would like to thank our employees for their hard work and dedication,” commented Robert A. Niblock, Lowe’s chairman, president and CEO. “Their steadfast commitment to serving customers is critical to our success, and an important driver of this quarter’s strong results.

“We remain focused on improving our profitability even while investing in key capabilities to drive sales growth,” Niblock added. “Our transformation is gaining momentum, and macroeconomic fundamentals are aligned for modestly stronger home improvement industry growth in 2015.”

In looking toward 2015, Lowe’s expects total sales to increase for 4.5 to 5% for the year, and forecasts opening stores in 15 to 20 new locations.

Lowe’s is very pleased with its efforts to attract customers to e-commerce, and believes it is seeing strong increases not just in commercial customers but also professional contractors on its website.

“We continue to be pleased with the performance of lowes.com,” Lowes stated. “We have worked on this for more than a decade and we are seeing growth in all areas. 

What we have been working on performance scheduling and on search capabilities on the site. We are also working on improving our content, and for thousands of items that are listed on our site. Tools are becoming a mainstay for shoppers online. And we recognize that our customers want to be able to do business with us at any time.”

Lowe’s is also pleased with its efforts to attract contractors to its LowesForPros website, and the company reports better than expected success in 2014 and strong potential for 2015.

“When you look at the pro in general we have seen growth in all regions. We have seen growth in the pro by 24% for the quarter. We feel good about the strength of the pro and the response to the programs.”

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