As the fiscal month of June came to a close this past week Mother Nature reined in sales as she delivered severe storms across the country leaving retailers with softer but positive sales results at month's end. As a result, for the week ending June 30, weekly retail sales rose slightly by 0.2%, according to the International Council of Shopping Centers (ICSC) and Goldman Sachs Weekly Chain Store Sales Index. On a year-over-year basis, however, retail sales continued to weaken and slowed to 1.4% over last year. "Weather took a bite out of sales with some 2.5 million people without power late in the sales week as severe storms affected the consumers' ability to shop," said Michael Niemira, ICSC vice president of research and chief economist. "As a result of the late month weakness, ICSC has trimmed its forecast for the monthly sales performance of the industry to between 1.0% and 1.5% year-over-year growth and, excluding drug stores, sales are expected to increase by between 2.5% and 3.3% for June when retailers report their monthly results this Thursday, July 5, 2012," Niemira added.