Ethan Allen Provides Business Updates, Increases Share Repurchase Authorization and Announces Earnings Release Date for Fiscal 2020 Second Quarter Results

Danbury, CT, Jan. 13, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Ethan Allen Interiors Inc. (“Ethan Allen” or “the Company”) (NYSE:ETH) provided several updates on its business today.

Preliminary Results for the Fiscal 2020 Second Quarter - the Company expects to report the following:

• Consolidated net sales of $175 million
• GAAP diluted EPS in the range of $0.24 to $0.26
• Adjusted diluted EPS in the range of $0.25 to $0.27
• Regular quarterly dividends paid of $5.6 million
• Cash on hand of $28.3 million as of December 31, 2019 and no debt
• Repurchased 2.1% of the Company’s outstanding shares during the second quarter, representing a total of 545,727 shares
• The Company’s Board of Directors increased the share repurchase authorization to three million shares

Farooq Kathwari, Ethan Allen’s Chairman, President and CEO commented, “We are pleased with the favorable customer response to the Ethan Allen Member Program, which we launched in October 2019. As we mentioned when we launched the program, we expected sales and operating income to be negatively impacted during the transition period as we move from a promotional to membership model, providing our clients an improved customer experience through everyday savings.”

“While our wholesale orders, which reflects sales through all our channels, decreased 22% from a year ago, we realized sequential improvement in orders each month during the second quarter, with October reflecting a decrease to the prior year, November reflecting a lesser decrease and December orders increasing year over year,” Mr. Kathwari continued.

“We are pleased that our unique vertical structure continues to provide strong operating leverage to allow us to consistently return value to our shareholders through our regular quarterly dividend, periodic special cash dividends and share repurchases. During our second quarter we paid $5.6 million in cash dividends and repurchased 545,727 shares, representing 2.1% of our outstanding shares.”

Mr. Kathwari concluded, “For our third quarter, as the Member Program continues to gain momentum, we have a strong marketing program planned, starting with a direct mail magazine being distributed this month to 2.5 million households. This will be supported by various other marketing channels including local television in select markets and digital and social marketing. I am also pleased to announce that Rodney Hutton has recently joined Ethan Allen as our Chief Marketing Officer. Rodney brings a strong marketing and brand building background having previously held senior marketing leadership roles in a number of leading enterprises including Karl Lagerfeld, Ann Klein, Ralph Lauren and Giorgio Armani.”