Strong Start

Federated Department Stores Inc. (Cincinnati) is reporting strong sales and earnings for the first 13 weeks of its retail year.

Federated’s sales for the first quarter of 2004 totaled $3.5 billion, a 6.9 percent increase from the same period last year. On a same-store basis, the department store retailer’s year-to-date sales were up 6.9 percent.

In addition, Federated reported operating income for the first quarter of $216 million, or 6.1 percent of sales. That’s up from $146 million, or 4.4 percent of sales, a year earlier.

“The economy has improved and our customers are responding to our ongoing efforts to improve the shopping experience, as well as to our merchandising, pricing and marketing strategies,” said Terry Lundgren, Federated’s chairman, president and ceo. “As a result of the effective execution of these four priorities, Federated has experienced an exceptionally strong start to the year, and we now expect that this momentum will continue through the remainder of 2004.”

Federated opened two new Bloomingdale’s stores during the quarter: the SoHo store in New York and the Roosevelt Field furniture gallery in Garden City, N.Y. The company also closed two small Macy’s bedding store locations in New York.

Federated operates more than 450 stores in 34 states, Guam and Puerto Rico under the names of Macy’s, Bloomingdale’s, Bon-Macy’s, Burdines-Macy’s, Goldsmith’s-Macy’s, Lazarus-Macy’s and Rich’s-Macy’s.