More Coal In The Stocking For Holidays

There will be more “Going Out Of Business” sales after the first of the year than was expected just weeks ago. Deloitte’s annual holiday survey data shows that:

Consumers who plan to spend less this year (42 percent) largely point to the higher costs impacting their household budgets. Six out of ten cite higher food prices (63 percent) and higher gas prices (60 percent) as the top two reasons for spending less this year.

 

Gasoline prices have fallen from nearly $4 to about $3.50 over the last few months. It appears that is not enough of a drop to help most people who want to buy gifts in November and December.

Bricks and mortar retailers can expect to do worse than e-commerce companies:

Of the 68 percent who plan to change the way they shop to save money, 51 percent plan to head online to find better prices – a 10 percentage point jump from last year – while 46 percent plan to buy more items that qualify for free shipping. The Internet also climbed 13 percentage points to tie discounters as the #1 destination to purchase gifts.

Shareholders in Target (NYSE: TGT), Best Buy (NYSE: BBY), Barnes & Noble (NYSE: BKS), and Sears (NASDAQ: SHLD) may as well drop whatever expectations they had for the stocks. Consumers won’t be driving to malls this year.

The top 1% of the the holiday shoppers by income have no intention to cut their budgets:

Households earning $100,000 or more annually expect to trim a mere 2 percent off gift spending to shell out an average of $812 on presents, compared with a 26 percent drop to $291 on gifts among those earning less than $100,000

It will be a good year for Tiffany (NYSE: TIF)

Douglas A. McIntyre