Circuit City Stores Sales Drop 8.9% in December

Circuit City Stores today announced net sales for the month ended December 31, 2007. Total net sales decreased 8.9 percent to $1.92 billion from $2.10 billion in the month ended December 31, 2006, with a consolidated comparable store sales decrease of 11.4 percent driven by a 12.2 percent decrease in domestic segment comparable store sales.
“Our sales performance, while disappointing, was in line with our expectations. The company saw significantly improved performance over the last two weeks of the month, but the sales improvement was not enough to offset the weakness experienced at the beginning of the month,” said Philip J. Schoonover, chairman, president and chief executive officer of Circuit City Stores, Inc. “Based on December trends, we are reaffirming our guidance of a modest loss before taxes for the fourth quarter.”

“We will intensify our attention to fixing our close rate and attachments by empowering our sales associates with the necessary knowledge and tools needed to improve both sales and margin; fixing our gross margin rate through merchandising, marketing and pricing discipline; fixing our expenses through achieving our targeted expense reductions for next year and further aligning our workstreams with strategic goals; and growing the business by expanding sales of our firedog(SM) services and in our direct channel businesses as well as relocating, remodeling and successfully opening new stores.”

“Our efforts to turn around the business have led to greater disruption than we anticipated, but we continue to believe that we are on the right path to return to sustainable, profitable growth and increasing shareholder value.”

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