Black Friday outperforms festive footfall

UK store footfall fell by 7.2 percent in December against last year, according to the latest retail footfall figures from Ipsos Retail Performance.

Black Friday has been stated as the main reason for the drop, with Ipsos revealing that November average weekly footfall was up 27.7 percent.

Dr. Tim Denison, director of Retail Intelligence at Ipsos Retail Performance said in a statement: “We knew the start of the official reporting month would be strong, given it contained Black Friday, and this proved to be the case. Stores were +0.8 percent busier in that first full week compared to Black Friday week last year, with footfall on the day itself being up by +5.6 percent.

“The obvious concern was this strong showing would cannibalise demand in the following run-in to Christmas; and so it transpired. Black Friday knocked the stuffing out of Christmas shopping, at least in-store footfall terms.”

The number of shoppers in non-food stores usually rises progressively each week in the month before Christmas Day, but this year that failed to materialise, instead footfall fell by 1.8 percent during the week commencing December 8.

The following week, the final full week before Christmas did see something of a recovery, jumping up by 13.7 percent, "but not enough to make up for lost ground,” added Ipsos.

UK store footfall fell by 7.2 percent in December

Super Saturday was also “not so super” as it recorded a decline of 6.2 percent on last year, and both Christmas Eve and Boxing Day disappointed against last year with falls of 9.4 percent and 13.4 percent respectively.

Footfall did improve for the final weekend of the year, driven by the festive sales, with shopper numbers for Friday, December 27 being only 1.1 percent down on Super Saturday.

London and the South East was the only region to register an increase in-store footfall in December, up 0.8 percent on 2018.

However, overall store footfall declined by 5.0 percent in 2019, and by 7 percent in Quarter 4 compared to 2018.

Denison added: “Overall, the annual decline in footfall ended up as we had predicted, but the pattern of the year was very different. Far from being a ponderous start, shoppers came out of the blocks early and in their numbers during the first 6 months, responding to the strengthening of real earnings growth. However, the resolve of shoppers eroded after the summer, reflecting the political and economic stalemate that befell the nation.

“We start 2020 in a more optimistic hue than in any of the previous three years. Now with a powerful Brexit mandate behind the Government, the country is hoping to be lifted out of paralysis and back into productivity, bringing new vigour into the consumer economy.”

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