Mark Mathews with the National Retail Federation, the world’s largest retail trade association, joins America’s Commercial Real Estate Show to discuss how retailers are doing and expectations for retail sales activity going forward, which of course has implications for retail property investors. Discussions include holiday sales forecast, online sales vs in-store, and categories of retail expected to perform well. He begins by noting that consumers accumulated savings of $2.5 trillion from the $10 trillion or so of fiscal stimulus during the pandemic and that though this has been spent down some it still is estimated to be about $1.5 trillion. This, he says, has fueled strong retail sales, up 7.5% over last year, with last year itself being a record year with 13.5% growth in retail sales. The NRF is projecting 6-8% growth in retail sales for 2023, and similar growth for the impending holiday season versus last year.
This is an interesting video with lots of interesting charts, a must for retail property investors but also one for anyone interested in general economic trends.