Retail Sales Ex Gas/Autos MoM

The series is a derived line called Total excluding motor vehicle and parts and gasoline stations, inside the Census Bureau advance retail release. It is produced by MARTS (the Advance Monthly Retail Trade Survey, an early national estimate of store and restaurant sales). It covers employer firms only, excluding nonemployers, in retail plus food services and drinking places under NAICS sectors 44 to 45 and subsector 722. It removes only motor vehicle and parts dealers and gasoline stations, and values are nominal dollars, meaning sales at current prices without inflation adjustment.

Firms report sales for the calendar reference month; phone follow-up starts the 3rd business day after month end and closes by the 6th. Release arrives about 10 business days after month end at 8:30 AM Eastern time, beside headline totals and sibling ex-auto and ex-gas lines.

Tables show dollar levels with MoM and YoY (year on year) changes. The advance estimate is replaced one month later by the larger survey and benchmarked to the Annual Retail Trade Survey. Response is voluntary; read the number directionally, with a rise signaling stronger consumer demand and a fall signaling weaker demand.

Only included store kinds move the total; auto dealers and gasoline stations are excluded by construction.

• Food & beverage stores: grocery and specialty food sales for home use.
• Health & personal care stores: pharmacies, drug stores, and personal care goods.
• Clothing and general merchandise stores: apparel, department stores, warehouse clubs, and supercenters.
• Furniture, electronics and building material stores: furniture, appliances, and garden supplies.
• Sporting goods, hobby, book and miscellaneous stores: sports, hobbies, books, and miscellaneous goods.
• Nonstore retailers and food services: online and mail-order sales plus restaurant and bar meals.

In January 2024 (released February 15, 2024) the headline fell 0.8% to $700.3 billion while this core line fell a softer 0.5%. Motor vehicle dealers and gasoline stations each fell 1.7%, with building material and garden stores down 4.1%. Inside the core, food services stood 6.3% and nonstore retailers 6.4% above January 2023. The same release cut November-to-December growth from 0.6% to 0.4%, showing the routine one-month-later revision; autos and fuel swings can overstate demand shifts.

1. Link relative: for each store kind, divide matched reporters weighted sales in month t by month t minus 1. Example: matched furniture stores at $10.00 billion versus $9.90 billion give a ratio of 1.0101.
2. Advance estimate: multiply that ratio by the prior month preliminary estimate from the larger monthly survey; a few large nonrespondents use past performance. Example: 1.0101 times a $10.05 billion prior estimate gives a $10.15 billion advance estimate.
3. Total: sum the industry estimates across all retail and food services except motor vehicle dealers and gasoline stations.
4. Seasonal adjustment: adjust the total with X-13ARIMA-SEATS (the Census seasonal adjustment program) using the X-11 filter for seasonal, holiday, and trading day effects. There is no price adjustment, so higher prices alone can raise the total.
5. MoM rate: compute 100 times the seasonally adjusted change divided by the prior level. Example: $516.5 billion versus $514.7 billion gives plus 0.35%, rounded to plus 0.3%.
6. Significance: the 90% confidence interval (range of true values) is plus or minus 1.753 times the standard error; a change spanning 0 is not significant. Example: with 0.2 point error the margin is 0.35 points, so plus 0.3% spans 0 and is not significant.