NEW YORK (AP) — Americans took a pause in shopping in October, leaving retailers with their weakest peformance since April as unsually warm weather depressed their appetite for cold weather items.

Stores were forced to discount more on coats and hats to get shoppers to spend. And even as the weather cools, discounts will be necessary to keep pulling shoppers in amid high unemployment, analysts said.

The International Council of Shopping Centres index measuring revenue at stores open at least a year showed a 1.6 percent increase, the weakest performance since April's 0.8 percent increase. October's figure represented a slowdown from September, when it rose 2.6 percent.

Bright spots among retailers reporting revenue figures Thursday were Costco Wholesale Corp. and Limited Brands Inc., both of which reported bigger increases than Wall Street analysts expected. Macy's Inc., helped by tailoring merchandise to local markets, also had a decent performance, outshining rivals such as J.C. Penney Co. and Kohl's Corp., both of which suffered sales declines. Target Corp. posted a small gain that's slightly above Wall Street estimates. And Gap Inc. posted a surprise gain.

Luxury chains like Saks Inc. continued to do well as wealthy shoppers are back to spending, albeit cautiously.

"It was a promotionally driven month," said Jharonne Martis, director of consumer research at Thomson Reuters. "Warm weather hurt sales of fall merchandise. We expect discounting is going to be necessary to drive holiday sales."

The figures are based on revenue at stores open at least a year. That's considered a key indicator of a retailer's health because it measures growth at existing locations and excludes new or closed stores.

The big factor depressing October sales was the unusually warm weather, said Mike Niemira, chief economist at International Council of Shopping Centers. He estimated that depressed October sales by one percentage point.

For retailers, the good news is that heavy discounting may not hurt third-quarter profits because October is the least important month for the period, according to Ken Perkins, president of RetailMetrics, a research firm. Macy's and Limited raised their earnings outlook. Gap offered a surprising strong profit outlook that topped analysts' estimates.

October is typically slow because it's between back-to-school season and the Christmas season, but shoppers took more of a breather this year. That made stores push discounts even more to entice consumers, who are buying even closer to when they need the items in the wake of the Great Recession.

Shoppers are expected to remain tight-fisted with unemployment stuck near 10 percent. That's why many more stores than last year are pushing discounts on holiday gifts earlier, even before Halloween.

Americans are also being bombarded with holiday ads on TV. Best Buy Co., for example, started its holiday TV ad campaign Monday; last year, it began Nov. 11.

A report Thursday from the Labor Department underscored the job market's weakness. It showed the number of people seeking jobless benefits jumped sharply last week, after two straight weeks of declines.