Tire Foam Helps Boost Armor All Profit

Armor All Products Corp. polished its 1992 performance with a new tire cleaner that helped pump revenue to a record level, resulting in a 49% boost in profit.

The Aliso Viejo company on Monday reported earnings of $19.2 million, or 91 cents a share, for the fiscal year ended March 31. That was an increase from a profit of $12.9 million, or 61 cents a share, for 1991. Revenue grew 15% to $168.4 million from $145.9 million.

Armor All is known for its popular Armor All Protectant, a sunscreen of sorts for plastic, rubber and vinyl automotive surfaces.

In late 1991, the company introduced Armor All Tire Foam, which quickly caught on with consumers and helped pull Armor All out of a two-year slump. Armor All said in a press release that “revenue gains in the fourth quarter and the fiscal year are primarily attributable to the success of Armor All Tire Foam.”

Profit for the quarter increased 19% to $8 million, or 38 cents a share, from $6.7 million, or 32 cents a share, for the same period a year earlier. Three-month revenue was $60 million, up from $50.5 million.

Company officials would not comment on the year-end results because Armor All is in its “quiet period,” a restriction imposed by the Securities and Exchange Commission when a company is preparing for a public stock offering. On April 1, the company and its majority owner, McKesson Corp. in San Francisco, said Armor All had filed with the SEC for permission to sell 4.5 million additional shares of common stock.

Mark Matheson, an analyst with the brokerage Crowell, Weedon in Los Angeles, said Armor All’s new tire product, coupled with an increased emphasis on marketing its original products, pulled the company out of the doldrums.

“One of the best things that happened to them was the tire foam,” Matheson said. “It’s great for a new product to come in and hit it so big.”

In Monday’s trading on the NASDAQ market, Armor All’s stock closed at $16.75 a share, down 62.5 cents.