Burlington Stores, Inc. (BURL – Free Report) , a retailer of branded apparel products, is slated to report third-quarter fiscal 2017 results on Nov 21. Last quarter, the company’s earnings surpassed the Zacks Consensus Estimate by a margin of 44%. Notably, the company’s earnings beat estimates in three of the last four quarters by an average of 17.7%.

What to Expect?

The question that now lingers in investors’ minds is whether Burlington Stores will be able to deliver a positive earnings surprise in the quarter to be reported. The Zacks Consensus Estimate is pegged at 65 cents, up nearly 27% year over year. We note that the consensus mark has increased by a penny over the past seven days. Analysts polled by Zacks expect revenues of $1,441 million, up approximately 7% from the year-ago quarter.

Factors at Play

In an era of competitive retail landscape, Burlington Stores has made multiple changes to its business model to adapt to the ongoing changes in the industry. The company that started business as a coat-focused off-price retailer is now focusing on open to buy off-price model. The current model is helping customers purchase nationally branded, high quality and fashionable products at affordable prices.

Further, over the years, the company has increased vendor counts, made technological advancements, initiated better marketing approach and focused on localized assortments. These along with effective inventory management and cost containment efforts have helped elevate the company’s gross margin. In the first and second quarters of fiscal 2017, gross margin expanded 80 and 110 basis points to 40.9% and 40.7%, respectively.

On the other hand, comparable store sales (comps), which have shown a constant improvement over the first and the second quarters of fiscal 2017, are likely to witness gain in the third quarter too. Meanwhile, analysts surveyed by Zacks expect comps to increase by 3.4%.

Burlington Stores has recently updated its third-quarter fiscal 2017 guidance. The company now expects adjusted earnings per share in the range of 64-66 cents, up from the previous estimate of 58-61 cents. Further, adjusted EBITDA is expected in the band of $129-$131 million. Total sales are projected to increase nearly 7.1%.