With the official opening day of the holiday shopping season less than a week away, retailers are crossing their fingers that consumer confidence will bounce back in time.
There might be hope based on a new survey released by the National Retail Federation, the industry’s largest trade organization.
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The survey, the 2001 Consumer Holiday Outlook, found that a majority of consumers don’t plan on drastically changing their holiday shopping traditions this year, planning to spend an average of $940 per household. The national survey received input from 1,000 people, who were contacted between Oct. 19 to Oct. 21.
This is good news for retailers, as earlier predictions were calling for this to be one of the most dismal holiday shopping seasons in years.
“Given the many uncertainties facing the country as we head into the holidays this year, consumers appear to remain dedicated to celebrating the season as they’ve done before,” said Tracy Mullin, president and CEO of the NRF. “There may be more enthusiasm from consumers than originally forecast for gift shopping, decorating, and browsing for bargains.”
The holiday shopping season, which traditionally begins the day after Thanksgiving and continues through the month of December, is one of retail’s busiest, but some local storeowners were preparing for the worst.
“We have been plugging along all year long so we have had some minor cutbacks with purchasing and things like that,” said David Riordan, owner of OOP!, a specialty gift store with locations in the Providence Place Mall and on Thayer Street in Providence. “We kept thinking that the bottom would fall out, and nothing like that has happened.”
In preparation for the upcoming holiday season, Riordan said, he has ordered less merchandise and instead opted to keep more on “reserve.”
“We are just being a little more cautious,” he said. “We have reserve product so in December, if we need to we can tap into that. It’s just more of a cushion.”
Paul DeRoche, executive director of the Rhode Island Retail Federation, said major retailers aren’t doing things all that differently this year.
“There is plenty of merchandise, plenty of in-store personnel,” he said. “Nobody wants to look at this with a pessimistic point of view. We want to keep people upbeat and in the stores.”
Despite an increased interest in the holiday shopping season, consumers remain focused on finding the bargains. According to the NRF study, two-thirds of consumers plan on taking advantage of holiday sales and discounts.
This is good news for the Massachusetts-based TJX Companies, a leading off-price retailer of apparel and home fashions that operates T.J. Maxx, Marshalls, HomeGoods, and A.J. Wright. The company has already seen an increase in its sales for the month of October.
“We are well positioned in a more value-conscious environment,” said Sherry Lang, vice president of investor and public relations for the company. “That said, any retailer, including us, would always prefer a more buoyant economy.”
This year, consumers are also once again being lured out of stores to do their shopping. According to the NRF survey, 59.8 percent of consumers say they plan to use remote shopping channels, including mail order, catalog or the Internet, to get their holiday gifts.
And while what really happens during this holiday shopping season won’t be known until it’s officially over, retailers remain optimistic at the start.
“We opened our store during the Gulf War, and we did well,” Riordan said. “We are in the business of selling fun, and positive images. I think people really want that right now.”
DeRoche added, “The holiday spirit is in the air, I think that consumers are feeling it.”
