"Demand during the quarter has remained sluggish, reflective of a continuing softness at the retail level"
Jerry Kiser
La-Z-Boy president and CEO

La-Z-Boy Incorporated announced today it anticipates earnings for its July first fiscal quarter will be in the range of $0.10-$0.12 per fully diluted share, after a previously-announced restructuring charge, or $0.17-$0.19 before the charge. The current analyst consensus earnings estimate for the quarter is $0.23 per fully diluted share, excluding the restructuring charge. La-Z-Boy earned $0.32 per fully diluted share in the July 2002 first quarter before the cumulative effect of a change in accounting principle for goodwill and intangible assets.

Jerry Kiser
La-Z-Boy president and CEO
"At the time of our most recent investor conference call in May, we suspended offering specific earnings guidance for the company, citing a lack of business visibility. We previously stated we expected earnings for our July 2003 first quarter to be down 'significantly' compared to a very strong July 2002 quarter and they will be. Last year's 9% sales increase in the first quarter was abnormally strong, driven in part by a larger than normal beginning backlog. That was not the case this year. As a result, we expect sales volume to be down about 10% compared to the quarter a year ago."

Kiser continued, "Demand during the quarter has remained sluggish, reflective of a continuing softness at the retail level. Historically, the fiscal first quarter is our weakest quarter, and this year we have taken substantially more than our normal amount of plant shutdown time to avoid building additional inventories. That action negatively impacts our margins with lower cost absorption. The combination of lower volume and unabsorbed costs will yield reduced earnings."

"We fully expect the normal seasonal pickup in our business will unfold as we enter the all important fall selling season. As such, we anticipate a return to more normal capacity utilization."

La-Z-Boy will report its first fiscal quarter operating results before the opening of trading on Tuesday, August 12th, and will hold its regular quarterly investor conference call at 11 a.m. EDT the following day, Wednesday, August 13th.