The British Retail Consortium (BRC) announced the retail sales of London for November 2005.
Retail sales in Central London during November were 2.1 percent higher, on a like-for-like basis, than in November 2004, when sales had picked up 1.4 percent. November's result was the first increase since June, before the July bombings.
Nevertheless, the average monthly change so far this year is a 1.7 percent decrease, much worse than the 2.6 percent increase for the same months of 2004. The three-month trend rate of growth in November improved to a 1.2 percent decrease from a 5.1 percent decrease in October.
Cold weather turned minds to winter clothes and Christmas shopping, and the many promotions and special sales attracted shoppers. Clothing and footwear did well, but elsewhere trade was often driven by discounts. Footfall was slightly better than in the last few months, but remained down on a year ago.
London sales outperformed UK sales, after four months of substantially larger declines than in UK sales.
Kevin Hawkins, LRC Director, comments that Central London retailers have been under a lot of pressure in recent months and this improvement, modest though it is, should provide some additional and welcome momentum in the run-up to the Christmas trading peak. Although customer footfall is still trailing last year? level, those who are coming into Central London to shop, do at least seem to be spending money.
Helen Dickinson, Head of Retail, KPMG, comments that after a very disappointing run in Central London for the last four months, November? growth will come as a welcome boost to retailers in the run up to the crucial Christmas trading period, particularly as it is on the back on stronger comparatives than we have seen for a while.
It also represents a break from the recent trend of London underperforming the rest of the UK. However, it will be a challenging task to continue this growth through December with the warmer and wetter weather we have seen so far, but at least it gives some basis for a degree of optimism.
BRC is the lead trade association representing the whole range of retailers, from the large multiples and department stores through to independents, selling a wide selection of products through centre of town, out of town, rural and virtual stores.
