My “Company” is the national postal administration. We are pretty catholic (small ‘c’) in what we ship - namely everything and everything.
(bolding mine)
Australian companies are exposed to the US markets more than you would imagine. For example, the street level shopping plazas of the World Trade Centre in NYC were Australian-owned. Our share market has just been hit by a collapse in shares of shopping mall giant Centro. Most of their property listings are in the US, and they have been hit hard by an inability to refinance due to the credit squeeze.
Since “consumer confidence” refers to the willingness to spend money regardless of their personal income or debt, it’s both inaccurate as a label and a poor index of long-term economic health.
Anyone have any figures on alcohol sales? I have a feeling they reach their goal regardless of the state of the economy. Even better in a depressed one.
Well, I disagree with your characterisation of it (surely it’s a measure of how much short term personal debt a person is willing to sustain with a given level of personal income), and while I agree that it’s a poor index of long-term economic health, I don’t really think anyone is pretending otherwise. It’s just an indicator like any other, and one which at this time of year takes on a large amount of perceived short-term significance (it also becomes easier to observe).
Anyway, regardless of how useful an indicator you think it is, I just don’t see the point in taking umbrage at economic terms by taking their constituent words out of their economic context. Consumer attitude is just another thing to look at, and it’s an important one to have a handle on if you’re in the retail trade. It clearly doesn’t have anything to do with “low self-esteem” or any such nonsense, so why pretend otherwise?
The way it’s used in the media is clearly meant to imply that consumers are “confident” in the economy if they spend money and lack confidence if they don’t. Since they base that on whether or not people are spending MORE money than they did last year and since a high percentage of people are already living beyond their means, it actually means that “consumer confidence” requires getting further and further in debt, and they are warned that they’ll be punished with a recession if they don’t go out and spend more. It’s naive to presume that economics are just an objective science with neutral language and value-free messages.
Maybe there are too many stores selling the same shit? Do we really need a Best Buy, Circuit City, hhgregg and Rex within a 2 block radius of each other (Dayton Ohio)? There are only so many purchasers out there and they only have so many gifts to buy. You spread the money thin that way so everyone loses due to overhead costs.
I’ve felt this way about clothing stores for years. There are WAY too many clothing stores selling the same shit with a different label on it throughout the malls of America. They can’t all be profitable.
I work for a major retailer and I can tell you that, as you suspect, we most definitely do NOT make a huge profit on Black Friday. In fact, we lose our ass on Black Friday and management does not like it a bit. Our margins are not high enough normally to discount that deeply and still make a profit.
Also, keep in mind that traffic is not a good indicator of sales. It could be that normally those same people buy five items for Christmas there and now they’re only buying one. It could be that they’re spending the same amount of money on home goods but not buying gifts there this year. It could be that they normally buy five high-ticket items and now they’re buying five low-ticket items. There are too many variabilities.
I had to go get a gift for my mother yesterday, so I went to the mall. I had procrastinated all morning because I didn’t want to have to deal with the traffic. I left an item that I needed to return at home, because I didn’t want to deal with the lines on one of the busiest shopping days of the year.
Only…There was nobody there.
I don’t mean that literally of course- there were people- Just not any more than a usual Saturday. I even went to one of the busier sections of the west end of town…Nothing unusual.
I don’t know whether it’s the economy or people shopping online…I’m just sayin’.
One of the local news broadcasts (Fox 45) had a story tonight about how sales are down dramatically this year, and how retailers are depressed about the whole situation. There was much ballyhoo about how this meant that there would be lots of bargains, and a reminder that there is still time to take advantage of the low prices before Christmas. It was little more than thinly disguised consumer boosterism.
The following, unrelated ( :rolleyes: ) story discussed the worrying increase in consumer debt and defaults on credit card payments.
What’s worse is that the Charities come out every single fucking year as far back as I remember with “this has been a bad year for giving and we need your donations even more this year”. Wolf! Wolf! Wolf! Wolf! Wolf! :rolleyes:
I would think so too, but only for anecdotal reasons. Both my family and my fiancee’s have decided not to celebreate the season with gift giving, and I was quite surprised that two of my co-workers’ families are doing the same.
In all of our cases it didn’t have to do with “recession spending” it had to do with “nobody wants more stuff!” Plus, the headaches and general unpleasantness of having to deal with holiday crowds etc. I certainly wouldn’t think that we’re representative of any larger sales trend, but if there are more people who are foregoing the big commercialism push of the season, then it probably would be disappointing for retailers.
I don’t think this is the “same song and dance as every year.” I’ve seen articles in the past that have said the opposite, that a boom of Christmas shoppers is “indicating consumer confidence in the face of a strong economy”. But it doesn’t surprise me at all that, with today’s ecomony, American’s are spending conservatively. And the economy generally sucks for a few years in a row, so you’ll see the same song and dance a bunch of times before it changes.
I can vouch for sales plummeting at Best Buy this season. At least, while there yesterday I was not actually trampled into pudding in the last minute gift rush, though it was a near thing.
*"The nation’s shoppers – taking advantage of deep discounts and expanded hours – jammed stores over the last weekend before Christmas to try to grab a hard-to-find Wii or scoop up bargains on other items. But the spending surge may not be enough to offset what is shaping up to be a mediocre December for some retailers.
Based on early reports on Sunday, mall operators including Macerich Co. said they were pleased with the spending spree over the weekend, but they were still counting on Christmas Eve and post-Christmas business to meet holiday sales goals in what has turned out to be a nail biter of a season."*
It’s going down to the wire! Better do your part to save our retailers! Get out there and buy more stuff!!!
Meh. If gift cards and internet sales aren’t getting factored in, then I agree, the numbers are a little bogus.
Although, I can see how specific outlets may be affected (if every one is shopping online, then some of the individual shops are not earning their employees paychecks.) But overall, it doesn’t sound like a disasterous retail season to me.
To amend my previous post: I neglected to factor in the new stores that have been built in my area, and I am not sure if the population has yet caught up.
Has anyone seen online shopping figures for the same time period?
Partly, of course, sales are down for December because Chanukah came in early December, so all the Jews (who own the banks and control all the money, after all) made their purchases in November.
My daughter and her boyfriend went to some stores this morning, and reported amazing bargains and not nearly as many people as they’d think. They parked right next to Penney’s yesterday. I’m eagerly awaiting the reports tomorrow.