{"id":23760,"date":"2015-11-12T09:03:07","date_gmt":"2015-11-12T14:03:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/acrossthecurve.com\/?p=23760"},"modified":"2015-11-12T09:03:07","modified_gmt":"2015-11-12T14:03:07","slug":"coal-in-the-stocking","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/acrossthecurve.com\/?p=23760","title":{"rendered":"Coal in the Stocking"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>This one is personal as I owned (past tense) some Macy stock and got clobbered yesterday.<\/p>\n<p>Via the NYTimes:<\/p>\n<p id=\"story-continues-1\" class=\"story-body-text story-content\" data-para-count=\"170\" data-total-count=\"170\">When Macy\u2019s, a store closely associated with Christmas, says there is trouble brewing ahead of the holidays, it is enough to send the world of shopping into a tailspin.<\/p>\n<aside id=\"middle-right-paid-post-container\" class=\"ad middle-right-ad paid-post-ad nocontent robots-nocontent\">\n<h2 class=\"marginalia-heading\"><\/h2>\n<\/aside>\n<p id=\"story-continues-2\" class=\"story-body-text story-content\" data-para-count=\"220\" data-total-count=\"390\">The retailer of \u201cMiracle on 34th Street\u201d <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2015\/11\/12\/business\/macys-lowers-its-guidance-on-sales-slump.html\">warned Wednesday<\/a> that its stores were awash with merchandise after a sluggish fall season and that slow business would force it to go all-out on discounts during the holidays.<\/p>\n<p class=\"story-body-text story-content\" data-para-count=\"226\" data-total-count=\"616\">Macy\u2019s shares plunged about 14 percent, dragging other retailers down, too. The Hudson\u2019s Bay Company, which owns Saks Fifth Avenue and Lord &amp; Taylor, fell 5 percent, as did Kohl\u2019s. Burlington Stores fell about 7 percent.<\/p>\n<p class=\"visually-hidden skip-to-text-link\" data-para-count=\"256\" data-total-count=\"872\">\u201cWe\u2019re clearly disappointed,\u201d Terry J. Lundgren, Macy\u2019s chief executive, said in a call with investors. \u201cWe believe the retail industry is going through a tough period. We seem to experience something like this every five to seven years or so.\u201d<\/p>\n<aside class=\"marginalia related-coverage-marginalia nocontent robots-nocontent\" data-marginalia-type=\"sprinkled\">\n<div class=\"nocontent robots-nocontent\"><\/div>\n<\/aside>\n<p id=\"story-continues-3\" class=\"story-body-text story-content\" data-para-count=\"268\" data-total-count=\"1140\">Aggressive discounting from one of the country\u2019s biggest merchants is bad news for retailers this holiday sales season, which is shaping up to be highly discount-driven. It also raises questions about the strength of the economic recovery, and of consumer sentiment.<\/p>\n<p class=\"story-body-text story-content\" data-para-count=\"267\" data-total-count=\"1407\">But a shift in the way Americans shop because of the proliferation of e-commerce, and the power to compare prices at a click of the mouse, has meant that a brightening economy is no longer a tide that raises all retailers, said Oliver Chen, a retail analyst at Cowen.<\/p>\n<p class=\"story-body-text story-content\" data-para-count=\"83\" data-total-count=\"1490\">\u201cThe only tide that\u2019s raising all ships is online and mobile,\u201d Mr. Chen said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"story-body-text story-content\" data-para-count=\"97\" data-total-count=\"1587\">Still, the outlook for some merchants is better, analysts say. Winners, and losers, are emerging.<\/p>\n<p class=\"story-body-text story-content\" data-para-count=\"199\" data-total-count=\"1786\">Retailers that go head-to-head in the mall with Macy\u2019s are likely to take a hit from its heavy promotions, including J. C. Penney, Gap and Kohl\u2019s, said Paul Lejuez, a retail analyst at Citigroup.<\/p>\n<p id=\"story-continues-4\" class=\"story-body-text story-content\" data-para-count=\"294\" data-total-count=\"2080\">But off-price stores like Ross Stores or TJX, which runs T.J.Maxx and Marshalls, are expected to do well again this year as \u201ctreasure hunting\u201d for rock-bottom deals on national brands becomes the norm. These off-price businesses also source their wares from retailers with excess inventory.<\/p>\n<p class=\"story-body-text story-content\" data-para-count=\"182\" data-total-count=\"2262\">Over all, the National Retail Federation, a trade group, predicts sales in November and December will rise 3.7 percent to $630 billion, slightly under last year\u2019s 4.1 percent gain.<\/p>\n<p class=\"story-body-text story-content\" data-para-count=\"254\" data-total-count=\"2516\">Another retailer looking to prove itself is <a class=\"meta-org\" title=\"More information about Wal-Mart Stores Inc\" href=\"http:\/\/topics.nytimes.com\/top\/news\/business\/companies\/wal_mart_stores_inc\/index.html?inline=nyt-org\">Walmart<\/a>, which announced its holiday plans on Wednesday. Its <a title=\"More articles about Black Friday.\" href=\"http:\/\/topics.nytimes.com\/top\/reference\/timestopics\/subjects\/r\/retail_stores_and_trade\/black_friday\/index.html?inline=nyt-classifier\">Black Friday<\/a> deals will begin in stores at 6 p.m. on Thanksgiving Day, the same time as last year. Online deals are available at 3 a.m. Eastern time.<\/p>\n<p class=\"story-body-text story-content\" data-para-count=\"189\" data-total-count=\"2705\">Once laser-focused on price, Walmart has been investing in wage increases for its workers, and in improving stocking and presentation to try to revamp the shopping experience in its stores.<\/p>\n<p id=\"story-continues-5\" class=\"story-body-text story-content\" data-para-count=\"242\" data-total-count=\"2947\">So while Walmart is offering so-called doorbusters \u2014 a Samsung curved 55-inch, 4K flat-screen TV for $999, for example \u2014 a focus this holiday season will be execution, Walmart\u2019s United States chief executive, Greg Foran, told reporters.<\/p>\n<p id=\"story-continues-6\" class=\"story-body-text story-content\" data-para-count=\"267\" data-total-count=\"3214\">For Walmart, that means stocking up to avoid shortages on the most popular products \u2014 more than a million TVs, and more than 10 million pajamas \u2014 as well as helping shoppers navigate the store with an integrated shopping app, and speeding up the checkout process.<\/p>\n<p class=\"story-body-text story-content\" data-para-count=\"115\" data-total-count=\"3329\">Simplicity is a big theme this year, Mr. Foran said. Almost all deals available in stores will be available online.<\/p>\n<p class=\"story-body-text story-content\" data-para-count=\"172\" data-total-count=\"3501\">\u201cThere\u2019s nothing more frustrating than getting to the store in search of a deal and finding out: Gee, how many did the store have? Just four of them,\u201d Mr. Foran said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"story-body-text story-content\" data-para-count=\"201\" data-total-count=\"3702\">Mr. Chen said Walmart would benefit this holiday season because of the breadth of its offerings, like pharmacy products and electronics, which makes it less dependent on winter fashion and the weather.<\/p>\n<p class=\"story-body-text story-content\" data-para-count=\"111\" data-total-count=\"3813\">Still, all retailers are fighting another big shift for the American consumer: away from buying things, period.<\/p>\n<p class=\"story-body-text story-content\" data-para-count=\"192\" data-total-count=\"4005\">\u201cThe big issue is what are consumers spending money on?\u201d Mr. Lejeuz of Citi said. \u201cThey\u2019re spending it to eat out, they\u2019re spending it on iPhones, on Netflix and Spotify,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"story-body-text story-content\" data-node-uid=\"1\" data-para-count=\"73\" data-total-count=\"4078\">\u201cThe consumer is fine,\u201d Mr. Lejeuz said, \u201cbut retailers are not.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This one is personal as I owned (past tense) some Macy stock and got clobbered yesterday. Via the NYTimes: When Macy\u2019s, a store closely associated with Christmas, says there is trouble brewing ahead of the holidays, it is enough to send the world of shopping into a tailspin. The retailer of \u201cMiracle on 34th Street\u201d [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23760","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p9YXi-6be","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/acrossthecurve.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23760","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/acrossthecurve.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/acrossthecurve.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/acrossthecurve.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/acrossthecurve.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=23760"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/acrossthecurve.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23760\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23761,"href":"https:\/\/acrossthecurve.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23760\/revisions\/23761"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/acrossthecurve.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=23760"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/acrossthecurve.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=23760"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/acrossthecurve.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=23760"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}