Having been in the Retail sector for my entire professional career, I am on the front line of the driving force of our (until now) consumer driven economy. This story from the WSJ hit close to home: Recession Turns Malls Into Ghost Towns
If retail sales continue to decline at current rates, the dead-mall roster could exceed 100 properties by the end of this year, according to Green Street. That's up from an estimated 40 failing malls in 2006, before the recession began.
Shoppertrak reports that YoY retail sales increased 0.2% last week. Although they failed to publish the statistic for the week previous, in this week's press release they note that this is the second week in a row for positive YoY retail sales.
Please note these figures do not adjust for Easter being one week later this year vs. last year, so the comparisons are probably even better.
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