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A6 U.S. NEWS
Saturday 17 december 2016

Stores push deals, hope to lure shoppers for holiday stretch

from Seattle, says he’s been cused America’s Research
shopping more online. Group.
“It’s easier,” he said. “You “Consumers are saying,
can tap into people’s wish ‘where is the deal?’” he
lists, so there’s not a lot of said. “Retailers hurt them-
guesswork involved.” selves last weekend by not
Four of the seven catego- having more deals.”
ries First Data tracks showed Stores were still aggressive.
sales growth this season: Sixty-seven percent of or-
building materials, elec- ders were placed online
tronics and appliances, fur- using a promotion from
niture and home furnishings Nov. 1 through Nov. 30,
and health and personal up from 38 percent in the
care. General merchan- same timeframe a year
dise stores suffered the big- ago, according to Dynam-
gest sales drop — 2.8 per- icAction, which studied $4
cent — because of deep billion in online consumer
discounts as well as less foot transactions. For the first
traffic. Within that catego- five days of December,
ry, department stores took 60 percent of orders were
the biggest hit, with overall placed using a promotion,
sales down 8.8 percent. compared with 29 percent
While the Thanksgiv- a year ago.
Shoppers look for gifts in booths set up for the holidays around City Hall in Philadelphia. New ing weekend has usually Nearly 156 million people
numbers from a key data source show that shoppers are so far spending at a decent, but slightly kicked off the holiday sea- — or 66 percent of Ameri-
slower pace this holiday season compared to last year.
(AP Photo/Matt Rourke) son, stores have been start- cans — plan to or are
ing their sales earlier and
considering taking advan-
A. D’INNOCENZIO urday, which could be the card transactions in the U.S. earlier. They also started tage of Saturday sales to
AP Retail Writer busiest day of the year. but excludes cash. the season with less inven- complete their holiday
NEW YORK (AP) — Stores “This has really become a Online sales growth was up tory on hand than in years gift lists, according to a
are pushing deals and in- game of chicken. In that 9 percent, while spending past. survey released Friday by
centives like free shipping game of chicken, retailers at physical stores was up Many hoped that shoppers the National Retail Federa-
for the final week of the once again were the ones a mere 0.1 percent. At the would have more to spend tion and Prosper Insights &
holiday shopping season, who flinched,” said Joseph mid-season point, e-com- with the economy improv- Analytics. The survey found
as new numbers show peo- Schmitt, director at the re- merce made up about 22 ing and lower gas and that more people said they
ple are so far spending at tail consulting firm AlixPart- percent of retail spending, food prices, and the uncer- planned to shop on Satur-
a bit of a slower pace than ners. up from 16 percent in 2015. tainty over the presidential day than those who aimed
last year. Retail spending is up 2 per- Overall, the average dollar election behind them. But to shop over Thanksgiving
Retailers pared down their cent, slightly slower the 2.4 amount spent per person many shoppers retain the weekend in an earlier sur-
inventories and offered percent gain at this time for the 45-day period was habits they developed dur- vey.
more exclusive merchan- last year, with the rate of $70.28, up slightly from last ing the Great Recession, fo- Still, given the quirk in the
dise this season in a bid to online spending far out- year’s $69.34. cusing on deals and more calendar that makes this
avoid having to offer big pacing buying at physical “It’s pretty decent growth, readily using technology to weekend the last full week-
discounts that shoppers stores from Oct. 29 through but the average shopper find them. end before Christmas, re-
have come to expect. But Monday, according to First is moving online,” says Rishi Stores needed to be more tailers including Best Buy,
customers seem willing Data. The firm analyzed on- Chhabra, vice president for aggressive with discounts, Gap and J.C. Penney,
to wait, and so stores are line and in-store payments information and analytics particularly last weekend, have set an earlier dead-
once again counting on from nearly a million mer- at First Data. said C. Britt Beemer, chair- line to order holiday gifts
last-minute buyers for the fi- chants. The data captures Gregg Omoto, an infor- man of the consumer-fo- this year, according to
nal stretch, particularly Sat- about 40 percent of all mation technology worker StellaService, which tracks
online services at retailers.
UPS delivers assault rifle instead of toy for Christmas gift Wal-Mart, along with oth-

OCEANSIDE, N.Y. (AP) — A board-sized case in front rifle, scope, stand, ammo picked up the weapon. ers, is encouraging online
shoppers to pick up their
New York couple was hor- of his wife and 6-year-old clip and copies of an Ari- Atlanta-based UPS says it’s merchandise at the store.
rified when a UPS deliv- granddaughter Wednes- zona man’s driver’s license investigating the “highly un- Target will be offering last-
ery that they thought was day night in Oceanside, on and concealed-weapons usual incident.” The com- minute shoppers deals that
a Christmas present turned Long Island. Instead of a permit. pany says it accepts legal are good only for a day on
out to be an assault rifle. toy plane they were buying They hustled their grand- shipments of some firearms. certain in-demand prod-
Newsday reports that Joel for their friend’s son, they daughter out of the room It says shippers must meet ucts like children’s sleep-
Berman opened the key- found a semi-automatic and called police, who certain requirements.q wear and fragrance sets.q