Myer sales slow in second half but dodges worst of retail rout as economy slows

Myer has issued strong full-year sales and profit updates as it manages to maintain profitability, despite the pressures on the retail sector from a worsening economy. Picture: Britta Campion/The Australian

• Senior Business Reporter

  
  
• 9:37AM August 8, 2023

"The nation’s largest department store Myer has witnessed a significant slowdown in sales since January as cost of living pressures keeps shoppers away, but it looks to have dodged the rout hurting many other retailers with its annual profit and sales still growing.

Myer has updated the market to its trading performance for the 2023 financial year to forecast a net profit of between $69m and $73m, an increase of between 15 per cent and 21 per cent on 2022 and total sales to be up 12.5 per cent.

Its online sales has also bounced back, after retreating in 2022 like many other retailers as Covid-19 lockdowns ended and people put away their devices to shop in a physical store, with Myer saying that group online sales for the second half of fiscal 2023 returned to growth of 3.2 per cent. However, after a burst of sales activity through the pandemic, online sales for the full-year were down 4.5 per cent to $690.5m.

The nation’s $400bn retail sector has been under considerable pressure since the Reserve Bank started hiking up interest rates last year, with soaring inflation adding to cost of living pressures that were squeezing household budgets and reining in consumer spending.

This has dented the sales and profit performance of many discretionary retailers, especially department stores such as David Jones and other general merchandise stores, but Myer has so far missed the worst of these impacts as reflected in its trading update to the market..."