There are signs that the ASX retail sector could be having a bit of a dull Christmas retail period after the exciting Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales almost a month ago.
According to reporting by the Australian Financial Review, retailers are cutting shifts for casual Christmas workers, "culling" staff and bringing forward Boxing Day discounts.
The cause of all this? Weaker sales than expected in December, probably because many people fulfilled their shopping needs after Black Friday and Cyber Monday.
Only a couple of weeks ago we learned that Harris Scarfe was going into receivership and planned to close 40% of its stores.
Department stores are retailers with some of the largest staff counts, though Myer Holdings Ltd (ASX: MYR) and Wesfarmers Ltd's (ASX: WES) Target both denied they had reduced staff in the week before Christmas, although Target said that stores manage their own rosters.
I wonder how David Jones, Wesfarmers' Kmart and Woolworths Group Ltd's (ASX: WOW) Big W are going during the Christmas shopping period.
Gary Mortimer, senior lecturer at QUT Business School, said that for some retailers the six weeks to Christmas accounted for 60% of annual profits for some retailers, so it's very important to do well in this period.
You can imagine that Christmas is also an extremely important time for retailers like JB Hi-Fi Limited (ASX: JBH) with a focus on electronics.
As long as retailers still achieve overall growth between Black Friday and the Boxing Day sales, I don't think it truly matters when the sales happen in that month or two period, as long as they aren't too heavily discounted.
Foolish takeaway
Retail is a tough business, particularly when it comes to discretionary spending. If I had to buy a retailer I would rather invest in something like City Chic Collective Ltd (ASX: CCX) which is growing online and overseas.
