The tenants include Adventure 16 - an outdoor outfitter that includes in its store Patagonia, an apparel seller - and Billabong, a surfboard, skateboard and snowboard retailer.

The department stores did the worst, with apparel sellers second.

More surprising, perhaps, are some of the less publicized e-tailers that rank relatively high on the list - like Staples's Quill.com and Alticor's www.Quixtar.com, which are fifth and sixth, and Spiegel's Newport-News.com, which ranks behind only Victoria's Secret among online apparel sellers.

To clean the shelves, apparel sellers must promote heavily.

On Thursday, Nike, the world's top athletic shoe and apparel seller, announced that second-quarter earnings were off 51 percent.

The holiday season just passed left most apparel sellers bloodied, but the Kohl's Corporation, whose stores are a cross between discount chains and midlevel department stores, emerged triumphant.

In a retail environment that has been extremely chilly for most retailers, particularly apparel sellers, Pier 1, which is based in Fort Worth, is enjoying growth.

Richard Last, executive vice president for Internet commerce solutions at J. C. Penney, whose sited ranked third in visitors among apparel sellers, concurred.