Afternoon, and thanks to everyone for joining us today. On our call today are WD-forty Company's President and Chief Executive Officer, Gary Ridge and Vice President and Chief Financial Officer, Jay Remboldt. Following their prepared remarks, the operator will come back on the line for the Q and A portion of the call. Before we get started, let me remind you that supporting materials for this call are available on our Investor Relations website at investor. Wd40company.com.
In addition to our traditional disclosures, the company has published its supplemental slides, which can be downloaded from this website. We encourage investors to review these slides in conjunction with today's prepared remarks. A replay and transcript of today's webcast will also be made available at that location shortly after this call. As a reminder, today's call includes forward looking statements about our expectations for the company's future performance. Of course, actual results could differ materially.
The company's risk factors detailed in our SEC filings for further discussion. Finally, for anyone listening to a taped or webcast replay or reviewing a written transcript of this call, please note that all information presented is current only as of today's date, July 8, 2015. The company disclaims any duty or obligation to update any forward looking information, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise. With that, I'd now like to turn the call over to Gary.
Thanks, Wendy. Good day and thanks for joining us for today's conference call. I'm pleased with the performance of our global business, yet foreign currency exchange headwinds are distorting our reported results. Hopefully, today we'll throw some color on what that is. Today, you will hear that we reported net income of $11,000,000 and diluted earnings per share of $0.75 for the 3rd quarter.
Year to date net income was $33,100,000 and diluted earnings per share were $2.24 You will hear that we reported net sales of $92,500,000 for the 3rd quarter, which is a 3% decline from the Q3 of last fiscal year. Year to date net sales were 286 $200,000 which is a slight increase year over year. You will hear that the Americas performed very well in the 3rd quarter with a 10% increase in net sales. You will hear that Asia Pacific is on track for a great year despite a product quality challenge we encountered during the quarter. You will hear that EMEA's base business is strong, but reported sales continue to be impacted by significant currency headwinds and political and economic instability in Eastern Europe.
You will hear that the WD-forty Specialist product line continues to perform well with global growth rate of 26 percent in the Q3. And you'll hear that later this month, we are launching our new delivery system for the WD-forty multiuse product in the USA. In the Q3, nearly 40% of our revenues were generated in currencies other than the U. S. Dollar, which means we are experiencing significant foreign currency headwinds, particularly in EMEA.
However, if you peel back the onion, our underlying business is performing well and in local currencies seeing growth in all but a few of our markets globally. While foreign currency exchange rates may obscure the strength of our underlying business, we remain focused on our long term strategic initiatives, which are intended to drive organic growth despite foreign currency transaction and translation impacts. Let me remind you that we currently have 4 subsidiaries located outside of the United States that generate sales and do businesses business in currencies other than the U. S. Dollar.
They are located in the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and China. The main currency in which each of our subsidiaries conducts its business is called the functional currency. We have foreign currency translation exposure when we translate the results of our foreign subsidiaries from their functional currency other than the U. S. Dollar and thus has a negative impact on our consolidated results.
In addition to this translation exposure, our U. K. Subsidiary also experiences foreign currency transaction exposure because it conducts business in currencies other than its functional currency, the pound sterling. A significant portion of EMEA's net sales are generated outside the U. K.
And transacted in euros and U. S. Dollars. When these sales are converted into pound sterling, EMEA reported results are impacted by the weakening of the euro against the pound sterling. In 2015, the euro has continually weakened against the pound sterling, making transaction exposure more significant to our business.
Keeping the present currency environment in mind, I will now discuss our sales results in greater detail. Consolidated net sales were $92,500,000 in the 3rd quarter and 280 $6,200,000 year to date. These numbers reflect a decline of 3% for the quarter and growth of nearly 1% year to date. If we take a closer look at the net sales by product group, we continue to be well positioned for sustainable growth of our multipurpose maintenance products. We refer to this group as MPMP.
We focus our time, talent and treasure on this product group and it accounted for 88% of our global sales in the 3rd quarter. Consolidated MP MP sales were down 4% to $81,500,000 in the 3rd quarter and flat at $253,000,000 year to date. By trading block, MPMP sales in the 3rd quarter were up 12% in the Americas, down 18% in EMEA and down 12% in Asia Pacific. Year to date, MP MP sales were up 4% in the Americas, down 7% in EMEA and up 10% in Asia Pacific. If we take a closer look at the current quarter results, the increase in MPMP sales in the Americas was driven by strong growth of both our multi use product and specialist sales throughout the trading block including double digit growth of both categories.
MP MP sales in EMEA in the 3rd quarter decreased 18%, primarily due to the unfavorable impact of foreign currency exchange rates. Overall, in EMEA, we saw double digit growth of specialists despite currency headwinds. The decrease in MP MP sales in Asia Pacific in the 3rd quarter was attributed to a 28% decrease in our Asian distributor markets. This decrease was due to a defective aerosol can component that caused an evacuation failure in one of our sizes of our multi use products sold to our marketing distributors in various countries in Asia. We recorded a sales return allowance and we were not able to sell the product this SKU to our marketing distributors in the Q3 due to the quality issue.
Although our Q3 was negatively impacted by this event, it was an isolated incident and one which was quickly addressed from a quality perspective. Sales of MPMP products increased year over year in both China and Australia during the Q3. Turning to our Home Care and Cleaning Products Groups. Sales were $11,000,000 in the 3rd quarter $33,200,000 year to date, up 1% in both periods. The product group accounted for 12% of net sales in the 3rd quarter.
By trading block, sales of our home care and cleaning products in the Q3 were up 1% in the Americas, up 6% in EMEA and down 3% in Asia Pacific. Year to date sales were flat in the Americas, up 2% in EMEA and up 7% in Asia Pacific. As a reminder, our home care and cleaning products, particularly those in the U. S. Are considered harvest brands that continue to generate positive contribution and cash flows, but are generally expected to become a smaller part of the business as net sales of multipurpose maintenance products grow with the execution of our strategic initiatives.
Now on to the results by segment. Let's start with the Americas. Net sales in the Americas, which includes the United States, Canada and Latin America increased to $49,700,000 in the 3rd quarter, up 10% versus last year. Year to date, net sales in the Americas increased to 139 point $2,000,000 up 4% versus last year. Looking at the U.
S. Alone, sales were up 11% in the 3rd quarter and 4% year to date. During the Q3, the U. S. Experienced double digit growth for all MP MP products due to the increased distribution and higher level of promotional activities.
In the U. S, we experienced a 21% growth of the WD-forty Specialist product line in the 3rd quarter and now 17% year to date. In Canada, net sales were up 7% in the 3rd quarter and down 3% year to date. Changes in foreign currency exchange rates had a negative impact on sales results in Canada. In its transactional currency, the Canadian dollar, sales increased by 19% in the 3rd quarter and 6% year over year.
Total Latin American sales were up 7% in both the 3rd quarter and year to date. Primarily in Mexico due to a successful promotional program, which was conducted in the Q3 of fiscal year 2015. Now over to EMEA. Net sales in EMEA, which includes Europe, the Middle East, Africa and India, decreased to $30,300,000 in the 3rd quarter, down 17% versus last year. Year to date sales decreased 7% to $103,600,000 EMEA results in the 3rd quarter were negatively impacted by currency headwinds as well as the political and economic instability in Eastern Europe.
Since our results fluctuate due to the changes in foreign currency exchange rates, we also discuss our sales in what we call constant currency. For that, we translate the current period results from the foreign subsidiary functional currency in the U. S. Dollars at the same period last year exchange rates. On a constant currency basis, sales in EMEA would have decreased 9% in the 3rd quarter and 3% year to date.
But wait, there's more. We sell into EMEA through a combination of direct operations as well as through marketing distributors. The direct market sales account for 67% of EMEA's total third quarter sales and 61% of sales year to date. Direct market reported sales declined 6% in the 3rd quarter and 5% year over year. Now here is the more.
These sales declines were entirely due to foreign currency exchange impacts. If we look at the local currencies in which sales are transacted in EMEA in the direct markets. In the United Kingdom, we sell in pound sterling. Sales increased by 15% in the 3rd quarter and 10% year over year. In the European direct markets where we sell in euros, sales increased 9% in the 3rd quarter and 6% year over year.
So there you have it, currency headwinds obscuring what is going on within our Europe direct markets. Our distributor markets accounted for 33% of EMEA's total third quarter sales and 39% of sales year to date. Distributor markets net sales decreased 33% in the 3rd quarter and 10% year to date, primarily due to a significant decrease in Eastern European sales, particularly in Russia and Ukraine, where there continues to be political and economic instability. During the Q3, we recorded no sales in Ukraine and we have only recorded sales for Russia in the last month of this quarter. Unfortunately, at this point, experts are uncertain on how long this political and economic situation in Russia and the Ukraine will last.
Now Asia Pacific. Net sales in Asia Pacific, which includes Australia, China and other countries in the Asian region, decreased to $12,500,000 in the 3rd quarter, down 11% versus last year. Year to date sales increased 9% to $43,400,000 Changes in foreign currency exchange rates had an unfavorable impact on sales. On a constant currency basis, sales in Asia Pacific would have decreased 6% in the Q3 and would have increased 12% year to date. In Australia, reported net sales were flat both in the quarter year over year.
Changes in foreign currency exchange rates had a negative impact on sales results in Australia. In its transactional currency, the Australian dollar, sales increased by 16% during the 3rd quarter and 8% year to date. Sales in China increased 10% in the 3rd quarter and 11 percent year over year due to the continuing building of distribution, much of which came from Southern China and ongoing promotional activities throughout the country. We continue to be optimistic about the long term opportunities in this region, although we expect a lot of volatility along the way due to the timing of promotional activities and programs, the building of distribution, the shifting economic patterns and varying industrial activities. Sales in the rest of the Asian region decreased 28% in the 3rd quarter.
As I mentioned earlier, this decrease was due to a product quality issue linked to a defective aerosol can component in one SKU sold to our Asian marketing distributors. The issue was quickly identified and rectified and we do not anticipate having any further disruptions. We do not expect that sales in the Asian distributor markets will be negatively impacted in the future periods by this product quality issue. Year to date, sales in the Asian region increased 15% year to date, primarily due to the increased sales of WD-forty multipurpose product throughout most of the distributor markets, including those of South Korea, the Philippines and Indonesia. Now I would like to provide you with an update on our strategic initiatives.
Our strategic initiative number 1 is to grow the WD-forty multiuse product, the blue and yellow cab with the little red top. Our goal under this initiative is to take it to take the multi use WD-forty multi use product to more places for more people and with more users. Under the umbrella of strategic initiative number 1, we're really excited to finally give you a sneak peek of our innovative new delivery system and it's on Slide 10 of our Q3 results earning presentation that's currently on our website. Additionally, you can see a glimpse of our teaser campaign at www.wd40.com /ez. Much like our Smart Straw, it was designed to make WD-forty multi use product even easier to use.
The delivery system is on this new product is designed to make the hard to reach easy to reach. The product will not replace any of our current delivery systems, but rather is an additional SKU for our end users to choose. It's scheduled to be on select store shelves in the U. S. By the end of this month.
Strategic driver number 2 is to grow the WD-forty Specialist product line. Our goal under this initiative is to leverage the power of the shield to develop new products and categories within identified geographies and platforms. The WD-forty Specialist product line continues to grow and sales of the product line increased 26% in the 3rd quarter and 20% year to date. We continue to launch new specialist categories in markets around the world. Although each market and country and segment experience different short term trends relating to the sales of WD-forty Specialist product line, we continue to believe that WD-forty Specialist will be a sustainable and substantial revenue and earnings growth engine for many, many years to come.
Strategic driver initiative number 3, broaden our product base and revenue. Our goal under this initiative is to leverage the strength within our company to derive revenue from new sources outside of our WD-forty flagship brand. WD-forty bike continues to grow and we've expanded our product line and it is now available in 19 countries at thousands of retailers around the world. During the Q3, we continued to broaden distribution of our products. Our newest 3 in-one product, LOCKDry Lube was on the store shelves in retail channels in the U.
S. For the first time in the Q3. Strategic initiative number 4, attract, develop, retain outstanding tribe members. Our goal under this initiative is to attract, develop and retain our most valuable resource, our tribe. We welcomed 10 new tribe members during the Q3, bringing our total number of new hires year to date to 48.
Developing our tribe and building our company's bench strength for our future success remains a top priority. During the Q3, we concluded our 4th year of Leadership Lab, a program created to facilitate understanding of our leadership principles and values in order to develop the next generation of leaders within our organization. In total, we've had 162 tribe members graduate from various levels of leadership lab in the past 4 years. That's nearly 40% of our tribe globally. Finally, our organization was recently recognized for the 5th consecutive year by World Blue as one of the most freedom centered workplaces for high levels of innovation, accountability and transparency.
Driver number 5, operational excellence. This initiative includes the continuous improvement of resources, systems and processes in order to help offset rising costs to protect our operating margin. We continue to make progress on several initiatives that we plan for fiscal 2015. We made additional progress in the implementation of the upgraded ERP system in Imo and in June, we went live with our new system at our Italy branch. I mentioned in the past that one of the projects we planned in fiscal year 2015 under the strategic initiative was to transition all 50 states to a lower VOC formula we launched in California in fiscal year 2014.
We continued working with our manufacturing partners on test production runs in preparations for the upcoming transition, but it will not occur this fiscal year. There are no negative ramifications as a result of this change to our plans, but the cost associated with the implementing of these regulatory requirements will shift now into 2016. I'll take a break now and I'll be happy to hand over to Jay, who will continue the review of our financials. Thanks, Jay.
Thank you, Gary. In addition to the information that we're presenting on this call today, we suggest that you review our Form 10 Q for our quarter, which we will file tomorrow. Let's first review our fifty-thirty-twenty rule. As you may recall, those are the measures we use to guide our business. The 50 represents our gross margin, which we target to be above 50% of net sales.
The 30 represents our cost of doing business, which is our total operating expenses excluding depreciation and amortization. Our target is to be at or below 30% of net sales. Finally, the 20% represents EBITDA. If our gross margin is at above the 50% and our cost of doing business is 30% or less, our EBITDA will be above our 20% target. EBITDA is earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization.
The descriptions and reconciliations of these non GAAP measures are available in our 10 Q and in our web investor presentation, which is available on our Investor Relations website. Now we'll look at our gross margin, the 50 in our fifty-thirty-twenty rule. Gross margin in the 3rd quarter was 53.3% compared to the 51.4% in the prior fiscal year period. The increase in gross margin was primarily driven by decreased input costs in all three trading blocks. These favorable impacts were partially offset by the unfavorable impacts from foreign currency exchange rates in EBA and increased discount and other allowances, primarily within our Americas and Asia Pacific blocks.
Our cost of products sold, a look at closer look at input costs, we experienced a net favorable impact of 2 60 basis points from our major input costs. This was driven primarily by changes in the cost of petroleum based specialty chemicals and to a lesser extent aerosol cans. As we have shared with you in the past, it takes considerable time, approximately 90 days to 120 days for changing commodity prices to impact our cost of goods sold. All three trading blocks saw net positive impacts to gross margin due to lower crude oil prices, one of the primary feedstocks of our petroleum based specialty chemicals. As Gary mentioned earlier, we've delayed the transition to all 50 states for the lower VOC formula of the multi use products, which was launched in California during fiscal 2014.
However, when we move forward with the implementation, we will expect to see some increase in our cost base. Also impacting gross margin this quarter were improved warehousing, distribution and inbound freight costs, which had a favorable impact on our gross margin of 30 basis points, mainly in the Americas. As you may recall, last year, we had some elevated expenses due to a promotion in the U. S. That had special delay display configurations, which resulted in increased storage and transportation costs.
Transportation costs were also higher last year due to disruptions caused by adverse weather conditions. In addition, our gross margin improved by 30 basis points as a result of sales price increases implemented in the past 12 months in certain markets in Asia Pacific and EMEA. Gross margin had another positive impact of 30 basis points due to the combined effects of sales mix changes and other miscellaneous costs. The overall favorable sales mix changes in the Americas and EMEA more than offset the additional costs associated with the write off of defective goods in our Asia distributor markets. These improvements to margin were partially offset by increased promotional discounts and allowances, which had an unfavorable impact of 110 basis points in the 3rd quarter.
This was driven by increased advertising, promotional spending and investment in the Americas and Asia Pacific. Changing foreign currency rates impact our net sales, but they also impacted our margin by 50 basis points. This is because in EMEA, our cost of goods are sourced almost entirely in pound sterling, while approximately 45% of our revenues are generated in euros with 30% pound sterling and the remaining 25% in U. S. Dollars.
Although the U. S. Dollar strengthened against the pound, the euro deteriorated against the pound compared to last year. As a result, revenues in total were worth less in pound sterling and thus decreasing our gross margin. The themes that we've just discussed for the Q3 for gross margin also apply to our year to date results.
Gross margin year to date was 52 point 5% compared to 51.6% in the prior year. Though we cannot control global market dynamics such as the impact of foreign currency or the price of crude oil, we continue to be focused and deliberate in managing the rest of our business for maximum growth in our gross margin. Now on to the 30, our cost of doing business. In the Q3, our cost of doing business was 35%, up from 34% the same period last year. While our goal is to have our cost of doing business at or below 30% of net sales, we plan to continue investments in our new product development activities, brand protection, regulatory compliance and quality assurance.
As a result, we expect our cost of doing business to remain near current levels throughout the remainder of the year. We expect to move closer to our target of 30 over time as our revenues grow. Year to date, 76% of the total cost of doing business came from 3 areas: people costs or the investments we make in our tribe the investments we make in marketing, advertising and promotion and freight costs, the cost to get our products to our customers. Now let's take a closer look at our expense items that lead to our final EBITDA measure. 1st, SG and A expenses.
In the 3rd quarter, SG and A expense declined by $300,000 $300,000 compared to the prior year to $26,600,000 As a percent of net sales, SG and A expense increased to 28.8% for the 3rd quarter compared to 28.1% last year. The decrease in the SG and A expenses was primarily attributable to the impact of $1,100,000 from changes in foreign currency exchange rate and a decrease of $800,000 in professional service costs. The decrease in professional service costs primarily driven by lower legal fees associated with litigation and intellectual property protection activities, as well as reduced consulting services in our Americas and EMEA segments. These decreases were offset by $1,000,000 increase in employee related costs, a $200,000 increase in costs for travel and meetings and $400,000 of increased other miscellaneous expenses. Year to date, our SG and A expense increased by $1,200,000 compared to the prior year to $81,400,000 As a percentage of net sales, SG and A expense increased to 28.5 percent year to date compared to 28.1% last year.
Year to date, the increase in SG and A was primarily attributable to higher employee related costs, which increased by $2,200,000 compared to the prior year period. These increases were primarily due to increased headcount and annual merit increases implemented in the Q1 and were partially offset by lower earned incentive compensation accruals. Also contributing to the increase in SG and A expense was travel and meeting expenses in support of our strategic initiatives, which increased $700,000 compared to the prior year. Depreciation expense increased $400,000 compared to last year, primarily due to our increased investments in systems. Finally, other miscellaneous expenses increased $400,000 These increases were partially offset by $1,700,000 impact due to changes in foreign currency exchange rates as well as $800,000 decrease in professional service costs associated with litigation, intellectual property protection activities and general consulting services in our Americas and EMEA trading blocks.
We continued our investment in innovation and renovation by investing $2,200,000 in the 3rd quarter $5,500,000 year to date in research and development activities, which is up from $2,000,000 $4,400,000 in the same period last year. The majority of this investment is associated with our multipurpose maintenance products and directly supports our strategic initiatives. Advertising and sales promotion expense decreased by 15% in the 3rd quarter to $5,500,000 compared to the prior year quarter. As a percentage of sales, A and P investment decreased to 6% in the 3rd quarter compared to 6.8 percent last year. The decrease in advertising sales promotion during the Q3 was primarily due to lower level of promotional programs and marketing support in EMEA and Asia Pacific, which was offset by increased promotional activities in the Americas trading block.
Changes in foreign currency exchange rates had a positive impact of $300,000 on A and P expense in the 3rd quarter. Year to date, advertising and sales promotion expense decreased by 6% to $16,900,000 compared to the prior year. As a percentage of sales, A and P investment decreased to 5.9% compared to 6.3% in the prior year period. The decrease in advertising and sales expense year to date was primarily due to a lower level of promotional programs and marketing support in EMEA. Changes in foreign currency exchange rates had a positive impact of $400,000 on our A and P investment during our year to date period.
As a reminder, it is common for advertising and sales promotion expense to fluctuate period to period based on the type of marketing activity or promotion we employ. The amortization of intangible assets increased by $100,000 to $800,000 in the Q3 of this year. Year to date such expense has increased by $400,000 to $2,300,000 due to the primarily to our intangibles that we acquired in the GT85 acquisition completed earlier this year. Total expenses in the Q3 were $32,900,000 versus $34,000,000 in the Q3 last year. Operating income in the Q3 was $16,400,000 compared to $15,100,000 in the prior year quarter.
And year to date total operating expenses were $106,000,000 compared to $102,000,000 for the same period last year. This resulted in year to date operating income of 49,600,000 dollars versus $47,100,000 last fiscal year. EBITDA, the last of our fifty-thirty-twenty measures was 19% of net sales in the 3rd quarter, up from 17% in the prior year period. Year to date EBITDA was at 18% of net sales and flat compared to last year. We target EBITDA of 20%, but expect variations from time to time as sales, A and P investment and other expenses fluctuate with the timing of our activities.
Our EBITDA percentage is also affected by the investments we make for future growth. Well, that completes the discussion on our operating items for the current quarter and year to date. I'll quickly review our other non operating items. Interest income and interest expense in total remained relatively constant in both the Q3 year to date periods. Other expenses increased by $400,000 in the 3rd quarter and $1,300,000 year to date.
These increases were primarily due to higher foreign currency exchange losses as a result of the significant fluctuations in foreign currency exchange rates, primarily the euro against the pound sterling. The provision for income tax was 30.2% in the 3rd quarter and 30.1% year to date. This is compared to 30.4% 30.6% in the prior year period. The lower tax rate is primarily driven by the portion of the company's earnings from foreign operations, which are taxed at decreasing rates. Net income in the 3rd quarter was $11,000,000 versus $10,400,000 in the prior year quarter.
Changes in foreign currency rates had a unfavorable impact of $500,000 on the translation of our consolidated results this quarter. On a constant currency basis, net income would have increased by $1,100,000 in the 3rd quarter. Our diluted earnings per common share were $0.75 in the 3rd quarter compared to $0.69 in the prior year quarter. Diluted shares outstanding decreased to 14,600,000 shares, down from 15,100,000 shares last year. Year to date net income was $33,100,000 compared to $32,200,000 in the prior year period.
Changes in foreign currency exchange rates had an unfavorable impact of $800,000 on the translation of our year to date consolidated results. On a constant currency basis, net income would have increased by $1,700,000 in the year to date period. Diluted earnings per common share were $2.24 year to date compared to $2.10 in the prior year period. Diluted shares outstanding decreased to 14,700,000 shares from 15,200,000 shares in the same period last year. Now let's take a look at our balance sheet at May 31.
Our balance sheet and liquidity remained strong. At the end of the Q3, our cash balance was $46,900,000 and we had $48,300,000 in short term investments, which consists of time deposits held in money center banks. During the quarter, we amended our line of credit agreement with Bank of America to extend the maturity date of our revolving credit facility to 2020. It increased the revolving commitment to $150,000,000 and to revise the financial covenants. In addition, other changes to the credit agreement now permit us to classify draws on the line of credit as long term provided certain conditions are met.
You will see this classification change on our balance sheet for the current quarter. In the Q3, we borrowed an additional $5,000,000 on our revolving line of credit. As a result, our debt outstanding is $108,000,000 at the end of the period. The $5,000,000 increase in the line of credit balance during the Q3 was used for share repurchases. A quick word about capital allocation.
We continue to return capital to shareholders through regular dividends and share repurchases. On June 23, the Board of Directors declared a regular quarterly cash dividend of $0.38 per share payable July 31, 2015 to stockholders of record at the close of business on July 17, 2015. Based on today's closing price of $88.82 the annualized dividend yield would be 1.7%. During the Q3, we acquired approximately 130 6,000 shares of our stock at a total cost of $11,300,000 This plan, which was approved in October of 2014 became effective March 1, 2015, and it provides authorization to acquire up to $75,000,000 company's outstanding shares through the plan's end date August 2016. While that completes the financial review, more information will be available on our Form 10 Q, which will follow tomorrow.
Thank you so much. And now back to Gary. Thanks, Jay. Now let's take a
look at our view for the remainder of fiscal 2015. We've updated our full year 2015 guidance. It reflects the impact of foreign currency exchange movements as well as the macroeconomic and political challenges in our European markets, particularly in Russia and Ukraine, as well as the quality issues identified in Asia Pacific. This guidance does not include any future acquisitions or divestiture activities and is based on recent foreign currency exchange rates. We expect our fiscal year net sales results to be in the range of $383,000,000 to 390,000,000 dollars which will mean either flat or growth of up to 2%.
We project gross margin to be better than 52%. We expect our global advertising and promotional investment to be in the range of 6% to 7% of net sales. We expect net income of between $44,500,000 $45,400,000 which would achieve EPS of between $3.03 $3.09 assuming 14,700,000 weighted average shares outstanding. So in summary, in closing, our business continues to perform well. Foreign currency exchange headwinds will continue to impact our reported results, but we believe if we remain focused on our long term goals, we will navigate this environment just as we've done in the past.
In summary, what did you hear from us on this call? You heard that the Americas performed very well in the 3rd quarter with a 10% growth rate overall in revenue. You heard that Asia Pacific is on track for a great year. Despite a minor hiccup in the quarter, they were up 9% year to date. You heard that EMEA's base business is strong, but the reported sales continue to be impacted by significant currency headwinds and political and economic instability in Eastern Europe.
You heard that the WD-forty Specialist product line continues to perform well with a global growth rate of 26% in the 3rd quarter. You heard that crude oil costs going down continues to be a tailwind and we are seeing the positive impact of lower input costs in our gross margin. You heard that later this month, we are launching our new delivery system for WD-forty multi use product and that is designed to make the hard to reach easy to reach. You've heard that we continue to return capital to our stockholders and that we've begun executing repurchases under our new $75,000,000 plan during the Q3. And you heard that we amended our line of credit agreement, which extended the maturity date of our revolving credit facility to 2020, increasing the line to $150,000,000 and revised financial covenants.
So in closing, I'd like to share a quote with you from Mike Gapka. To be successful, you must accept all challenges that come your way. You can't just accept the ones you like. Thank you for the call joining us on the call today, and we'll be happy to take any questions.
Our first question comes from the
line of Linda Bolton Weiser with B. Riley and Company. Hi, guys. How are you doing?
Good, Linda. How are you?
Hi, Linda.
Good. Hi. So first off, I guess just a question on Eastern Europe and the weakness you're seeing there now. Did I understand you correctly that you said you only posted some sales in Russia in the last month of the quarter? And yes, and so last quarter, I think that the distributor markets in EMEA were up 9%.
So I'm kind of wondering how did this weakness kind of it just caught you by surprise or it took time to settle into the market? Or I'm just wondering how embedded this weakness is being that it was still pretty strong last quarter. And also can you quantify it like is Russia and Ukraine, what percentage of the EMEA distributor markets would that be roughly?
Okay. Firstly, we've been seeing the activity in Russia and the Ukraine, and I think we've mentioned it a couple of times. What we saw was a period of time where inventory in the market is being absorbed. So we think that right now we're starting to see inventory coming back into the market from us. We do about 10,000,000 cans a year in Russia.
So I guess it's about a $10,000,000 business plus or minus, if that's real rough. So that's about the extent of it. The Ukraine is a lot less. The rest of the distributor markets in Europe are still performing well. In fact, you're right, they grew last quarter.
And excluding the Ukraine and Russian business, they grew in the Q3 of this year. So it's really isolated around the Russian economy inflation there went through the roof. It took some time for it to settle. We believe it will settle down and we'll see us back to some type of normalized business in the next couple of quarters. It's just a hiccup.
And I'm not sure Linda took us by surprise. I think it just was something that we didn't understand the extent of the timing of it and we're back on track again, I think as long as Russia continues to improve.
I mean, did you take any price increases there in Russia that made maybe is making this be a temporary situation and then when the pricing pieces settle in the growth will return?
No, we didn't. The ruble was deteriorated against the dollar. So we sell into Russia in U. S. Dollars.
So our marketing distributors there did take some pricing. We also helped support that with some promotional activities of free goods to sort of minimize that. But yes, the price has increased, but it's truly because of the ruble.
Okay. Thanks. And then just kind of seeing what's happening in China, I think people are bracing themselves for slower overall economic growth in China. Is that something that you're seeing at all? Or do you suspect that that could happen there as well?
Well, China is going to continue to be a bumpy road. The thing that we love about China is that there are a lot more people who don't know us than know us. Sure, if it's growing at 8% to 10%, we do better. But we're doing we see China long term as a large market. We've Since opening, we've taken the revenues from a couple of 1,000,000 to 15,000,000 or so.
We're growing at 10% this year. We think we'll see growth again next year. It'll bump around quarter to quarter, but it's a journey that we're on and we're continuing on the path.
Okay. And then your new product here, that's going to be launched here, did you ship any of that at all in the 3rd fiscal quarter? Or will the shipments begin in the next quarter, in the 4th quarter?
They're all in this quarter. There was none in Q3. They started shipping this week. That's why you couldn't find them in the stores.
Okay. And then, I mean, it looks I haven't looked at all the pictures here, but the bendy neck looks interesting. But it looks actually bigger than the straw application. So is it for a different type of application? And I assume this would be purchased by the user in addition to the straw type application.
Is that true?
Yes. Basically, the extended tube on this is about 8 inches in length and it's completely flexible. So what it's meant to do is enable the delivery of our product to places that are very hard to get at with a normal can. Firstly, without a straw, it's impossible to get there. And without smart straw, it can get there.
But our heavy end users, particularly in automotive, industrial, one of the big feedback points we got from our research over the past couple of years was we need we'd love to be able to deliver the product to these hard to get places So it's a bigger can. It's designed to appeal to our heavy end users. And we believe that it will be a can that they will have on the shelf as well as the other. It has a higher price obviously because that delivery system costs more. There's been a lot of innovation, a lot of work going into it.
We have a patent on it. So we're excited take it to the end users. And you should see displays initially in store within the next week or so. The first stores will be Home Depot and then other retailers will follow soon after or other supply chains will follow soon after.
And how fast do you think you can ramp up the distribution reach of it in the U. S? Do you think you'll get 80% there by the end of next fiscal year or even quicker?
Well, I don't know. I think we one of the things that we're working on now is demand. 1 of the key components of this is actually manually assembled right now. Our supply partners are in the late stage of putting in automated assembly equipment. So that's a bit of a pacing item.
So I'd say by the end of this year, we will have distribution in 4 or 5 of our major supply channels and then we'll see where we go from there. So it will take time. And then of course after that the world is to come. So you know how we do things Linda. We're deliberate and we'll we're not here as a bottle rocket.
We're here to grow our revenue with our end users over time. So it'll be interesting to see and we're excited to see how it moves off the shelf when it hits in a very attractive display configuration in the next couple of weeks.
Great. And then can I just ask you in terms of the VOC implementation, is there any way to quantify how much in those costs will be shifted to FY 16? Is that $1,000,000 or a couple of million or any quantification?
We haven't shared that yet.
Okay. And then, just finally, the quality issue here that you had with the one SKU in Asia, I know these things happen and everything, but it kind of you had something in Canada that happened, I think, about a year ago as well.
Totally unrelated, totally unrelated.
Right. But I'm wondering if you if there needs to be some improvement or modification of your monitoring of the outsourced suppliers when they're manufacturing the components in the product?
Thank you for the question. It was impossible to do that. These products the products that we manufactured past all of our quality control stringent testing as it left. And the issue was not apparent until about 3 weeks after the product shipped, because it took that long for actual for the extended tube to actually disengage from the under of the valve. So it was quite it was really intriguing for us.
But we were fortunate enough that this happened while product was on boats shipping across the Pacific Ocean. And when we then tested it on arrival, which we do at our distributors, we identified the problem. So we don't know how we would have identified this problem other than the way we did. And I'm extremely proud of our quality people and the way they were able to actually catch this before it even got into the market. It only got to the actual distributor warehouses.
So they did a great job.
Okay. So then no end user ended up with this problem in their hands? Correct. Okay, great. Okay, I guess that's pretty much it for me.
Thank you very much.
Thanks, Linda.