Ronald Friedman, Co-Leader, Retail/Consumer Products Industry Group, Quoted in NPR Article, "Back-To-School Shoppers: Hunting for Tax Breaks and Bargains."
NPR
By Marilyn Geewax and Kaomi Goetz
Excerpt:
For millions of Americans, August is a month for relaxing and basking in the summer sunlight.
Those are the people without children.
The households with students are likely to be scurrying around under the bright florescent lights of big-box stores, searching for back-to-school bargains on clothes, shoes, notebooks, backpacks, computers and dorm furniture.
And many shoppers are timing their purchases to take advantage of sales-tax holidays for school-related items, hoping to keep a bit more in their wallets.
Consumer confidence is fairly good for now, but may start to erode because of bad news coming from the Middle East, Africa and Russia. “Caution is the word because the market is very unsettled right now,” says Ron Friedman, a retail consultant with Marcum Group. “Folks are nervous about everything.”
