Spartan Stores Earnings Preview

Spartan Stores (Nasdaq: SPTN  ) didn't hit the Street's expectations last quarter, but investors hope that it will rebound this quarter. The company will unveil its latest earnings on Wednesday. Spartan Stores is a regional grocery distributor and grocery retailer, operating mainly in Michigan and Indiana.

What analysts say:

• Buy, sell, or hold?: Analysts strongly back Spartan Stores, with three of four rating it a buy and the remainder rating it a hold. Analysts don't like Spartan Stores as much as competitor Core-Mark Holding overall. Analysts still rate the stock a moderate buy, but they are a bit more wary about it compared to three months ago.
• Revenue forecasts: On average, analysts predict $622.8 million in revenue this quarter. That would represent a rise of 3.5% from the year-ago quarter.
• Wall Street earnings expectations: The average analyst estimate is earnings of $0.49 per share. Estimates range from $0.48 to $0.51.

What our community says:
CAPS All-Stars are solidly backing the stock with 97.3% granting it an outperform rating. The community at large backs the All-Stars with 94.7% assigning it a rating of outperform. Fools are bullish on Spartan Stores, though the message boards have been quiet lately with only 53 posts in the past 30 days. Spartan Stores has a bullish CAPS rating of five out of five stars that is about on par with the Fool community assessment.

Management:
Spartan Stores' profit has risen year over year by an average of 48.5% over the past five quarters. The company's revenue has now risen for two straight quarters.

Now let's look at how efficient management is at running the business. Traditionally, margins represent the efficiency with which companies capture portions of sales dollars. The following table shows gross, operating, and net margins over the past four quarters.

Quarter	Q1	Q4	Q3	Q2
Gross Margin	20.8%	22.7%	21.1%	22.5%
Operating Margin	2.3%	2.8%	2.1%	3.7%
Net Margin	1.0%	1.4%	0.9%	1.9%

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