Off Target on Black Friday - And Death At WalMart

This reporter checked out the big Target store in the Overbrook section of Philadelphia, which borders on the tony Main Line. The crowds were non-existent. The quote of the day came from my check out clerk, who noted at 9:30 AM, "I'm bored. I've been here since 6:00 AM and there ain't no body here."

Clearly the crowds were bigger at WalMart, where at least one store associate was trampled to death by bargain hunters.

Nov. 28 (Bloomberg) -- A worker at a Wal-Mart in Long Island, New York, was killed when a throng of shoppers broke down the doors to the store early this morning and knocked him to the ground, according to local police and the company.

The event involved a temporary worker and was “a tragic situation,” Bentonville, Arkansas-based Wal-Mart Stores Inc., the world’s biggest retailer, said in a statement. “The safety and security of our customers and associates is our top priority.”

At least four other shoppers were hurt in the melee at the Valley Stream store, about 13 miles (20 kilometers) east of New York City, Nassau County Police said in a statement. The injured include a 28-year-old pregnant woman who was taken to a nearby hospital for observation and three people who suffered minor wounds, police said.

The 34-year-old worker, who wasn’t identified by police, was knocked down by the crowd shortly after 5 a.m. local time and taken to a nearby hospital, where he was pronounced dead at 6:03 a.m., the police statement said. The county medical examiner will determine the cause of death.

Merry Christmas.

Shoppers Sacrifice For Kids -- And Pets!

There's no surprise in today's NY Times report that parents--and especially mothers--are sacrificing personal expenses to afford toys for their children this recessionary holiday.

"Come Christmas, McKenna Hunt, a gregarious little girl from Safety Harbor, Fla., will receive the play kitchen and the Elmo doll she wants. But her mother, Kristen Hunt, will go without the designer jeans she covets this season.

For Ms. Hunt and for millions of mothers across the nation, this holiday season is turning into a time of sacrifice. Weathering the first severe economic downturn of their adult lives, these women are discovering that a practice they once indulged without thinking about it, shopping a bit for themselves at the holidays, has to give way to their children’s wish lists.

“I want her to be able to look back,” Ms. Hunt declared, “and say, ‘Even though they were tough times, my mom was still able to give me stuff.’ ”

But there is a bit of a double-take in the news that some families will sacrifice even kids' gifts to insure a merry holiday for the household pet.

Emilie Wilson's menagerie includes 15 ferrets, two dogs and four cats, including a hefty gray feline named Tonie Stewart who rides in style inside a pet stroller during family outings.

Wilson spent $300 on Christmas gifts for her brood last year and figures she'll exceed that sum this year. And despite the recessionlike economy, the Chicago woman has no plans to scale back pet presents anytime soon.

"I couldn't care less if there's anything under the tree for us, as long as there's something for Tonie," she said....

Market researcher Euromonitor International, which tracks sales of pet food and accessories but excludes the cost of animals, grooming, training and certain other expenses, puts this year's animal expenditures at $23.9 billion.

But the group forecasts the segment's sales are still on pace to grow more than 13 percent by 2013.

Look for Mattel (MAT: NYSE) to be offering "Barbi" chew toys soon.

As Credit Crashes, Cash Use Soars

Is the check out line at your local grocer moving more slowly these days? Look carefully, and you’ll find that more shoppers are paying with cash, and those check out cashiers are having to stop and make change.

It’s all just another sign of the (hard) times.

"Twenty-three percent (23%) of Americans reported using cash more often to pay for purchases compared to one year ago.

More Budget Conscious. Eighty-four percent (84%) of respondents who reported using cash more often than one year ago to pay for purchases said this was to help control spending and manage their budgets. Six years ago when poll respondents who used cash more often were asked the same question (Coinstar National Currency Poll Dec. 2002), only 46% said they were using cash for this same reason.”



One way to avoid those long lines is to avoid shopping near paydays. When I was a kid, we knew that the first and the 15th of the month was when most local factories paid their workers and those payroll checks got spent. Those days are coming back.

“One sign of how strapped consumers are for credit — and buying only what they have the cash for — is that for the first time in 17 years, Penney's has seen swings in spending around payday cycles over the past three months.

That's common for discounters like Wal-Mart, but a rarity for a mall-based department store — suggesting that Penney's middle-income customers are feeling the pinch as well. Penney's President and Chief Merchandising Officer Ken Hicks noted that the chain hasn't seen swings in spending around payday since about 1991, when the U.S. was entering a recession

At Wal-Mart, the volatility in spending around payday — a drop in spending in the days before, followed by spending bursts right afterward — has become even more pronounced since September. Chief Financial Officer Tom Schoewe told The Associated Press that shoppers are now unable to buy even necessities in the few days before payday.”

Sad Soup News

Despite an aggressive "soup 'n sandwich" promotion touting grilled cheese from Kraft, Campbell's (NYSE: CPB) net income has tumbled. So much for THAT strategy. Per the WSJ:

Campbell Soup Co. reported Monday a 3.7% drop in its fiscal first-quarter net income amid a commodity-hedging loss, despite strong sales gains for its condensed soups and broths business….

Gross margin fell to 38.7% from 40.8% amid the increased marketing costs…

The food company has promoted its condensed soups as a bargain buy and has teamed up with cheese giant Kraft Foods Inc. to promote meals of soup and grilled-cheese sandwiches. In the quarter, sales of Campbell's condensed soups rose 14%.

Back to Spam.

Better Than Spam!

This week's theme has become "eating our way to economic survival."

Chris Burritt at Bloomburg reports today that Campbell's soup (NYSE: CPB) has joined Hormel's spam as a port of refuge from the economic storms sweeping the globe.

The recession will make 2009 ``the year of condensed soup, driven by the backdrop of severe economic pressure on the consumer,'' Mitchell Pinheiro, a Philadelphia-based analyst at Janney Montgomery Scott LLC, wrote in a note yesterday.

The appeal of a cheap meal is turning the world's largest soupmaker, which says it sells to 85 percent of U.S. households, into an outperformer in hard times. The shares led the 12- company Standard & Poor's Packaged Foods Index over the past three months, and their 0.87 percent loss this year beat the S&P 500 by almost 48 percentage points.

Camden, New Jersey-based Campbell is ``acknowledged as a way to weather a recession,'' said Edgar Roesch, a Soleil Securities Corp. analyst in New York who rates the shares ``buy.''

Way back in the 1970's at McCann-Erickson, I worked with a guy whose father wrote Campbell's signature line, "Mmm good!" Later, the slogan morphed into the very boring, but mysteriously effective, "Soup is good food." Today I find "Nourishing people's lives everywhere, every day" on the Campbell's web site. Really boring.

For 2009, how about updating the Campbell's Soup slogan to the very timely, "Better than Spam!"

Mmm good.

Detroit Bail Out Plan -- Introducing the SPV

The Detroit News is reporting the outline of a bailout deal for the Detroit automakers. Funds allocated to Detroit in September covering "retooling" to make greener automobiles would be diverted to bail out the automakers.

"Sen. Carl Levin , D-Detroit, has been negotiating with Republican Sens. Kit Bond of Missouri and George Voinovich of Ohio on a plan, favored by Republicans and the White House that would draw the money from the $25 billion retooling program, which was approved in September."

Seems to us that this is a terrific opportunity to make the car that America really needs now--the Spam Powered Vehicle or SPV. Since all we'll be able to afford to eat soon will be Spam, why not get double duty from the pink lunch meat powerhouse? Insurance will still be provided by AIG, of course.

Chinese unemployment up, car sales down. Buy more Spam.

From BBC online:

"Companies in two Chinese provinces, Shandong and Hubei, have been told they must seek official consent if they want to lay off more than 40 people.

The order highlights the Chinese authorities' concern over mounting job losses.

As China's main external markets plunge into recession and export orders shrink, layoffs have multiplied in the country's big manufacturing regions.

In Shandong alone, nearly 700,000 people have lost their jobs this year.

In southern Guangdong, tens of thousands of firms have closed, sparking off reverse migration to the countryside by redundant workers."

Further evidence of the Chinese slowdown by the NY Times which reports exports of used paper from the US to China have plunged,

"Not far away, metal, cardboard, paper and plastic are piling up in the lot of Corridor Recycling. The company takes in refuse from around the country, then bales it for shipment to China. The cardboard is used to make new boxes while used shrink wrap is turned into shoe soles and insulation for sleeping bags and coats.

For much of this year, the company shipped about 25 containers a day, each filled with 23 tons of refuse to be recycled. But after the Olympics, demand slowed for recycled metal. In October, demand for everything else took a sharp downturn, and for the last two weeks the company has not shipped a single container.

“It just came to a complete stop. Absolutely a stop,” said Gilbert Dodson, the recycling company’s co-owner. “I’ve seen it slow over the last 25 years, but this is the worst,” he said of the current downturn."

On top of everything else, China's automakers have been inspired by Detroit's antics to ask for a bail out of their own, also from the NY Times.

"China’s car industry is quietly pressing Beijing for government help as it copes with a jarring slowdown, top Chinese auto executives said in interviews here on Tuesday.

This autumn, after six years of 20 percent or more annual growth, vehicle sales were flat or slightly negative"

Wonder if imports of Spam are up?

Gobble

From the Boston Globe: "The economy is in tatters and, for millions of people, the future is uncertain. But for some employees at the Hormel Foods (NYSE: HRL) plant here, times have never been better. They are working at a furious pace and piling up on overtime.

The workers make Spam, perhaps the iconic hard-times food in the American pantry."

Hey, Happy Thanksgiving. Spam and Giblets, anyone?

CondoMobiles Solve GM and Real Estate Crisis At One Stroke

Imaginative minds can find solutions to even the most vexing problems. The federal government is just about to socialize General Motors with a bail out. And it has already socialized the real estate market via the takeover of FannieMae and FreddieMac.

Now comes the imagination.

The Feds are soon going to be responsible for moving all that GM iron. We've learned that paltry $1000 rebates don't seem to do the trick any more.

So how about a FannieMotors or a GeneralFreddie tie up? The deal is obvious. Offer a free condo with every purchase of a qualifying GM vehicle. Buy a Chevy Malibu and get a California Condo (yeah, that's pretty obvious!).

Naturally, buyers will be offered a great discount on their homeowner/auto insurance from the national insurance company, AIG.

The same deal could work with all those banks we've just nationalized also. "CondoChecking" needs no explanation.