TRANSCRIPT
REPORTER: Not much holiday cheer for retailers this year - hit early on by Hurricane Sandy and later by consumer worries about the fiscal cliff. Preliminary estimates from Mastercard Advisors SpendingPulse showed a gain of just 0.7 percent- much slower than in 2011. Brian Sozzi, Chief Investment Strategist at NBG productions ...
BRIAN SOZZI, CHIEF INVESTMENT STRATEGIST, NBG PRODUCTIONS: "I see a lot of companies warn in terms of profits. I think that in those companies that warn they will have had a lot of discounts they didn't have the right product in the store."
REPORTER: The companies he's most worried about? Nordstrom because aspirational shoppers held back on fiscal cliff worries. Best Buy - their new pricing initiatives didn't do enough to counteract poor consumer perception and Radioshack - which Sozzi says has become too commoditized. Among the likely winners: Wal-Mart, Macy's, Michael Kors, and Gap according to Telsey Advisory Group. In the case of Gap, analysts say it was their bright sweaters that were a hit with consumers. Consumers definitely picked favorites this year. Mike Niemira is the Chief Economist at the International Council of Shopping Centers ...
MICHAEL NIEMIRA, CHIEF ECONOMIST, INTERNATIONAL COUNCIL OF SHOPPING CENTERS: "It has been a very uneven industry performance, probably at least for the last year and that certainly continued into the holiday season. So you can pick a segment like department stores that overall is not doing that well, however, you can also point to individual stores, a Macy's, that is doing well. So its a very fragmented industry performance."
REPORTER: An early start helped retailers this year- as many added Gray Thursday- stores open on Thanksgiving- to Black Friday and Cyber Monday. But there were consequences. Chris Christopher of IHS Global Insight ...
CHRIS CHRISTOPHER, DIRECTOR, U.S. AND GLOBAL CONSUMER ECONOMICS: "Gray Thursday, Black Friday and Cyber Monday helped boost sales in November but took away from December. In our analysis retail sales at a weekly level suffered quite a bit after Black Friday weekend. "
REPORTER: Retailers are now hoping post-Christmas sales can salvage what has been the worst holiday season since 2008, when the country was in recession.
VOCABULARY
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