Musafir123
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The Boxing Day shopping expedition loses its allure
Retailers braced for difficult times ahead, despite online pick-up
Retailers braced for difficult times ahead, despite online pick-up
Boxing Day customers wait to board an escalator at Selfridges Getty
by: Vanessa Houlder
The number of bargain hunters visiting the Boxing Day sales is likely to have fallen this year, marking a further shift away from bricks-and-mortar stores towards internet transactions.
While footfall declined, a growing number of shoppers went online on Monday. By midday, transactions were 11.5 per cent higher than the same period in 2015, according to Springboard, a retail consultancy.
Diane Wehrle, insights director at Springboard, said that the reduction in footfall, which at midday on Boxing day was 6 per cent lower than a year earlier, was a concern to retailers even though it was likely to be offset by the growth in internet sale
She said: Some retailers do really well from the move to online but ultimately they need people to visit their stores which are a huge fixed cost.
The figures showed big regional variations, with relatively strong performances from London and the north of England. In central London, the New West End Company, which represents more than 600 retailers across 25 West End streets said that average footfall was up 5 per cent by mid-afternoon on Boxing Day compared with the previous year.
Jace Tyrrell, chief executive of New West End Company, said that prices had been slashed by up to 80 per cent, with particularly big discounts on high fashion items.
He said the very strong sales in the West End was partly driven by the decision of more retailers to open, including Bond Street shops. The fall in sterling had also increased demand, as international customers account for a third of sales.
West End shops were expected to report sales of 55m for the day, he said. Chinese shoppers were making a significant contribution, spending five times more than UK shoppers
Intu, the shopping centre group which owns many of the UK's largest retail destinations including Lakeside in Essex and MetroCentre in Gateshead, reported that shoppers were out in force and said that many had been waiting in long queues for the stores to open.
But even retailers expecting to post a strong performance are braced for difficult conditions ahead. Earlier this month, Helen Dickinson, chief executive of the British Retail Consortium, said there was a tough outlook for 2017 when retailers were braced for a triple whammy of cost pressures.
Retailers will grapple with inflation, big increases in business rates in some areas, another increase in the national living wage and apprenticeship levies. At the same time they needed to increase their digital investment to respond to the changing ways in which people want to shop, she said.
These challenges came at a time when the market was growing slowly. She said that retail sales were likely to show a marginal increase in pound terms over 2015.
The decline in footfall on Monday was largely driven by shopping centres, where footfall had fallen by 16.6 per cent by midday on Boxing day compared with a year earlier.
Ms Wehrle said that many smaller shopping centres did not offer the leisure and hospitality facilities that were increasing important for shoppers. High streets and big shopping centres were more resilient.
Ms Wehrle predicted that footfall would pick up later on Boxing Day, but still post a decline for physical stores over the day as a whole. The overall number of people visiting shops in December has declined every year except 2011, since Springboard began monitoring footfall in 2009
Source link: https://www.ft.com/content/b6c407a4...amp=published_links/rss/home_us/feed//product
