Bob Wright. Chief Financial Officer:
Thanks Rob. Good morning everyone! Our comparable basis to diluted EPS for Q3 commutative dollar 23, that’s a 12% increase versus Q3 last year. We continue to see robust market place momentum for our beer business with depletion growth of 8%. This result was in line with our 8% depletion growth performance here today and our high single digit depletion growth target for full year fiscal 15. As expected we saw a ship that have approximately 2 million cases to wholesalers from the second quarter into the third quarter, as a result of the previously discussed Corona extra recall activities.
This translated into a benefit of about 37 million of net sales and 6 cents of diluted EPS for the quarter. Even after excluding this benefit, beer shipment volume growth came in ahead of depletion growth during Q3 as distributers increased their inventory position during the quarter to the more in line with historical levels and to be better positioned to capture growth opportunities going forward. As result of this activity for fiscal 15, we now expect beer segment net sales growth to be in the low teens range versus our previous assessment of about 10%. Operating income growths for the beer segment is now expected to approximate 30% for fiscal 15.
When factoring an estimated full year of brewery profit for fiscal 2014 underlying operating income growth for the beer segment is expected to be in the mid to high teens range. We still anticipate a full year operating income margin for beer to approximate 32%, while on net sale performance for wine and spirits was somewhat needed during Q3 for the reasons Rob mentioned earlier, E-bit primarily benefited it from lower cogs. For fiscal 15 we see net sales for wine and spirits tracking towards the low end of our low to mid-single digit range and E-bit at the high end of our low to mid-single digit range. Due to the factors just mentioned, we’re increasing our fiscal 15 comparable basis EPS outlook to 4.25 to 4.35 a share versus our previous range of $4.10 cents to $4.25 cents a share. Our comparable basis guidance excludes unusual items which are detailed in the release.
Given those highlights, let’s look up to Q3 performance in more details where my comments will generally focus on comparable basis financial results. As you can see from our earnings release, consolidated net sales for Q3 grew 7%. Beer net sales increased 16% primarily due to volume growth excluding the impact of the recall activity that we outlined earlier, net sales increased 11%, wine and spirits net sales on cogs and currency basis were even with the prior year quarter. This primarily reflected higher spirit volume, off-set by the lower wine volume. Higher promotional spend and lower bulk wine net sales. For the quarter consolidated gross profit increased 59 million primarily due to the higher volume for the beer business and favorable cost of goods sold; the wine and spirits.
Our consolidated gross margin increased just over 1% in point to 43.5% for the quarter primarily due to the favorable cogs and reduced bulk wine sales for the wine and spirits business, as she made for the quarter increased $18 million dollars. The increase was primarily due to higher SGNA for the beer business. Due to the factors just mentioned Q3 consolidated operating income increased 40 million and consolidated operating margin improved 90 basis points. Equity earnings increased 3 million dollars due to the strong results for our Opus One joint venture. Interest expense for the quarter were 86 million down to 4% versus Q3 last year. This decrease was primarily due to lower average interests rates.
That provides a good spot to discuss our debt position. At the end of November our total debt was 7.3 billion dollars. When factoring in cash on hand our net debt totaled 7.25 billion, an increase of 295 million since the end of fiscal 2014. During Q3 we issued 800 million of senior notes consisting of 400 million of 3.875 notes to 2019 and 400 million of 4.75% notes due to 2014. Our strong credit and financial profile combined with the favorable interest rate environment hoped us execute this attractive financing activity.
