Michael Hill International is expecting a productive holiday trading period off the back of a loyalty program boom.
With more than two million members, the ‘Brilliance by Michael Hill’ loyalty program is expected to generate considerable sales activity during the holiday period.
“We have seen transactional sales data from multiple external sources that demonstrates that both the Michael Hill brand and Bevilles continue to take market share in a challenging retail environment,” CEO Daniel Bracken said.
“Earlier this year, the company undertook a comprehensive product range review, enabling the largest-ever injection of newness in readiness for our key Christmas trading period.”
He also revealed that sales have increased by 13 per cent on a year-on-year comparison and improved by 15 per cent compared with pre-pandemic trade in 2019.
Michael Hill reported total sales of $AU628.1 million in the past year, an increase of six per cent. The company operates more than 300 stores in Australia, New Zealand, and Canada.
Bracken added that trading in November has been positive, driven by the release of a new Christmas campaign. The campaign was released to counter weakened consumer confidence.
According to the latest ANZ-Roy Morgan research, consumer confidence has now spent a record 42 consecutive weeks below the mark of 85 points.
ANZ senior economist Adelaide Timbrell said consumer confidence is persistently weak.
“It was among the ten worst results since the beginning of the COVID pandemic in March 2020,” he said.
“The recent decline in confidence has been sharp for those paying off their homes, while for renters and outright owners, it has been shallower.
“There has been an increase in the subindices that capture the future financial and economic conditions, whereas, in the past two weeks, there has been a weakening in those that capture current conditions.”
The latest report revealed that consumer confidence has slightly improved in Victoria, South Australia, and Western Australia and was unchanged in New South Wales.
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