RECOIL NOT SO BAD

Dick’s solid quarter even after gun restrictions

Ed Stack can exhale now. Just a couple of months ago the Dick’s Sporting Goods chief executive worried that his decision to yank assault rifles and ammunition from store shelves might have customers running for the exits.

The move — coming in the wake of the Parkland school shooting — “won’t be positive from a sales and traffic standpoint,” Stack said in March after gun enthusiasts threat-ened to boycott the chain’s 7200 stores.

Stack, in a second bold move,e, also raised the minimum age too buy firearms to 21 from 18.

But on Wednesday, Dick’ss beat back those fears with a ro-o bust earnings report that blew past Wall Street expectations.

After the surprisingly goodd results, shares of the Pitts-s burgh chain’s shares soared 26 percent, to $38.35.

Shares are up 21 percentnt since it announced its gun re-estrictions on Feb. 28.

“They were concerned thatat losing the gun business would cost them, but they are making it up by selling other stuff,” Susquehanna Financial Group analyst Sam Poser told The Post. “Whatever their concerns were, they didn’t come to fruition.”

Revenue in the three months ended May 5 rose 4.6 percent, to $1.91 billion, while profit increased 3.2 percent, to $60.1 million. At the same time, Dick’s raised its profit estimate for the year.

Customer traffic fell 3.7 percent in the quarter and samestore sales declined 2.5 percent, but management largely blamed cold weather in March and April for the shortfalls.

The average transaction increased 1.2 percent.

While sales in brick-andmortar stores were down, ecommerce sales, following a wider trend, jumped 24 percent during the quarter compared with a 9.9 percent rise in the year-earlier period.

The chain’s private label business helped fuel the growth.

“I’m extremely optimistic about the future of Dick’s Sporting Goods,” Stack said on a conference call.

Nevertheless, execs expect the hunting business segment will continue to shrink.

Guns are sold in its Field & Stream stores — but it’s a low-margin business that had been declining well before the firearms policy was announced, it said.

The restrictive stance on gun sales may even have boosted customer traffic to some stores, according to Reveal Mobile, a Raleigh, NC, company that tracks mobile data and found that foot traffic at Dick’s stores surged nearly 4 percent the weekend following its new gun policies, as first reported by The Post.

“It’s very easy for people to go to their social media accounts” to express their support or anger, “but it’s harder to change their shopping patterns,” said Matthew Davis, chief marketing officer of Reveal Mobile.

Davis- noted that the backwlash against Facebook following its privacy debacle did not affect its advertising reve- nue or customers use of their accounts.

Meanwhile, Vista Outdoor, which makes many outdoor products — from Savage assault-style rifles to Camp Chef grills, Bollé safety goggles, Bell bike helmets, Blackburn bike accessories and Bushnell golf range finders — said earlier this month that it may sell off its gun business following decisions by several major retailers, including REI Co-op, to no longer sell any Vista outdoor products because of the company’s gun business.

Shares of Vista are down 3 percent since Feb. 28.