# Macy's is spending its tariff refund on the store floor, not the bottom line

Published 2026-09-10 · Retail on MarketScale
Canonical: https://www.marketscale.com/industries/retail/macys-q2-2026-tariff-refund-reinvestment-reimagine-200

> Macy's raised its full-year outlook on 2.7% comparable sales growth, but the number retail operators should care about is $96 million: the share of its $116 million tariff refund going back into stores instead of earnings. The remodeled fleet, the labor line, and a software capex budget that now outruns bricks say more about where department store money is moving than the EPS beat does.

## Key points

- $96 million of Macy's $116 million tariff refund reinvested in 2026 initiatives signals funded capital absorption capacity for labor, fixtures, and technology vendors.
- Reimagine 200 remodeled stores achieved 1.9% comparable sales growth for five consecutive quarters on 60-80 basis points payroll and merchandising premium, not markdowns.
- First half capital expenditures show software spending of $171 million outpaced property and equipment at $153 million, reflecting technology prioritization over physical remodels.

## The $96 million signal

Macy's collected $116 million in IEEPA tariff refunds, $98 million of it inside the quarter and $18 million after the close. Only about $20 million of that flows to full-year earnings. The other $96 million is being reinvested into 2026 initiatives, primarily the customer experience and the turnaround plan.

> A one-time windfall of that size could have been banked to protect an EPS range that was already under pressure from tariff and freight costs.

That is a deliberate choice, and it is the kind of choice vendors should read closely. Instead it became a spending budget inside a fiscal year that is already half over, which means it has to be deployed into things that can absorb capital quickly: labor hours, fixtures, visual merchandising, assortment, and technology already in flight. If you sell any of those, there is a funded window here that did not exist in the original plan.

The refund itself is worth noting as a category. Duty recovery moved from a compliance footnote to a real P&L lever this year, and $116 million against a $4.87 billion quarter is not a rounding error. Trade and customs teams that were treated as cost centers in 2024 are now sitting on recoverable dollars, and the retailers with the cleanest entry documentation are the ones collecting fastest.

## Remodels are outperforming, and the mechanism is labor

The Reimagine 200 stores, roughly 60% of the go-forward Macy's fleet, posted comparable sales growth of 1.9% against 1.1% for the nameplate overall. That is the fifth consecutive quarter of positive comps for the reimagined group.

What is inside those stores is not a pricing strategy. It is staffing in high-traffic departments such as women's shoes and the fitting room area, fresher product, better visual presentation, and more local authority over assortment. Macy's is buying a 60 to 80 basis point comp premium with payroll hours and merchandising standards rather than markdowns, and it has now held that result long enough to stop looking like noise.

> Workforce management, task orchestration, in-store analytics, and fixture and visual programs are being underwritten by evidence now, not by theory.

That distinction matters for anyone pitching a retailer this cycle. The counterargument, that service is a cost you cut when comps go soft, just lost a data point in a very public fleet.

## The barbell is widening

Bloomingdale's comparable sales rose 11.3% and delivered the highest second quarter sales volume in the brand's history. Bluemercury grew 6.2%. The Macy's nameplate grew 1.1%.

A ten point spread between the luxury banner and the mainline banner inside one holding company is a demand mix signal, not a merchandising quirk. Wholesale brands allocating inventory, beauty suppliers negotiating door counts, and marketing partners setting 2027 co-op budgets are looking at a customer base splitting by income, with the top end still spending on discovery and experience while the middle trades carefully. The go-forward store plan reflects the same read: about 150 underproductive Macy's locations closing by the end of 2026, with investment concentrated in roughly 350 remaining doors.

Those closures carry a measurable drag. Fiscal 2025 closures reduced second quarter sales by about $35 million and will take roughly $145 million out of the full year. That is the cost of the reset, disclosed rather than buried, and it is also a pipeline of decommissioning, liquidation logistics, and real estate work moving through the market right now.

## Margin, inventory, and the discipline underneath

Gross margin rate hit 41.5%, up 180 basis points. Strip out the tariff refund benefit and the offsetting drag from ongoing tariff and fuel costs, and the underlying rate was up 10 basis points. Flat-to-slightly-better core margin is the honest number, and it is the one to plan against.

SG&A ran $1.96 billion, or 38.7% of total revenue, down 20 basis points as a rate. Adjusted EBITDA was $457 million, 9.0% of revenue. Merchandise inventory rose 2.5% to $4.45 billion against sales growth of 1.1%, a modest build rather than the kind of gap that forces a promotional quarter later. Demand planning and allocation vendors will recognize that as the whole game in a department store: a couple hundred basis points of inventory discipline is worth more than any single campaign.

The balance sheet gives the plan room. Cash and equivalents stood at $1.3 billion against $0.8 billion a year ago, total debt at $2.4 billion with no material long-term maturities until 2030, and $2.0 billion of availability under the asset-based facility.

## Two revenue lines that are not merchandise

Macy's Media Network generated $37 million, up 8.8%. Credit card net revenues came in at $156 million, up 2.0%.

Neither number moves the quarter on its own. Both are high-margin, and both are growing faster than the merchandise business they sit on top of. Retail media in particular is still small enough at Macy's that the ad tech, identity, and measurement conversation is open, which is not true at the scale players who locked their stacks down years ago.

## The capex number worth circling

First half capital expenditures were $153 million on property and equipment and $171 million on capitalized software.

Software outspent bricks. In a company whose entire public narrative is about remodeling physical stores, more capital went into systems than into buildings. Anyone selling retail technology into a department store should be quoting that ratio back.

## Raised guidance, and the market's skepticism

Full-year expectations now sit at net sales of $21.675 billion to $21.825 billion, comparable sales growth of 1.0% to 1.5%, adjusted EBITDA margin of 7.8% to 8.0%, and adjusted diluted EPS of $2.15 to $2.35. Every range moved up.

The stock fell anyway, which is a reasonable reaction to a quarter whose earnings upside came substantially from a one-time refund and whose fourth quarter still carries tariff cost exposure. CEO Tony Spring framed the results as continued progress on the Bold New Chapter strategy, built on brands, assortment, and events rather than price.

Investors and operators are reading the same release differently, and both are right. The refund is not repeatable. The remodel result, now five quarters deep, might be. For suppliers and service partners, the second one is the number that sets next year's budget.

## Sources

- [https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/0000794367/000162828026061217/m-20260910xexx991.htm](https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/0000794367/000162828026061217/m-20260910xexx991.htm)
- [https://www.cnbc.com/2026/09/10/macys-m-q2-2026-earnings.html](https://www.cnbc.com/2026/09/10/macys-m-q2-2026-earnings.html)
- [https://www.aol.com/articles/macys-turnaround-shows-promise-earnings-112559000.html](https://www.aol.com/articles/macys-turnaround-shows-promise-earnings-112559000.html)
- [https://www.retaildive.com/news/macys-turnaround-tariffs-gross-margin-hit-second-quarter-earnings/759105/](https://www.retaildive.com/news/macys-turnaround-tariffs-gross-margin-hit-second-quarter-earnings/759105/)

Tags: Macy's, department stores, store operations, retail media, tariffs, merchandising

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