Retailers cautious over sales figures

Christmas shoppers have splurged on everything from electronic gadgets to the safety
of gift vouchers but retailers are holding their breaths on final sales figures.
Australian Retailers Association (ARA) executive director Russell Zimmerman said
spending in the lead-up to Christmas was below retailers' expectations.
On Christmas Eve, Melbourne CBD's main shopping thoroughfare Bourke Street Mall had
a few people milling around but there were no signs of purchases, Mr Zimmerman said.
"There's nobody walking around with bags," Mr Zimmerman said after visiting the mall
on Thursday morning.
"From a strictly Victorian point of view it just doesn't feel like it's happening
out there."
Books, clothing and footwear topped the hot list, Mr Zimmerman said, with MP3
players and game consoles also popular.
The ARA said retailers around the nation had expected about $38.7 billion in sales
this Christmas, including $9.3 billion in Victoria, but that this now looked
unlikely.
Sydney's CBD retail district looked abuzz with shoppers but they may have been
last-minute laggards going full tilt on Christmas Eve.
Margy Osmond, chief executive of the Australian National Retailers Association
(ANRA), said shoppers got off to a late start this holiday season and it showed in
sales figures.
She said yearly increases of six or seven per cent seen from one Christmas to the
next would not materialise this year.
"It will be a solid but not spectacular Christmas with a slight amount of growth on
last year," Ms Osmond told reporters in Sydney.
"We are seeing a less spectacular Christmas than we might otherwise have been able
to hope for."
Ms Osmond said gift cards were making a comeback, with leading retailers David
Jones, Coles and Harvey Norman reporting vouchers as the number one Christmas
purchase.
ACT and Region Chamber of Commerce and Industry chief executive Chris Peters said
Canberra retailers could expect a busy but probably not a record Christmas trading
season.
"But I expect it will be close to last year's results and last year's results were
aided by the cash stimulus packages," Mr Peters said.
Electronic goods are 25-35 per cent cheaper than last year, he said, because of the
strong Australian dollar.
Retailers Association national executive director Scott Driscoll said Queensland
sales were strong with imported items such as iPhones, blue ray players, iPods and
computers.
"What I think we're going to see at the end of this is that we will have exceeded
last year's record trade (nationwide) and I think really we're probably looking at
somewhere between four and five per cent up," Mr Driscoll said.
WA Retail Traders Association spokesman Wayne Spencer predicted a $200,000 drop on
the $2.749 billion turnover in WA shops last Christmas.
However pre-Christmas sales end up, Boxing Day and early January retail sales are
set to exceed last year's numbers.
Estimates from Access Economics, produced for the ANRA, say sales between Boxing Day
and January 15 will reach $14.73 billion - a slight increase on the 2008 result of
$14.25 billion.