Trendy mallrat Abercrombie & Fitch
The company behind the Abercrombie & Fitch, abercrombie, and Hollister concepts reported healthy second-quarter results as earnings climbed 26% higher. Unfortunately, sales rose by just 13% as the company suffered a 5% dip in comps. That sluggish trend at the store level finds the retailer now looking for its pivotal back-to-school third-quarter period to come in flat with last year's bottom-line showing. The company earned $0.51 a share last year while analysts were hanging their hopes closer to the $0.59 mark.
Just as goth-haven Hot Topic
It's also fair to say that if you are slumping at the register in the spring, then the weakness is likely to follow into the crucial back-to-school selling season by summer's end. Some specialty retailers like Aeropostale
So Abercrombie & Fitch, always willing to give Urban Outfitters
Have you been offended by Abercrombie's magalogs, or is it what's hanging on the rack that turns you off? Which specialty retailers are putting out the clothing that you want to wear? All this and more in the What to Wear? discussion board. Only on Fool.com.
Longtime Fool contributor Rick Munarriz was never in a boy band singing about girls who wear Abercrombie & Fitch. He does not own shares in any companies mentioned in this story.