Macy’s Stock Jumps 20 Percent on First Quarterly Comparable-Sales Gain in 3 Years

Sales volume, traffic and average order value at Macy’s 125 reimagined stores outperformed the rest of its stores.

Shoppers enter a Macy's department store at Miami International Mall in Doral, Fla., on Feb. 22, 2021. Wilfredo Lee/AP Photo

Beleaguered retailer Macy’s stock rose roughly 20 percent on Sept. 3 on the strength of a quarterly earnings report that highlighted the company’s first increase in comparable sales in more than three years.

Macy’s net sales of $4.8 billion in the second quarter topped the company’s guidance of $4.7 billion. Comparable sales—revenue from stores open at least one year—rose 0.8 percent year over year on an owned basis, beating FactSet’s estimate for a 0.5 percent decline, and marked the first positive result since the first fiscal quarter of 2022, according to FactSet.

The retailer raised its sales and earnings guidance for the year to revenue between $21.15 billion and $21.45 billion, with earnings projected to fall between $1.70 and $2.15 per share.

Macy’s stock ended the day’s trading at $16.28 after sinking to a 52-week low of $9.76 in early April. Its quarterly dividend returned $50 million to shareholders, matching the same amount of dividends earmarked for shareholders in the first quarter.

Sales volume, traffic, and average order value at Macy’s 125 reimagined stores outperformed the rest of its stores, Macy’s chief financial and operating officer Tom Edwards said during the earnings call with investors and analysts.

The retailer revamped 50 of its stores in 2024 and an additional 75 this year in an effort to enhance brand storytelling, improve visual merchandising, and increase staffing. Sales at those stores spiked 1.1 percent in the second quarter.

Sales at the company’s subsidiary Bloomingdale’s were up 4.6 percent, marking the fourth consecutive quarter of comparable sales growth at the upscale retailer. Bluemercury, a luxury cosmetics retailer that Macy’s opened inside its stores in 2015, also saw a 3.3 percent increase in sales, the 18th straight quarter of comparable sales gains.

Tony Spring, chairman and CEO of Macy’s Inc., said the company’s second-quarter performance highlighted the advantages of being a multi-brand, multi-category, omni-channel retailer.

“Our teams achieved better than expected top- and bottom-line results during the second quarter, driven by our strongest comparable sales growth in 12 quarters, reflecting the strong performance in Macy’s Reimagine 125 locations, Bloomingdale’s and Bluemercury,” Spring said.

“The substantive, enterprise-wide improvements across our business, with a strong focus on customer experience, give us further confidence that our Bold New Chapter initiatives can drive sustainable, long-term profitable growth.”

In February 2024, Macy’s announced its Bold New Chapter strategy that included modernizing its go-forward stores and closing roughly 150 underperforming locations in the next three years. It announced 66 store closures in January of this year.

“We are closing underproductive Macy’s stores to allow us to focus our resources and prioritize investments in our go-forward stores, where customers are already responding positively to better product offerings and elevated service,” Spring said.

Macy’s currently operates 424 nameplate locations, as well as an additional 20 small-format locations and five freestanding Macy’s budget-conscious Backstage stores.

In addition, it operates 32 Bloomingdale’s stores, 21 Bloomingdale’s Outlet locations, and four small-format Bloomie’s stores. Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, however, Macy’s had 614 stores, 56 Bloomingdale’s, and 171 Bluemercury stores.