WinnebagoWinnebago Industries reports a rise in revenue for the latest quarter. The Forest City-based recreational vehicle maker saw its fiscal third quarter revenue increase 7.6 percent when compared to the same period a year ago.

CEO Randy Potts says while analysts this fiscal year have expected not-so-good news for the company, Winnebago is doing well. He says there’s a good top line, a good bottom line, reducing the inventory and really being focused on some of the nit-pick things that drove the negative comments. He says business is strong and people should feel good about how both the quarter and the year are going.

Motor home revenue rose 7.4 percent in the quarter, primarily a result of motor home unit shipment growth of over 11-percent, while the average selling price for the units fell. Towable revenue jumped 16-percent, boosted by better volume and shipments. Potts says there’s still room to grow.

He says the towable side is at or slightly above pre-recession levels, while the motor home side of the business is still recovering almost eight years after the start of the recession. He says their goal is to continue to try to outperform the market as they have been doing. Recreational vehicle sales are considered by many analysts as a leading economic indicator. Potts says he sees a lot of positives ahead for his company with the current state of the economy.

“The housing market continues to recover, I continue to see strong consumer sentiment,” Potts says. He says there are a lot of reasons to think there’s “a lot of good years for our business ahead.” For the quarter ending May 30th, Winnebago booked earnings of 11-and-a-half million dollars, or 43-cents a share, up slightly from 11.4 million, or 42-cents a share, a year earlier.

Analysts predicted Winnebago’s third-quarter earnings to be 41-cents a share. Winnebago shares have dropped 13-percent over the past three months but were up nearly eight-percent shortly after the opening bell this morning.

(Reporting by Bob Fisher, KRIB, Mason City)