Sales

Would Confucius drive a Hummer? News that an obscure Chinese company has reached a tentative agreement to buy bankrupt General Motors' Hummer unit has people here pondering the larger meaning of Chinese ownership of the mother of all gas guzzlers. The news has propelled Sichuan Tengzhong Heavy Industrial Machinery Co. onto the radar screen of auto enthusiasts worldwide. And it underscores China's growing economic might at a time when U.S. industrial prowess is flagging. China is already the U.

Consumers, daunted by the recession, hit the pause button on buying video games in May. The game industry last month racked up $863.3 million in sales of games and consoles, the first time since August 2007 that monthly sales came in less than $1 billion, according to a report released Thursday from market research firm NPD Group Inc. Sales of game consoles took a big hit last month, dropping 30% to $302.5 million from $433 million in May 2008.

In the first few days after Michael Jackson's death on June 25, bereaved fans downloaded nearly 2.5 million digital copies of his songs, setting a record that's likely to stand for years. Before that, no music act had ever rung up even 1 million digital tracks in a single week.

When Joy Papa of Silver Lake stopped by Fry's Electronics in Burbank last week, she did something movie executives wish consumers would do more often this year: buy a DVD. "Every time a new movie comes out that I like, I buy it even if I saw it in theaters," she said while clutching a copy of "Fast & Furious," which had just come out. The DVD business may be down, but it's not out -- at least for the biggest titles.

Despite signs that the country's economic free fall may be bottoming out, demand for business travel continues to plummet, putting airlines and hotels in financial straits. As businesses continue to tighten spending practices, corporate travel is projected to drop by 15% this year compared with 2008, while overall travel demand could decline by 11%, according to a study by PhoCusWright, a Sherman, Conn., market research firm. Corporate travel -- defined as business travel managed under strict corporate policies -- has historically represented about 40% of the total travel market, but PhoCusWright predicts that share will drop to 35% next year.

The video game industry experienced a stomach-churning 29% drop in U.S. sales in July, its third-worst year-over-year slide since January 1995, when NPD Group Inc. first began tracking sales data. The monthly decline, the industry's fifth consecutive drop, means game console and software sales are now down 14% from January through July this year compared with the first seven months of 2008. To climb out of the red zone, sales from August through December would need to grow 11% from a year earlier, NPD analyst Anita Frazier said.

Abercrombie & Fitch Co. raised eyebrows last Christmas when the teen retailer insisted it would ride out the recession without resorting to widespread price-slashing. Then came months of massive double-digit sales declines and dwindling store traffic as shoppers defected to competitors that sold similar clothes at more affordable prices. Industry experts wondered whether the company was risking its business in its attempt to uphold its brand image. At the same time, Abercrombie was criticized for missing several fashion trends, for instance, waiting too long to offer casual dresses and relying too heavily on its graphic T-shirts.

This conservative city is taking an unusual, some might say extreme, step to try to stem its fiscal woes: It's entering the gun business. The Colorado Springs City Council is expected in coming weeks to approve the final details of a program that would allow the police department to sell confiscated firearms to federally licensed gun dealers. Police have already stopped melting down the hundreds of guns they collect from crime scenes, drug houses or just from civilians who don't need them anymore.

Does Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger have a deal for you. His plans to cut up the state's credit cards didn't go so well, and voters gave the thumbs-down to his bid to shackle government spending. No matter. In his latest effort to balance the budget, the governor is cleaning out the state's storage sheds and holding a garage sale on Craigslist and EBay. Need a 2001 Ford Focus wagon with 110,059 miles and Schwarzenegger's autograph on the visor? Someone did, offering the high bid of $1,625.

Unemployment in California is high, which could partly explain why thousands of people had time to line up on a Friday morning to go shopping. Another possibility was the allure of a bargain, as Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's administration launched the Great California Garage Sale to unload some unneeded items, cheap. The governor toured the site Friday morning before flying east for the funeral of his wife's uncle, Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.). The shoppers had waited in the pre-dawn outside the Sacramento-area warehouse.