Global Powers of Retailing 2011 |
More than one-third of the world’s 250 largest retailers suffered a decline in sales, as the global economic downturn led to more cautious consumer behaviour and a drying-up of available credit.
Despite these negative pressures, the efforts of many companies to cut costs and adjust their inventory levels have paid off, with net profit across the top 250 retailers increasing from 2.4 percent to 3.1 percent.
Read and download the full report 'Global Powers of Retailing 2011' in PDF format.
Australian retail trends
Australian retail giants, Woolworths and Wesfarmers, are now listed in the world’s top 25 retail companies.
The report, which identifies the 250 largest retailers by revenue globally for the fiscal year 2010, lists Woolworths in 20th (26th last year) and Wesfarmers in 23rd position (28th last year).
Profitability up in all sectors
Profitability improved in every product sector, with fashion retailers showing a particularly strong performance, increasing their composite net profit margin from 4.1 percent to 7.6 percent against overall sales growth of just 0.7 percent.
Even the bottom line for the historically low margin Fast Moving Consumer Goods sector (which includes food and accounts for more than two thirds of the Top 250 sales) improved, increasing 0.3 percent year-on-year to 2.5%.
Global top ten
- Wal-Mart
- Carrefour
- Metro
- Tesco
- Schwarz
- The Kroger Co.
- Costco
- Aldi
- Home Depot
- Target Corp
Global Powers of Retailing, 2011
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