Consumer Confidence

Consumer Confidence for the month of July hit a six year high at 112.6. With consumer confidence up that could pave the way for retail stores to post increase sales for the back to school season. With retail experience at L.S. Ayres I know that the back to school season is always a good time for sales and with the boost of confidence it could prove quite favorable for the retailers.

http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/070731/consumer_confidence.html?.v=10

Bad Day

Today seems to be a bad day for the entire market with no exception in the luxury departments. Department stores, specialty retailers, and more are all down a few percent during intraday trading. Now could possibly be a good time to get into the market while it is down because surely the big companies such as Ralph Lauren and Macy's will go back up.

Neiman Marcus Group

On July 12, 2007 The Neiman Marcus Group released June sales information and it looks good! Revenues are up 8.8% compared to June 2006 with the winning departments being designer handbags (what a shock!), ladies fine apparel, jewelry and men's. Neiman Marcus stores must be doing something right and in this luxury era it has to be the products that they sell and the exceptional service they have.

Here is another example of the luxury market still in an upswing.

Information for this blog came from www.neimanmarcusgroup.com

Simon Property

Indiana's own Simon Property seems to be doing exceptionally well regardless of their . The Indianapolis based retail developer is opening new malls in Texas as well as reaping the benefits of rising rent costs; on average the square foot price is $26-$32. Simon is a haven for luxury retailers--from Circle Centre in Indianapolis with stores like Coach and Nordstrom (both great companies to own) to The Fashion Mall on the Las Vegas Strip with every department store desired for luxury shoppers (they don't have the local Sears or Penney's. With such a dependency on these stores doing well they are hoping that consumers keep spending and on luxurious items too.

From Yahoo Finance:
http://biz.yahoo.com/bizj/070718/1492835.html?.v=2

Same Store Sales

Same store sales, the key statistic for department stores were mixed for the second quarter. Same store sales are based on the change in sales in the same stores open at least one year. This shows the company exactly how each store is doing and can be combined to show if the company is growing at existing locations. For the second quarter we have the following results that show same store sales changes and stock price:

Dillard's: -1% worse than analysts expectations
Macy's: -2.7% worse than analysts expectations
Nordstrom: +2% greater than analysts expectations
Saks: -5.6% worse than analysts expectations

Hopefully the third quarter will bring better results to the stores and it is possible with back to school coming up, but if there is a major hurricane it may cause another drop like after Katrina.

Information from Yahoo Finance

Buyout Update

Barney's: The $825 million bid for the department store chain from Istithmar investment group has been beaten by a $900 bid by Japan's Fast Retailing. This could get interesting!
http://www.fool.com/investing/international/2007/07/09/fast-retailings-big-bid-for-barneys.aspx

Macy's: The new Sears? Possibly, rumor has it that Edward Lampert may be interested in purchasing the company. I think a Sears/Macy's combo would be an even worse marriage than what has happened with the Federated/May merger that created nationwide Macy's. I thought the nationwide Macy's would be a good thing, but some people just cannot get over the lost names of Filene's, Marshall Fields and others. A Sears/Macy's creation would destroy any status that Macy's has as being a fine retailer because of the plainess and lower quality merchandise associated with K-mart and Sears. I think this could be good news for other department stores such as Dillard's and the Bon-Ton group of stores because they are the closest things to Macy's and have some prestige.
http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/070706/apfn_macy_s_mover.html?.v=1

Tiffany & LVMH: Nothing new to report on this merger yet.

Another Takeover!

Tiffany's & Moet Hennessey Louis Vuitton

More takeover speculation amidst retailers. This time it is with top-of-the-line companies, Tiffany and LVMH. Monday shares of Tiffany closed up 4% after topping out up 6.8% in intraday trading. Again, this is just speculation and may not ever happen, but I think that it could be a match made in heaven, here's why:

-Tiffany's is headquartered in NYC and LVMH in Paris, both two of the top cities for fashion and wealth, this could be used to increase operating efficiency in the two different markets.

-LVMH doesn't have a fine jewelery segment that I know of and Tiffany's doesn't sell clothing, wine, etc.; here is another way that they seem to match well

-Both are known for extraordinary quality and prestige.

-Finally, I just think it could reduce overhead because they could close stores, cut staff and increase shoppers efficiency by having a stop shop for luxury goods.

http://biz.yahoo.com/rb/070625/tiffany_shares.html?.v=4

http://www.flickr.com/photos/irishclare/108765351/