America’s Car-Mart of Rogers reported Tuesday income of $25 million for the first quarter of fiscal 2022, up 28% from the same quarter last year.
Earnings per share was $3.57, up from $2.83, which surpassed the average estimate of $3.55 from three analysts surveyed by Zacks Investment Research.
America’s Car-Mart (Nasdaq: CRMT) reported revenue of $280.3 million, up 49% from $187.9 million a year ago.
The company also celebrated the 40th anniversary of its founding by Bill Fleeman earlier this month.
“We continue to make foundational investments to our business model, and as expected, we are experiencing an increasing capacity to serve more customers at the highest levels,” America’s Car-Mart CEO Jeff Williams said. “For over 40 years, our customers’ lives have been better as part of the Car-Mart family, and we have an obligation to serve an ever-increasing customer base as we move forward. We have a unique place in the markets we serve as our customers rely on us to keep them on the road and give them peace of mind with local transportation needs.”
In July, Williams said the company had an “a big, hairy, audacious” goal of having 100,000 customers by April of 2022.
America’s Car-Mart made a significant move to reach that goal, growing its customer base by more than 11% to 91,158.
Williams said the customer base has increased 3% since the beginning of the fiscal year. Williams also announced that America’s Car-Mart is acquiring The Carman LLC of El Reno, Oklahoma, which will give the company a new dealership.
Williams said Carman, led by Jake Haller, was one of America’s Car-Mart vendors, and Haller will focus on providing vehicles for the company.
Williams said America’s Car-Mart is scheduled to open a dealership in Norman, Oklahoma, in the next quarter. It had 151 in the first quarter of 2022, up one from a year ago, with an average of 604 customers per location.
“As we have stated, we believe that most of our dealerships can support 1,000 or more customers at some point in the future,” Williams said. “We have significant opportunities for growth by increasing customer count at our existing locations, and we will continue to push for market share gains. In addition, we will continue to open new dealerships and look for acquisition opportunities in markets that align with our business.
“The infrastructure investments we are making are critically important to our growth plans as our high touch business model is focused on the customer experience journey, with the primary objective of keeping our customers on the road.”
The company reported selling 15,239 vehicles in the quarter, up from 12,176. The average sale price was $15,405, up from $12,800.
Same-store revenue growth was 46%, up from 5.5%.
