Black Friday Stretch Sparks Cheer
Robust online gains, satisfactory store traffic and the strong economy have retailers encouraged for holiday 2019.
Holiday selling is proceeding according to script, with consumers shopping online and in stores Thursday through Saturday at levels that supported widespread forecasts for seasonal sales gains averaging in the 4 percent range.
For now at least, the industry mood remains upbeat and the economy strong, although there are concerns about the shorter calendar — six fewer shopping days between Thanksgiving and Christmas than last year — and intensified promoting impacting fourth-quarter margins. Also, the robust growth in online sales continues
to come at the expense of brick-andmortar retail businesses.
The Neiman Marcus Group reported increased traffic in all of its online and off-line properties for Black Friday. “Our customers were delighted by our overall experiences and we saw major interest within our ladies’ shoes, contemporary, men’s, and beauty departments,” Geoffroy van Raemdonck, NMG’s chief executive officer, told WWD.
“Our associates were connecting with customers throughout the day not only in-store, but through text and our digital customer tool. Black Friday was also one of our biggest demand days online since we launched our web site in 1999....We plan to continue offering competitive and personalized offers on Cyber Monday and through the rest of the holiday season.”
“We’ve had a very positive start to the holiday season, double-digit increases over last year,” said Mary Ellen Coyne, ceo of J. McLaughlin. “We are encouraged that in such a promotional environment the majority of our business is still driven by full price, and we’re seeing a nice mix of self-purchasing and gift-giving.”
Bob Mitchell, copresident of Mitchells Stores, said although it’s too early to predict how holiday will wind up, “We’re still cautiously optimistic it will be a good season. With the calendar shift, we’ll end up slightly ahead,” with low singledigit growth.
“It was a good start for holiday. We are reasonably pleased and online had a very strong weekend,” said one ceo of a major national retailer, who requested anonymity. “But the shorter season does make it harder to read. You have to take it day by day, but in the end I think we will have a good season.”
Disney Stores opened at 6 p.m. Thanksgiving and stayed open into Black
Friday. “Disney store locations saw strong traffic at opening and throughout the night into Black Friday,” said Edward Park, senior vice president, unified retail, Disney Parks, experiences and products, adding that there was a bump in traffic between 11 a.m. and 4 p.m. Friday. “Traffic at our outlet locations has been particularly strong all year.”
“Overall, the top line has been good,” said Mike Sansone, principal in the consumer and retail practice at the A.T. Kearney consulting firm, commenting on holiday selling. “Underneath that, I am seeing a roughly 3 percent brick-andmortar decline for Thanksgiving and Black Friday, but combined with continued online increases there’s still healthy consumer spending.”
Sansone said projections for 4 to 5 percent total seasonal sales gains are “not out of line” and that companies with good cross-channel businesses — notably
Best Buy, Target and Walmart — should fare well.
However, there are still 23 days left until Christmas and anything can happen, and over the weekend, some urgency crept in. Retailers and brands unleashed ads notifying consumers that time was running out on extended Black Friday deals, then shifted the narrative to promoting early Cyber Monday discounts. That happened just as a big storm pushed east, bringing snow, sleet, winds and rain to metro areas. Precipitation was notable in the Southwest with Los Angeles, San Diego, Las Vegas and Phoenix recording their most Black Friday weekend rainfall in more than 20 years, according to Planalytics, a firm forecasting the weather and helping retailers to plan accordingly.
The weather did suppress some brickand-mortar traffic, though snowfall was heaviest in higher elevations and smaller markets throughout the Rockies and
Plains. Out west, colder weather lifted demand for jackets, gloves, hats and hot drinks as well as need-based categories such as snow shovels, boots, and wiper blades, Planalytics said.
Though disrupting shopping as well as traveling, the timing of the storm was in one respect fortunate, hitting the Northeast on Sunday, which is when many consumers break from visiting malls to instead eat turkey leftovers, watch football and mine early Cyber Monday deals online.
Retail experts see possible fourth-quarter margin pressures based on the fewer shopping days and some intensified and prolonged Black Friday and Cyber Monday promotions. Site-wide promotions offering 25 or 30 percent off entire assortments also seemed more apparent.
Sansone sees some heightened promotional activity from a year ago, noting that Michael Kors last week was at 70 percent off, versus 60 percent in 2018, and Bed, Bath & Beyond offered 25 percent off, versus last year’s 20 percent off.
However, generally, the promotional activity seems controlled and not way off last year.
Despite these and other concerns about what’s ahead, optimism generally prevailed.
“There’s more buzz and more traffic,” said Craig Johnson, president of Customer Growth Consumers, who is among the most optimistic of retail experts. “This augurs to be at least a good if not great holiday,” possibly exceeding 5 percent, he said. “Big box discounters Walmart, Target and Costco are rocking along.”
He also cited Lululemon, Dick’s Sporting Goods, Athleta, Best Buy,
Apple, T. J. Maxx, Home Goods, Wayfair, West Elm and Williams-Sonoma as holiday winners.
Johnson cited a “sea change” in how women are shopping during holiday. At Apple and Best Buy, 50 percent of the customers are women, whereas five years ago, 35 percent were women. That has taken a toll on apparel, which is getting less of a share of wallet, though it’s not all bad, Johnson said. He cited distressed denim, sneakers, ath-leisure, puffer jackets, animal prints, sequined tops, tops with dramatic shoulder treatments, onesies for adults, thigh-high boots, sherpa jackets, shorter- cut jackets and ►