Off the wire
• Toronto Raptors lose three in a row for first time in 14 months  • Spotlight: Uncertainty remains over Samsung's wish to restore consumer trust after Note 7 debacle  • Bolivian leader marks 11 years in power  • Chinese shares close higher Monday  • Terrorists exploit conservative nature of women in Saudi Arabia: reports  • Beijing 2022 preparations to speed up in 2017  • International military force takes over Gambia's presidential palace  • U.S. pop star defends explosive anti-Trump speech after causing social media stir  • Western Australia launches seaplanes package to boost tourism  • Venezuela meets 70 pct of OPEC-agreed cutback target in oil output  
You are here: 　 Home

Japan's supermarket sales drop 2 percent in December on-year

Xinhua, January 23, 2017 Adjust font size:

Supermarket sales in Japan marked a decline in December as year-end buying, usually a boon for retailers, slumped in the reporting period, details from the Japan Chain Stores Association showed Monday.

According to the association's figures, nationwide supermarket sales here slumped 2 percent in December from a year earlier, on a same-store basis.

The association said that significant drops were noticed in purchases of big ticket items like electrical appliances, but also on clothes and furniture.

According to the figures for December, sales of furniture dropped 4.2 percent and those of home appliances tumbled 10.0 percent.

Supermarkets, however, most notably, sold 10.4 percent less clothes than a year earlier, the association also said.

The industry bodies' figures are based on the combined sales at 57 supermarket chains nationwide, which together operate more than 9,489 outlets, and totaled sales of 1.27 trillion yen (11.1 billion U.S. dollars), in the reporting month, the association said in its latest report.

The numbers have been adjusted to facilitate comparisons on a same-store basis. Endit