Henry Schein reports record Q4 results

Henry Schein reported net sales of $2 billion for the fourth quarter of 2010 (end-December 25), a 13% increase over net sales of $1.8 billion for the same quarter a year ago.

Net income for the quarter was $93 million, up 8.5% over net income of $86 million for the fourth quarter of 2009.

North American dental sales of $720.7 million increased 7.3%, consisting of 6.7% growth in local currencies and 0.6% growth related to foreign currency exchange. The 6.7% growth in local currencies included 9.7% growth in dental consumable merchandise sales and 0.2% growth in dental equipment sales and service revenues.

"We marked our fifth consecutive quarter of increased internal dental consumable merchandise sales growth in local currencies, which provides further evidence of stability in our markets as well as the efficiency of our consultative approach to sales and customer service," said Stanley Bergman, chairman and CEO, in a press release. "We have also recorded growth in sales of dental equipment for each quarter of 2010, including the fourth quarter where the comparison is more difficult than earlier quarters in the year, due to strong equipment sales in last year's fourth quarter."

For the year, net sales of $7.5 billion increased 15.1% compared with 2009 and net income was $325.8 million.