Butchey points out that shoppers did their due diligence to save money on holiday gifts purchased\u2014and that in some areas the shopping season was not a total disappointment.<\/p>\n
\u201cLuxury stores had stampeding customers taking advantage of generous sales and promotions,\u201d she said. \u201cWhat\u2019s more, many consumers shopped on the Internet to get gift ideas and to locate bargains. Educated consumers also purchased a larger share of their gifts on the Internet to save money on gas and to benefit from retailers\u2019 free shipping offers. In addition, Internet searches made it easier to comparison shop.\u201d<\/p>\n
Buying patterns shift.<\/em><\/p>\n According to Butchey, consumers who turned to the Internet had more cash to spend because of the savings on gasoline expenditures. However, they tended to purchase only useful items that were reduced markedly and represented good value.<\/p>\n \u201cStores were prepared for this and had leaner inventories, so items in high demand ran out very quickly,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n Florida, along with Arizona and California, has been \u201cground zero\u201d for foreclosures, which spurred the rapid erosion of consumers\u2019 perceived home equity and wealth.<\/p>\n \u201cCombine the real estate slump with the stock market slump and you see why South Floridians are in general feeling more despondent than the rest of the country,\u201d Butchey said. \u201cThankfully, we did not have depressing cold and stormy winter weather to compound our sentiment!\u201d<\/p>\n Numerous stores in South Florida have shut their doors, including KB Toys, Linens \u2019n Things, Mervyns, Sharper Image, and Whitehall Jewelers.<\/p>\n \u201cTourists who usually arrive and shop are staying away from Florida this year, lured by phenomenal deals in the Caribbean and Mexico,\u201d she said. \u201cThose deals are driven by the fact that poor economic conditions in Great Britain and Europe are keeping many potential tourists from those regions at home, which is in turn reducing overall demand and generating appealing price deals for those who can afford to choose travel to the Caribbean and Mexico over trips to Florida.\u201d<\/p>\n What\u2019s in store for 2009?<\/em><\/p>\n Moving into the New Year, larger stores will demand rent concessions. This will help the retailers\u2019 bottom line while spelling bad news for commercial real estate markets, especially for highly leveraged property owners.<\/p>\n \u201cStrong stores will survive\u2014and with less competition,\u201d Butchey said. \u201cI do think we are in for a tough 2009. The new administration brings a glimmer of hope, but there is a danger of expecting too much too soon. That could see us revisit recent stock market lows if the market doesn\u2019t quickly get a clear view that the proposed stimulus package will be enough.\u201d<\/p>\n Butchey was quick to point out one bit of good news displayed in the University of Florida\u2019s monthly consumer confidence report: Consumer confidence among Floridians rose five points in January, 2009. Although the report did show that consumers felt very pessimistic about their current personal finances, the other four components of the index rose, reflecting optimism about the future.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The 2008 holiday shopping season reflected both the economic woes and the reduced consumer confidence that abound in today\u2019s retail markets. \u201cWorries about their jobs, the difficulty in accessing credit, and the uncertainty about the economy caused many consumers to exercise restraint and to use cash for the purchases they did make,\u201d said Deanne Butchey, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":32,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[4,14],"tags":[595,619,694,697],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/biznews.fiu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1439"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/biznews.fiu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/biznews.fiu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/biznews.fiu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/32"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/biznews.fiu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1439"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/biznews.fiu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1439\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29481,"href":"https:\/\/biznews.fiu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1439\/revisions\/29481"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/biznews.fiu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1439"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/biznews.fiu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1439"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/biznews.fiu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1439"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"South](\"https:\/\/biznews.fiu.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/01\/module.gif\" "\\"South")
South Florida<\/em> retail market reflects regional challenges.<\/em><\/p>\n