What ups and downs has the US market experienced in the two years of coexistence with the epidemic?

In March 11, 2020, WHO officially announced the global pandemic of COVID-19. Since then, countries in the world have embarked on a two-year struggle with COVID-19. As of March 21, 2022, novel coronavirus pneumonia cases were confirmed in more than 470 million cases, and the virus has not been effectively curbed in the world. There is still great difficulty to end the epidemic in the near future. During the two years of coexistence with the epidemic, the world political and economic pattern and development have been impacted unprecedentedly, and the world's major textile and clothing retail markets have also experienced ups and downs.

In order to understand the development of major textile and clothing retail markets in the world and look forward to the future development trend of major markets, the Secretariat of China textile international production capacity cooperation enterprise alliance has made a comprehensive analysis on the development track of textile and clothing retail in the United States, the European Union, Japan and domestic markets in the past two years, hoping to provide information reference for the international development cooperation of industry enterprises.

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US market with ups and downs and strong recovery

Looking back on the past two years, the epidemic prevention and control measures of countries around the world have been constantly adjusted and changed. Policies such as home isolation and social distance have changed intermittently with the epidemic. After the "ice age" at the beginning of the epidemic, commodity retail in major markets around the world have recovered slowly, but the development is extremely uneven. With the help of various parties, the US retail market has recovered strongly and experienced 24 months of ups and downs.

"Two pronged" stimulus policy

Help the United States quickly stabilize the domestic retail market

Novel coronavirus pneumonia continues to spread to hitherto unknown pressure on the US economy. In order to stabilize development, the US government has taken various response measures and several rounds of economic stimulus plans, and "two pronged" monetary and fiscal policies have effectively stabilized the market. In 2020, the U.S. retail market experienced big ups and downs. By the end of the year, the total annual sales increased slightly by 0.6% compared with 2019, basically the same as before the epidemic.

The U.S. economy continued to improve in 2021. In March of that year, the new president signed and entered into force the $1.9 trillion economic stimulus bill, which included about $1 trillion in direct subsidies for U.S. individuals and families (including subsidies and unemployment insurance), which significantly promoted the accelerated recovery of the national retail market.

In 2021, the total retail sales in the United States was close to US $7.42 trillion, with a year-on-year increase of 19.3%, even far exceeding the pre epidemic level (US $6.19 trillion, 2019). The surge in U.S. consumption has also stimulated the development of its domestic economy. According to the data of the US Bureau of economic analysis, the annual GDP growth rate of the United States in 2021 was 5.7%, the best in recent years, and the total GDP also reached US $22.99 trillion.

The epidemic has led to the largest decline in the stable clothing retail market in the United States

Before the epidemic, clothing as a non necessity accounted for 2-2.5% of personal consumption expenditure in the United States. After the outbreak of the epidemic, consumers are more cautious about the consumption of clothing products, and the recovery and development of clothing consumption market has also experienced a long time cycle. According to the data released by the US Bureau of economic analysis, the proportion of clothing products in us personal consumption expenditure fell to 1.99% in 2020, falling below 2% for the first time in nearly a decade.

From the monthly data, the US retail market, especially the retail of clothing products, has experienced a historic sharp decline. Since March 2020, the United States has begun to take strict epidemic prevention and control measures, and the implementation of home isolation policy has brought the offline retail market of the United States to the freezing point. In March, the total retail sales in the United States decreased by 5.9% year-on-year, and the retail sales of clothing (including shoes) decreased by 49%, far more than other consumer products. In April, US retail sales fell by 16.4% month on month and 20% year-on-year, the largest decline in history. The sales of clothing consumer goods plunged 87% year-on-year, ranking the first in all categories. In the next eight months of 2020, the U.S. retail market is struggling. However, benefiting from the hot sales of food, household, sports and building materials, the overall sales still climbed slowly. By the end of 2020, the total retail sales in the United States had been basically the same as that in 2019. However, the sales of clothing products are still in a dilemma and have been in a negative growth trend. The annual sales decreased by 26.4% year-on-year.

"Retaliatory" consumption helps us retail of clothing products surpass the pre epidemic level

In 2021, under the influence of the deregulation of epidemic prevention and control, the stimulation of financial subsidies and the rebound of consumer confidence, the total retail sales in the United States increased month by month and stabilized at a high level. The "retaliatory" consumption of consumers on clothing products also began to show signs. In the month when the $1.9 trillion economic stimulus bill came into effect (March 2021), the sales of clothing products in the United States recovered to $25 billion, a year-on-year increase of 115.4%, an increase of 12% compared with the same period in 2019 before the epidemic. In April, such products soared by 764.6% year-on-year, an increase of 10.8% over the same period before the epidemic. Since then, the retail sales of clothing and apparel (including footwear) products in the United States have been triumphant all the way, and the high growth has been maintained until the end of the year. In 2021, the sales of the above products in the United States exceeded 303.1 billion US dollars, with a year-on-year increase of 48.8% and 12.9% compared with 2019. The consumption of textiles and clothing basically entered the normal development track.