Ulta Beauty’s Q2 Ecomm Sales Rise 43.4%

Ulta Beauty says net sales increased 19.4% to $877.0 million in the second quarter, up from $734.2 million in the second quarter of fiscal 2014.
 
Comparable sales (sales for stores open at least 14 months and e-commerce sales) increased 10.1% compared to an increase of 9.6% in the second quarter of fiscal 2014. The 10.1% comparable sales increase was driven by 7.0% growth in transactions and 3.1% growth in average ticket, according to the retail.er
 
Retail comparable sales increased 8.9%, including salon comparable sales growth of 10.1%.  Salon sales increased 19.7% to $51.6 million and e-commerce sales grew 43.4% to $36.1 million from $25.2 million in the second quarter of fiscal 2014.
 
 “The Ulta Beauty team achieved outstanding results in the second quarter, with top line momentum delivering better than expected earnings growth,” said Mary Dillon, CEO. “Strong traffic growth drove healthy comparable sales increases across stores, salon and e-commerce, while average ticket growth also contributed. An exciting pipeline of new products, combined with increasing effectiveness of our marketing strategies, drove market share gains across all categories. In light of the excellent performance of the business in the first half of the year, we are raising our outlook for the full year and now expect to achieve earnings per share growth in the high teens.”
 
For the first six months, net sales increased 20.5% to $1.7 billion. Comparable sales increased 10.8% Retail comparable sales increased 9.3%, including salon comparable sales growth of 10.2%. Salon sales increased 20.1%  and e-commerce comparable sales grew 46.8% to $80.1 million from $54.5 million in the first six months of fiscal 2014,
 
Ulta opened 20 stores in Q2, and ended the quarter with 817 stores.
 
For the third quarter of fiscal 2015, the company currently expects net sales in the range of $869 million to $883 million.
Ulta said is raising its previously announced fiscal 2015 guidance; the Company plans to: achieve comparable sales growth of approximately 8% to 10%, including the impact of the e-commerce business, compared to previous guidance of 7% to 9%; increase total sales in the mid to high teens percentage range; and grow e-commerce sales in the 40% range.