Inflation, supply issues won't stop holiday consumer demand: Former Toys ‘R’ Us CEO

Storch Advisors CEO and former Toys "R" Us CEO Gerald Storch argued, despite inflation and supply issues facing the retail industry, "nothing" will stop a strong consumer momentum going into this year’s holiday shopping season on FOX Business' "Varney and Co." 

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GERALD STORCH: These issues are all real -- labor shortages, supply chain issues, inflation -- it's all real. Having said that, consumer momentum is overwhelmingly positive right now. You know, consumers are simply flush with cash. A lot of it is due to all this government stimulus. Regardless of the source, they are spending. 

So if you compare sales over the last several months to 2019, the last pre-pandemic year, they're up 20% in just two years. And that trend has continued on a relatively consistent basis for many, many months now. And I expect it to continue all the way through the holidays. I see nothing that's going to stop it. 

Meanwhile, people want to have some Christmas, for gosh sakes, after everything we've been through, so that'll drive it even higher. So a lot of these shortages are driven by an unbelievable consumer demand. That's really the underlying cause of all this. People have money and they're spending it. If you take that 20% over a two-year basis, it means we'll be up double digits this Christmas alone. 

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