With roughly half of the UK Christmas retail reporting season now passed, the picture is one of gloom pierced by a few bright spots - although some of the sector's acknowledged stars have yet to publish.
Figures released yesterday by industry lobby group the British Retail Consortium compounded a pessimistic mood. The BRC said December same-store sales had fallen at their fastest rate in almost two years, although the story is rather more complex.
While this measure was down 0.4 per cent in what BRC director-general Kevin Hawkins called the "worst Christmas in living memory," total high-street sales increased by 2.5 per cent, roughly on a par with economic growth.
So it's new retail space rather than a downturn in spending that has dragged down like-for-like sales, and in fact the December upturn in total sales was slightly higher than the figure for November.
The BRC is hoping to pressure the Bank of England into an interest rate cut, and the figures serve well in that context. But it's undeniably true that high debt levels and interest rates and a flat housing market have depressed spending growth.
Online retail is one sector that has had a bumper Christmas, although its impact is difficult to quantify and e-tail, like the country's myriad independent retailers, are not included in the BRC figures.
That being said, the high-street report card thus far is mixed, to say the least. Topping the disappointment league is Marks & Spencer, Britain's top clothing retailer and favourite fallen star of retail.
Labouring under the legacy of several seasons of ill-advised fashion and homewear collections, M&S warned on profits - although CEO Stuart Rose denied he had done so - as Christmas same-store sales dropped 5.6 per cent.
The fashion sector in general has performed weakly, with one or two honourable exceptions such as discount out-of-town chain Matalan, which bounced back from a very poor Christmas 2003 to report a 5.3 per cent same-store sales increase.
Unlisted New Look did even better at 11.6 per cent, although many others, including Alexon, House of Fraser, and JJB Sports, actually saw a fall in like-for-like turnover.
Even Next, long the analysts' non-food favourite, put in a performance some saw as disappointing.
Acknowledging that its menswear lines had not hit the mark during the autumn, Next posted just 2.9 per cent growth for the August to December period and took £5 million write-down on unsold stock.
"It's probably marginally worse than expected," said Mintel analyst Richard Perks of the trading statements so far.
"If you look at the overall picture you're going to end up with sales up one or two per cent in December. When consumers get more cautious, they're much more fussy about where they shop and they tend to go to the places that serve them best - like New Look," Mr Perks said.
Game Group took the biggest percentage hit as sales fell 17 per cent on a global shortage of SonyPlaystation 2 consoles.
Of the listed food retailers, only WM Morrison Supermarkets has so far posted its Christmas trading data, and that was a mixed picture in its own right.
While sales at the "core" Morrison supermarkets - as opposed to conversions from the Safeway format - were flat on last Christmas and core growth was down since the autumn, the performance at the newly-converted outlets was very good indeed, with sales density up over 40 per cent.
Other strong performers included wine and beer seller Majestic and upmarket foodseller Waitrose, while Asda, the UK arm of the mighty US company Wal-Mart, said it had enjoyed a record Christmas.
But the real test of the food retailers comes in the next few days, with J Sainsbury, Somerfield and the country's top retailer Tesco all due to report.
Tesco, which publishes data on January 18, could well have accounted for all the spending growth on the high street, with Christmas same-store sales seen around eight per cent higher.
Tesco, along with Argos owner GUS, which reports tomorrow, could go a long way to "rescuing" the UK retail Christmas, but the real headline-grabbers could be elsewhere.
Sainsbury will possibly be the most closely-studied retailer of this reporting season. Analysts screening the results tomorrow will be looking for signs that CEO Justin King's recovery plan is beginning to pay off - or not.