Woolies beats Coles over Christmas

WOOLWORTHS has triumphed over Coles for the third Christmas in a row, investment bank Morgan Stanley says.

Woolworths’ like-for-like sales grew by 3 per cent during the busy Christmas trading period, while Coles could only manage a 2 per cent rise, Morgan Stanley has found. The investment bank also said non-food retailers suffered a weak Christmas trading period, with foot traffic down significantly in December.

“Falling house prices, a greater focus on Black Friday driving discounting and weaker equity markets all look to have held the Australian consumer back this Christmas,” it said in a note to clients. Foot

performers, ringing up year after year of strong sales growth under former chief Guy Russo, who retired late last year.

Mr Scott said the Kmart team, now led by Ian Bailey, was working to revive sales, with a particular focus on the women’s apparel category. traffic was down, and the drop could not only be explained by consumers browsing online and then transacting in-store, it said.

The retail update will be followed by National Australia Bank’s cashless sales report for December later this month.

Morgan Stanley said total retail sales grew by 0.4 per cent in November – higher than what most analysts had been expecting but down on the previous year, when growth clocked in at 1.2 per cent.

“This could suggest less pull forward of demand from Christmas sales this year, or that overall sales growth over the last two months of the year was weaker,” the bank said.

“Women’s apparel is a dynamic category and we need to make sure we have product that is resonating really strongly with our customers,” Mr Scott said.

“And that is what we have been working on.”

Like-for-like

Kmart fell by sales 0.6 per at cent

for the six months to December, Wesfarmers reported yesterday.

The result is a turnaround from the 3 per cent growth the chain posted in the same period a year earlier.

Like-for-like sales strip out the impact of stores opening and closing to give a