Walgreens March Sales Increase 2.3 Percent
DEERFIELD, Ill.–(BUSINESS WIRE)– Walgreens (NYS: WAG) (NAS: WAG) had March sales of $6.16 billion, an increase of 2.3 percent from $6.02 billion for the same month in fiscal 2012.
Total front-end sales increased 5.4 percent compared with the same month in fiscal 2012, while comparable store front-end sales increased 4.2 percent. Customer traffic in comparable stores decreased 1.3 percent while basket size increased 5.5 percent.
Prescriptions filled at comparable stores increased by 4.0 percent in March and increased 7.4 percent on a calendar day-shift adjusted basis. This year’s March had one additional Sunday and one fewer Thursday compared with March 2012. In addition, Easter fell on March 31 this year compared with April 8 last year. These calendar shifts negatively impacted prescriptions filled at comparable stores by 3.4 percentage points.
The company said the percentage of former Express Scripts customers returning to its pharmacies continued to increase in March.
March pharmacy sales increased by 0.4 percent, while comparable store pharmacy sales decreased 1.5 percent but increased by a calendar day-shift adjusted 1.9 percent. Calendar day shifts negatively impacted pharmacy sales in comparable stores by 3.4 percentage points. Calendar day-shift adjusted comparable store pharmacy sales were negatively impacted by 4.8 percentage points due to generic drug introductions in the last 12 months. Pharmacy sales accounted for 62.2 percent of total sales for the month.
Sales in comparable stores increased by 0.7 percent in March. Calendar day shifts negatively impacted total comparable sales by 2.1 percentage points, while generic drug introductions in the last 12 months negatively impacted total comparable sales by 3.0 percentage points.
The company will report combined comparable store sales for March and April with its April sales results.
Registrations for Walgreens Balance® Rewards loyalty program, which launched in September, totaled more than 64 million through March.
Calendar 2013 sales to date were $18.09 billion, an increase of 2.3 percent from $17.68 billion in 2012.
Fiscal 2013 year-to-date sales for the first seven months were $42.12 billion, down 1.7 percent from $42.83 billion in the comparable period in fiscal 2012.
Walgreens opened 12 stores during March, including four relocations, and closed one.
On March 31, Walgreens operated 8,541 locations in all 50 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico and Guam. …read more
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