Reports this week suggested a continuation of the trends that were indicated over the last several weeks when retailers reported their fiscal 3Q22 results. That is also true of retailer footfall with discount and off-price doing better on a relative basis. Best Buy also produced a stronger week from its trend and commentators also signaled them out for doing better-than-feared, especially with big screen TVs. (Per the Placer.ai traffic variances shown below, as a reminder the prior weeks were affected by last year’s pull forward surge and this year’s warm weather in early November.)
On a related topic, we’ve updated our presentation Holiday 2022 and Beyond Outlook and this week’s past reports (below) affirm our conclusions. Should you like to review our outlook, please reach out to us and we will happily share.
Other notable insights about the Black Friday shopping period:
- NPD: Thursday-Saturday sales were down -5% YoY with beauty being the only industry tracked by NPD where revenue and units both increased relative to recent years and 2019. Consumer electronics, toys, and apparel were down YoY.
- NRF – “A record 196.7 million Americans shopped in stores and online… The total number of shoppers grew by nearly 17 million [+9.4%] from 2021 and is the highest figure since NRF first started tracking this data in 2017… Retailers saw a sizable uptick of in-store shoppers. More than 122.7 million people visited bricks-and-mortar stores over the weekend, up 17% from 2021. The number of online shoppers also grew, albeit at a slower pace. This year saw 130.2 million online shoppers, a 2% increase over 2021.
- Mastercard Spending Pulse - Retail sales on Black Friday were up 12% YoY, with in-store sales increasing 12% and eCommerce sales growing 14% – these rates are +100 - 200 bps faster than has been recent trend. The acceleration was attributed to increased promotions across channels. Restaurants were the leading retail category at +23%.
- Amazon – “Thanksgiving holiday shopping weekend was its biggest ever, with customers around the world purchasing hundreds of millions of products… “ – We read this to imply record units, not necessarily record sales.
- Wayfair, “...a low-single-digit sales increase in the U.S.” We read this to be a substantial improvement from the minus high-single-% trend prior to the holiday weekend; moreover, the text of the release suggests that Wayfair is operating more like an off-price retailer, example HomeGoods, and is using its leverage to secure great deals in a flooded wholesale market to bring extreme value to its shoppers. Given Wayfair higher average order size ($320) it can make the unit economics and shipping work; the contribution margin on an order is 25%.
- Costco had a slower November with U.S. comp-store-sales up only +4.6%, resulting in a 200bps softer 2- / 3-year CAGR of +7% / +9%. Non-food categories decreased low-single-digits with tires, sporting goods, and toys doing better, and electronics and jewelry underperforming. Sam’s outperformed Costco in traffic for the month and holiday weekend. You can read our commentary about Sam’s ongoing outperformance here.
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