Ruby Tuesday Posts Narrower Q3 Loss

reported a narrower loss for its fiscal third quarter on Thursday. The Maryville, Tennessee-based company posted a quarterly net loss of $769,000, or $0.01 per share, compared to a year-ago loss of $7.4 million, or $0.12 per share. Excluding special items, loss from continuing operations came in at $0.01 per share, versus a loss from continuing operations of $0.07 per share. Its total revenue from continuing operations fell to $285.9 million from $295.6 million. However, analysts were expecting a loss of $0.04 per share on revenue of $286.36 million. Its same-restaurant sales slipped 0.3% at company-owned Ruby Tuesday restaurants. The company ended the quarter with $61.2 million in cash on hand, versus $44.5 million at the end of the previous year quarter. The average estimate among 12 Estimize users was for a loss of $0.06 per share and revenue of $282.74 million. JJ Buettgen, Chairman of the Board, President and CEO, said, "We have made meaningful progress on multiple fronts since we began our brand transformation journey. We are pleased with our cost savings actions and resulting bottom line improvements that have strengthened our business model, improved restaurant level margins, and reduced selling, general and administrative expenses. We continue to improve the guest experience through operations initiatives like our Memorable Service training that rolled out this past January." Ruby Tuesday projects same-restaurant sales to be flat to down low single digits for the fourth quarter and full-year same-restaurant sales to be flat to -1.0%. The company had earlier expected 2015 same-restaurant sales of +1% to -1%. Ruby Tuesday shares gained 1.56 percent to $6.50 in the after-hours trading session.