5 September 2012
Latest figures from Ipsos Retail Performance showed that British retail had
cause for quiet satisfaction last month. Ipsos’ Retail Traffic Index (RTI),
which monitors the volume of shoppers in non-food stores across the UK,
recorded a narrowing gap between this year and last. In August 2012,
year-on-year figures were only 1.1% down for the country as a whole, much
the best comparison of the year and far healthier than the 5.1% year-to-date
deficit. Figures for August against July showed a slight decline of -0.8%.
Dr Tim Denison, Head of Retail Intelligence at Ipsos Retail Performance,
says: “August has been another one of those event-filled months of this
year, making it difficult to draw out meaningful trends. As a standalone
month, traffic was pretty strong, and retailers can be thankful for that,
but, in itself, it doesn’t provide any great steer on the direction that the
nation’s shopping activity is heading. The general circumstances impacting
households remain largely unchanged, but data on the broader economy is
presenting conflicting messages. Inflation has been dropping, but the worry
ahead is that food, commodity and oil prices are set to surge again. It’s a
bit like sailing a dinghy in fluky conditions at the moment, unsure of
whether the wind will propel you forward, cause you to capsize, or becalm
you.”
There were mixed opinions on the expected impact of the Olympic Games on
retail sales and footfall, with concerns that the disruption to normal
living and working patterns would keep shoppers away and that regular summer
day-trippers would not venture into the capital during the Games. There was
also the belief that while tourist figures would be very similar to any
other summer, their interests in shopping would be substantially less. In
contrast, others felt that the Games presented a great shop window for
London retailers, in particular, to expose their goods to a new audience and
reap some reward.
In the event, retail traffic in London and the South East, where most of the
Olympic action took place, was more subdued than the national average.
There, numbers over the month were 2.3% down on August 2011 and 4.6% down on
July. Any year- on-year comparison with August 2011 is further complicated
by the summer riots of 2011 that began in London and rapidly spread to other
retail hubs such as Manchester and Birmingham.
Dr Denison says: “We saw such fluctuations in daily figures and between
near-by locations that no definitive patterns prevailed over the fortnight.
As you would expect, there were winners and losers, but the Games failed to
have the across-the-board impact on retailing, positive or negative, that
some had foreseen.”
With the summer months behind us, attention is now firmly focused on
September and the results of the back-to-school campaigns. Dr Denison
comments: “UK retailing remains in a volatile and nervous state and any
month that delivers ahead of run rate results at the moment will be greatly
received.
A steady September would secure an improved quarter for retail footfall and
help counter the pessimism in the CBI’s latest survey for Q3, which reported
the weakest outlook since February 2009.”
Comments
Post a Comment