Increase in profit

Ace Hardware, the largest retail hardware cooperative in the United States, achieved centrally invoiced sales of US $ 1.067 bn (€ 719 mio) in the second quarter of 2008. This amounts to a drop of 2.8 per cent compared with the same period last year. By contrast there was a 13.2 per cent increase of net profit to US $ 33.4 mio (€ 22.5 mio). The cooperative has announced sales down by 4.8 per cent for the first six months to US $ 1.939 bn (€ 1.307 bn) and a 1.2 per cent rise in net profit to US $ 44.2 mio (€ 29.8 mio).