It happened again Thursday - a Christmas sales downgrade, another chapter in the saga of Myer disappointments- received major coverage.

The implication in some quarters was that the formerly important department store chain represented the state of Australian retailing, which in turn meant the health of the Australian consumer. It's a mindset that's stuck in the last century.

To put Myer in context, department stores make up the smallest of the Australian Bureau of Statistics' six categories of retail sales.

On the latest figures, the October year, department stores provided $18.6 billion out of the $310.1 billion that went through the tills - six per cent.

Within department stores, Myer's latest annual sales (comparing Valencia and navel oranges, a slightly different financial year) came to $3.2 billion, some 17 per cent of department stores.

Of total retail sales, Myer represents just one per cent - and shrinking. But it has Jennifer Hawkins.

Myer's prominence in last century's simpler times, when it and David Jones were considered at or near the top of the retail tree, is a memory stubbornly refusing to fade.

Myer has become decidedly mid-market and squeezed as a new top-end arrived in Australia and the bottom end rose.

By far the biggest department store brand is Wesfarmers' Kmart.

It had sales of $5.58 billion in its latest year and most enviable earnings before interest and tax of $553 million.

Kmart doesn't have Ms Hawkins so it tends to skate a little under the radar.

Guy Russo, the former McDonald's boss, isn't nearly as photogenic but his masterful turnaround of the failing stores is one of our greatest retail success stories.

To the extent that any single brand tells the story of Australian retailing, resurgent Kmart does a much better job than old Myer.

But retail shops themselves only tell part of the story about consumption, making the extrapolation of Myer's performance to the overall economy all the sillier.

The ABS noted in a 2013 feature that retail trade estimates historically contributed 55 to 60 per cent of household final consumption expenditure, but that had fallen to only about 30 per cent as households spend a greater proportion of their income on services.

And so it is in the latest national accounts. And while parts of retail are struggling, our services spend is still growing. NAB's customer spending behaviour analysis for the September quarter showed a slowdown from the June quarter, but the out-performance of services remained obvious.

NAB customers' spending on retail was up just 2.4 per cent year on year, a growth rate that was behind nine other categories. ("Arts and recreation services" continues to soar, up 20.6 per cent as we increasingly want to go to concerts and shows rather than shops.)

The NAB survey also is interesting for what it says about the much-headlined impact of higher utility bills.

NAB customers - a fairly representative bunch - spent only 2.7 per cent more on them in the quarter than included the July energy price rises.

They seem to have had plenty of cash left over to increase their discretionary spending elsewhere.

Yes, overall consumption growth is being held back by stubbornly low wages growth, but the extent of job creation in general and the low unemployment rate in our economic heart - if the consumer perceives value in the offering.

So while Jennifer Hawkins is a most charming woman, it's foolish to worry much about Myer - unless of course you're an employee, a shareholder or have a fascination for the Solly Lew saga.

Good luck to the first group, commiserations for the second and suit yourself for the third.