Uniqlo July sales drop sharply on weather woes

By

Sandra Halliday

Published
Aug 2, 2019

Uniqlo’s run of see-sawing sales figures continued in July in its domestic Japanese market. The Fast Retailing-owned chain saw a rather hefty drop of 10.3% year-on-year. And online sales, which were included in the figures and usually manage to boost them, couldn’t rescue a disastrous month. Like-for-like sales across stores and online dropped as much as 10%.

Sales had soared in June as its delayed clearance sale was launched and saw plenty of pent-up demand. So what caused them to go so much into reverse last month? As ever with fashion retailers, it was the weather. A bit too much sunshine/rain/snow in some months, or a bit too little, can be devastating, and this time, at the height of the summer season, Uniqlo said that “same-store sales declined as markedly unseasonal cool weather throughout the month resulted in weaker demand for summer clothing.”

It’s further evidence of consumers buying their fashion product very close to the time they’re going to wear it, a habit that makes sales even more sensitive to weather conditions.

That said, customer numbers were up slightly, although perhaps those customers couldn’t find the cooler weather pieces they were looking for and overall, those who did make a purchase bought slightly less than they have in the year to date.