Kurt Barnard
Kurt Barnard
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What's happening is very simple. The numbers we saw today are clear evidence that the American public is shell-shocked to the point of being frightened over a big long list of circumstances surrounding the economy over which they have no power, no control.
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Oil, jobs, housing prices, unfunded pensions and geopolitical events that could go any number of ways will have an effect in 2006. At this point it's foolhardy to forecast. Any one of those things could send shivers up the spine of consumers.
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I think that they reached the point where something had to happen to Burlington Coat. (CEO) Monroe Milstein was not active for quite sometime, and I think it was mostly his sons running the company. I think his sons were running out of ideas. They weren't expanding and they felt it would be too much of an effort to make the company shape up and be competitive.
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What the Gap is doing is not only what it must be doing, but what it should have done a long time ago.
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The worst part of these results is that they show that the effect of the tax rebate checks has petered out. This is a nightmare in itself for retailers and it doesn't bode well for Christmas. Also, we'll probably see more markdowns now, more than retailers anticipated for the holidays. That will hurt their bottom line.
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They are all planning very cautiously, very carefully. Some companies have very decent inventory controls, but however good those controls are they still have to do some economic forecasting, and forecasting is a little difficult this time around. Nobody is going to spring for big orders until there's evidence that consumer demand is back, and there is no such evidence to date.
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The sales clear evidence of modest consumer spending slow down. We expect a decent holiday sales season, but an unspectacular one. The last three have been spectacular, particularly the last one.
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Early indications show that store traffic and the promotional activity is at lower levels than last year at this time. I wouldn't be surprised if many retailers try to get away with selling merchandise at full price.
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February sales were very strong, stronger than anticipated in many instances. I will tell you that if you were a retailer in February and did not do very well, you stood out like a sore thumb. We're telling our clients that the first half of this year will continue to be marked by continued strong spending at the retail cash register.
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February is a testing month for spring, and the results have not been spectacular, ... There seems to be a sense of foreboding that while spring is likely to be a smidgen better than we have seen in past months, it is not going to be a barn-burner.
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There's a general sense of weakness and caution and I'll tell you the headlines in the newspapers these days do not help, ... We're seeing more layoffs and consumers are beginning to feel there's a cold winter breeze suddenly blowing their way.
beginning blowing breeze caution cold consumers days general headlines layoffs newspapers seeing suddenly weakness winter
There's a general sense of weakness and caution and I'll tell you, the headlines in the newspapers these days do not help. We're seeing more layoffs and consumers are beginning to feel there's a cold winter breeze suddenly blowing their way.
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Sales results were not exactly exceptional and they do represent a slowdown in the overall economy,
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People still like to be out. There's a social aspect to this. It's hard to change people's habits. Many people have the day, it's a family day, and retailers have specials.