Washington — Turns out even a major tentpole event like Memorial Day couldn’t reverse the recent slump in furniture and home furnishings sales.
The category’s struggles continued in May with another month of declines according to the Department of Commerce’s advance monthly estimates, even as retailers held sales during what is traditionally one of the biggest sales events of the year.
For the month, sales at home furnishings and furnishings retailers totaled an estimated adjusted $10.72 billion, down 6.8% compared with $11.5 billion in May 2023 and off April’s adjusted $10.84 billion by 1.1%. Year-to-date, the home furnishings and furniture retail segment’s $53.04 billion in sales is off 2023’s pace by 7.9%.
Although the home furnishings and furniture category is struggling, dollars are up in the overall retail snapshot. For May, the DOC estimates adjusted sales of $703.088 billion, up 2.3% compared with $687.47 billion in May 2023 and up slightly vs. an estimated adjusted $702.46 billion in April.
While no measured category had a larger year-over-year dip than home furnishings and furniture, it wasn’t alone showing declines. Building material and garden equipment and supplies dealers were off 2023’s pace by 4.3%, while sporting goods, hobby, musical instrument and bookstores missed the mark by 2.6%, and health and personal care stores were down 0.7%.
The DOC’s advance estimates are based on a sub-sample of the U.S. Census Bureau’s full retail and food services sample. A stratified random sampling method is used to select approximately 5,500 retail and food services firms whose sales are then weighted and benchmarked to represent the complete universe of more than 3 million retail and food services firms.