The Bombay Company again heads this list as consumers continue to favor home improvement. This theme is validated by the strong performances of Hancock Fabrics and Jo-Ann Stores. … The teen fashion market remained strong as evidenced by Hot Topic, Pacific Sunwear and Chico's comparable and overall sales growth as this cash rich demographic found their product offerings clearly desirable. … Cache is leading the Women's market with their regular price assortments. … Value shopping remained in vogue as evidenced by Big Lots' continued sales growth. … Walgreen, the preeminent drug store retailer, also continued to dominate their sector.

A dismal holiday season in 2001 was the aftermath of the September 11th tragedy, which on a broad basis drove most retailers to the worst performance levels for holiday sales that they had experienced in many years. The rising stars cross a number of retail sectors and generally reflect sales performance improvements from last years' abysmal lows. … Specialty retailers were selectively consumer destination points. … Pacific Sunwear is the only rising star to deliver positive comps in 2001 and its momentum continued in the recent holiday season. … Notably Spiegel/Eddie Bauer continue to remain in negative territory.

The teen market has always been fickle and when fads or fashions shift the impact can be huge. This idiosyncrasy is evident in the double-digit comp declines of Wet Seal and Deb Shops. … Consumer Electronics, which had long-been a strong performer, felt the sting of waning consumer confidence and lackluster music sales. Musicland Stores (a division of Best Buy) and Ultimate Electronics made our Bottom 10 list accordingly. … The absence of the suede/leather craze in the current holiday season was felt by Wilsons The Leather Experts, which also experienced double-digit declines. … Women's retailers, Talbot, AnnTaylor and United Retail (plus sizes) each attributed the declines to the economy while sporting goods retailer, West Marine, blamed a more traditional enemy, the weather.

The Consumer Electronics industry, which had found favor with consumers given the array of digital product offerings, experienced steep declines as consumer belt tightening and the lack of a new "must have" music release coupled with unfettered electronic copying of new music product offerings caused many retailers to suffer this holiday season. Best Buys' Musicland Stores, Ultimate Electronics and Circuit City Stores all were counted among December' Falling Stars. … Value retailers who had weathered the difficult post-9/11 holiday season, such as Stage Stores and Filene's Basement, were unable to sustain their momentum in light of the weakening economy, albeit each were up against tough comparatives. … Children's apparel retailers, Children's Place and Gymboree each experienced declines, which were attributed to the economy and accentuated by the inventory dislocation caused by the West Coast dock strike.

The entire Retail Sector is best reflected by the performance of Apparel Stores, a scant few of which experienced substantial gains while many others faltered under the weight of a sluggish economy and cherry-picking consumers, whose confidence has waned. Fabrics and Notions, representing the at-home market with two of the top performers in the retail sector bucked this trend as did the seemingly recession-proof Drug Store industry. Consumer belt tightening inordinately impacted the Sporting Goods industry while other industries performed in line with expectations, flat to slightly negative comps, which may portend less than satisfactory margins.