New York – Target
and Costco gave little credit to CE for their solid sales gains in January.
Rather, Target
said its CE, music, movies and books business led a mid-single-digit decline in
its hardlines category last month. Nonetheless, the discounter reported a 5.1 percent
increase in net sales for the four weeks, ended Jan. 29, to $4.6 billion, and a
4.3 percent hike in comp-store sales.
Similarly, Costco finance
director David Sherwood said the warehouse club’s CE business “continued to be
negative” in January, posting a mid-single-digit decline, while Costco’s net
sales rose 11 percent for the month, to $7 billion, and comp-store sales
increased 8 percent excluding the positive impact of gasoline sales.
