Holiday outlook upbeat for Isles
By Andrew Gomes
Advertiser Staff Writer
National retail experts predict holiday sales will grow 3 percent to 5 percent this year, a modest if not merry increase that Hawai'i's retailers are expected to surpass.
Advertiser library photo • October 2004
Local retail observers say Mainland reports about higher energy costs and falling consumer confidence cutting into shopper spending this holiday season should not dampen what has been strong store sales this year in Hawai'i.
Shoppers browse at Ala Moana Center. Sales at Hawai'i's largest mall already have topped $1 billion so far this year, center officials say.
"We've got this strong job market, tourism is booming and construction is strong with military spending," said Ron Yoda, general manager of Kahala Mall. "We're looking at continuing that into the Christmas season."
Year-to-date sales at Kahala Mall are up 9 percent.
Yoda predicts the holiday season, which runs from the day after Thanksgiving to Christmas Eve and can account for 25 percent of a retailer's business for the year, should be up at least 7 percent to 8 percent.
Yoda and other managers at the state's largest malls said they expect holiday sales to rise to the high single-digit range because of low unemployment, a rise in personal income, and energy costs that tend to affect Island consumers less because of shorter driving distances and the lack of need for home heating.
Nationally, economists caution that rising prices are expected to influence consumer spending during the holidays, leading to more conservative projections of retail sales growth.
Last month, the New York-based Conference Board's Consumer Confidence Index fell for a third straight month.
Columbus, Ohio-based market research firm Retail Forward said a November consumer survey showed 17 percent of respondents expected to spend more on holiday gifts this year, compared with 31 percent who said they planned to spend less.
The National Retail Federation, an industry trade group, noted that holiday-sales gains this year will be harder to achieve because 2003 growth was a solid 5.1 percent. In 2002, the gain was a meager 1.2 percent, which made last year's increase easier.
Rosalind Wells, the National Retail Federation's chief economist, projected that November-December sales this year would rise 4.5 percent, in part based on inconsistent consumer spending in recent months.
In Hawai'i, consumer spending generally has been stronger.
According to local commercial real-estate firm Colliers Monroe Friedlander, more than half of 75 retailers surveyed recently reported sales increases of between 10 percent and 20 percent this year.
At Ala Moana Center, sales are 10 percent ahead of last year, and already have eclipsed the $1 billion mark.
Dwight Yoshimura, the center's general manager, said the $1 billion level has been reached in a year only twice before at the state's largest mall.
"We're doing well," he said. "The economy is good."
Reach Andrew Gomes at agomes@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8065.
