Aaron's announced revenues and earnings for the first quarter ended March 31, 2015. Revenues increased 40.4% to $821.8 million compared with $585.4 million for the first quarter of 2014.
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Net earnings increased 28.4% to $49.2 million compared with $38.3 million in the prior year period. Diluted earnings per share were $.68 compared with $.53 a year ago. Non-GAAP earnings per share were $.73 compared with $.53 last year.
On a non-GAAP basis, excluding the $6.6 million of amortization expense related to the acquisition of Progressive, net earnings for the first quarter of 2015 were $53.4 million compared with $38.3 million in the first quarter a year ago, and diluted earnings per share were $.73 compared with $.53.
EBITDA for the Company was $103.7 million for the first quarter of 2015 compared with $76.3 million in the prior year period. EBITDA is calculated as the Company's earnings before interest, depreciation on property, plant and equipment, amortization of intangible assets and income taxes.
The Company ended the first quarter of 2015 with $129.8 million in cash compared with $3.5 million at the end of 2014. Debt was reduced to $520.7 million at March 31, 2015 from $606.1 million at December 31, 2014.
Aaron's Sales & Lease Ownership revenues decreased $12.8 million, or 2.3%, in the first quarter of 2015 to $552.5 million compared with $565.3 million in revenues in the first quarter of 2014.
HomeSmart revenues were $16.8 million in the first quarter of 2015, a 2.9% decrease from $17.3 million in the first quarter of 2014.
EBITDA for the core business in the first quarter of 2015 was $75.4 million compared with $76.3 million a year ago. As a percentage of total revenues, EBITDA was 13.2% compared with 13.0% for the same period in 2014.
Write offs for damaged, lost or unsaleable merchandise were 3.0% of revenues in both periods.
Same store revenues (revenues earned in Company-operated stores open for the entirety of both quarters) decreased 3.8% during the first quarter of 2015 compared with the first quarter of 2014, and customer counts on a same store basis were down 4.2%.
Company-operated Aaron's stores had 1,047,000 customers and franchised stores had 576,000 customers at the end of the quarter, a 3.5% decline in total customers from the end of the first quarter a year ago (customers of franchisees are not customers of Aaron's, Inc.).
During the first quarter of 2015, the Company revised the methodology for calculating same store revenues and same store customer counts to reflect a full lifecycle for customer retention after stores are closed. As a result, revenues for stores that have been consolidated/merged are now included in the comparable same store calculation after 24 months.
Previously, merged stores were included in the same store calculation after 15 months. The change in the same store calculation had an immaterial impact on comparable store revenues and customer counts for the first quarters of 2015 and 2014. ■