Stanley Sees Sales Decline

July 16, 2007  by in UnCategorized   

By Home Furnishings Business in Case Goods on July 2007 Stanley Furniture, Stanleytown, Va., reported Monday that sales for its second quarter declined 12.6 percent to $67.7 million, and the case goods maker now expects sales for the whole year to fall below 2006 levels.

During the quarter, Stanley had a net loss of $2.4 million, including a $6.6 million charge to earnings related to its defined benefit pension plan. The company announced plans a year ago to terminate the plan, which had been frozen since 1995 in favor of having contributions to a 401K savings plan become the company’s primary retirement benefit.

President and CEO Jeff Scheffer said business conditions “deteriorated slightly” as the second quarter progressed. “While we are disappointed with lower sales and earnings, we believe this is consistent with current industry-wide conditions. We are not anticipating any significant improvement in the demand environment for the balance of 2007. Consequently, we have lowered our sales and earnings guidance.”

For the full year, the company now expects net sales in the range of $280 to $290 million after posting 2006 sales of $307.6 million.

On Monday, the company’s board of directors declared a regular quarterly cash dividend of 10 cents per share that will be payable on Sept. 6 to shareholders of record on Aug. 10.