NEW YORK – For the past two years, home segment sales at Macy’s Inc. have contracted at a faster rate than the company’s overall sales declines.
In addition, 2023 home sales fell below $4 billion for just the second time in five years, coming in at $3.79 billion. The last time that happened was during 2020, when the COVID-19 outbreak forced Macy’s to close its entire store fleet for several weeks.
While Macy’s Inc. operated 109 fewer stores last year than it did in 2019, the ratio of home segment sales to total company sales was roughly the same in 2023 and 2019: 16.4% and 16.6%, respectively.
Still, the fall-off in home segment sales is getting steeper. In both 2023 and 2022, Macy’s Inc. home segment sales fell nearly 10%, marking a sharper drop-off than total company sales, which declined 5.5% and 0.7%, respectively.
Unless digital operations for Macy’s and Bloomingdale’s manage to significantly pick up the slack, the company’s share of the home segment is likely to continue shrinking. In late February, the company announced plans to shutter 150 underproductive Macy’s locations by the end of 2026.
The company plans to roll out more Macy’s small-format concepts in addition to the 350 go-forward Macy’s units. However, the amount of space devoted to home in those formats will not replace the footage that will evaporate as the full-line stores slated for closure go dark.