The third quarter at Macy's Inc. recorded a net loss of $44 million, over the $33 million profits, in the said quarter of 2007. While sales dipped by 7 percent, valuing at $5.49 billion, same-store were close falling by 6 percent.

Sales did not show any growth in the first nine months of the current year also, slipping by 4.3 percent to $16.96 billion and same-store sales by 3.5 percent. The loss in the nine months amounted to $30 million, from $143 million profits in the same period of last year.

As reported in the media, the retailer expected the same-store sales of Q4 in 2008 to see a dip between 1 to 6 percent, resulting in the same-store sales during the for the fall season (third and fourth quarters combined) to fall between 3 to 6 percent. The retailers is undertaking various promotional schemes to maintain consumer interest through unique and differentiated merchandise assortments, customer service, creative marketing which includes campaigns like 'Believe' for Macy's and 'Oh What Fun' for Bloomingdale's.