May Co. 3Q Earnings Plunge 39 Percent

May Department Stores (St. Louis) reported a 39 percent drop in third quarter earnings for the 13 weeks ending Nov. 3, 2001. Same-store sales dropped 6.1 percent. Nonetheless, financial analysts declared the performance unsurprising, matching their consensus forecasts.

For the first nine months of the year, the retailer declared that earnings were down 20 percent from a year ago but that revenues were steady.

The Number Two traditional department store retailer in the U.S. (trailing only Federated Department Stores of Cincinnati) operates about 425 stores in 48 states under the Lord & Taylor, Foley's, Filene's, Hecht's, Strawbridge's, Robinsons-May, Famous-Barr, L.S. Ayres, Meier & Frank, The Jones Store and Kaufmann's nameplates. Last year, it purchased the 120-store David's Bridal chain.