Retailers See Flat Spending This Holiday Season
Citing the impacts of high inflation and interest rates, Massachusetts retailers don’t expect a big bump in holiday season shopping sales this year.
Retailers Take to Beacon Hill to Reshape Franchises’ Reputations
The Retailers Association of Massachusetts is preparing for a majority of its members to either retire or sell their small businesses in the next decade, and the trade group’s president said Wednesday that local franchise operations are going to be “key” to the future success of the small business sector.
Mass. Biz Report Sluggish Holiday Sales Season
Local small businesses saw the dollar amount in holiday sales increase by just more than 1 percent last year over the 2021 holiday shopping season, well shy of the 4 percent annual increase that the Retailers Association of Massachusetts said is typical.
Mass. Retailers Forecast 10 Percent Spike in Holiday Sales
High inflation and steady recession talk do not appear to be dampening holiday shopping appetites, according to projections by the Retailers Association of Massachusetts.
Webinar: What’s in Store? Local Experts Look Ahead to 2021’s Retail Trends
A discussion of retail trends in Greater Boston in 2020, the beginning of 2021 and the rest of the year.
Real-Time Sales Tax an Untested Gamble
In January, Gov. Charlie Baker filed his annual state budget proposal, which again included proposed changes to the commonwealth’s sales tax collection and remittance process.
Amid Adversity, Downtowns Learned How to Survive
The pandemic is not over yet. Still, retail shop owners and restaurateurs in small downtowns across Massachusetts are starting to eye a post-pandemic future – and they’re hoping many of the successful emergency relief measures put in place to help them get through the COVID-19 crisis remain permanent features moving forward.
Biz Feel Blindsided by New UI System Costs
Massachusetts businesses are facing sudden and sharp unemployment tax increases just weeks after implementation of a new law aimed at limiting their costs, but a fix is unclear.
U.S. Numbers May Foreshadow Mass. Retail Sales Surge
American retail sales grew surged in May after a dismal April, offering some encouraging news about the prospects of economic recovery and delivering a potential glimpse toward the near-term future in Massachusetts, where reviving public activity has lagged other parts of the nation.
Retailers Shift on the Fly
Government stimulus programs so far have missed the mark, retail industry groups say, leaving small merchants to build their own life rafts and search for safe harbors in the COVID-19 economic crisis.
Landlords Can’t Bail Out Tenants by Themselves
Government action and cooperation between tenants and property owners on rent relief is needed now to put these small businesses in the best position to reopen their doors once this emergency is over.
Retailers Reel from Virus, but Get Creative
Across Massachusetts, restaurateurs are swapping dining room china and silverware for to-go containers and plastic cutlery as they scramble to deal with the impact of the coronavirus.
Needham Bank Partnership Aims to Draw New Customers
The town of Ashland and Needham Bank have inked a first-of-its-kind public-private venture that should help attract new businesses to Ashland’s downtown and generate new small business loans at Needham’s Ashland branch.
DOR: Real-Time Sales Tax Collection May Be Years Off
Developing a cost-effective system that would allow businesses to pay sales taxes owed to the state on a daily basis is “not feasible” under the timeline envisioned by the Legislature, the Department of Revenue has determined.
