Walgreen’s (Happy Harry’s) Update
DEERFIELD, Ill., November 04, 2008 – Walgreens (NYSE:WAG)(NASDAQ:WAG) had October sales of $5,160,900,000 an increase of 6.8 percent from $4,833,495,000 for the same month in 2007. Sales in comparable stores (those open at least a year) rose 2.0 percent, while comparable store front-end sales increased 0.4 percent.
October pharmacy sales increased 6.5 percent, while comparable pharmacy sales increased 2.8 percent. Comparable pharmacy sales were negatively impacted by 2.2 percentage points due to generic drug introductions in the last 12 months.
Total prescriptions filled at comparable stores decreased 0.4 percent in October, negatively impacted by 0.6 percentage points due to the switch of Zyrtec from prescription to over-the-counter status. Pharmacy sales accounted for 66.5 percent of total sales for the month.
Calendar shifts negatively impacted total comparable store sales by 0.5 percentage points, comparable pharmacy sales by 0.7 percentage points and prescriptions filled in comparable stores by 0.7 percentage points. The preliminary sales results announced last week for the first 28 days of the month were not impacted by any calendar day shifts.
And so they answer some of the questions about the previous early update for the first 22 days of October; Calendar Shifts.