16 ways to blame the weather

Does your business have a problem? You can always blame the weather.

The impact of permanent climate change is starting to be felt everywhere from the arctic oil rush to temperature fluctuations in the world’s great wine-producing regions. Superstorm Sandy alone is expected to cost the US economy $50 billion.

But even short of real extreme conditions, weather gets blame—and, more rarely, credit—for unexpected variations in business performance. It’s obviously an easy way to pass the buck. Quartz decided to look at some recent issues attributed to weather-related factors. We leave it to you to decide whether the causality claimed is actually justified.

It’s Warm!

• Softer snowboard apparel sales — “It was a slow start in North America. As everyone has heard, the weather was unseasonably warm particularly on the East Coast, but we’ve got snowfall and cold weather, and things are starting to pick up. Europe, we’ve got really nice cold weather, and we’re off to a good start.” —Robert McKnight, CEO, Quiksilver
• Disappointing sweater sales at Dressbarn — “I really do think – even though we had sweater issues in several of our brands, I think it may have been at best a combination of weather and style, and at worse, it was primarily our own style issues.” —David Jaffe, CEO, Ascena Retail
• Lackluster suit sales —”We believed we had a strong marketing and promotional strategy for the period. However, many of the promotional items and a large part of our holiday assortment were items that sell best in cold weather and the weather was unseasonably warm,” —David Ullman, COO, Jos. A. Bank Clothiers
• Lower propane prices — “[L]ast year for the propane industry anyway was a punishing year. It was a brutal year, and I’m glad it’s over. Much of what happened last year was beyond our control. Weather was incredibly warm and, in fact, it was the second warmest in recorded history.” —Ryan VanWinkle, CFO, Ferrellgas Partners
• Weaker coat sales — “It has been warmer than typically during this time period. And as we mentioned in other calls previously, colder–we do better in colder weather, overall. So I can’t really–I don’t really want to talk about specifics within the quarter, but as the weather gets colder, it’s a help to our business.” —Thomas Kingsbury, CEO, Burlington Coat Factory
• Fatter chickens — “The primary reason during the fourth quarter was we had such a mild fall. The weather down here was perfect across all of our operations, and our live weights, the chickens, just — they perform very well in that type of environment,” Lampkin Butts, COO, Sanderson Farms.