US Retail Sales Plunged a Record 16 Percent In April As Virus Hit (apnews.com) 24
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Associated Press: U.S. retail sales tumbled by a record 16.4% from March to April as business shutdowns caused by the coronavirus kept shoppers away, threatened the viability of stores across the country and further weighed down a sinking economy. The Commerce Department's report Friday on retail purchases showed a sector that has collapsed so fast that sales over the past 12 months are down a crippling 21.6%. The severity of the decline is unrivaled for retail figures that date back to 1992. The monthly decline in April nearly doubled the previous record drop of 8.3% -- set just one month earlier.
The sharpest declines from March to April were at clothing, electronics and furniture stores. A long-standing migration of consumers toward online purchases is accelerating, with that segment posting a 8.4% monthly gain. Measured year over year, online sales surged 21.6%. Other than online, not a single retail category was spared in April. Auto dealers suffered a monthly drop of 13%. Furniture stores absorbed a 59% plunge. Electronics and appliance stores were down over 60%. Retailers that sell building materials posted a drop of roughly 3%. After panic buying in March, grocery sales fell 13%. Clothing-store sales tumbled 79%, department stores 29%. Restaurants, some of which are already starting to close permanently, endured a nearly 30% decline despite shifting aggressively to takeout and delivery orders. Economists estimate that the gross domestic product (GDP) is shrinking in the April-June quarter at a roughly 40% annual rate. That would be the deepest quarterly drop on record.
Joshua Shapiro, chief U.S. economist for the consultancy Maria Fiorini Ramirez, said he thinks retail sales should rebound somewhat as states and localities reopen their economies. But he said overall sales would remain depressed "because there is going to be a big chunk of the lost jobs that don't come back."
The sharpest declines from March to April were at clothing, electronics and furniture stores. A long-standing migration of consumers toward online purchases is accelerating, with that segment posting a 8.4% monthly gain. Measured year over year, online sales surged 21.6%. Other than online, not a single retail category was spared in April. Auto dealers suffered a monthly drop of 13%. Furniture stores absorbed a 59% plunge. Electronics and appliance stores were down over 60%. Retailers that sell building materials posted a drop of roughly 3%. After panic buying in March, grocery sales fell 13%. Clothing-store sales tumbled 79%, department stores 29%. Restaurants, some of which are already starting to close permanently, endured a nearly 30% decline despite shifting aggressively to takeout and delivery orders. Economists estimate that the gross domestic product (GDP) is shrinking in the April-June quarter at a roughly 40% annual rate. That would be the deepest quarterly drop on record.
Joshua Shapiro, chief U.S. economist for the consultancy Maria Fiorini Ramirez, said he thinks retail sales should rebound somewhat as states and localities reopen their economies. But he said overall sales would remain depressed "because there is going to be a big chunk of the lost jobs that don't come back."
Only 16%? (Score:5, Informative)
That seems much smaller than I expected given the scale of the lockdown - I haven't bought anything but groceries and a few items for my home office since lockdown.
Re: Only 16%? (Score:1)
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March had to be interesting for Costco. Started off more or less normal. Then a huge spike when the panic-buyers all jammed in to stockpile up. The end of March had to be brutal - I went then during the middle of the day expecting a zoo, but the panic-buyers were done by that point and in terms of customers the place was by far the emptiest I had ever seen it (stock levels, however, were more or less still normal). April started out that way, and from what I can tell over the past few weeks a ramp back
Re:Only 16%? (Score:4, Informative)
While, for the US, the article only mentions the March -> April drop, there was already a hard downward economic shift underway prior to the widespread stay-at-home orders.
The February -> March drop in the EU, according to the article, was -11.2%. Note that the first EU country to impose a nationwide lockdown was Italy on March 10.
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Actually, the summary does mention that the previous month's drop in the US was -8.3%.
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Yep, with brick and mortar on curbside only, and Amazon slow... quite a big drop was expected.
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That's normal (Score:3)
Nobody need trousers or skirts on video-conferences.
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meanwhile, pajama sales are up 143% [cnet.com]
16% grade is steep, but a plunge? (Score:1)
Online ... (Score:2)
..are you including online sales
If not how are the figures so high, if you are then of course the clothes sales are down,since clothes sizing in the states is an arbitrary figure not a reality no-one is buying online
That's because there is no toilet paper (Score:3)
Retail sucks anyway (Score:1)
Only reason to buy in a physical retail store is:
- you want it right fucking now
- not practical to ship
- you do not know what you want
- impulse buys
So many stores either do not carry what I want or have it in stock even if they carry it. Why fucking bother? Especially with crowds or dumb shit rules.
Re: Vaccine or no vaccine, we're back! (Score:1)
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What China did or did not do was the same for South Korea, but they managed to avert a health and economic catastrophe. We cannot depend on other countries doing the right thing if we are unwilling to hold our own leaders to a standard of minimal competence and coherence and moral leadership.
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Still playing your silly game I see.
Just so everybody knows, BlindWillieMcTell is one of PopeRatzo's sockpuppets. This guy posts something under the Pope account (usually a troll), then he logs on as BlindWillieMcTell to try and attack any user who challenges the original post made under the Pope account. All you need to do is check BlindWillieMcTell's posting history and you'll see it's the same pattern repeated over and over and over.
The More You Know
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I see you got the memo:
Republican strategy memo advises GOP campaigns to blame China for coronavirus [washingtonpost.com]
‘Don’t defend Trump,’ the memo says. ‘Attack China.’
instagram online store (Score:1)