It may be sweltering outside, but it looks like consumers cooled to retailers in June. While some chains used aggressive markdowns to win stronger sales results, others issued sales figures somewhat
below forecast.
Overall, comparable-store sales at leading chain stores gained 3.2%, reports Kantar Retail, up a bit from last month's 2.7% same gain, and much better than the 4.7% decline of
stores struggled with last June. The International Council of Shopping Centers, which tracks a slightly different group of retailers, says its Index gained 3% for the month, with luxury stores doing
the best (with a combined gain of 8.8%) for the month, followed by department stores (up 5.9%).