Matsuya's October sales rise 9.4% as its Asakusa branch surges 115.6%, far outpacing Ginza's 5.5%
Matsuya's Ginza-and-Asakusa combined sales rose 9.4% in October, but the headline hides a sharp split: the Asakusa branch's sales more than doubled while the Ginza flagship itself grew a modest 5.5%, a gain Matsuya said domestic jewellery and watch sales, up 22%, did more to drive than its still-modest tax-free business.
Matsuya Co., Ltd. said combined sales at its Ginza Main Store, a figure that includes its Asakusa branch, rose 9.4 per cent year on year in October, according to a monthly sales flash dated November 2. Taken alone, the Ginza store rose 5.5 per cent, while the much smaller Asakusa branch's sales rose 115.6 per cent — more than doubling.
Matsuya gave no specific reason for Asakusa's jump in this flash; the branch is far smaller than the Ginza flagship, which means the same yen amount of extra sales shows up as a much bigger percentage gain there than it would at Ginza.
At the Ginza store, tax-free sales rose about 3 per cent year on year, with cosmetics-led consumable items up about 44 per cent, the company said. Domestic customer sales excluding tax-free rose a steadier 7.8 per cent, which Matsuya attributed mainly to jewellery and watches, up 22 per cent. The company said it will publish a fuller October report, with customer and category detail, on November 12.
Matsuya's figures read differently next to its department-store peers reporting the same week. Isetan Mitsukoshi's domestic sales rose 10.9 per cent in October with overseas-customer sales up 38.9 per cent, and H2O Retailing's Hankyu Hanshin stores rose 13.2 per cent with tax-free sales at a third straight monthly record; Matsuya's own tax-free growth, at roughly 3 per cent, is smaller than either by a wide margin, even as Japan's consumer prices rose 2.1 per cent in September, the most recent month published. Ginza's growth this month leaned on domestic jewellery buyers more than on the overseas trade still lifting its bigger Tokyo and Osaka rivals. The 22 per cent jump in jewellery and watches also tracks a national trend: Japan's own watch-and-ring prices rose 16.2 per cent in September, the most recent reading, so part of Ginza's gain is pricier pieces rather than only more of them sold.
What is worth watching is whether Matsuya's tax-free trade — the laggard of the three sales flashes out this week — picks up as the comparison base evens out, or whether Ginza keeps leaning on domestic jewellery spending to carry the flagship while Asakusa's outsized swings keep moving the group total around.
% change year on year