Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. In accordance with the notice of this meeting, I'd like to call to order the 2012 Annual Meeting of Stockholders. I'm Ed Stack, Chairman and CEO of Dick's Sporting Goods. I'm also Director of the company and Chairman of today's meeting. On behalf of the Board of Directors and Management, I welcome you to the 2012 Annual Meeting of Stockholders and thank you for your attendance here today.
Present today, our representatives from Deloitte Touche LLP, the company's independent auditors, if questions arise during the discussion period that these advisors should appropriately address, they will be glad to respond. Following the official business of the meeting, we will present a review of 2011 and briefly discuss the Q1 results of this year, which were released a few weeks ago. At this time, if you have not already done so, would all stockholders please turn in their proxy cards to David Musse, Senior Vice President, General Counsel and Corporate Secretary for the company. Any stockholder or representative of a stockholder who is present would like a copy of the meeting notice and proxy statement, David will provide 1. David Musse will act as secretary of this meeting and now will report on the mailing of the notice of this meeting.
Mr. Chairman, this meeting is held pursuant to printed notice mailed on or about April 20, 2012, to all holders of record of company common stock and Class B common stock, respectively, as of April 9, 2012. Also, the stock records of the company as of April 9, 2012, have been available for at least 10 days prior to this meeting in accordance with Delaware law and are available for inspection at this meeting.
The Board of Directors has appointed Anne Marie Magiella as Inspector of the Election for today's meeting. She will determine the presence of a quorum, the validity of the proxies and the results of voting. During the meeting, we will be calculating the votes. After the meeting, the inspector will deliver for filing with the minutes of this meeting a written and certified report of all proxy and vote tallies. The Chairman is ready to receive the inspector's report on the presence of a quorum.
Mr. Chairman, at the close of business on April 9, 2012, the Brexit date, there were 97,153,000 293 shares of common stock of the company, each with 1 vote per share issued and outstanding and 24,960,870 shares Class B common stock of the company, each with 10 votes per share issued and outstanding, which collectively represent an aggregate of 346,761,993 votes. The presence of the meeting in person or by proxy of the holders of record of the issued and outstanding shares of capital stock representing a majority of the votes entitled to be cast at the meeting constitutes a form. Holders of record of issued and outstanding shares of capital stock representing a majority of the votes entitled to be cast at the meeting are present at this meeting, either in person or by proxy. Therefore, a quorum is present.
I hereby declare a quorum present at the meeting. On behalf of the Board of Directors of the company, I would like to express my appreciation to all stockholders who returned their proxies. I would now ask that Ann Marie present the 4 items for consideration by both.
First, the election to Class A directors to serve for 3 year terms until the annual meeting of stockholders to be held in 2015 and until their successors shall be elected and qualified. As set forth in the proxy statement made available to all stockholders of record as of April 9, 2012, the nominees for the Class A directorships have agreed to stand for election as recommended to the Board by our governance and nominating committee and is recommended by the Board of Directors to be voted upon by the holders of record of the common stock and Class B common stock are William J. Colombo and Larry D. Stone. 2nd is the approval of the company's 2012 Stockton Incentive Plan.
The 2012 plan, which was approved by the Board at its meeting on March 14, 2012, will replace the company's amended and restated 2,002 Stockton set of plans, which expires in July of this year. With the 2012 plan, we seek to attract, reward, retain and motivate our employees and non employee directors for the long term growth and profitability of the company and to align their interests with the interests of our stockholders through the granting of equity and non equity incentive awards. 3rd is the ratification of Deloitte and Touche LLP as our independent registered public accounting firm for fiscal 2012. Deloitte and Touche LLP has served as our independent accountant since the audit for the 11 month period ended January 30, 1999. For 2011, Deloitte and Touche rendered professional services in connection with the audit of our financial statements and provided tax services.
Our audit committee has selected Deloitte and Touche as such for 2012. Force is a nonbinding advisory vote to approve the compensation of the company's named executive officers as disclosed in the company's most recent proxy statement in accordance with the compensation disclosure rules of the Securities and Exchange Commission. We hereby submit for approval by the stockholders the election of William J. Colombo and Larry D. Stone as Class A Directors, each to serve for a 3 year term and until their successors shall be elected and qualified, the approval of our 2012 Stock and Incentive Plan, the ratification of Deloitte and Touche LLP as the company's independent registered public accounting firm for fiscal 2012 and approval on a non binding advisory basis of the compensation of the company's named executive officers as disclosed in the company's most recent proxy statement.
The company's Board of Directors has recommended a vote for the election of William J. Colombo and Larry B. Stone as Class A Directors for approval of our 2012 Stockton incentive plan for ratification of Deloitte and Touche LLP as the company's independent registered public accounting firm and for approval on a non binding advisory basis of the compensation of named executive officers. Are there any questions or discussions? If any stockholder requires a ballot to vote on these matters, please raise your hand, and I will provide you with a ballot.
It appears that everyone has voted. Therefore, I declare the polls for voting are now closed. I now ask the Inspector to report the results of the voting.
Mr. Chairman, I have completed the tabulation of votes by the stockholders of the 4 proposals brought forward for consideration. Each of the persons nominated by the Board of Directors for election have been elected as members of our Board of Directors for a 3 year term and until their successors are elected and shall have been qualified. The 2012 Stock and Incentive Plan has been approved. Deloitte Intouch LLP has been ratified as the company's independent registered public accounting firm for fiscal 2011 for fiscal 2012, and the compensation of the company's named executive officers as disclosed in the company's most recent proxy statement has been approved on an advisory basis.
My written report to you will contain the vote tallies for each item.
Thank you. I hereby declare that William J. Colombo and Larry D. Stone have been duly elected as directors of the company to serve for a term of 3 years and until their successes are elected and shall qualify that the 2012 stock and incentive plan has been approved, that Deloitte and Touche LLP has been ratified as our independent registered public accounting firm for fiscal 2012, and that the compensation of the company's named executive officers as disclosed in the current proxy statement has been approved on an advisory basis. If there is no further business to come before the meeting, a motion is in order to adjourn the formal part of the meeting.
We shall then present a report on the company. Mr. Chairman, I move to the community of insurance. I second the motion. All in favor, say aye.
Aye. Opposed? I would like to thank you for attending today's meeting and for the interest you've shown in the affairs of the company. The motion is carried and the formal business of the meeting is adjourned. We will now turn our attention to reviewing the results of last year with an update on this year's Q1.
We will afford all of our stockholders the opportunity to ask questions or to make comments. I would request, however, that you hold your questions and comments until the end of the formal presentation. Additionally, please address your questions to me stating your name and confirming the fact that you are a stockholder or a representative of a stockholder. Note that this presentation as well as Regulation G reconciliation requirements can be found on the Investor Relations section of our website at www.dicksportinggoods.com. I will present the highlights from 2011 and the Q1 of 2012 as well as detail our growth opportunities and provide our expectations for the year ahead.
In 2011, we generated a 7% increase in sales, driven by same store sales increase of 2% in the opening of new stores. Gross margin increased 85 basis points, primarily as a result of an increase in merchandise margin and occupancy leverage. Year over year non GAAP earnings per diluted share increased 24% to $2.02 a share in 2011 compared to $1.63 in 2010. In 2011, we opened 36 new Dick's Sporting Goods stores and remodeled 14 existing Dick's Sporting Goods stores. We grew our e commerce business by 36% in 2011 over 2010.
Looking at the balance sheet, we improved our cash position by $188,000,000 In 2011, we also declared and paid our first dividend and initiated a 12 month share repurchase program. Over the past 5 years, our bottom line has grown at a faster pace than the top line on average. New store growth has averaged 10%, sales growth has averaged 11% and net income has averaged 19%. In the Q1 of this year, sales increased 15%, driven by an 8.4% consolidated same store sales increase in the opening of new stores. The gross margin rate increased 112 basis points and operating profit increased from $64,400,000 to $95,700,000 resulting in a 50% increase in EPS from $0.30 to 0.45 Looking ahead, we are confident we can continue to grow both top line sales and earnings.
We will add new stores, continue to build out our e commerce business and add mobile functionality. We will also execute on our margin accelerators, including inventory management, product mix refinement and increased penetration of our private brands and exclusive products. We believe our continued focus on these growth drivers will enable us to reach double digit operating margins within the next 3 years. As we mentioned in our recent call, for the Q2 of 2012, we expect consolidated earnings per diluted share to increase 19% to 21% to between $0.62 $0.63 For the full year 2012, we expect consolidated earnings per diluted share to increase 21% to 23% to between $2.45 $2.48 which includes approximately $0.03 coming from the 53rd week. For the Q2, we expect consolidated same store sales to be 2% to 3% up 2% to 3% on top of a 2.5% increase last year.
For the full year, we anticipate our consolidated same store sales will increase between approximately 3% 4% on top of a 2.2% increase in 2011. In 2012, we plan to open approximately 38 to 40 DICK'S Sporting Goods stores, of which 4 are scheduled to open in the Q2. We also plan to reposition 2 Gulf Galaxy stores. With that, I'll open it up to any questions. Yes.
My name is Jerry Meitzman, Stockholders.
We actually our employee stock purchase plan was discontinued. It was suspended.
From time to time, we take a look at it and we felt that the there were certain reasons participation that we ended up suspending the plan. So at the present time, we have no plans to reinstitute it. 2nd question, what happens to the employee Yes, we're not. We've done we had done that in the past and felt that it wasn't necessary to do that and so we decided not to do it. Yes, yes.
Okay. Thank you very much. You're welcome. Thank you. Any other questions?
With no other questions, Andrew, we can conclude the meeting.
We can conclude the meeting.
Great. Thank you all for coming, and we look forward to seeing everyone next year.