Worried US Shoppers Are Rapidly Cutting Back As Major Retailers Close Over 60,000 US Stores

In the space of just a week, US shoppers have become much more worried about the coronavirus outbreak: Our latest US consumer survey, undertaken on March 25, recorded a significant week-over-week uptick in the proportion of respondents that are extremely concerned about the pandemic. We also found that a much greater proportion of US consumers are reducing their purchases of discretionary categories than just one week earlier. The cutbacks in spending are reflective of shoppers battening down the hatches for the long haul: Over half of respondents in our March 25 survey thought the severe impact of the outbreak on everyday life in the US will last for three months or more.

Shopper cutbacks also mirror the shutdown of a huge tranche of US brick-and-mortar retail. As of Friday, March 27, we recorded almost 62,000 temporary store closures by major US retailers. Coresight Research estimates that discretionary retailers make up around three-quarters of brick-and-mortar stores, and the effects of a universal shutdown are likely to be profound and lasting—as we noted in our recent 2020 US Store Closures Outlook, we anticipate that some of the retailers that recently announced temporary store closures, including some well-known names, will never reopen their doors.

Find our rolling list of the major retailers that are closing stores in our Coronavirus Tracker—which we update every working day.