The snap in the air that signals the onset of autumn also prompts clothes-minded shoppers to seek out the newest styles.
At least that`s what retail executives hope.
Still reeling from months of flat sales, they are facing the season with a mixture of cautious optimism, carefully planned strategies for recovery and an urgent need for a look that will lead the way.
Retailers are expanding and renovating departments to project a more focused image. They are also building new shops to take advantage of perceived strengths in the market.
”Business right now is up and down,” said Gerald Blum, the executive vice president of Lord & Taylor, which has 48 stores nationwide and is expanding its New York operation into the spaces occupied by three adjacent stores on 5th Avenue. ”Weather has a lot to do with it. In June, when we started to get our fall merchandise in the store, it sold at a very fast rate. Then the hot weather came in, and it stopped.”
Department store executives, normally sanguine even in difficult times, are watching early fall developments closely.
”The results of the last 10 days in August seem to be mixed,” said Barbara Kahn, a retail analyst with Kidder Peabody & Co. ”It`s the most uncertain environment in many years. Women seem to be sticking with what they have, buying single pieces and spending more per piece.”
This summer`s torrid weather led customers to postpone fall and winter buying. But some items have sold consistently better than last year, including designer and ”bridge” clothing (the price category between moderate and designer clothes), menswear and accessories.
Bridge clothing was selling well at Macy`s, Saks and Lord & Taylor, spokesmen said. Blum at Lord & Taylor singled out suits and pants from Anne Klein II and Ellen Tracy as fall successes, particulary an Ellen Tracy patterned mohair cardigan sweater, $245, over a slim wool gabardine knee-sweeping skirt, $162.
Kalman Ruttenstein, a senior vice president of Bloomingdale`s and its fashion director, said the store`s leading sellers have been coordinated separates, jumpsuits by Norma Kamali and clean, modern looks from American designers, epitomized by the sleek chemises of Donna Karan and Calvin Klein. –
