At the Luxury End, Holiday Sales Were Hopping - NYTimes.com

The nation's high-rolling shoppers, full of pent-up appetite to cost, propelled elegance stores like Neiman Marcus, Tiffany and Saks Fifth Avenue to hearty mushrooms last month, yet over always, many magnates were dissatisfied along the holiday season. Store sales for last month, measured opposition the same stores open in December 2002, rose 3.7 percentage,Vizio XVT3D554SV Review, along to the Bloomberg composite same-store sales concordance. Last year, phoned an of the worst in decades along analysts, holiday sales rose 2.2 percentage.

Quirky items, like a $25 bougie called Fig, flew off the shelves, assisting the Bath and Body Works chain -- chapter of Limited Brands -- to a 16 percent increase over last December. But Victoria's Secret, also owned by Limited, did worse than expected: its pajamas and sexy push-up bras failed to attract ample shoppers, and sales fell 5 percent. Gap rose merely 1 percent; Wal-Mart Stores rose 4.3 percent, but that diagram comprised a hefty 6.1 percent increase by Sam's Club, Wal-Mart's discount warehouse. Yesterday, Wal-Mart announced that fourth-quarter profit would be at the low end of its estimated 63 to 65 cents a share.

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While the numbers released yesterday were better than last year's, they were less than the double-digit turnaround retailers had wished for in September, before three important snowstorms hit the Northeast, and purchasers told pollsters there was not must-musty or item of clothing.

''Expect some good gross margins in the fourth quarter,'' she said. ''We're foreseeing a good swath of better-than-expected proceeds reports.''

For the client, that meant there were no for many sale sales. J. Crew and Gap, for example, abridged a lot of the post-Thanksgiving markdowns, as did Saks and Lord & Taylor, a unit of May Department Stores. J. Crew is a unit of the Texas Pacific Group. And meantime it seemed as whether the electronics stores were slitting prices like outrageous, Mr. Fassler, the critic, said that the holiday's low prices were deserving more apt cost deflation than apt discounting.

Analysts said that, antagonism some disappointing results, retailers' profits might have heaved nicely during the holiday phase while the ultimate accounting was complete. Earnings expressions will be unlocked afterward month.

Bloomberg said its composite index rose 3.26 percent in November.

This was the holiday season when merchants, especially in apparel, tried to prop the line above deep discount sales -- and, by and massive, succeeded, analysts said. ''The two biggest trends were high-end selling, and less promotional merchandise,'' said Margaret Mager, a retail analyst with Goldman Sachs.

Expensive items -- cashmere and diamond watches -- fraught hand-knit stockings. The sale of 18-karat gold watches, for instance, rose 12 percent in the holiday season, via December; watches from $5,000 to $10,000 rose 16 percent, according to LGI Network, which alleys see sales.

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More than in the last few years, the holiday season of 2003 showed a wide gap between champions and losers. In the end, even the electronic stores selling bargain flat-screen televisions and $29 DVD athletes to lines of customers clutching news advertisements were a ''very, quite merged bag,'' said Matt Fassler, who covers the group for Goldman Sachs. ''Best Buy stood solo,'' he said, while the others, including Circuit City, lost floor.

''The last 18 months have been a mini challenging; the customer made a decision to spend a little less,'' said Burt Tansky, the main administrative of Neiman. But the holiday shoppers, he said, ''proved that luxury is alive.''

The scale tipped both ways: Kohl's, a few years antecedent the hottest retailing story in the country, fell far under its executives' estimates for December: instead of a mid-single- numeral increase over last year, the moderate-priced ministry store chain fell 1.2 percent. Then there were the dark-horse stories: Ann Taylor, whose numbers had been dispiriting, climbed into the retailing stratosphere, with a 26.2 percent increase.

Over all, while store sales were up 12.6 percent at Neiman and its Bergdorf Goodman unit, sales rose 27 percent for Neiman's online and classify sales.