Holiday Sales Blog
News, Trends and Analysis for the Key Shopping Season
  • December 16, 2010
    10:05 AM

    The Good News From The FedEx Earnings Report

    Federal Express reported an 18% decline in second quarter earnings today. At first blush, that might appear to indicate that maybe the economy isn’t on the road to recovery after all. That’s because FedEx, and fellow shipping company UPS, are looked at as proxies for the economy. When businesses are building more products, they need [...]

  • December 14, 2010
    10:54 AM

    Best Buy Bludgeoned: Candidate for Ugliest Chart of the Week

    Thomson Reuters

    Best Buy looks like it’s definitely going to be a candidate for ugliest chart of the week when we roll our latest completely unscientific poll on Friday. The retailer is getting absolutely bludgeoned after posting a weak earnings report before the open.

    A bit of color from analysts. But the short version is: It’s the outlook, stupid.

    Matthew Fassler, Goldman Sachs: We believe the stock will clearly come under pressure. We saw acceptable risk/reward into the print, but secular issues that have loomed for years and TV challenges we cited in our recent notes converged to drive a nearworst-case scenario. We would stay on the sidelines pending resolution of two issues: (1) LOTS of inventory to clear, and (2) management’s rather ominous comments about market share declines, which reflect pressure of being sandwiched between online and discount competitors.

    Christopher Horvers, J.P. Morgan: Overall, both gross margin rate and SG&A [translation: expenses, -eds] dollar growth were very impressive and in line with our estimates. However, it appears that BBY ended up pulling the short side of the wishbone with a large sales miss. As we talked about in our Thanksgiving weekend review, BBY was walking a fine line by balancing fewer promotions (at the risk of sales) against better margins, and it appears that their conservative promotional stance magnified weakness in the category. Notably, BBY has historically treated market share as the Holy Grail, and it lost share in both TVs and notebooks, two of their largest categories.

    Stephen Chick, FBR Capital Markets:: Results out of Best Buy today should have negative implications for Staples (SPLS/Underperform), as 1/3 of that company’s North American Retail sales (NAR: 39%of total company sales) are from technology hardware (including notebooks, netbooks, digital cameras, navigation etc). As we have stated previously, we think that that the [consumer electronics] category in general will be soft this holiday, excluding Apple and excluding mobile (smartphones), and BBY results echo this view.

  • December 14, 2010
    08:45 AM

    Coal Alert: Best Buy Misses, Warns About Sales

    Futures were higher this morning. Then Minnesota darling Best Buy slammed the mood.

    The electronics retailer with a bit of a volatile earnings history and a very nifty headquarters in Richfield, Minn., reported weak sales figures, declining market share and earnings of 54 cents a share – well shy of the 61 cents a share expected.

    In premarket action, Best Buy shares were down 10%.

    The company also slashed its outlook and said it doesn’t “have complete visibility to how customers will behave over the next several weeks.”

    Those next several weeks, natch, include the Yule, the most crucial time for a retailer, especially one in the electronics game.

  • December 13, 2010
    12:32 PM

    Your Holiday Sales Update

    The Black Friday hoopla has died down, and now it’s just the waiting until the holidays are over and we find out how the retailers fared. But here’s a hint, from Newswires’ Karen Talley: US consumers may be a little spent from their holiday shopping after greeting the season in November by strongly spending. December [...]

  • December 29, 2009
    06:20 PM

    Holiday Cheer Spreads For E-Commerce Giants

    Online sales are up from last year through most of the holiday season. But it’s the largest Internet retailers that have been the big winners. One reason: Customers are more satisfied with their experiences with big e-commerce companies than with smaller services.

    The 40 largest online-retail Web sites achieved their highest level of customer satisfaction during the 2009 holiday season, according to a survey by ForeSee Results, an e-commerce consulting firm. These companies averaged a satisfaction score of 79 on ForeSee’s index compared with a score of 74 in both 2008 and 2007.

    But a similar survey of the 110 online retailers that ForeSee works with—which range from large to small—found that overall satisfaction dropped to a 73, compared with a 75 in 2008 and a 77 in 2007. The smallest companies took the biggest hits.

    “The strong are getting stronger and the rest of the pack is getting weaker,” says Larry Freed, ForeSee’s chief executive.

  • December 21, 2009
    06:00 AM

    Tech Today: E-Commerce Sizzles, Verizon Defends Fees

    Tech Today gathers all the biggest technology news of the morning’s Wall Street Journal into one place for your reading pleasure.

    As Stores Sputter, Sales Sizzle Online: A holiday season of Web price wars and aggressive online promotions by store-based retailers is leaving e-commerce a larger force in American retail.

    Verizon Wireless Defends Fee: Verizon Wireless said a new $350 fee that it charges some subscribers to break cellphone contracts is necessary to cover its higher costs and the “risks” of offering high-speed wireless Internet service.

    Barnes & Noble to Compensate for Late Nooks: Barnes & Noble said customers who pre-ordered Nook e-book devices but don’t get them by Christmas will receive $100 gift certificates.

    Youku.com Raises $40 Million: One of China’s largest video sites raised $40 million in new funding, a nod of confidence that the medium will continue to grow in China.

  • December 19, 2009
    01:43 PM

    Retailers Feeling Effects of Snow on Super Saturday

    Some facts about the Super Saturday snowstorm, provided by Planalytics:

    1. SUPER SATURDAY: The Saturday before Christmas, known as Super Saturday, is typically the biggest shopping day of the year with over $15 billion changing hands. retailers expect big sales.

    2. STORM TRACK: The snow storm is expected to run from Virginia to Boston including major population/shopping centers. Major population centers in the East will have heaviest impact on Saturday.

    3. CONSUMER BEHAVIOR: Some business may shift to Sunday, but not all will be made up. Some demand will shift online, but the peak period for the Web has passed.

    4. RETAILERS AFFECTED:

    Percentage of retailers’ store base receiving snowfall on Super Saturday

    Bon Ton 76%
    DSW Shoes 44%
    Kohls 40%
    American Eagle 37%
    Lowes 37%
    TJMaxx 36%
    Family Dollar 36%
    Sears 35%
    Macys 35%
    Target 31%
    WalMart 29%
  • December 17, 2009
    04:43 PM

    Live-Blogging RIM Earnings

    Research In Motion reported a 59% increase in fiscal third-quarter earnings as it added 4.4 million net new BlackBerry accounts.

    Associated Press

    The BlackBerry maker’s revenue climbed 11% to $3.92 billion, with 82% coming from device sales. It shipped some 10.1 million devices during the quarter.

    RIM said it sees fourth quarter revenue of $4.2 billion to $4.4 billion, and it expects to add 4.4 million to 4.7 million net new subscribers.

    Will the company comment on today’s outage, which affected many BlackBerry customers? Highlights from its conference call with analysts start at 5 p.m. ET…

    10:01 pm

    The call starts, led by Jim Balsillie, co-CEO, and Brian Bidulka, chief accounting officer.

    10:03 pm

    Over 75 million BlackBerry devices shipped to date, Balsillie says.

    10:04 pm

    Over 80% of net new subscribers came from non-enterprise customers.

    10:06 pm

    3Q launches included Storm 2 with Verizon and Vodafone, Bold 9700 and Curve 8530. Bold 9700 has had an "exceptional" response, Balsillie notes.

    10:06 pm

    About 35% of the subscriber base is now outside North America.

    10:08 pm

    Shout-outs to Verizon, Sprint, T-Mobile and AT&T, all of which launched BlackBerry devices this quarter.

    10:09 pm

    Wal-Mart and Best Buy were strong performers on Black Friday, Balsillie says. Wal-Mart offered $100 gift cards with BlackBerry purchases, while Amazon.com also offered aggressive promotions.

    10:10 pm

    Vodafone marketed the Curve 8520 with the tagline "Tweet your heart out," he says, positioning the device as a social-networking gadget.

    10:11 pm

    Continued demand for BlackBerry phones in the Middle East, particularly Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, he says.

    10:13 pm

    RIM is also seeing strong results in South Africa, Venezuela, India.

    10:16 pm

    "China represents a large new market opportunity," Balsillie says. Last week RIM and China Mobile announced plans to offer BlackBerry service and to jointly develop products. Another deal with China Telecom inked today, which will extend RIM devices to its customer base.

    10:17 pm

    RIM plans to continue pursue tiered pricing opportunities, particularly in North America, Balsillie says.

    10:18 pm

    Its recent marketing campaign, "Love what you do," which targets consumers instead of businesses, has been successful in increasing brand awareness and prospective customers, he says. It will be expanded in Q4 to Latin America and Asia.

    10:22 pm

    Bidulka will become RIM's chief financial officer, Balsillie says.

    10:23 pm

    RIM has also named Keith Pardy its chief marketing officer, he says.

    10:26 pm

    Sales, marketing and admin expenses grew 8% from the prior quarter to about $465 million, Bidulka says.

    10:28 pm

    RIM expects to ship 10.6 million to 11.2 million units in 4Q. Expects operating expenses to grow 8% to 9% from Q3, and for R&D to increase 8-9% as well. Sales, marketing and admin expenses to grow 9-10%.

    10:31 pm

    Q&A starts. RIM declines to break out CDMA versus GSM device sales, and declines to name the top-selling device. Clearly 8520, Bold 9700 and Storm were successful, RIM says.

    10:33 pm

    "There's a lot of turbulence in the ecosystem right now," Balsillie says of wireless carriers. "There is a lot of turbulence in the channel."

    10:33 pm

    "I'd like to think that we represent an element of consistency," he says.

    10:35 pm

    Carriers can shift strategies quickly, he adds, "but at the end of the day, you can't force love."

    10:41 pm

    Jim Suva at Citi, going back to the "you can't force love" comment, asks Balsillie if he sees Apple or Android providers "trying to date" enterprise customers. Balsillie says there are shifts happening in enterprise but that it maintains a strong competitive position with CIOs and B2B in general.

    10:45 pm

    "I feel good about China...Asia's kicking in big, Latin Am is kicking in big, and Europe is really, really kicking in big. And North America is still going good," Balsillie says.

    10:49 pm

    "That's a very good question," he says, regarding bandwidth issues for the carriers. RIM is very efficient with the networks, he says, but he acknowledges that carriers have a challenge providing for high-impact apps.

    10:57 pm

    Brand marketing has been "fantastic" for RIM, calling the recent campaign "more than a home run," Balsillie says. A lot of aspects of BlackBerry are viral, he says.

    11:00 pm

    When you go Web or print, you can highlight features more, he adds, and the marketing will evolve through the winter. "We're No. 1, so there must be something there," he says. "But it is a work in progress, not a job done."

    11:00 pm

    Call ends. No mention of the outage.

WSJ Blogs

Holiday Sales Blog
News, Trends and Analysis for the Key Shopping Season

404: Page Not Found

The document you requested either no longer exists or is not currently available.

  • You may use the "Back" button in your browser to return to the previous page.
  • Click Home to return to the Holiday Sales Blog home page.
  • Access the Site Map
  • To report this problem, contact Customer Service at onlinejournal@wsj.com