Retail sales managed small gains last week as March conformed to the proverb and came in very much like a lion.
With cold and snowy weather affecting much of the northern and eastern portions of the U.S., sales during the week ended March 7 rose 1.8 percent versus the comparable 2014 week, the same pace as in the week ended Feb. 28, according to the chain store sales survey of The Retail Economist LLC and Goldman Sachs.
On a sequential basis, sales were up 1.3 percent from the prior week after a flat finish the week before that.
“Early March continued the weather-dampened sales pace that has colored the January and February performance,” said Michael Niemira, chief economist and principal of The Retail Economist. “However, with the earlier Easter this year compared with 2014, sales momentum should advance more briskly by the end of March.”
Related Articles
This year, Easter Sunday falls on April 5, 15 days earlier than it did in 2014. The earlier timing is expected to push some holiday-related and spring business into March, likely at the expense of some business in April.
You May Also Like
Weather has been a contributing factor in disappointing sales so far in this calendar year. Among the small sample of public companies that continue to report monthly sales, including Gap Inc. and L Brands Inc., comparable sales, excluding drug stores, rose 1.2 percent in February, missing Thomson Reuters’ consensus estimate of 2.1 percent for the month, while January sales advanced 0.8 percent, behind the 1.1 percent estimate.
Niemira noted “improving consumer demand” at department, dollar, drug and electronics stores last week. However, business was described as “weak” at apparel and non-apparel specialty stores; office, furniture, grocery, drug and discount stores, and wholesale clubs.
Wholesale clubs had registered strong results, virtually without exception, in recent months.
While gasoline prices registered their sixth consecutive week of increases after 18 straight weeks of declines, they remained 29.2 percent below their year-ago level at $2.487 a gallon, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.