Haverty Furniture Companies, Inc. (NYSE:HVT) Q3 2024 Earnings Conference Call October 31, 2024 10:00 AM ET
Company Participants
Richard Hare - Chief Financial Officer
Clarence Smith - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer
Steve Burdette - President
Conference Call Participants
Michael Legg - The Benchmark Company
Anthony Lebiedzinski - Sidoti & Company
Cristina Fernandez - Telsey Advisory Group
Operator
Greetings, and welcome to the Haverty's Third Quarter 2024 Earnings Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. A question-and-answer session will follow the formal presentation. [Operator Instructions] As a reminder, this conference is being recorded.
It is now my pleasure to introduce your host, Richard Hare, Chief Financial Officer. Please go ahead.
Richard Hare
Thank you, operator and good morning. During this conference call, we'll make forward-looking statements, which are subject to risks and uncertainties. Actual results may differ materially from those made or implied in such statements, which speak only as of the date they are made, in which we undertake no obligation to publicly update or revise. Factors that could cause actual results to differ include economic and competitive conditions and other uncertainties detailed in the company's reports filed with the SEC.
Our Chairman and CEO, Clarence Smith, will now give you an update on our results and our President, Steve Burdette, will provide additional commentary about our business.
Clarence Smith
Good morning. Thank you for joining our third quarter conference call. Consolidated sales were a $175.9 million, down 20.2% from last year. Earnings per common share were $0.29 versus a $1.02. We are seeing a cautious consumer and we were impacted by the two hurricanes hitting our regions. We do believe that our customer is beginning to move back into the buying process based on an improvement in store traffic over the last month. We expect to see better traffic and sales once the elections are behind us.
During the third quarter, we were excited about the opening of our new Pembroke Pines store in North Miami. We are pleased with the store traffic, which is on par with our other recent openings in South Haven, Mississippi and Destin Florida, earlier this year. We expect to open three additional stores this year in St. Petersburg, Florida and Greenwood, Indiana, south of Indianapolis, and we began our return to Houston Texas after 43 years, with our first store in the Woodlands area in December, we expect to end the year with 129 stores.