For Tiffany & Co., profits in the fourth quarter ending January 31, 2009 decreased by 76 percent to $31.1 million. The main dip in profits was observed in the US markets. In the said three months, sales had dipped by 20 percent to $841 million. In the U.S. same-store sales dropped by 33 percent, while total sales slipped down by 30 percent. In the Asia-Pacific region comparable store sales were down by 13 percent and were flat in the European markets. %% The company has been implementing various cost conscious measures in the past year due to economic slowdown. According to reports, it took a one-time pretax charge of $97.8 million for an early retirement programme and cut staff in the said quarter. It gave around 800 employees an early retirement, of which 600 took it. Also it took a $7.5 million pretax charge for the probable closure of its Iridesse retail operations, $12.4 million were for writing off an investment in diamond mining at the Jericho mine in Canada, and a pretax charge of $3.4 million to close its diamond polishing facility in Yellowknife, Canada. The company is of the view that with a 10 percent cut in its staff it would save around $60 million as pretax savings in the current year. %% The lowered sales resulted in 17 percent hike in the net inventories in the fiscal year, amounting to $1.6 billion. Inventories also went up due to the launch of new Tiffany stores. The company’s full fiscal year profits dropped by 32 percent to $220 million and sales dipped by 3 percent to $2.9 billion.