Westfield predicting bumper Christmas footfall
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Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield has revealed that its two London shopping centres welcomed more than 827,000 visitors from December 7-9, which the company states is a “positive indicator” for the rest of the festive season.
Over the weekend, Friday, December 7 to Sunday, December 9, Westfield London and Westfield Stratford City recorded a 14 percent increase in visitors on last year, with the Sunday seeing both centres recording an increase of 26 percent compared to last year.
Since Black Friday, which now signals the start of the official Christmas shopping period, the two London shopping centres have attracted 4.3 million customers, up 13 percent on last year.
Myf Ryan, chief marketing officer Europe and group director of brand and strategic marketing for Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield, said in a statement: “Footfall across both our London destinations since Black Friday has been extremely positive with a double-digit rise on 2017 figures. We are looking forward to an extremely busy end to the festive period in 2018.
“Last year over 14.1 million people visited Westfield London and Westfield Stratford City over the Christmas period. We’re expecting strong footfall again in 2018, following the 600 million pounds expansion at Westfield London including John Lewis and Partners and Primark, transforming Westfield London into the largest shopping centre in Europe.”
The festive cheer doesn’t stop there as the shopping centres are predicting that Saturday, December 22 will be the biggest shopping day of the year.
Ryan added: “The final weekend before Christmas is always a bumper trading weekend and last year, with the benefit of a full weekend of trading just before Christmas Day, we welcomed 800,000 visitors across our centres. This year, ‘Super Weekend’ comes immediately before Christmas Eve, representing three full days for shoppers to pick up those last-minute presents or indulge in some self-gifting. We predict December 22, the last Saturday before Christmas, will be our biggest shopping day of the whole year.”