Total sales for March 2007 were 119,788 million yen, up 2.4% year on year. Existing store sales edged down 0.6% and average daily sales per store were 463,000 yen. The average amount spent per customer was 586 yen, up 0.8%, and the average number of customers per store per day was 794, down 1.6%.

By area, existing store sales were up year on year in the Kanto region, but sales in the Tohoku and Shikoku regions were lackluster.

The rice dishes category performed poorly, but the cooked noodles category turned in a strong performance, driven by sales of cold noodles.

The fast food category struggled, due to an inadequate response to changeable temperatures.

On March 20, LAWSON launched an ongoing shopping points campaign for the original Totte Oki Sengen bakery range and Casual Sweets series of LAWSON-only desserts. While this campaign didn't produce appreciable year-on-year growth in bakery category sales, given that a similar promotion was run last year, the dessert category continued to report strong results. Customers can continue to accumulate point stickers through May 7.

Sales of hay fever-related merchandise remained strong in March.

As of March 31, 2007, in addition to our nationwide network of regular LAWSON stores, we had 101 NATURAL LAWSON and 67 LAWSON STORE100 stores.

In April, LAWSON will roll out its third promotion under the 'Energetic Body Declaration' banner, featuring an assortment of merchandise based on the theme of eating products of different colors. Furthermore, as one of its initiatives to conserve resources, LAWSON will continue to promote a drive encouraging people to bring their own shopping bags and use their own chopsticks.

LAWSON plans to announce its business results for the year ended February 28, 2007 on April 11, 2007. The earnings release and supplementary materials will be available on this website soon thereafter.