Seal Beach sales dropped almost 20 percent in the last quarter of 2009.
According to The HdL Corporation’s First Quarter Receipts for Fourth Quarter Sales, receipts from the fourth quarter of 2009 were down 18.2 percent from the same time in 2008.
“Actual point-of-sale activity dropped 19.7 percent after accounting aberrations were excluded,” the report said.
Seal Beach receives the report every three months.
Orange County actually fared better than Seal Beach. “Adjusted for onetime anomalies, taxable sales for all of Orange County were 6.4 percent lower over the comparable period,” the report said. “Southern California as a whole was down 6.8 percent.”
One cause of Seal Beach’s lost sales tax revenues was a “sharp decline” in gas stations, according to the report.
The HdL Corporation report also credited the closure of Seal Beach’s Circuit City outlet. Apparently the new Marshall’s outlet that opened in the same location as the old Circuit City didn’t generate enough sales to offset losses.
The HdL report said a smaller allocation from the county sales and use tax pool also contributed to sales receipt declines.
“New businesses contributed to gains from family apparel and the business/industry group,” the report said.
“Most economists and trade analysts are cautiously optimistic that there will be recovery over the next two or three quarters,” the report said.
“Others argue that a second dip in the recession is likely. They maintain that the current recovery is a ‘bubble’ created by unsustainable tax cuts, federal stimulus spending, low interest loans and modification programs that mask and only delay inevitable foreclosures,” the report said.
By law, some sales figures are kept confidential so competitors won’t be able to profit from the information. For that reason, there is no information about discount department stores, petroleum production and equipment, grocery store liquor sales or amusement places in Seal Beach. County-wide, petroleum production equipment businesses saw a 22.5 percent decrease in sales during the last quarter of 2009.
Electronics and department stores in Seal Beach saw a reported 59.1 percent decline in the same quarter.
The total receipts for the last quarter in were $936,724. The county sales tax pool allocation was $99,845, a 16.3 percent drop from 2008. The total gross receipts: $1,036,570.
