US Region

Prodco’s Retail Traffic Index for Labor Day 2019 reported a year-over-year decrease of -4.80%.

Labor Day is amongst America’s favorite holidays and 25% of Americans planned to travel and get out of town for Labor Day weekend.

However, Hurricane Dorian substantially affected the decline in traffic that we can observe this year. The Southern coast was especially impacted by the damages caused by Hurricane Dorian. As such, year-over-year results reported a decrease of -16.93% in the Southeast regions.

As per Wikipedia, Hurricane Dorian was an extremely powerful, long-lived, and destructive tropical cyclone that devastated the northwestern Bahamas and caused significant damage to the Southeastern United States.

Even though Labor Day weekend is a popular time for bargain shopping, the impact of the hurricane made shoppers stay home and encouraged them to wait for better opportunities to shop.

Canada Region

Prodco’s Retail Traffic Index for Labor Day 2019 reported a year-over-year decrease of -3.11%. All regions reported a decline year-over-year, but the least affected was Ontario with a decrease year-over-year of -1.08%.

As for the US, Hurricane Dorian had a significant impact on the results this year.

Despite the employment increase in many provinces like Ontario (+58,00) and Quebec (+20,000) that suggested a stronger outlook for growth, the hurricane warnings issued by Environment Canada largely contributed to the decrease in traffic. Shoppers were more cautious and encouraged to wait for a better time to go deal-hunting.

Sources:

US:

WalletHub
Wikipedia

CA:

Trading Economics

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