Retailers report surprise drop in November

So here we go again

NEW YORK – The nation's retailers posted a surprise sales decline for November after two consecutive months of gains, as a modestly positive start to holiday shopping wasn't strong enough to offset weak spending the rest of the month.

The 0.3 percent decrease, according to one measure, is especially worrisome because it comes on top of a freefall last November as spooked shoppers went into a defensive crouch after the financial meltdown. Analyst had expected a strong gain.

full story

Good news for X-mass shoppers, a worrisome sign for an economy in the early stages of a fragile recovery. Now, merchants may have to step up discounting beyond what's planned as they try to entice financially strapped shoppers back to the stores. Maybe let go even more of there staff to keep costs in line too???



[edit on 3-12-2009 by DaddyBare]

Do not forget to listen to the news, tell you the opposite.

I doubt anyone will listen as they get the first headline, and tv just imprints it into them.

reply to post by DaddyBare


The beginning of the end??

For the past year I have been saying that it all hinges on Black Friday in 2009. The Christmas season brings crime and suicide and despair, and all of the major retailers pin their hopes for a profit on Black Friday.

If it is a flop, then the economy goes in the crapper! If it is a flop two years in a row and crushes a flailing recovery, and creates a scenario where retailers that survived last year are facing a second straight year of losses, and job cuts, and more doors are shutting, and more real estate is sitting idle, and more cities are facing vacant areas for crime to pop up . . . . .Then we have some serious issues!

When the reports for Thanksgiving weekend come out, it will make or break this economy, and it will set the tone for the rest of the winter and the beginning of 2010.

If the $700B bailout did nothing to help, and we are strapped with all of that debt, this administration will have lost all credibility!!

The government will not be very functional, the economy will not be very functional, and the outlook is very gloomy!!

[edit on 3-12-2009 by getreadyalready]

The media has been working overtime to convince us that people are out happily holiday shopping and snapping up too-good-to-be-true deals. They figure if we tyhink our neighbors are shopping then it's ok for us.

What they failed to take into account is that the banks have been on a year-and-a-half mission to curtail and rollback credit lines and cancel credit cards altogether. So you can write-off all the plastic spending right away. Most people are scared hanky-less about losing their jobs so people are not going to be in the mood to part with much of their money. And lots of others have nothing to part with in the first place.

It's been evident to me for almost a year that this will be an apocalyptic holiday season as far as retail sales go. There will be significant numbers of layoffs and store closing after the holidays as retailers who were holding on for dear life just can't anymore. All the bank bailouts did was make the banking and investment industries whole. They've been pretty much sitting on that money and using it to leverage the huge profits they've been reporting. But it did nothing for the economy at-large.

This is a classic case of throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

If confirmed to a second, four-year term, Bernanke vowed to work with Congress to overhaul the nation's financial regulatory structure and to bring about stronger and more effective supervision, he told the Senate Banking Committee.

"It would be a tragedy if, after all the hardships that Americans have endured during the past two years, our nation failed to take the steps necessary to prevent a recurrence of a crisis of the magnitude we have recently confronted," Bernanke told the panel.

finance.yahoo.com...

reply to post by liveandletlive


Yea but you see... all those 'safeguards' were put in place after the Great Depression. And over the years since the banking lobby has bought-off politicians to slowly neuter or remove them. Remember Regan and the Savings and Loan catastrophe? It's been a long steady mission on the part of the banksters.

Now they're raking-in as much as they can, redistributing the wealth of the nation into the top

reply to post by jtma508


I just think its nice he is so worried about me….now……..that he wants to keep his job…………taking care of his buddies while screwing me………and my children………

I'm still wondering why we keep seeing the word recovery.

We're still losing jobs, the dollar is still falling, things are steadily getting worse and the media keeps talking about a recovery.

How could these people possibly be suprised that they have a slow shopping season?

The folks that still have jobs are making even less money on average and they are trying to save what they can because may of them are worried about their future income.

Of course spending has dropped.

It's not even economics, it's basic math.

Less income = less spending.

My wife works for a major clothing retailer. Probably one of the top 5 in the country. They were down 50% on the year for black Friday. People were not buying clothes on black Friday that's for sure. You know why? Because for the most part clothing is not worth or as easy to finance as say a $800 t.v. or a computer or other high technology item. At least that's my opinion. I don't think retailers will start laying people off until after the holiday season. But once they do LOOK OUT! I think unemployment is going to jump after the new year.

Everyone in the MSM likes to spin the economic story to reflect a “recovery”. The service sector activity and retail sales drop clearly demonstrates what most of us already know. No one has any money and if they do they don’t plan to spend it.

The largest employer (aprox 3,000) in my area will be notifying their employees later this month if they will get to keep their jobs. So far it doesn’t look good for over 75% of them. They are hoping for a miracle.
The people I know from every walk of life have had to take a cut in pay, a cut back in hours or lost their job completely. I know many people that both the husband and wife have lost their jobs and are trying to make it through Christmas on unemployment and food stamps.

No recovery here and I am in one of the “best” parts of the country!