US retailers scramble to stock shelves
LOS ANGELES: At Stationery and Toy World, a family-owned shop in New York’s Upper West Side, manager Gary Rowe is having difficulty geting all the pens and folders he ordered for the important back-to-school season.
His usual vendors have low stocks of Pilot’s erasable Frixion pens and Paper Mate Flair marker pens - and prices are high on stationery and other in-demand school supplies.
And Rowe is not alone, retailers are navigating a storm of challenges - higher production costs, cargo delays from China and other Asian countries, and sky-high shipping rates - as they gear up for the industry’s second-biggest selling season.
“I’m hoping that when everything catches up, we get more stock,” Rowe said at his store packed wall-to-wall with a colourful array of pens and markers. “Business has been really slow.”
Ater a year of keeping their kids at home, parents are eager for classes to start again.
Stimulus checks and advance child tax credits from US President Joe Biden’s administration are expected to boost sales of back-to-school merchandise, especially shoes and clothing, following last year’s outlays on laptops, headphones and other equipment for remote learning. The National Retail Federation expects total backto-school spending to rise 6.4 per cent to $108.1 billion this year.
Average spending for all age groups is forecast to be $2,049, up 10.8 per cent.
But following retailers’ moves to prune inventories, shoppers may find fewer discounts, smaller markdowns and less merchandise in stores. Retailers “just don’t know how much to stock,” said Stacy Debroff, founder of marketing data firm Influence Central, which works with retailers such as Jcpenney, Dick’s Sporting Goods and Skechers. “There continues to be lingering supply-side issues because manufacturing was done abroad,” Debroff said. Jcpenney, Dick’s Sporting Goods and Skechers declined to comment on inventory.