Uniqlo monthly sales down again as December weather stays mild

By

Sandra Halliday

Published
Jan 5, 2022

Fast Retailing’s Uniqlo has turned in another weak set of sales figures for its Japanese stores with last month seeing a double-digit comp sales decline. 

The retailers’ same-store sales including online declined as much as 11.1% in December and total sales for the business were down by 8.2%. That was despite customer numbers holding up reasonably well.

So what was the reason for another fall? Once again, it was the weather, the company said. It explained that “sales of cold-weather clothing struggled in December after temperatures remained stubbornly high through the fourth week of the month”.

While revenue increased in the final week of December “thanks to a drop in temperature and a strong year-end sale”, but it still wasn’t enough to rescue the revenue for the month.

That latest result came after a succession of months in which the weather hasn’t played ball. The autumn and winter seasons have been characterised by weather than was too mild for the firm’s classic cool climate AW offer. 

And earlier in the year it faced problems too with August, for instance, hit by wet weather, while previous months suffered from Covid-linked disruption.