TOKYO, Jan. 23 (Xinhua) -- Supermarket sales in Japan marked a decline in December as year-end buying, usually a boon for retailers, slumped in the reporting period, details from the Japan Chain Stores Association showed Monday.
According to the association's figures, nationwide supermarket sales here slumped 2 percent in December from a year earlier, on a same-store basis.
The association said that significant drops were noticed in purchases of big ticket items like electrical appliances, but also on clothes and furniture.
According to the figures for December, sales of furniture dropped 4.2 percent and those of home appliances tumbled 10.0 percent.
Supermarkets, however, most notably, sold 10.4 percent less clothes than a year earlier, the association also said.
The industry bodies' figures are based on the combined sales at 57 supermarket chains nationwide, which together operate more than 9,489 outlets, and totaled sales of 1.27 trillion yen (11.1 billion U.S. dollars), in the reporting month, the association said in its latest report.
The numbers have been adjusted to facilitate comparisons on a same-store basis.
