Walgreens (WAG) said its January comparable-stores sales declined 4.6 percent, with the effect of calendar day shifts positively impacting total comparable sales by 0.8 percentage point. Also, the company reported January sales of $5.80 billion, down 2.3 percent from $5.93 billion in the year earlier period.
Total front-end sales went up by 2.7 percent in January 2012, while comparable-store front-end sales increased 1.6 percent, following a 0.6 percent rise in December. Customer traffic in comparable stores decreased 0.6 percent, whereas basket size grew 2.2 percent.
Prescriptions filled at comparable stores slipped 8.6 percent, while calendar day shifts in January, which had one additional Tuesday and one fewer Saturday versus January 2011, positively impacted prescriptions filled in comparable stores by 1.3 percentage points. Lower incidence of flu negatively impacted comparable prescriptions filled by 1.5 percentage points, the company added.
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