Macy’s CFO: Sales Are Sluggish Because Women Don’t Want To Put Makeup On To Shop There

(The Caldor Rainbow)

You there, with the bare lips and the TJ Maxx bag binge-watching Scandal online: Did you decide to skip Macy’s and head to an off-price store because you just couldn’t bear to tear yourself away from Netflix and put your face on that day? Macy’s CFO seems to think an aversion to lipstick and millennials’ love of digital content (among other things) is funneling customers away in favor of off-price stores, leading to sagging sales.

Macy’s reported 1.8% increase in revenue last quarter to $9.36 billion fell short of analyst expectations, and it’s the fault of those makeupless women and millennials shopping with mobile devices, Macy’s CFO Karen Hoguet explained during an industry conference on Tuesday, as reported by MarketWatch.

“We did some consumer research, and the customers said, she likes going to the off-price retailers because she doesn’t have to put lipstick on,” Hoguet said, according to a transcript of the event cited by MarketWatch, implying that said customer would feel pressured to slap on the war paint to go to Macy’s.

Along with that is the growing consumer trend of shopping for electronic devices and services like streaming media, and millennials’ habit of using mobile phones to shop instead of going into bricks-and-mortar stores, she added.

“I think part of that is the customers are buying other things, whether the electronics, cable services, Netflix, whatever,” she said, all things Macy’s doesn’t sell. There doesn’t seem to be any actual data linking the popularity of Netflix or other services to the downward slide of physical retail stores, however.

Macy’s is trying to remedy by that luring millennials into stores, where the retailer has had success selling them impulse purchases like cosmetics (need that lipstick to go shopping, natch), shoes and apparel. In an attempt to make that happen, Hoguet says Macy’s is focusing on getting millennials on board when they get engaged, and then keeping them once they’re hooked on flatware and bed skirts.

Macy’s didn’t offer MarketWatch a comment on Hoguet’s reported remarks, shoppers who hate putting on lipstick, or a link between paying for a monthly digital content subscription.

Macy’s CFO blames millennials, Netflix and lipstick haters on shifting retail landscape [MarketWatch]