For some the weather has been a "get out of jail free" card for the economy but others believe it is a weak excuse. Three companies quickly pointed fingers towards the weather for their poor sales. The fifth company in 24 hours to blame the weather on slow sales was Lumper Liquidators, they were not alone as they were accompanied by Mattress Firm Holding, Group One Auto, La-Z Boy, and Panera. While the winter may hurt companies due to the dangerous weather conditions the spring has always been much better to the companies hurting from the winter putting them in good shape come summer. Another scare front the weather is the treat of the thought running out of natural gas. This may be a concern but in the reality it is something that will be hard to reach.
http://www.cnbc.com/id/101427902
I am interested to see if sales are above average for these companies come this spring as demand has not decreased rather the consumer has been forced to wait longer until they can purchases the product.
ReplyDeleteThe cold weather explains some of the early struggles in the service sector. For example Amazon, UPS, and FedEx all came under fire this winter for their failure to deliver presents before Christmas. It is a well known fact that GDP is lower during colder winters.
ReplyDeleteI would be interested to see how much lower sales are this winter than compared to others because of how cold it has been. Because winter sales usually are less than spring I wonder if states that are not accustomed to colder winters have suffered even more.
ReplyDeleteWith the upcoming spring it is expected for sales to go back up with the temperatures. this winter has been colder than usual and there have been many storms, Retail sales usually relies on foot traffic and people being out side so the slight drop is understandable due to the weather and i believe that the sales for the future will go back to normal once winter closes out.
ReplyDeleteIt would make sense that companies, especially those in the housing sector, would be having troubles. Productions of houses is so dependent on the weather because of the process that it would cause a lot of problems. I think the development in the south though would cause the biggest impact. In the north, while we did have a very large amount of snow, the impact of the snow was not unprecedented. It was in places like Georgia that they had infrequently have conditions like this.
ReplyDeleteWeather is definitely a factor in many businesses' income; especially companies that rely heavily on sales that are not done over the internet. It will be interesting to see if business picks up for these companies when the weather gets better.
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