Home goods sales have declined for three years in a row, and Target is hoping for a reversal in 2024

Home goods sales have declined for three years in a row, and Target is hoping for a reversal in 2024

Target's home furnishings sales have been underperforming in recent years. According to the latest data, Target's share of total sales and year-on-year levels have been declining for three consecutive years. Target urgently needs to find a solution to turn the situation around.

Specifically, Target's total sales will reach US$105.8 billion in 2023, and the home and decoration category will only account for 17% of this. The proportion will be 18% in 2022, 19% in 2021, and 20% in 2020, showing an annual decrease of 1%.

Target's home and decoration category sales fell to approximately $18.19 billion last year, a decrease of approximately 6% compared with 2022. This decline even exceeded the 2% decline in the company's overall sales, showing the weakness in home furnishings sales.

In fact, over the past year, Target's sales of all discretionary items have been generally weak, which is similar to the situation of other general merchandise retailers. However, the situation seems to be showing signs of improvement, and Target's clothing and home furnishings business began to show signs of growth in the third quarter of last year. This could be a positive sign that Target is gradually emerging from the woods.

Target recently announced an ambitious growth plan to increase sales by $50 billion over the next decade. To achieve this goal, Target plans to open more than 300 large-scale stores and upgrade its nearly 2,000 existing stores. These initiatives are expected to bring more traffic and sales to Target, helping it reverse the decline in home furnishings sales.

US furniture/home furnishing sales suffered a cold snap in February, falling by double digits year-on-year

Sales in the U.S. furniture and home furnishings industry fell into a downturn in February this year. Furniture and home furnishings sales fell sharply by double digits year over year that month, according to monthly estimates from the U.S. Commerce Department.

Specifically, total adjusted sales of this category in February were US$10.59 billion, a decrease of 10.1% compared to US$11.78 billion in the same period in 2023. It was also down slightly by 1.1% from the revised $10.71 billion in January. The U.S. Department of Commerce also predicts that sales of furniture and home furnishings will reach $19.557 billion in the first two months of 2024, still down 9.2% year-on-year.

Overall, although adjusted total retail sales in February were $700.73 billion, an increase of 1.5% from $690.38 billion in February 2023 and an increase of 0.6% from $696.71 billion in January, this increase did not Meet some people's expectations.

While furniture/home furnishings stores saw the largest year-over-year declines, similar trends were seen in other retail sectors. Sales at dealers of building materials and gardening equipment and supplies fell 6.1% for the month. Sales at gas stations fell 4.5%. Sales at sporting goods, games, musical instruments and bookstores also fell 3%, none of which reached 2023 levels. same period level.