John Lewis reports “best Christmas in its history”

Quintessentially British department store chain John Lewis has coined this Christmas to be the "best in its history" in term of sales. The start of the Boxing Day sales was key to round up a series of record weekly sales.Andy Street, managing director

of the department store chain, said a series of bumper sales weeks totted up to a Christmas that was the "best in its history" as shoppers flocked to its stores to buy gifts, reported Wednesday 'The Guardian'. Street said the sales picture had been "marginally better" than last year when the country was still in recession but confidently added: "December was a little stronger for everybody but I would predict that nobody will be near our numbers."

In the week prior to Christmas, the centenary retailer recorded 150 million pounds in sales for the first time with takings at its 39 stores and website hitting £157.8m, a 26.5 percent increase on the same week a year ago, highlighted the retailer. The employee-owned retailer's sales have exceeded 570 million pounds over the last month, which included three record weeks, reminded Street. "This is a story of John Lewis outperforming the high street," added the managing director of the company. "2012 has been very encouraging for us."

Helen Dickinson, director general of the British Retail Consortium (BRC), said that despite John Lewis's strong figures it "hasn't been a boom time for UK retailers" with many Britons spending the same amount as last year: "There are big variations in individual retail performances but, when the final sums are done, total spending is likely to be up modestly on last year though only broadly in line with shop price inflation. Sales were hard-fought and often driven by discounts."

Dickinson said the Christmas rush had come even later than usual as hard-pressed customers held out for bargains. The frugal mindset helped explain the huge Boxing Day crowds with some prospective shoppers setting out in the middle of the night to beat the rush.

A survey cited by BBC suggested shoppers will spend almost three billion pounds in the one day, with many stores reporting their busiest ever dayPrice comparison website MoneySupermarket.com said shoppers were planning to spend a total of 2.9billion pounds in the Boxing Day sales, according to a survey that it had conducted. However, market analyst Experian says online spending is also expected to be the "biggest and busiest ever", accounting for almost 500 million pounds on Boxing Day.