Research >> Economics
ICSC Chain Store Sales increasing 0.9% in Dec 24 Wk
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The International Council of Shopping Centers (ICSC) reported that chain store sales rose 0.9% from the prior week and increased 4.5% over the prior-year period during the week ending Dec 24th. Sales were boosted by an extra shopping day this year which included Christmas eve compared to a holiday shortened week last year, and this calendar boost will be reversed in the final week of the month. “As expected, holiday shopping went down to the wire as consumers took advantage of the full shopping week ahead of Christmas Day, which fell on a Sunday this year,” said Michael Niemira, ICSC’s vice president of research and chief economist. ”Overall this holiday season appears to have been a positive one for retailers, though there were some pockets of weakness.
Looking ahead, the ICSC-Goldman Sachs consumer tracking survey suggests that consumer gift-card expenditures were higher than in recent years, which suggests gift-card redemption in the coming weeks could be stronger than in recent years too.” Consumers notched up their visits to and spending at department and electronic stores last week, as both saw a seasonal shift in customer traffic to their highest share in 2011 and only bested by their own performance during the same week of the prior year. By type of shopping center, super‐regional and regional malls were very busy over the past week with customer traffic the strongest since the first week of 2011. Meanwhile, factory‐outlet footfall remained busy, but less so than the prior week.
Over the entire holiday season, consumers estimated that about two‐thirds of their purchases were in a store (62.4%), about one‐third (34.3%) was purchased online and 3.3% was purchased through a catalog. According to Weather Trends International (WTI), national temperatures over the past week ending Saturday were 4.3°F warmer than last year and 4.6°F warmer than its long-term average. For all of December, ICSC Research projects industry sales rose 3% to 3.5% excluding the impact of fuel and 3.5% to 4.0% with fuel, with total November-December sales of 3.5%.
Posted: December 28, 2011 Wednesday 07:45 AM