Dow Jones Newswires | Ulta Salon Cosmetics & Fragrance
Inc.’s fiscal fourth-quarter earnings surged 65 percent on revenue and
margin gains to surpass its boosted guidance. The beauty-products
retailer gave a sunny outlook as well.

It expects first-quarter earnings of 14 cents to 16 cents a share on
revenue of $301 million to $307 million, compared with 12 cents and
$299 million, respectively, expected by a survey of analysts by Thomson
Reuters. Ulta also expects same-store sales to rise 4 percent to 6
percent.

The company has posted top-line growth and strong profit throughout the recession. Its initial expectations for a challenging holiday season turned out to be unfounded, as the company posted holiday same-store sales growth of 7.9 percent and a 9 percent traffic boost.

Same-store sales rose 6.2 percent in the full quarter, beating with the company’s January forecast of up 4 percent to 5 percent.

Ulta Chief Executive Lyn Kirby said the company has three goals for 2010: increasing its profitable market share, finding permanent cost efficiencies and delivering free cash flow. Of those, Kirby said the company was “particularly optimistic” about opportunities for market share gains through comparable store sales growth and new store expansion.

For the quarter ended Jan. 30, Ulta’s profit rose to $20.2 million, or 34 cents a share, from $12.3 million, or 21 cents a share a year earlier. Revenue increased 16 percent to $396.4 million.

The company last month raised its targets to earnings of 28 cents to 30 cents on sales between $388 million and $392 million.

Gross margin rose to 31.4 percent from 29.7 percent.

The company opened three and closed two during the quarter, to end with 346. Square footage increased 12 percent from a year earlier.

Ulta shares were down a slight 0.2 percent at $21.50 in after-hours trading. The stock has more than quadrupled from a year ago, when it was trading near its lowest level since going public in 2007.