By Thomas Paulson, Head of Market Insights As anticipated, March was a strong month for retail sales per the Census Bureau’s Advance Monthly Sales report, and no, it wasn’t all due to pull-forward effects and pre-buying ahead of tariffs as we showed earlier . Yes, there was pull-forward in auto, furniture, and electronics but the month was also better for other general merchandise categories and apparel as well. We attribute that improvement (beyond pull-forward) to warmer temperatures after a harsh February and early March, and an overall strong spring selling season despite Easter’s timing.

By Thomas Paulson, Head of Market Insights With Albertson’s quarterly results came the first public comments from incoming CEO Susan Morris (currently COO). Morris touched on management’s current initiatives and didn’t introduce anything meaningfully different, i.e. they will continue to work from the same playbook. Morris, “Our Customers for Life strategy is working. We’re growing digitally engaged customers, omnichannel households, loyalty members and increasing customer traffic. Our stores are operating more effectively and efficiently as new technologies take hold, and we’re proactively reducing our costs.

By Thomas Paulson, Head of Market Insights Following comments from RH two weeks ago that high-end buying patterns had softened, do we see more of that with LVMH reporting a surprisingly soft Q1 sales result? LVMH’s revenue in the US was down -3%, a -600 bps deterioration from Q4’s rate, which itself marked a period of broader strength in performance than the year’s prior periods, i.e. we went from “better” to “worse.

By Thomas Paulson, Head of Market Insights CarMax reported strong quarterly results with increases of +6.2% for comp-unit sales, +3.0% for gross profit per retail used unit, and +8.2% for CAF income. Additionally, management shared that trends in March / April had strengthened; healthy sourcing of 15% more vehicles in the quarter will allow CarMax to meet that increased demand. The chart below shows the T28D trend in traffic and conversion rate at its locations, and that is overlaid onto BEA PCE figures industry-wide for used cars (% ch YoY), as well as CarMax’s results and commentary.

By Thomas Paulson, Head of Market Insights On Wednesday, Walmart had a well-timed investor day to make its pitch on why it is a steady ship in all sorts of tempests (and sunnier periods), and the justification for accelerating the number of Sam’s Club openings. Big picture, what we heard: (1) while Walmart sources mostly from US suppliers (2/3rds of COGS), China is also a large supplier, meaning that tariffs could be a meaningful impact on the business as they will be judicious on what gets passed through to the consumer, (2) February was a very soft period for its sales of discretionary goods, but March was much improve (something that we’ve broadly covered ), and (3) it’s US ecommerce business, as part of its omni-channel consumer offering, has flipped to profitable.

By Thomas Paulson, Head of Market Insights Yes, the stock market and economy are in a tempest, and investors have been de-risking their portfolios and cutting exposure to cyclical companies and those that have too much debt; that change in preferences favors consumer staples and utility stocks. How about telecom? After all, few households can risk cutting their wireless subscription to save money, (unless they’re planning to escape the potential calamity by riding out the next two years on a deserted tropical island.

By Thomas Paulson, Head of Market Insights Last Friday, we delivered a presentation to Morgan Stanley’s institutional clients. Our conclusion of the work was that consumer spending had picked up in March following a slow start to the year. However, given Wednesday’s news, what happened in March was of limited importance as the focus ripped over to “how bad are things going to get.” Well to understand how significantly things moved, one needs a starting point.

By Thomas Paulson, Head of Market Insights Lululemon’s quarterly results in the Americas segment (Canada and the United States) were flat on a comparable basis; the segment’s revenue increased +2% (ex-unusuals) reflecting the contribution of more locations. Advan estimates that traffic per location increased +4%, but that was offset by a decline in the conversion rate and store-level average-ticket; as such, the reported results align with Advan’s estimates. In Wall Street lingo, LULU is known as a “battleground stock,” with the different sides debating / fighting over whether Lulu is facing competitive encroachment by Vuori and Alo Yoga.

By Thomas Paulson, Head of Market Insights We’ve recently analyzed Sprouts Farmers Market’s strong 2024 performance and highlighted its success of driving capturing market share and avoiding the grocery industry’s woes. That success stems from merchandise differentiation (see the figure below). The merchandise strategy and the successful execution come from its team – a team that Sprouts affectionally calls its “foragers.” Since the results, Sprouts has met with investors and updated them on Sprouts medium- to long-term aspirations, particularly on retail store expansion, which is to be at a 10% rate in the markets shown in the chart below.

By Thomas Paulson, Head of Market Insights Dollar Tree reported an improvement in its comp-store sales trend due to an improvement in its discretionary business (as did Dollar General, Walmart, and Target). The discretionary comp increased by +0.4%, the first positive number of the year; moreover, its 2- and 3-year trend also improved. The earnings release quotes CEO Mike Creedon saying, “2024 [finished] on a high note with strong execution at Dollar Tree as growing customer acceptance of our expanded assortment drove sales momentum.