retailers

Looting at Macy’s, Target and other retailers is not the only reason to avoid retail stocks

By Tommy Flemm 1 year ago

The retail stock rally looks crazy overdone.

Looters ransacking retail stores such as Target, Macy’s and Nordstrom (as seen below in one of many Twitter posts) amidst the George Floyd protests is far from retail’s biggest problem at the moment. No, that’s actually one of many major red flags. Take the large sums of money it will take to repair the destroyed stores (and the time needed to repair consumer confidence around the stores) and combine it with minimal business happening inside the stores anyway due to the aftershock of COVID-19, and you have a retail space in for brutal second and third quarters.

“The whole thing going on in America right now, we have moved from lockdowns to looting. What is going on in retail, it’s extremely difficult out there,” said former long-time Chairman and CEO of the American Apparel & Footwear Association Rick Helfenbein on Yahoo Finance’s The

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How toilet paper and hand sanitizer may surprisingly save these 3 retailers

By Tommy Flemm 1 year ago

In the post COVID-19 world where new consumer shopping habits such as curbside pickup for daily needs will be ingrained and people only want to make one trip to a store to reduce the potential of getting sick, those non-essential retailers with the best-positioned stores will be the winners.

That is if they are nearby jam-packed grocery stores like Kroger (KR) or Target (TGT).

“Given the continued strength we see in essential retailers like grocery stores and broadline retailers, we think those retailers with real estate that is most closely located near them will likely benefit from a faster recovery of sales at their store locations,” said Goldman Sachs retail analyst Kate McShane in a new note to clients.

The investment thesis here is straightforward. A consumer visits a grocery store for milk, eggs, toilet paper and hand sanitizer, they get the stuff put into the car, and then they

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Under Armour, Fanatics and other sports retailers are making coronavirus masks

By Tommy Flemm 1 year ago

Now that the U.S. has more coronavirus cases than any other country with over 100,000, American manufacturers are rapidly pivoting to help address the urgent shortage of protective medical gear.

Fanatics, the maker of official licensed apparel for all the major sports leagues, has converted its Easton, Pennsylvania factory, where it makes official MLB jerseys, into a hub for making medical masks and gowns for hospital workers.

And it’s making the masks and gowns out of MLB jersey material, beginning with Phillies jerseys.

Fanatics Chairman Michael Rubin (also a co-owner of the Philadelphia 76ers) credited Pennsylvania Governor Tom Wolf and Attorney General Josh Shapiro with calling Fanatics to kickstart the plan.

The masks are from mesh fabric and are not as protective as N95 respirators, but this week the Pennsylvania Health Secretary Rachel Levine said at a press conference that such DIY masks are “better than nothing.”

On

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Cheesecake Factory, Subway, other major retailers tell landlords they can’t pay April rent due to coronavirus

By Tommy Flemm 1 year ago

To slow the spread of the novel coronavirus, retailers and restaurants have shuttered their doors. 

But facing a halt in income, many major retailers say they can’t pay rent for the month of April — and they are asking their landlords for deferrals. 

Here is an up-to-date list of retailers that are asking for special accommodations on rent payments.

Cheesecake Factory

Cheesecake Factory, the Calif.-based restaurant chain with over 200 U.S. locations, told landlords on March 18 that it would not be able to pay rent for April due to the novel coronavirus pandemic, according to reports.

“We have very strong, long standing relationships with our landlords. We are certain that with their partnership, we will be able to work together to weather this storm in the appropriate manner,” said chief financial officer Matthew Clark told Eater.

Denver, USA – September 11, 2011: Cheesecake Factory sign on a

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‘There’s going to be a generalized crushing of retailers in America’

By Tommy Flemm 1 year ago

When all is said and done, Amazon may not turn out to be the killer of some major retail chains.

Stores across the United States are currently shuttered as state governments order people to stay home and businesses to close to stop the spread of the deadly coronavirus. While retailers such as Dick’s Sporting Goods, Abercrombie & Fitch and others expect to reopen their stores in the coming weeks many experts are unsure if they will be delayed even further into May or June as infections in the U.S. continue to spike. Moreover, it’s unclear what the appetite will be for consumers to spend once stores do reopen seeing as they may have been laid off from work or are paying back debts incurred during said layoffs.

That is all a recipe for disaster for a retail sector — mostly the department store space — that continues to be saddled

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