雅詩蘭黛 (EL) 2009 Q3 法說會逐字稿

Good day, everyone.

Welcome to the Estee Lauder Company's fiscal 2009 third quarter Conference Call.

Today's call is being recorded and Webcast.

For opening remarks and introductions, I would like to turn the call over to Vice President of Investor Relations, Mr.

Dennis D'Andrea.

Please go ahead, sir.

Good morning, everyone.

We have on today's call William Lauder, Chief Executive Officer, Fabrizio Freda, President and Chief Operating Officer, and Rick Kunes, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer.

Dan Brestle, our Vice Chairman and President of ELC North America is also on the call and Dan will be available for questions.

Since many of our remarks today contain forward-looking statements let me refer you to our Press Release and our reports filed with the SEC where you'll find factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from these forward-looking statements.

And I'll turn the call over to William now.

Good morning.

Thank you for joining our Fiscal 2009 Third Quarter Conference Call.

I want to begin by congratulating Fabrizio on his election to Chief Executive Officer effective July 1 as part of the succession plan and Senior Management transition we announced in November 2007.

Fabrizio has been with the Estee Lauder Company for just over a year and in that time he's accomplished a great deal working in partnership with me and other executives.

Soon after he arrived, Fabrizio immersed himself in all of the facets of the Company and visited affiliates and retailers.

He is a quick study with a fresh eye, he sized up the Company's strength and identified areas for improvement.

He then took the lead in developing a long term strategy that will better integrate the Company's brands, regions and functions, with the goal of making us more unified, productive and profitable.

We are leveraging the companies numerous strengths and sharing knowledge and resources, by focusing on innovation, consumer insights and a holistic approach to running a multinational business we expect to enhance the Company's leadership in global Prestige Beauty.

When I assume my new role as Executive Chairman, we will continue to work closely as we refine the Company's blueprint for growth and cost reduction as times and needs dictate.

Turning to another major transition, I want to acknowledge the tremendous impact Dan Brestle has had during his more than three decades at the Estee Lauder Companies.

Dan will retire at the end of June and his outstanding business judgment, teamwork and brand building skills will be greatly missed.

During his career he has worked in virtually all of our brands and been an important contributor to the Company's direction and growth.

In fact when Dan joined we had just three brands and one main channel of distribution.

In his current position of Vice President and Chairman of ELC North America, he's helped create the North American affiliate which is a vital component in the reorganization and refocusing of our regional structure.

He will continue to be engaged in broader issues through our industry trade association.

It's been an honor for so many of us have have worked with Dan and we are deeply appreciative all he has done for the Company.

I'm sure many of you saw the announce am last week that Thia Breen currently global President of the flagship Estee Lauder brand will become the President of the North American region, a newly created role.

Thia's next assignment is one of several changes in the senior leadership team.

Fabrizio will talk more about those changes in a few minutes.

Turning now to global business conditions, we're finding it's still difficult to know when we'll start to see real improvement.

With conflicting economic reports and ongoing uncertainty, our visibility remains limited.

That said, we're running our business under the assumptions that the challenging climate will last for at least the next 12 months.

In the recent quarter, our US sales declined but at a slower rate than in our Second Quarter.

In the US, there are early signs of economic improvement, but retail sales remain soft, particularly at high end department and specialty stores, which continued to show significant declines.

However, Prestige cosmetics have out performed Department Stores overall business.

For the three months ended March 31, US Prestige Beauty sales fell by half the rate of the average decline for Department Stores total business.

Moreover, within Beauty we have good news to report.

We gained ground on competitors achieving identifiable success.

In the US Prestige department and specialty store universe tracked by NPD, the Estee Lauder Companies added 100 basis points of share during our fiscal Third Quarter compared with the prior year quarter.

The biggest increase was in skincare which is our most strategically important category and has the largest growth potential.

The makeup also gained and fragrance grew marginally.

By brand, Clinique had the largest share growth due to strong gift programs and product launches, followed by M-A-C.

The Estee Lauder Brand was flat.

In both the skincare and makeup categories our brand sold the top two positions in US Department Stores as measured by NPD.

In this difficult economy, consumers contemplate their purchases more carefully and are attracted to innovative products and those that offer good value.

Innovation has always been a priority for our Company and we are devoting even more resources and attention to creating outstanding products that fulfill and exceed consumers desires.

Skincare is a critical area for driving growth and profitability, so we're committed to being in the forefront of innovative skincare products.

Clinique introduced a new anti-aging product,Youth Surge which uses cutting edge technology.

Its unique characteristic is that it prevents and repairs visible signs of aging simultaneously.

Shipments were strong and consumer response has been enthusiastic.

Clinique's new redness solutions mineral powder acts like a makeup to cover redness, but is a skincare treatment at heart.

This unique product helped drive the brands domestic skincare sales this quarter.

The Estee Lauder Brand reformulated its best selling 27 year old advanced night repair.

The latest version which hits counters in July contains our exclusive technology to support the natural synchronization of the skins repair and protection processes.

Estee Lauder launched Time Zone moisturizers a few months ago and they've been strong sellers.

Time Zone enables skin a look and behave younger.

Line extensions will be introduced in coming months, to build on the momentum.

The Company's acquisition last year of Applied Genetics Incorporated Dramatics, a manufacturer of cosmetics ingredients will be instrumental in creating breakthrough skincare technologies.

AGI's Founder and President, Dr.

Daniel Yarosh, an expert in DNA repair has joined our Company.

As you all know consumers are being more selective about what they buy during this global economic slowdown.

They are still making purchases, but are buying products that are functional without being conspicuous.

As a result of this trend, skincare sale also holding up better than makeup products.

We're also placing a greater emphasis on the value our products provide and retrimming our message to consumers.

Value isn't just a reflection of price but encompasses quality, performance, personalized service and the average cost over time.

Across the Company, brands and businesses are reviewing their marketing and communications and tailoring their messages to position themselves for the consumers new mind set.

We believe value which can be expressed in various ways, will be a powerful message for the foreseeable future, especially for Prestige Brands.

So what are our brands doing?

Let me give you a few examples.

The 9,000 Clinique consultants in the US have begun explaining to consumers that the brands three-step treatment system can last for three months making it a great value.

The Estee Lauder Brand is actively promoting its free signature services and further educating its beauty Advisors so they can discuss a product value as well as its performance.

The brand got a taste of the new consumer attitude at Valentine's Day when fragrances sold rapidly thanks to having more inherent value than the previous year and stronger merchandising.

In travel retail there are several initiatives under way.

Clinique and Estee Lauder are working on new ideas to highlight values and special offerings.

Bobbi Brown and Clinique are communicating the complimentary services available in airports.

Some consumers do equate value with price, so several brands are launching products at lower suggested retail price points.

For example, the Estee Lauder Brand is creating smaller sized fragrances.

These examples show how our brands are reacting smartly and creatively to the challenging environment.

Thanks to many corporate and brand specific actions we believe we are well positioned to emerge even stronger when the economy improves.

We've taken steps to resize the Company for the current downturn and restructure for long term success.

We view Fiscal 2009 as a transition year, when the next Fiscal Year begins in less than two months, we believe The Estee Lauder Companies will be well on its way to becoming a leaner, more strategic, and better focused global business.

Now I will turn the call over to Fabrizio who will talk about progress we've made toward our strategic goals.

Fabrizio?

Thank you, William and good morning, everyone.

Since we spoke to you three months ago, we've been busy putting in place a structure to implement our full year strategy plan.

Today, we provide an update on our accomplishments.

As William mentioned, last week we announced the new leadership organization that will take affect on July 1.

I have to say that since I joined the Company I have been extremely impressed with the talent and dedication of the people here.

The top executives have deep industry backgrounds and in many cases years even decades with our Company.

The team consists of new executives who fill needed capabilities as our own experienced leaders.

Many of them are moving to different roles or are taking added responsibilities.

This team provides much continuity and also injects new thinking and ideas.

I'm confident that this will prove to be a superb group of leaders who will reach across brands, regions, and functions to achieve our financial goals and successfully implement the corporate strategy.

Our 29 brands are now being reorganized into four clusters based on channel and consumer segmentation enabling greater platform for growth.

This will allow the brands to take advantage of synergies, leverage ideas and scale, and better understand consumer needs.

In addition, we have strengthened the way we do business in the Americas, our largest region.

This involves the creation of a North America affiliate which will launched July 1.

The affiliate will execute distribution opportunities across brands and allow us to align ourselves with Department Stores as some of them also restructure.

By leverage of scale, all three of our regions also will have more resources available to develop locally relevant marketing plans and product offerings.

The regional structure will enable the affiliates to coordinate their approach to customers and share consumer and competitive insights.

This organization also provides a stronger platform for growth opportunities while reducing cost and complexity.

The Company functions will be more fully integrated with all of the brands and regions and with focus on shared services, productivity, and financial discipline.

The newly formed executive leadership team that I discussed on the last call includes all the brands, region, and function heads under my direction.

The group is responsible for achieving the Company annual growth, implementing strategic priorities and resolving critical business issues.

One of the main priorities of our strategies is to improve cost and productivity.

These efforts are being driven by our Program Management team.

On that front, we have already taken action.

We will close the Long Island assembly facility by the end of this calendar year and move the functions to our Pennsylvania plant where we have excess capacity.

We entered into an agreement to outsource a range of information technology services and support for the Company at a lower cost.

Our brands continue to make progress, reducing inventories and SKUs.

Even in the face of our global trade destocking and lower sales, our inventory days improved 13% as of March 31st compared to the previous year.

We anticipate by the end of this Fiscal Year the number of SKUs Company-wide will stand at approximately 15,400, down 25% from three years ago.

We are progressing in indirect procurement where we expect to save money by leveraging scale.

To facilitate our buying power we are converting our existing fragmented organization to full time professional groups.

This approach will give us better control over processes, policies and spending.

Our SAP implementation continues to move forward and we are pleased with the performance and quick adaptation of the functions and units that have gone live.

The next step, scheduled for this month, will involve demand planning for several brands and retailer interactions.

In addition we plan to accelerate the asset implementation in our North American manufacturing facility.

Based on the success of installing SAP in our UK plant and at Aveda.

We are planning to launch SAP all at once at our North America plants next April, shaving seven months off the previous schedule.

Our Origin Brand is concentrating on countries where it can achieve better returns and as part of this, its strategy calls for its exit of several small markets by the end of the Fiscal Year.

Our fragrance staffed force has taken several positive steps to improve the profitability of the fragrance division.

We selectively raised suggested retail prices earlier in the year based on competitive analysis, achieved lower cost of goods without sacrificing quality, and expanded distribution in US specialty stores.

In addition, Aramis and designer fragrances intends to cut the number of individual SKUs by 15% this year, on top of 20% it eliminated in Fiscal Year 2008.

As you saw in this mornings Press Release, we took an initial $6.2 million charge for restructuring primarily for employee related cost.

This is part of the $73 million restructuring and other special charges that we disclosed mid April.

Improving performance, however, involves more than just cutting costs.

The other side of the equation, generating growth, is equally important.

Our strategic focus, our strategy focus is on investing behind our most promising opportunities.

As William discussed, product innovation is critical to our success and we are continuing to develop breakthrough technologies.

We are also focusing our resources on the most important markets, and our strategy is already paying off.

In this quarter we gained share in our distribution in many countries and regions which we see as a direct growth of the strategy.

The Asia Pacific region has been a bright spot for us.

In each of the first three quarters of this Fiscal Year, we have grown our sales in Asia between 13 and 21% in constant currency.

We expect to finish the Fiscal Year strong in this region.

For the quarter we grew sales at retail in nearly every market in the region and as a Company, we estimate our share grow.

In Japan, our largest market in the region, we picked up share despite a difficult environment.

Certain brands also gained share in specific Markets.

For instance, the Estee Lauder brand became the top selling Prestige Brand in Hong Kong and increased share in our distribution in China.

In Europe, we believe retail sales of Prestige Beauty Products declined in the quarter; however our sell-through at retail grew low to mid single digits, so we grew share overall.

In the UK, our largest market outside of the US, we estimate our retail growth was nearly double than of the Prestige Beauty as a whole.

So, despite the global recession, we believe we continue to gain on competitors in our regions which is a goal of our strategy.

Expanding geographic and distribution diversification is another way to further our strategic objectives.

The following examples show how brands are exploring fast growing channels and venturing into new Markets.

Ojon open in several locations in JCPenny and will run a US infomercial later this month.

We continue rolling out Good Skin Labs best selling Tri-Aktiline anti-aging products.

It entered Hong Kong and Brazil and its successor product, Eyliplex made end roads in Europe.

Good Skin Labs expects to launch in more Markets in the Fourth Quarter, adding to the 50 that are open now.

Origin will host a show on Japan QVC channel.

Even as traffic has slowed in stores we have seen more shoppers online in every region which we attribute the consumer wanting to avoid being conspicuous and to target their purchases.

Market Clinique relaunched their website with [announce of features] and brands continue to expand international eCommerce capabilities.

Bobbi Brown opened freestanding stores in Tokyo, Dubai and Paris.

Its 12 global freestanding stores and locations attract a new range of consumers.

As we transition into our full year strategy, I'm extremely pleased with the first steps we have taken with initial progress we have already made.

We established the strategic growth and parameters, selected the right people for every job, taken decisive actions in operations, and refocused the portfolio toward opportunities with the highest margin and best growth potential.

By leveraging scale and ideas, investing in consumer knowledge, in global R&D and strengthening financial discipline, we expect the Estee Lauder Companies to enhance its position as the global leader in Prestige Beauty.

Now, Rick will speak to you about the financial results of the quarter.

Rick?

Thank you, Fabrizio, and good morning, everyone.

Overall, sales came within the range we forecasted.

In local currency, sales this quarter decreased 2% from last year at the high end of our expectations.

The strengthening dollar negatively impacted sales by eight percentage points resulting in a reported sales decline of 10% to $1.7 billion.

Reported net earnings for the quarter were $27.2 million or $0.14 per diluted share.

These results included restructuring and special charges of $6.2 million or $4.2 million after-tax equal to $0.02 per diluted share.

Net earnings excluding the charges in both periods were $31.4 million compared with $89.7 million in the prior year quarter, and pro forma diluted EPS was $0.16 compared to $0.46 in the prior year quarter.

Earnings came in $0.08 above the high end of our range due to the timing of some expenses which are expected to occur in our Fiscal Fourth Quarter.

The Americas region continues to be our most challenging.

Sales for the quarter fell 7% in local currency, largely because of difficult US business and softness in Canada and Mexico.

US Prestige Department Stores were challenged in the quarter.

Their overall sales fell more than 10% on average but only 5% in their beauty departments.

Retail sales of our products in the US Prestige Department Stores declined 3% according to NPD, with our shipments to this channel, while our shipments to this channel fell about 8%.

Clearly, the destocking we experienced last quarter continued.

Results in other US channels were mixed.

Sales declines in our freestanding stores were comparable to our retail performance in Department Stores.

The lines continued to suffer the effects of the downturn but our eCommerce business rose in the high teens with all brands recording double digit growth.

Our local currency sales in Europe, Middle East and Africa fell 3%.

While sales declined in some key western European Markets including Spain, France, and Italy, we saw growth in the United Kingdom and Germany.

Developing areas including the Middle East, Turkey, and Russia continued to see growth.

However, as expected, our travel retail division was pressured by reduced airline passenger traffic and continued trade destocking.

Local currency sales rose 13% in Asia Pacific with all countries except Japan contributing to the growth.

We are particularly pleased with our performance in Asia Pacific this year.

For the nine months, the region grew ahead of plan in more than 15% over last year in local currency.

Korea saw the fastest growth this quarter due to the devaluation of the Won which caused Koreans to curtail travel and buy locally.

China continued to expand at a pace exceeding 20%.

Same-store retail sales in China grew midteens reflecting the health of the business in this critical market.

The countries in this region are not immune to the economic issues felt elsewhere, but so far they have held up very well.

Japan has fared the worst in the region, recording a mid single digit decline after a government report on declining GDP appeared to affect consumer spending.

Moving on to gross margin, we had a 120 basis point drop this quarter to 73.7%.

Our ability to absorb overhead costs has been hampered by reduced production levels.

The impact of this was approximately 100 basis points this quarter.

Higher promotional activities trimmed margin by about 40 basis points and adverse currency and mix were 20 basis points each.

On a positive note these decreases were partially offset by reduced obsolescence charges and other favorable manufacturing variances of 30 basis points each.

Pro forma operating expenses as a percentage of sales for the quarter were 69.2% compared to 66.3% last year.

Total pro forma operating expenses declined approximately 6% this quarter as we continued our belt tightening efforts.

However, sales declined as a faster pace.

Continued investment in global IT systems and infrastructure, charges related to difficult business conditions at certain of our retail customers, and net losses from currency transactions hurt the operating expense margin by about 60 basis points each.

Intangible asset impairment charges which related primarily to our Darphin brand negatively impacted the operating expense margin by about 90 basis points.

Pro forma operating income fell to $76.5 million this quarter compared to $160.5 million last year.

Reported operating expenses were 69.6% of sales as restructuring and other special charges added about 40 basis points.

As a result, reported operating income dropped to $70.3 million including the charges.

Regarding our net interest expense we reported $20.6 million compared with $16.1 million in last years Third Quarter.

It rose primarily due to higher debt levels including the $300 million five year notes we issued during our last quarter partially offset by lower average rates on borrowings.

The effective tax rate for the quarter was 43.1% primarily because the majority of the write-off of intangible assets was non-deductible.

Moving on to working capital and cash flow, our cash balance at the end of March was $641 million.

Our Day Sales Outstanding were 55 days this quarter, the same as last year.

We continue to keep an eye on the financial health of the parties with which we do business.

For example, one US retailer is liquidating and we are closely monitoring one customer in Russia.

Despite lower sales and destocking in the quarter, our inventory days improved to 154 compared with 176 days last year.

Reflecting positive working capital trends, our net trade cycle improved to 128 days from 161 days a year ago.

For the nine months, net cash flows from operating activities were $307 million compared with $519 million in the prior year period.

We spent $216 million for Capital Expenditures in the nine months of Fiscal 2009, 14% below the prior year and reflecting significantly tighter controls on uses of cash versus our plan.

For Fiscal 2009, we expect to generate around $470 million of cash flow from operations and to use about $270 million for Capital Expenditures.

We continue to pursue our gross strategies while protecting our bottom line.

We expect about $250 million in spending reductions this year from our belt tightening initiatives.

As William and Fabrizio said, we began to execute the long term strategic plan that we laid out last quarter.

This resulted in restructuring and other special charges of $6 million representing the first actions against our targeted $350 million to $450 million in charges over the next few years.

We expect to have a clearer picture of the timing and amount of costs and savings by our Fiscal Year End.

Keep in mind that as restructuring decisions are made, we plan to update you through 8-K amendments as we did in mid April.

The figure cited these amendments represent charges that will eventually be recorded in our P&L as the relevant criteria are met.

We will keep you apprised as we continue to make progress on the strategy in the months ahead.

Let me now discuss our thoughts on the year.

We remain cautious about the consumer and continue to believe that the current global economic conditions will contribute to soft retail sales.

Our ability to forecast remains difficult, but we can convey our assumptions to give you some guidance.

For the year, on a constant currency basis we expect our international business to continue to be our leading performer.

We are forecasting sales growth in Asia in the low teens, although the environment could worsen.

Europe and the Americas are each forecasted to decline at mid single digit rates.

We expect Fiscal 2009 local currency sales to decrease between 1% and 3% compared to last year.

Foreign currency translation is likely to lower our reported sales by approximately five to seven percentage points.

For the remainder of the Fiscal Year, our assumption for the Euro is $1.33, for the Yen is $0.98 to $1 and for the Pound $1.43.

If the dollar strengthens or weakens against these major currencies it will further impact our financial results.

We are tightening our pro forma full year EPS forecast to between $1.32 and $1.44.

This includes approximately $0.21 to $0.23 related to the negative impact of foreign currency translation.

This range does not reflect any one-time expenses or charges that may result from the implementation of our strategic plan.

The expect that $350 to million $450 million in restructuring will be reflected in our P&L as per accounting rules.

Again we expect to give a clearer picture of the timing and amount of these costs and savings related to our program by our Fiscal Year End.

This implies that sales for our Fiscal Fourth Quarter are forecasted to decline 8% to 10% in local currency.

The negative impact of foreign exchange translation is expected to lower sales growth for the quarter by about eight percentage points.

As I mentioned earlier, some of the operating expenses we thought would occur in our Third Quarter are now expected to be incurred in the Fourth Quarter.

Additionally we are also expecting continued foreign exchange translation losses.

We forecast pro forma EPS for the three months ending June 30th, 2009, to be between $0.11 and $0.23.

Our assumptions for the economy and our business have not changed materially.

Our performance is dependent on trends in the consumption and trade stock levels.

Our outlook assumes that the downturn will last for at least another 12 months.

We remain focused on executing our strategy, reducing costs and conserving cash, while steadfastly maintaining vital investments.

That concludes my comments for today and we're happy to take your questions now.

(Operator Instructions).

Our first question comes from the line of Bill Schmitz from Deutsche Bank.

Good morning guys.

Good morning, Bill.

Just talking about the local currency guidance for the Fourth Quarter the down 8% to 10%, I mean did you see something in April that made you switch that from the negative 2% you saw this quarter?

No, we had a very strong Fourth Quarter last year, Bill.

And as well, some of our gifts are in the third quarter which drove a little bit of retail performance in North America.

So there's a little bit of a change from last year but overall we remain pretty confident in the range that we gave for the full year.

Great and then just sort of kind of a related follow-up.

I mean in the guidance, do you have, are there restructuring related charges or more goodwill write-offs in there?

I mean is there anything besides the sort of GAAP refined restructuring we should be mindful in the numbers?

Bill, the total we talked about was $350 million to $450 million and that will be incurred over the next several years.

So will there be further restructuring and one-time charges in our Fourth Quarter?

I think the answer is yes to that.

The question is how big will the magnitude be?

But we will inform you as soon as any of those decisions are reached by an 8-K.

But that is not included, those numbers are not included in our guidance.

Okay, Rick.

More of the question was like the amortization charge you guys reported this morning wasn't included.

So is there anything that isn't defined as restructuring under GAAP that might also impact numbers, like along the lines of that write-off the goodwill amortization?

Yes.

Bill, the reason that we included that in our normal operating results is in our minds that was business as usual and it was business decisions that we reached.

It wasn't something unusual in the fact that we're changing major distribution patterns or whatever around brands.

It was really just driven by our business.

And that's consistent with the way we treated some of that previously so we included that in our numbers.

Okay.

Great.

Thank you very much.

Your next question is from the line of Alice Longley with Buckingham Research.

Hi, good morning.

Could you tell me with that 8% to 10% decline for the Fourth Quarter how much of that do you think is continued destocking by retailers?

And are you seeing destocking continuing in both North America and in Europe?

Yes, we're seeing destocking continue in both places.

I think the pace of destocking is beginning to slow a little bit.

But part of it again as I just mentioned is because of the timing of some gift activity here in the US which was in the third quarter which drove some of the performance here a little bit better than maybe you're seeing it versus last year.

And we did have a strong Fourth Quarter last year, I think we reported 9% comparable currency and 13 or 14% reported numbers in the Fourth Quarter of last year.

So we had a strong Fourth Quarter last year which we're up against as well.

Thank you.

Your next question is from the line of Wendy Nicholson with Citigroup.

Hi.

My first question has to do with travel retail.

Could you spell out specifically how that did in the third quarter and what your guidance is for the Fourth Quarter?

In our Third Quarter, Wendy, our travel retail business was down around 20%.

For the year we see airline traffic down about 10% and we think our overall business will be roughly around those kinds of numbers, midteens.

And are you seeing destocking there too or is there a good translation between what your business is doing on a sell-through basis and what you're shipping in?

No.

There's absolutely destocking in that business as well.

It's the same pattern that we've seen quite honestly in many of our businesses where everyone is reacting to the economic conditions and pulling down their working capital investments if you will.

And do you think you're gaining share in that channel the same way you are in the traditional channels?

Yes, we believe in travel retail we are gaining share.

Okay, thank you very much.

The next question is from the line of Neely Tamminga with Piper Jaffray.

Good morning, gentlemen.

Just wanted to ask a little bit more big picture on the strategic plan.

Could you Fabrizio or for Rick, could you give us a sense in terms of the buckets, the biggest buckets towards that plan?

You've outlined, you have several different initiatives but wondering where you think you're going to see some of the earliest and possibly the biggest movements and basis points towards that margin goal?

Would be very helpful, thank you.

Sure.

I guess from a cost perspective, certainly I'll answer and if you need more than that, but we did talk about reducing our workforce by approximately 2,000 people.

That's a big driver of the savings and that's done through improving our productivity and also the new regional alignment structure that Fabrizio said.

Where we're looking to drive efficiencies and pull out some of the back office duplicative costs that the Company has traditionally held.

So that's the biggest opportunity for us.

In addition to that, we see a great deal of savings coming from the indirect procurement organization that Fabrizio outlined in his prepared remarks.

We see SMI and the implementation of SAP software particularly in our Supply Chain to be a big driver of our savings.

So I mean those are the three really big buckets which is people costs, around improving our efficiencies, and the organizational structure, indirect procurement with the global buying groups and then the implementation of SMI and the SAP software which will help us drive efficiencies in our Supply Chain.

So Rick, that would seem to me some of the cost savings are going to come sooner rather than later, kind of lumpier up front if you've already implemented some of these workforce reductions?

Well, it's -- actually our workforce reductions are in two parts one is achieving the productivity that we've traditionally had.

And the second is around the organizational structure.

And we see those savings coming over the next 12 to 24 months quite honestly before they are fully achieved.

Indirect procurement is one that we're working diligently against but it does take a little bit of time.

And the SAP implementation as we mentioned I think historically, we see that shifting over from a cost to a savings during our Fiscal 2011.

Great.

Thank you.

The next question is from the line of Ali Dibadj with Bernstein.

Hi guys.

A couple questions about just the transformation and first couple is around the announcement on Wednesday for management change.

It didn't seem like there were many new faces, many new people.

And then tying it to the comment today in the prepared remarks that we've selected the right people for every job, I guess I was surprised by that that there weren't more new people, more people coming.

Maybe, given how hard -- at least my experience has been in terms of changing a culture of an organization which sounds like what you guys have to do?

Ali, actually, I think we have some real great people, with excellent expertise in the industry that already are showing that they can drive the new strategy in the right way.

And so we obviously put the accent on expertise and continuity wherever this was possible.

There are a few cases where we have taken expertise from outside the Company and in the future in different positions in the mid Management level there will be more cases like that to inject the kind of scales in US Prestige that we need.

A larger view as you summarize, that we believe we have a strong team that will bring the strategy to success.

And the reason for this is that the strategy and the key actions and the new way of working together are going to make the same people that we had produce honestly better results.

Because of the way we are focusing on the goals more than because of the change of the people.

The people would be as you said largely the same and they'vere excellent.

Okay.

Can you comment a little bit in that structure about the oddity of Rick as CFO and Amy as HR reporting at least partially to the Chairman?

How does that work?

I've never really seen that before.

Well quite honestly, Ali, we are a unique Company and to try to put us into your round peg is going to be really quite a difficult challenge.

The fact of the matter is that the skill sets and the partnership that Fabrizio and I have is we believe very efficient, very unique and will allow us to work very closely.

There's a number of initiatives that are being lead by both Rick in the finance area and Amy in the HR area, which were initiated before Fabrizio came which we think are important for continuity purposes to continue to work closely both with Fabrizio and me.

The fact of the matter is that it's most important for all of us is the closest with which Fabrizio and I work together and the closest with which our entire senior team works together.

And it's less about reporting and more about partnership that makes us all successful.

Okay.

Last question is about the transformation, in terms of the SG&A.

It was certainly lower in dollar terms than we expected this quarter.

How much of that is the shifting that you mentioned, how much of that is a permanent change, and how much of that is a not so permanent change, not so much shifting but costs in terms of the belt tightening we may see come back in 2010?

Ali, the difference quite honestly between where the guidance we had given and where we actually turned out, that's really a shifting.

And it's a shifting in some respects of investment spending whereas we entered the third quarter, we were watching everything including what we would in many respects consider strategic spending, very carefully to make sure we delivered our year.

As we now feel much more confident in delivering the year, we're letting some of that strategic spending happen in the Fourth Quarter.

So that's I think what you'll see.

Regarding the belt tightening, we did mention I think on the last call that a lot of that belt tightening cost reduction is temporary in nature.

But that what we had to do was react to the economic climate that we all encountered in October as quickly as we can.

But we are incorporating that into our savings targets and our strategic plan overall.

And we intend to if you will more permanent ties to those savings in some form or fashion over the long term.

Thanks.

Very helpful answers.

Your next question is from the line of [Chris Ferraro] with Banc of America-Merrill Lynch.

Hi, thanks, guys.

Sorry to make you go through this again but wounding if you could just go through all of the different timing issues that hit?

And I guess Rick you touched on some of it, talking about some of the strategic spending I guess that you're allowing to happen in Q4.

But could you go through, I thought you said something about gift timing or more gifts last quarter.

I don't know if that's just because there was better performance or because there was some timing shift for something.

But can you just go through any sort of timing that might have changed from Q3 versus Q4 on the cost or the revenue side?

Sure.

I think that the gift comment that I made was more around the sales and the question was why are our sales, why do we think our sales are so much weaker in the Fourth Quarter versus the third.

And part of that sales performance was driven by a planned gift shift from the Fourth Quarter into the third quarter, so that was the reason for that.

The rest of it, Chris, the other spending quite honestly was us being very very cautious in the way we spent our money.

Even from a strategic point of view towards the beginning of the Third Quarter just to insure the we could achieve our full year results.

And we're comfortable with being able to deliver earnings within the guidance that we've just given, and so we're allowing that spending to happen.

Great and just for I guess the related follow-up, I mean you are talking it seems like we see some of your shipping, your trailing consumption you're still seeing inventory destocking, you just saw your sales growth come in not as bad as the previous quarter and I get some of the gift shipping and timing.

But can you talk more broadly, I mean do you guys feel like you seen the edge, you've seen it as bad as it's going to be and now things are sort of leveling off a little bit?

Like do you actually see that in your business and I understand it's hard to predict.

I'm just looking for a general sense of how you viewing the world from here.

Well it's really going to be very difficult Chris for us to give you any sort of insight.

Quite honestly, my instinct is until we get to the mid to late Fall of this year when we start going against what were meaningfully weaker retail sales, we're not going to be able to give you some indication of oh, gee, things are better, things are the same.

Are we bumping along the bottom or are bumping along the plateau with another drop?

I think not until we turn the corner against weak sales can we even begin to give you an instinct of where we're going.

Gut, we've probably we've got another 12 months to go.

Certainly right now I think what you're seeing is both the consumer as well as retailer with whom we trade are adjusting to a level.

Now the question is where is this level relative to where we were a year ago and where is this level relative to where we expect we might be in a year?

I think it's very soon, too soon to tell on that one.

What we're really focusing in on is adjusting our own ability to operate in this current environment under the assumption that this is the worst it gets but preparing ourselves in case it is worse and how we can adjust to that reality.

Thanks.

Sure, and Chris, one point also, to remember is that we had a fairly strong First Quarter this Fiscal Year.

So we're to the really talking about next year but you should bear in mind when we do enter into next year we had a very strong quarter this Fiscal Year to go up against.

Got it.

Thanks, again.

Your next question is from Linda Bolton-Weiser with Caris.

Hi.

I was just curious if -- on the restructuring program if when you give guidance for FY 2010 in July or August, will you be ready at that point to indicate to us the total amount of cost saves from the restructuring and new strategy that you're expecting for FY 2010?

Or is it going to be a gradual disclosure throughout FY 2010 as you take actions?

No.

Linda, I think we'll be in pretty good shape by the time we speak to you again to have the timing of cost and savings associated with our program laid out by Fiscal Year and hopefully by quarter roughly for Fiscal 2010.

As you can appreciate a multi-year program like we have, there will be some changes plus or minus, but we should be in pretty good shape by the next time we speak to you.

Okay, that's good, and then can I just ask about you had mentioned like in fragrance, you were making some smaller size units that were lowering to average price per unit.

Is that, are you doing that type of thing in some of the other brands or businesses?

Can you talk about that and what are the effects?

Is that helping you achieve volume growth, but is that hurting price per unit and how is that affecting profitability?

Can you just talk about that?

Yes, we had been doing this in very different brands depending on the opportunities and in different regions.

Basically, we are looking for deliver higher value wherever we can.

Where we do that, this does not affect others profitability, otherwise we tend not to do it obviously.

But we are able to deliver this in a pretty meaningful way for the consumer and for us internally.

We see the consumer obviously being interested in reducing the risk of new trials, reducing the risk of failing in experimenting new innovation.

In this way, some entry price point and some lower trial opportunities, lower price trial opportunities are delivering some good results across-the-board.

Okay, that's very interesting, and then finally, can you disclose what was the fragrance asset impairment, the small amount that was take in in the quarter for which fragrance license?

Yes, it was a small amount in our Tom Ford license.

Okay, that's all.

Thank you very much.

The next question is from the line of John Faucher with JPMorgan.

A quick follow-up, I apologize for asking again about the spending numbers but any chance you're going to give us an amount in terms of spending moving or should we just sort of back into that given the guidance?

And then secondly over the past couple of years your receivable terms have really been extended as you've given more credit to retailers internationally.

Do you have a sort of [handle on that] now and should we expect to see little bit slower growth internationally if you reign in on receivables over the next couple years?

Thanks.

Sure, John, I'm sorry, the first part of your question was, I'm sorry, John that was approximately a little over $20 million I believe in spending from one quarter to the next, so that was that answer.

Regarding receivables, even in this difficult climate, we're doing a pretty good job of maintaining our receivable balance and being very tight on that.

And actually, our receivables are in quite good shape.

There will be as our growth internationally is faster, there will be that natural pressure, if you will, on terms because they are longer trading terms internationally.

But we hope to mitigate that from a working capital perspective by also being smart with our payables and very tough on inventory.

So our overall working capital we're looking for improvements as time goes on.

The growth of the mix of our international business you may see a slight upward pressure on our DSOs.

Okay, thank you.

The next question is from the line of Lauren Lieberman with Barclays.

Thanks, good morning.

My first question was just throughout the prepared remarks you talked quite a bit about gaining share.

And I know that that is sort of the new in the strategic plan that you're benchmarking your success in terms of growth not just by profitable growth but by gaining market share.

So is it just a change in the dialogue or did something actually change this quarter in terms of your market share performance and if so, what happened that it worked so quickly?

Well Lauren I'd be careful about saying " Worked so quickly." One of the fundamentals that we're seeing and we've talked about this actually for a while is that it seems quite obvious in this environment that the consumer is shifting not only to value and the positions around value, but she's also shifting to the brand she knows and knows well.

Where previously, adventure and trying something new may have been her priority over what she knows, in this environment I think with a great deal of uncertainty the consumer seems to be tending towards those things she knows, those things she's more confident in.

We can see that clearly in our sector but anecdotally we've heard that in other sectors of merchandise and consumer purchasing that is not a part of our universe.

And when you think about it especially in North America, the two largest most well known brands in North America and Prestige Cosmetics are the Estee Lauder brand and the Clinique brand.

And we see these brands regaining some of the share that they have -- that have eroded over the last few years.

I think that's one of the primary objectives, not only because of their gift proposition, the value around their gift proposition but also if you look at the retailers with whom these brands trade, those retailers who are less at the top of the pyramid perhaps one step down, they have a strong, these brands have a strong presence.

And the consumers seems to be more comfortable shopping in this environment in the way she's spending right now.

In particular, when you talk about on a quarterly basis, the orientation of the brands, their gift propositions, the value proposition in consumer spending was weighted more heavily in this quarter versus -- in the third quarter versus the Fourth Quarter.

I'll remind you again, Easter fell at a different time this year versus last year and that changed the spending, our shipping patterns to retailers year on year.

Okay, great.

And then just would like to add a couple of comments on this one which is in the last year or six months particularly we have intensified this.

The focus on innovation has been very clear there's some excellent innovation which is coming out which is playing a big role for us.

Second, we had really a transformation in the way we speak value to the consumer as of October or November.

And this is really paying dividends and also we are using our consultants in the store, our advisor in store to deliver this message which is a unique way to leverage our scale and our value versus other competitors in other channels which needs to use expensive advertising to do the same exercise.

Then as William said, we have some very strong brands that in these tough periods come out and we are refocusing investment on these brand and particularly focused investment as we said many times from skincare and makeup which are paying big dividends for us.

And finally in this period of recession, our entry price of Prestige Brands, namely Clinique and M-A-C, are as we say receiving a lot of consumers that are trading down somehow but they want to stay within Prestige.

So some of our important brands out on the receiving ends within Prestige trade down which is helping us as a Company overall and obviously helping these brands.

Okay, that's great.

Thank you.

The next question is from the line of Connie Maneaty with BMO Capital.

Good morning.

Good morning.

I would expect at this point in the year, you and your retail partners have started to talk about Christmas and I'm wondering what the tone of your conversations is?

I suspect there will be a real value message, but how are the two of you thinking about Christmas this year?

Well, Connie, thankfully there's more than just two of us.

We have a number of retail partners around the world.

That's what I meant.

There are fewer than there were but there are still plenty with whom we can have the dialogue.

Obviously, we're all looking to at least match last year, if not slightly exceed last year.

We have a reasonable plan in place based on the sell-throughs last year of our Christmas specific programs as well as our full priced programs, we've got a reasonable plan in place on a brand by brand basis to continue to offer good values at the right price points that we believe the consumer will respond to.

I think that's probably one of the most important principals we're talking about which is the proper price points that appeal to the consumer.

And where she in her mind is comfortable spending both for her friends and family for whom she's buying gifts as well as herself.

Believe it or not, we've started ordering and buying and we're building for Christmas as we speak right now.

So for us, and our manufacturing facilities over the next few months, Christmas is now.

And we'll start shipping starting, we'll start shipping into the retailers and building their inventories starting in September, October.

Okay.

And my follow-up is on retail inventory.

Can you give us a comparison either you, William or Rick of where retail inventories stand now compared to the last period when there was big destocking which I think was around the Federated/May merger?

Well, Connie let's break it up between North America where we have more visibility.

And it's about two weeks we would say.

And quite honestly, the frictional notion of going through destocking you don't like it when you're in the midst of it, but once you're through it you like it better.

Because at least from our perspective and I know from the retailers perspective, faster turns are more profitable for everybody.

Better selling product and a faster turn on the retailer side is a better cash conversion rate, I'd imagine better use of working capital.

What exactly did you mean of two weeks?

What was two weeks?

It's two weeks less, Connie, than--

The retailers are holding two weeks less of inventory on hand at the given sales rate.

Okay.

Great.

All right, thanks very much.

The next question is from the line of Andrew Sawyer with Goldman Sachs.

Hi, guys.

I was wondering if you could help us frame up how I was wondering if you could help us frame up how you're thinking about investment spending into your Fiscal 2010.

I know on the plus side you have media deflation, you guys are working internally on improving efficiency and that's been a big initiative I know.

But I guess on the flip side you guys mentioned in the very near term you guys have been mindful of the weak consumer atmosphere and maybe not investing as heavily into that.

Can you frame up how you guys are thinking about what type of A&P budget you're going to look at as we look into next year?

Well, Andrew, you have to look at our A&P budget and break it down into two pieces, the A, advertising piece and the P, the promotional piece.

Quite honestly what we're seeing right now is that as we define it, advertising, the advertising piece is primarily around forms of national advertising which is predominantly but not exclusively print.

And we're looking at it being down approximately 6% year on year.

And the promotional piece which is primarily around gift with purchase and other value oriented programs at retail, we're seeing those about flat to last year on a spending basis.

But we're seeing greater response to these programs that we have in previous years.

Now let me put this in context.

The gift with purchase, promotional programming were primarily, but not exclusively oriented around the Estee Lauder and Clinique brands.

Over a three to five year period of time as we've spoken about before, we saw an erosion of the consumer response into these categories so that the portion of the total sales of these brands we're getting from this spending was going down as a portion of total.

We've now seen that flatten and actually increase.

So that apportion of their total sales in this one segment of our spending is starting to go up, not a surprise because that is a strong value proposition which the consumer responds to.

What we're looking towards in the future is we want to make sure that the consumer is responding and she is shopping.

It's obvious she's shopping and responding to value at all spectrums and we need to be responsive to what she wants.

I don't know anything you want to add?

No.

That's fine.

So that means you'd be shipping more of the mix to promotional spending you think as we think out the next, if the consumer environment is soft for another 12 months are we thinking more promotion for that period then?

Andrew, our goal is to maintain more, to get more efficiency out of our promotional spending than we have in the past.

We seem to be getting it because the consumer is responding more.

So if you will on an absolute value basis I wouldn't say we're spending more.

We're just trying to get more out of what we've got than we previously had.

And then if I could, just ask one other question on a separate line.

You guys alluded to the North American reorganization allowing you to kind of go to market with I guess better optimize your distribution.

Can you talk about how you're thinking about perhaps expanding into some of these specialty retailers where you've only had narrow product assortments to date?

Yes, well what the organization will allow us to do on top of expanding or not his expanding which will be strategic decisions that we will take gradually as we progress, is wherever we stand to be able to tailor our business model through the channel or to the region or to the country in the category in which we are spending it.

So the organizational structure is designed to allow us to tailor, to maximize, to customize wherever we decide to play, where will be relevant to the channel and to the region in which we are playing.

That's what the organization will do.

Then in which channel we will expand I think we said very clearly, we are going to continue winning in Department Stores across the group which are our core channels.

We continue to win even more and continue growing share as we have shown this last quarter.

And we're going to expand in many different channels including [Special Sarna, Deradar Terivino] and among all I want to mention online that we have not discussed in this call so far but is really growing very nicely across the globe.

That is our best performing channel where we are investing seriously for further expansion.

Thanks a lot guys.

The final question is from the line of Jason Gere with RBC Capital Markets.

Good morning.

I'm just wondering if you could give an update on the kind of portfolio assessment that you're going to take over the next one to two years and then put into context the destocking that you've been seeing in North America and EMEA?

Is it logical to say that we're seeing more destocking in those brands that are underperforming where you might be having to make some of those longer term decisions?

Thank you.

Well I think it's a two part question.

When you take to a portfolio assessment that's a dynamic, a continuously dynamic process where it never stops.

We're continually looking at the brands we have in our portfolio, theirs strength and relevance in the channels of distribution in which they exist, as well as where the future opportunities lie and where we're investing our money.

We'll continue to do that.

There's no deadlines on anything, make a decision now or not.

And as far as the destocking, quite honestly let's look at it.

Yes, some of those smaller brands are impacted but quite honestly on a macro basis, our three largest brands have the largest impact on any movement of the inventory as well as our sales associated with them.

And we'll continue to focus on these brands, strength, and success by channel, by region, by market, to continue to drive them where they can.

And I just want to remind you I made this comment earlier, while the frictional notion in the moment of destocking maybe a concern, the long term benefit is is we're selling more of our best selling products and less of the less productive products.

Which means we're making fewer of the unproductive, making more of the more productive and ultimately, we, our retailers and ourselves are more productive as a result.

There are no further questions at this time.

I'd like to turn the call back to Management for any closing remarks.

Thank you very much.

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