Shoppers gave Target a gift this holiday season, boosting the big box retailer’s sales and giving it a tailwind that has led the company to raise its financial forecast for not only the quarter but the full year.
Increased purchases of items ranging from groceries to clothing led to Target’s overall sales rising 3.4percent in the last two months of 2017 a significant leap over its earlier prediction of a 0percent to 2percent uptick.
The strong holiday performance has led Target to raise its earnings forecast for the fourth quarter to between $1.30 to $1.40 per share, up from the previous range of $1.05 and $1.25.
It also boosted its overall earnings expectations for 2017 to between $4.64 and $4.74 a share, up from an earlier projection of $4.40 to $4.60.
Want to publish your own articles on DistilINFO Publications?
Send us an email, we will get in touch with you.
Investors seemed pleased, with the store chain’s stock price rising 2.96percent to $69.16 per share in pre-market trading.
“We are very pleased with our holiday season performance, which reflects the progress we’ve made against our strategy throughout the year,” Brian Cornell, Target’s chairman and CEO said in a statement.
Target is the latest retailer to reap the bounty from a holiday season that paid off for the entire industry as U.S. sales rose 4.9percent the biggest bump in six years according to Mastercard SpendingPulse.
Macy’s reported that sales in locations open at least a year ticked up 1.1percent, and online sales spiked by double digits, while J.C. Penney reported a 3.4percent sales bump during the season.
Like many retailers who ramped up events and conveniences to entice shoppers during the all important holiday shopping period, Target offered free shipping, weekend deals and even hot cocoa and cookies to woo customers. It also made eight of a dozen new, exclusive brands available during the season, including Hearth & Hand with Magnolia, a home-goods collaboration with Chip and Joanna Gaines, the popular hosts of the TV show Fixer Upper.
But at a time when shoppers increasingly shop online and look first to e-commerce giant Amazon, even a successful holiday season has not been enough to save some struggling storefronts.
Macy’s, which said in August, 2016 that it would be closing 100 stores, announced seven of those locations last week. So far, it has revealed 81 of the storefronts that will be going out of business, and those closures, coupled with a paring back of staff at some locations that will remain open, will result in the elimination of 5,000 jobs.
Date: Jan 09, 2018