Brown Shoe Company, Inc. announced February retail sales for Famous Footwear decreased 7.4% to $67,200,000 for the four-week period ended March 1, 2003, compared to $72,600,000 for the first four weeks of fiscal 2002, ended March 2, 2002. Same-store sales decreased 8.5%, as snowstorms and severe cold weather deterred shopping in much of the country.
Sales at Brown Shoe’s domestic Naturalizer retail division, a 216- specialty store chain selling the Naturalizer brand of women’s footwear, were $6,000,000 in February, compared to $8,100,000 last February, on a base of 75 fewer stores. Same-store sales were down 7.6 percent, also due to severe weather.
“While poor weather greatly depressed traffic counts in the majority of our retail stores, we saw good sell-throughs of spring product in warmer markets,” said Brown Shoe Chairman Ron Fromm. “At Famous Footwear, our customer purchase ratios and average retail prices continued to run ahead of last year. And both chains increased their initial gross margin rates for the period.”
