We’re not going to take this SHT anymore.

That’s been the sentiment recently from Ikea Canada, which has taken a stand against what it calls SHT, for “secondhand tax,” demonstrating the same adroitness for skirting censors as their fellow Canadians who brought us Schitt’s Creek.

“We want our federal and provincial governments to consider eliminating the tax from secondhand items, Canada-wide,” Ikea Canada stated in a March 22 Change.org petition aiming to end what they called the “double tax” on used items. “And if they say yes, we don’t have to do SHT.”

The petition had received 32,480 signatures toward its goal of 35,000 at the time of this article’s publication.

Note there is no dedicated “secondhand tax” per se, but Ikea Canada and its allies argue that the sales tax should not be applied to used items.

To mark the beginning of Earth Month, from April 2–11, Ikea stores throughout Ontario discounted items for its loyalty program members in its “As-is” marketplace, which includes used items, by 13%, the same percentage as the sales tax. (To fully appreciate Ikea Canada’s wordplay, the country’s combined federal and provincial sales tax, which is 13% in Ontario, is commonly called HST, for harmonized sales tax.)

Keep reading here.—AAN

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The Retail Monitor, a monthly survey from CNBC and the National Retail Federation (NRF), found that sales ticked up 0.26% from March to April. NRF CEO Matthew Shay attributed the modest increase to “a growing job market and real gains in wages,” but qualified that “consumers remain focused on value and price and are shifting their spending patterns where needed to make ends meet.”

This trend is playing out online as well: The latest data from Adobe Analytics found that online spending remained resilient between January and April, rising 7% year over year on the back of “stable spend in discretionary categories,” the research firm said in a press release last week, while also noting that consumers are trading down to the cheapest goods across several categories.

In a Q1 earnings call released May 11, Shopify CFO Jeff Hoffmeister echoed that the company sees “consumer spend in North America remaining resilient, but we have factored in headwinds related to FX from the strong US dollar and some softness in European consumer spending in our Q2 outlook.”

In summary, consumers are changing up their spending patterns, but how they’re doing so is arguably the more relevant question for retailers.

Keep reading here.—AV

Core Power is diving into the deep end with its Paris 2024 marketing campaign: The protein-shake brand signed seven-time Olympic gold medalist Katie Ledecky to a multi-year deal that kicked off in mid-April.

Core Power has been the official protein drink of Team USA for almost a decade, but the campaign with Ledecky represents the brand’s “largest Olympics investment to date,” according to Erica Rosskamm, VP of brand marketing at Core Power parent company Fairlife.

Keep reading here on Marketing Brew.—AM

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