Shopper footfall continues to slide in February, despite warm weather
Footfall among shoppers fell in February, the fifteenth consecutive month of declines and the weakest February in five years.
According to the British Retail Consortium and Springboard, a retail consultancy, overall footfall was down 2% in February, compared to a 0.2% decline in February 2018. This was despite unseasonably warm weather at the end of the month, which traditionally encourages consumers to hit the shops.
High street footfall fell 1.9%, against a 1.2% decline in February 2018 and the seventh consecutive month of weakening. Retail parks saw a 0.8% reduction in footfall and shopping centres a 3.4% decline.
Diane Wehrle, marketing and insights director at Springboard, said: “The 2% drop in footfall in February occurred despite the fact that February this year was the hottest on record.
“However, the record temperatures only occurred in the final week, when footfall rose by 2.5% compared with drops in each of the preceding three weeks. Indeed, the conditions certainly helped high streets, where footfall rose by 4.5% in the last week of the month compared with an average drop of 4.1% in the preceding three weeks.”
Helen Dickinson, chief executive of the BRC, said consumers remained cautious. “While real incomes have been rising over the last year, the uncertainty surrounding Brexit appears to be driving a needs-not-wants approach to shopping.”
Clive Black, analyst at Shore Capital, said: “Online retail participation continues to grow in the UK, eating into store-based traffic, while an amalgam of the general economic climate, politics, the weather and comparatives also account for the challenging footfall data.
“March has started cold and blustery, but it is up against the ‘Beast from the East’, [with] a later Mother’s Day and Easter to muddy the overall comparative picture. More broadly, political shenanigans are likely to act as a cloud of sorts until, please, matters are sorted with the European Union.”