The U.S. may still be in an economic fog of uncertainty, but conumers are beginning to unclench their wallets a little bit—particularly on luxury goods. That is the picture emerging from the current round of U.S. earnings and sales reports, writes The Financial Times.
Good News: Tracey Travis, CFO of Polo Ralph Lauren, said the brand and retail company had "slowly begun to see the gradual return of our core luxury customer," including buyers of couture dresses that sell for more than $4,000. Likewise, Fabrizio Freda, CEO of Estée Lauder, said that sales of its beauty products at traditional department stores had grown faster than at mass drugstores and discounters during November and December, reversing the trend seen earlier in the year. “We view this as a return of the aspirational consumer,” he said.
It's not just clothes and cosmetics. Spirits are up too. Sales of cognac in the U.S. jumped 19 percent by volume during the fourth quarter compared with the same period last year, according to BNIC, France’s trade association of cognac makers.
It appears that all U.S. chain stores are seeing improvement. January sales figures from leading U.S. chain stores (think Neiman Marcus, Saks, Nordstrom, Bloomingdale’s) grew over levels of a year ago. Neiman Marcus, which operates about 43 luxury fashion stores, said that its strongest categories included women’s couture clothing and precious jewelery.
Outlook: Richard Hastings, a retail strategist at Global Hunter Securities, said that roughly half of the 80 percent of fully employed Americans were not affected by the depressed housing market and were now more ready to spend as they had become less concerned about their own job safety.
