Me, "In a time where malls have had to reinvent themselves to draw in shoppers, and shoppers have turned to the internet for a lot of holiday shopping: what does Macy's disappointing holiday sales and its decision to close even more stores say?
Well, there are ways of looking at this: One, maybe people need to be encouraged to come out of their homes and shop at brick and mortar stores. Two, maybe stores need to find a way of making shopping less stressful and more fun. In an age where private security is shadowing paying customers for fears of those customer stealing merchandise, and long cashier lines, you can see how shoppers would be turned off. They feel harassed and feel they are being treated as a thief. Better to stay home and order an item off the internet and hope it comes in time for the holidays.
The internet has less stress and more products for sale.
The one thing a brick and mortar store have going for it is on demand merchandise. You walk in and hopefully walk out with something. But even this is not true anymore. A lot of times a store will list and item on its website and won't carry it in their stores.
So what is to be done? Well, malls have been trying to lure customers in with the addition of attractions. Some have movies, ice skating rinks, skiing, arcades, Ferris wheels, carousels, anything to get a shopper into the mall and hopefully into stores to shop. But in this age of a simple click compared to traffic, parking, long lines, It's easy to see why people would rather stay home.
Macy's disappointing sales could be a sign of things to come (more store closings) or it could be an opportunity to reinvest in itself and see what is it that is working on the internet and try and do the same thing.
This may mean Macy's becomes more like an Amazon.com where it lists everything it has to sell and ships it directly to the customer. To be fair a lot of Brick and Mortar stores have started doing this but Amazon has a huge lead. There are those that say well, you need to be physically in the store to try on clothing. With the invention of Virtual Reality it may not be long until you have Virtual Clothing. A device that you put on like clothing that mimics the size and fit of the clothing you are looking at online, so, there are no surprises when it comes in the mail. Could be as interesting an item as VR. So, with Macy's disappointing earnings, it is not the end of the road, they just need to adapt."
From Article, "Macy's posts disappointing holiday sales, likely to cut 10,000 workers and move forward with store closures"
(Macy's shares tumbled more than 9 percent after the market's close Wednesday after it posted disappointing holiday sales and released the locations of 68 of the 100 stores it plans to close as it looks to turn around its performance.
Macy's comparable sales fell 2.1 percent in November and December, which was at the low end of its previous guidance. It maintained its 2016 comparable sales guidance of a 2.5 percent to 3 percent decline, but expects full-year diluted earnings to be in a range of $2.95 to $3.10. It had previously been expecting $3.15 to $3.40.
Macy's outgoing Chairman and CEO Terry Lundgren said the company expects "our 2017 change in comparable sales to be relatively consistent with our November/December sales trend."
Macy's shares recently changed hands at $32.60, down $3.24, or 9 percent.
As part of Wednesday's announcement Macy's said it will eliminate layers of management to cut costs and make more agile decisions. It also will work to reduce other non-payroll costs. As a result of these steps, the company estimates its work force will be cut by 6,200.
Another 3,900 workers will be displaced by the store closures and some of these employees could be reassigned.
The store closures are an attempt to reverse the downward slide in sales at its established shops, and they make good on a promise fromAugust, when the department store chain said it would close a chunk of stores to focus on its best-performing locations and its website.)
