Retailers It was a tough week for the retail sector after a series of disappointing results statements. Electrical retailer DSG International , which owns Currys and PC World , revealed a 7% fall in sales blaming cash-conscious shoppers for holding on to their old TVs and stereos rather than splashing out on a new ones.
It was a similar story at the parent company of Argos and Homebase , Home Retail Group , while felt the effects of the housing slump and bad weather reporting a pre-tax loss of 437m for the six months to 30 August. Meanwhile, growth in online shopping spend appears to have slowed, according to the latest IMRG Capgemini e-Retail Sales Index. It said that year-on-year growth in online shopping in September 2008 reached 14%, a dramatic dip from last year s figure of 73%.
Bucking the trend, however, was Debenhams , whose full-year figures showed online sales up by more than 60% to 42m. The retailer put the increase down to better site-to-store integration so that customers are able to return unwanted items bought over the web. Elsewhere, Office of Fair Trading this week announced that the Co-operative Group must dispose of 126 stores if is it complete its purchase of Somerfield .
It found that the merger would not affect competition nationally but at a local level. Brand owners Apple remained as on-message as ever with its new Macbook, which it claims to be its greenest ever. The fact that it uses one quarter the power of a single light bulb when it’s running grabbed the headlines - but we were more interested to learn that it uses 41% less packaging and more recycled materials than previous versions.
Leave a comment
You must be logged in to post a comment.