Global Industrial Company on Tuesday posted a decline in sales in the first quarter of the year, while its earnings and profit totals saw increases.
The Long Island-based distributor reported net sales of $321 million in the first three months of the year, down 0.7% from the $323.4 million posted in the same quarter last year.
Net income, however, climbed from $13.2 million last year to $13.6 million in the latest first quarter, and gross profit rose from nearly $111 million to just over $112 million; the latter translated to a gross margin of 34.9%, up 60 basis points year-over-year.
Global Industrial CEO Anesa Chaibi, who took over as the company’s chief executive in the middle of the fiscal quarter, said that the results reflected “good execution across the business” and suggested that revenue also would have been up year-over-year if not for the mid-week timing of the New Year’s holiday, which contributed to a “soft start” to January.
She said that the company’s Indoff subsidiary and its top strategic accounts bolstered the quarterly totals.
“Performance improved as we moved through the period and we ended the quarter with growth in March,” Chaibi said in the company’s earnings statement.
In April, however, Chaibi conceded that tariffs had created “a disruption” in Global Industrial’s business, as well as for its customers and across the entire supply chain. She said that the company is staying focused “on what we control” as external factors roil the broader economy.
“We are working closely with manufacturing and vendor partners, ensuring product availability, and providing customers with as much visibility as we can in a very fluid environment,” Chaibi said.
Global Industrial ranked no. 20 on ID’s 2024 Big 50 list.
