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American Morning

Post-Holiday Crush

Aired December 26, 2002 - 07:03   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Something else that everyone is concerned about today. Today is the first day of the first -- the last day of the first day of the retail season there, and stores are now discounting their discounts after a holiday season that didn't live up to everyone's expectations.
Our own Mary Snow is in front of Macy's department store in New York City here this morning, which apparently just opened its doors just a few minutes ago.

Is that right, Mary?

MARY SNOW, CNN CORRESPONDENT: That's right, Sanjay. Yes, the doors just opened. We're seeing some people trickling in here on the Broadway entrance, but no huge crowds so far. Some other Macy's opened as early as 6:00 a.m. in other parts of the country, and also other big retailers are now taking (ph) big discounts today to try to clear out those inventories. Target announcing on its Web site sales of up to 50 percent off on some of its items.

And this, as you mentioned, has been a sluggish retail season, because consumers are cautious. They're concerned about the economy, the unemployment rate, it's 6 percent. And we've seen a number of the big retailers weighing in. Even earlier this week, retailers like Wal-Mart and Federated, which owns Macy's and Bloomingdales, reporting weak sales.

But also one factor that retailers have been pointing to is that this shopping season has been six days shorter than past years, because Thanksgiving fell later this year. So, they're trying to make up for that lost time.

And this week, despite the fact that we're already past Christmas, is a big and it's an important one for retailers, especially because they've had such weak numbers. It's about 10 percent of all holiday sales are made up for this week.

Now, the National Retail Federation is still, at this point, sticking by its numbers. It's expecting about a 4 percent increase and thinks that this is an important week and perhaps some of these retailers can make up for lost sales in terms of discounts and clearing out some of their merchandise -- Sanjay.

GUPTA: Right, yes. And I was going to ask, so this seems like a pretty important week for the economy as a whole. Are they pretty optimistic about that, about making up some lost ground, as it were, over the next week or so? SNOW: Well, you know, some of the retailers have been saying that they're optimistic, but it's really hard to get a good read on it, especially since, you know, earlier this week, right before Christmas we heard a lot of stories about stores being crowded and perhaps that was a very good sign. But then, we got the numbers from, as I said, Federated and Wal-Mart. They reported slow sales. So, it's really hard to say exactly how much they'll make up for it in these final days of 2002.

GUPTA: OK. Mary Snow, thank you very much.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com.






Aired December 26, 2002 - 07:03   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Something else that everyone is concerned about today. Today is the first day of the first -- the last day of the first day of the retail season there, and stores are now discounting their discounts after a holiday season that didn't live up to everyone's expectations.
Our own Mary Snow is in front of Macy's department store in New York City here this morning, which apparently just opened its doors just a few minutes ago.

Is that right, Mary?

MARY SNOW, CNN CORRESPONDENT: That's right, Sanjay. Yes, the doors just opened. We're seeing some people trickling in here on the Broadway entrance, but no huge crowds so far. Some other Macy's opened as early as 6:00 a.m. in other parts of the country, and also other big retailers are now taking (ph) big discounts today to try to clear out those inventories. Target announcing on its Web site sales of up to 50 percent off on some of its items.

And this, as you mentioned, has been a sluggish retail season, because consumers are cautious. They're concerned about the economy, the unemployment rate, it's 6 percent. And we've seen a number of the big retailers weighing in. Even earlier this week, retailers like Wal-Mart and Federated, which owns Macy's and Bloomingdales, reporting weak sales.

But also one factor that retailers have been pointing to is that this shopping season has been six days shorter than past years, because Thanksgiving fell later this year. So, they're trying to make up for that lost time.

And this week, despite the fact that we're already past Christmas, is a big and it's an important one for retailers, especially because they've had such weak numbers. It's about 10 percent of all holiday sales are made up for this week.

Now, the National Retail Federation is still, at this point, sticking by its numbers. It's expecting about a 4 percent increase and thinks that this is an important week and perhaps some of these retailers can make up for lost sales in terms of discounts and clearing out some of their merchandise -- Sanjay.

GUPTA: Right, yes. And I was going to ask, so this seems like a pretty important week for the economy as a whole. Are they pretty optimistic about that, about making up some lost ground, as it were, over the next week or so? SNOW: Well, you know, some of the retailers have been saying that they're optimistic, but it's really hard to get a good read on it, especially since, you know, earlier this week, right before Christmas we heard a lot of stories about stores being crowded and perhaps that was a very good sign. But then, we got the numbers from, as I said, Federated and Wal-Mart. They reported slow sales. So, it's really hard to say exactly how much they'll make up for it in these final days of 2002.

GUPTA: OK. Mary Snow, thank you very much.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com.