A retooled Wizard of Oz at Sphere in Las Vegas did around $9.3M in box office receipts for the last Thursday – Sunday period; it’s second weekend. We base the estimate on observed visits of 46K for the four-day period and a seat price of $200 per showing. There are two showings Monday – Thursday and four on Saturday and Sunday. This second weekend benefited from all of the positive buzz after the opening weekend.

One year ago, Brian Niccol stepped into the CEO role at Starbucks, pledging to return the company “back to Starbucks” with a particular focus on reclaiming the 3rd Place through making the locations less busy (imagine that), better serviced, better maintained, and comfy. The wage ($500M) and location remodel investments ($150K each) are substantial. The location makeovers (1000) include sound insulation, rugs, dimmer lighting, more seating, more charging points, cozy dark wood paneling, and more.

Well for the non-Disney-s and -Universals of theme parks, the season ended on a soft note. Disney’s marketing machine and the new Universal Epic Universe park had just too much of a pull. Separately, given our “thrifty K-shaped consumer-economy” cruise as a better value continues to take market share (third season in a row). The way we track market share is shown in the table. Personal Consumption Expenditures on “Fun” has outpaced Amusement Parks + Camping spending each month of the summer.

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Lots going on in the sneaker space with Dick’s Sporting Goods set to close on Foot Locker on September 8th and fiscal quarter results showing sequential improvement for the major retailers (save WSS which is weighted to the low- to moderate-Hispanic consumer). Part of the better sales is lift was due to the broadly strong back-to-school season that we’ve been reporting on, the other part of it is tariff cost pass-through are driving comp-ticket; average transaction increased +4.

Fiscal Q2 results showed a markedly better pace of sales for off-price, led by Burlington (as we had previewed ). The gains were on a 1-, 2-, and 3- year basis as the table below demonstrates. Additionally, off-price’s acceleration wasn’t to the detriment of legacy department stores. If off-price was experiencing a big trade-down benefit, it would hit legacy department stores hard given that the three are 50% larger, in aggregate, than the legacy names.

To say the least, the dollar stores had a difficult 2023 and ’24, and best signified by 99C Only going away and new leadership being appointed at Dollar General, Dollar Tree, Family Dollar, and Five Below. With the new leadership teams, each pivoted to a “back-to-basics” strategy, or as we like to say, “retail is detail.” Well the details are being done right given the strengthening traffic and even better comp-sales results.

This week brought a lot of news about Aldi’s expansion, including 200 new locations by year-end, half from new openings and half from converting the acquired Winn-Dixie stores. Next year is to bring another round of new openings and around 120 Winn-Dixie / Harvey conversions. Florida is winning / experiencing the most with 50 (mostly conversions), giving residents a greater selection of strong grocers to choose from. As of August, Aldi had 268 locations in Florida, with Orlando its biggest market at 70 locations.

Follower Friday’s note on Walmart US’ Q2 results, here we dissect Sam’s Club quarter with a compare / contrast to BJ’s Wholesale and Costco, while also reflecting on Target. The table below shows the top-line KPIs for the four. Costco’s comp-sales and comp-transaction outperformance is notable; as readers will know, that outperformance stems from its strong private brand offering, the Costco member’s high affluence, and our “thrifty K-shaped economy” and consumer mood.

Thirteen years ago, when the lower-income and moderate consumer was under a lot of economic and budgetary strain, and Walmart was less “considered” by more affluent households, the US business was only able to deliver a +0.5% comp-sales increase (2011- 2014) and WMT’s valuation multiple was only 13X (price-to-earnings). Since then Walmart (and Sam’s) has gone through a “contemporization” of increased enhanced / enriched merchandise assortment, increased convenience (curbside, store delivery, in-stocks, .