Auto parts retailer AutoZone Inc. ended fiscal 2012 with a nice uptick in e-commerce sales.
For the fiscal year ended Aug. 25, Auto Zone, No. 121 in the Internet Retailer Top 500, reported:
- Web sales of $181.30 million, including all sales from AutoZone.com and AllData.com, which sells diagnostic and related repair work software, an increase of 9.0% from $166.28 million in fiscal 2011.
- Total sales of $8.60 billion, an increase of 6.6% from $8.07 billion.
- Domestic comparable-store sales were up 3.9%.
- Net income of $930.4 million, up by 9.6% from $848.9 million.
E-commerce accounted for 2.1% of total sales for the year, the same as in fiscal 2011.
“There are great opportunities for e-commerce sales growth on both a business-to-business basis and to an individual customer,” Bill Rhodes, CEO, told analysts on the company’s recent year-end earnings call. “This portion of our business, while small as a percentage of our overall sales mix, continues to experience faster sales growth than the auto parts stores.”
Auto Zone aims to increase sales to business customers via the Internet in fiscal 2012, Rhodes told analysts. “We’ve been expanding our product offerings and aggressively building our capabilities to serve our business-to-business customers more effectively. An example of this is our launch of the AllData product in Europe.”
Auto Zone also now has 321 stores in Mexico and plans to open one in Brazil. In the U.S., the company’s store total reached 5,000 with the opening of an Alaska location, the 49th state Auto Zone serves.
For the fourth quarter, AutoZone reported:
- Web sales of $56.7 million, including all sales from AutoZone.com and AllData.com, up by 6.3% from $53.3 million in the same quarter of 2011.
- Total sales of $2.76 billion, an increase of about 4.5% from $2.64 billion in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2011.
- Comparable-store sales increased 2.1%.
- Net income of $323.7 million, up by 7.4% from $301.5 million in the same quarter last year.
The web accounted for 2.1% of total sales for the quarter, compared with 2.0% in Q4 2011.
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