Business

Shaky start boxes in retailers

Black Friday was no match for Hurricane Sandy.

Retailers posted lackluster November sales as a brisk Thanksgiving weekend wasn’t enough to make up for business lost to disruptions from the historic storm.

The shaky holiday start adds pressure on retailers to rack up big sales in the weeks leading up to Christmas — a move that could require steeper markdowns to clear piled-up inventory.

“Despite the largest-volume Thanksgiving weekend in our company’s history, we were not able to overcome the weak start to the month,” Macy’s CEO Terry Lundgren said.

While Macy’s backed its profit outlook for the crucial fourth quarter, it disappointed Wall Street with a decline in November same-store sales, or sales at stores open at least a year.

Other big chains that posted surprising monthly drops included Target, Kohl’s and Nordstrom.

The downbeat results helped send the Standard & Poor’s Retailing Industry Group tumbling 0.5 percent yesterday. Poor results from Barnes & Noble and Tiffany also dragged down the index.

Collectively, retailers posted a 1.6-percent rise in sales at stores open at least a year — less than half of what analysts expected, according to Retail Metrics.

Nevertheless, a clear picture of consumer spending will have to wait until the end of December, said Ken Perkins, president of the research firm. That’s because November, in addition to the Northeast storms, was disrupted by the presidential elections, he noted.

The news wasn’t all bad. Limited said its Victoria’s Secret and Bath & Body Works chains had record Thanksgiving weekends, with both reporting stronger gains than expected to drive a 5 percent same-store sales increase.

Gap, whose stock lately has climbed on hopes that a turnaround under CEO Glenn Murphy is finally bearing fruit, posted a 3 percent increase, falling short of forecasts for a 3.9 percent gain.

Costco posted a 6 percent same-store sales gain, outstripping analysts’ expectations for a 4.8 percent increase. Still, the warehouse retailer said Sandy shaved half a percentage point off its monthly result.