Specialty Store Sales Unchanged
Retail sales were unchanged during the Thanksgiving weekend compared with the same period a year ago as U.S. consumers continued their pattern of waiting for late-season bargains, a shopping center trade group said Monday.
The New York-based International Council of Shopping Centers downplayed the importance of its weekend results, predicting a pickup in December sales.
The council’s report is based on results at specialty stores and does not include department stores or discount chains. However, discount chains said they were pleased with the weekend turnout. Discounters and department store chains will provide details on the Thanksgiving weekend when they issue November sales figures Thursday.
Sales figures for Southern California are not yet available. But retail executives and analysts said the weekend turnout appeared to be higher than the rest of the nation. Citing the region’s strong economy, many economists and retailers predict that Southern California will have slightly higher holiday season sales than the rest of the country. The forecast for the nation has been rosy. Industry analysts have predicted a nationwide holiday season sales increase of 4% to 6% and the council’s forecast is 4.5%.
“We’re sticking with our prediction,” said John Konarski, council vice president. “The sales projections are attainable. This is just another sign that Thanksgiving weekend has become less important.”
Increasingly, said Konarski, consumers see the weekend as an opportunity to window shop. Thanksgiving weekend accounted for 9% of holiday season sales in 1997, compared with 10% in 1996, he said. The Friday after Thanksgiving, the traditional start of the holiday shopping season, was the seventh-biggest sales day last year and the Saturday before Christmas was biggest, he noted.
Konarski also said unseasonably warm weather in the East and Midwest hurt sales--particularly the apparel business.
“When it’s warm, sales of coats and sweaters drop,” he said.
Rain in Southern California on Saturday may have dampened sales at some open-air malls, but that weather prompted many consumers to purchase warmer attire for wetter and cooler weather, said Ed Weller, an analyst at Sutro & Co. in San Francisco.
Macy’s was among the retailers generating modest gains in Southern California, said Michael Steinberg, chairman of Macy’s West, the San Francisco-based operator of the chain’s Western operations. He said sales of men’s apparel and home furnishings were strong. Women’s apparel, a weak seller industrywide, did poorly.
Target, the discount chain, said the weekend turnout in Southern California and the rest of the nation was higher than a year ago. Analysts said Wal-Mart and Kmart also had a good weekend.
A report on weekend check purchases was encouraging. Sales on Friday rose 4.4% over the same day a year ago, according to TeleCheck Services, the Houston-based check acceptance company.
