Alberta’s ‘retail tiger’ roars in latest sales forecast
Retail sales in Alberta — boosted by rising employment and wage gains — are forecast to show the strongest annual growth rate during the next two years.
The Conference Board of Canada’s new provincial outlook report says retail sales in Alberta will soar by 9.2 per cent this year to just over $70 billion, followed by 5.9 per cent growth in 2013, to almost $74.2 billion.
“In Alberta, we’ve seen in the past few months retail sales have been growing quite strongly,” said MarieChristine Bernard, economist with the conference board.
“We’re forecasting this to continue to have really strong retail sales growth in 2012 and that has to do with the bright labour market prospects. We’re forecasting a lot of job creation as well as strong wage growth.”
And with more income comes more consumer spending.
“We’re hearing about certain sectors having difficulty finding qualified workers so that’s indicating also that wage growth should remain fairly robust as well,” Bernard said.
Retail analyst Michael Kehoe of Fairfield Commercial Real Estate said Alberta is widely considered to be the “retail tiger” of Canadian retail.
“And over the next two years Al- berta will roar ever more loudly to confirm that designation,” Kehoe said.
“High oil prices encourage solid retail sales growth led by the big ticket and luxury categories,” he said.
The conference board is forecasting Alberta disposable income per capita to increase in 2012 by 2.8 per cent to $40,704 and by a further 3.3 per cent in 2013 to $42,060. Those are the highest levels in the country.
Personal income per capita is also forecast to grow by 3.6 per cent in 2012 to $51,814 and by 3.7 per cent in 2013 to $53,727. Those too are the highest levels in the country.
“The last quarter in 2011 was strong for us and we saw solid growth in the last quarter both in comparable and total sales volume,” said Shawn Hanson, general manager of Southcentre Mall in Calgary. “We look at that as being a positive indicator obviously.
“There’s still a lot of demand from a leasing standpoint and there’s a lot of unique to market retailers looking at Calgary as being a solid place to do business.”