Now that Millennials, the largest American generation in history some 80 million strong, are aging into the prime years for buying home furnishings, it should be glory days for furniture and home furnishings stores. But that is decidedly not the case. Through November 2019, retail sales in that segment were up only .4%, while retail […]
Archive | Affluent Consumers
RSS feed for this sectionHoliday 2019 Wasn’t So Jolly For Brick-and-Mortar Retailers and Challenges Will Continue
Early results are in and they show that holiday retail sales increased 3.4% (excluding automobiles), according to Mastercard’s post-Christmas holiday report for sales November 1 through December 24. But most of that growth, as well as through the rest of the year, is attributed to e-commerce.
Do Neiman Marcus, Saks and Nordstrom Discount Outlets Draw Customers to their Full-Priced Luxury Stores?
Luxury department stores, like Neiman Marcus, Nordstrom and Saks, have long been plagued by the problem of how to get rid of last season’s unsold merchandise without cluttering up their stores with too many sales signs and off-priced racks. It hurts the luxury brand image. While they could sell it through to liquidation wholesalers, the […]
High-Spending HENRYs Will Pull Out Holiday Retail Sales This Season
I’m the first to admit that I am skeptical about the overly optimistic holiday sales forecasts that are filling my inbox. This year I am particularly surprised by how many forecasts top NRF’s predictably rosy predictions, which this year range from 3.8 percent to 4.2 percent. That’s why I nearly went into auto-delete mode when […]
What’s Really Important About TheRealReal’s Partnership with Burberry
Burberry and the luxury resale marketplace The RealReal recently announced a partnership as a step forward toward a more conscientious, environmentally sound future. “Leading the way in creating a more circular economy for fashion is a key element of our Responsibility agenda,” Pam Batty, Burberry’s VP of corporate responsibility, said in a statement. “Through this […]