NEW YORK-With Hurricane Sandy wreaking havoc and the shift of some holiday sales to online, U.S. retailers tracked monthly by HFN reported tepid same-store results in November.
Among the downers were Kohl’s, whose same-store sales plummeted 5.6 percent; Target, off 1 percent; and Macy’s, down 0.7 percent. Terry Lundgren, chairman, president and CEO of Macy’s, said Sandy’s disruption to its business was so great that not even Thanksgiving weekend, which brought the largest sales volume for that period in Macy’s history, could offset the damage.
Kevin Mansell, Kohl’s chairman, president and CEO, said the superstorm was a key factor in the retailer’s weakness for the month, especially in stores in its mid-Atlantic and northeastern regions. Mansell added that Kohl’s experienced a significant shift of Black Friday sales into its e-commerce channel, whose sales rose 50 percent over the same period of last year.
November’s same-store gainers were Costco, up 6 percent (with and without gasoline sales); The TJX Cos., with an aggregate 3 percent increase; and Ross Stores with a 2 percent pickup. TJX’s CEO, Carol Meyrowitz, said the chains within the company’s umbrella benefited from increases in sales in the second half of the month, including “robust” sales during the Thanksgiving week.