Big Lots 2011 Annual Report Download - page 117

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PART I
ITEM 1. BUSINESS
The Company
Big Lots, Inc., an Ohio corporation, through its wholly owned subsidiaries (collectively referred to herein
as “we,” “us,” and “our” except as used in the reports of our independent registered public accounting firm
included in Item 8 of this Annual Report for Form 10-K (“Form 10-K”)), is North America’s largest broadline
closeout retailer (see the discussion below under the caption “Closeout Retailing”). At January 28, 2012, we
operated a total of 1,533 stores in two countries: the United States of America (“U.S.”) and Canada. Our goal is
to strengthen and build upon our leadership position in broadline closeout retailing by providing our customers
with great savings on brand-name closeouts and other value-priced merchandise. You can locate us on the
Internet at www.biglots.com. The contents of our websites are not part of this report.
Similar to many other retailers, our fiscal year ends on the Saturday nearest to January 31, which results in
some fiscal years being comprised of 52 weeks and some being comprised of 53 weeks. Unless otherwise stated,
references to years in this Form 10-K relate to fiscal years rather than calendar years. The following table
provides a summary of our fiscal year calendar and the associated number of weeks in the fiscal year:
Fiscal Year Number of Weeks Year Begin Date Year End Date
2012. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53 January 29, 2012 February 2, 2013
2011. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52 January 30, 2011 January 28, 2012
2010. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52 January 31, 2010 January 29, 2011
2009. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52 February 1, 2009 January 30, 2010
2008. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52 February 3, 2008 January 31, 2009
2007. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52 February 4, 2007 February 2, 2008
We manage our broadline closeout retailing business geographically on the basis of two segments: U.S. and
Canada. Please refer to the consolidated financial statements and related notes in this Form 10-K for our
financial information. In our U.S. segment, we evaluate and report overall sales and merchandise performance
based on the following key merchandising categories: Consumables, Furniture, Home, Seasonal, Play n’
Wear, and Hardlines & Other. The Consumables category includes the food, health and beauty, plastics, paper,
chemical, and pet departments. The Furniture category includes the upholstery, mattresses, ready-to-assemble,
and case goods departments. The Home category includes the domestics, stationery, and home decorative
departments. The Seasonal category includes the lawn & garden, Christmas, summer, and other holiday
departments. The Play n’ Wear category includes the electronics, toys, jewelry, infant accessories, and apparel
departments. The Hardlines & Other category includes the appliances, tools, paint, and home maintenance
departments, as well as the results of certain large closeout deals that we typically acquire through our alternate
product sourcing operations. See note 15 to the accompanying consolidated financial statements for the net sales
results of our segments and these categories for 2011, 2010, and 2009.
In May 2001, Big Lots, Inc. was incorporated in Ohio and was the surviving entity in a merger with
Consolidated Stores Corporation, a Delaware corporation. By virtue of the merger, Big Lots, Inc. succeeded
to all the business, properties, assets, and liabilities of Consolidated Stores Corporation. In 2009 and 2010, all
of our operations were located within the U.S. In July 2011, we expanded our operations internationally into
Canada with the acquisition of 100% of the outstanding shares of Liquidation World Inc. (now known as Big
Lots Canada, Inc.).
Our principal executive offices are located at 300 Phillipi Road, Columbus, Ohio 43228, and our telephone
number is [phone].
Closeout Retailing
Closeout merchandise generally results from production overruns, packaging changes, discontinued products,
liquidations, returns, and other disruptions in the supply chain of manufacturers. As a result, we can generally
purchase closeout merchandise at lower costs than would be paid by traditional discount retailers, and offer