Tiffany Still Has Polishing to Do

I don't envy Alessandro Bogliolo, the incoming chief executive of Tiffany & Co., and the luxe jeweler's quarterly earnings report on Thursday helped demonstrate why.

Yes, the company improved its profitability in the quarter, which seemed to cheer investors. But Tiffany's same-store sales were down 2 percent compared to the same quarter a year earlier, the seventh consecutive period in which the company was flat or down on this measure. That's bad enough, but Bogliolo's real problem is bigger than a string of disappointing sales results: It's that everywhere he turns, there are serious hurdles to turning things around.