Christmas footfall plunges
Published: 07 January, 2009
Christmas can often be the make or break period for retailers – especially if they have suffered a particularly quiet spell in the preceding months. The press is currently awash with speculation as to whether the shops fared worse than in December 2008 than in the same period the previous year. It was hoped that last minute pre-Christmas sales would reel in the punters, yet if the National High Street Index is to be believed, even the most ferocious of bargain-hunters decided to stay at home.
It comes as no surprise therefore that according to the National High Street Index shoppers did not spend as hoped during the lead up to Christmas 2008. Footfall on the nation’s high streets declined by 8 per cent from December 2007, and the increase of just over 11 per cent in footfall from November to December 2008 was the lowest monthly increase since the Index began in 2005.
The Index’s figures also confirm shoppers delayed their trips into town centres until as late as possible, in anticipation of the massive discounts advertised. In four of the five weeks in December, week on week increases in footfall were greater this year than last. Many shoppers even delayed purchasing presents until the week of Christmas itself: the highest levels of footfall in the high streets were in the third week of the month rather than in the second week as in December 2007.
However, despite consumers holding back during December, they came out in force after Christmas as the sales frenzy peaked with footfall on the high streets on Boxing Day almost 1 per cent higher than on Boxing Day 2007. Plus, whilst footfall typically dips significantly in the week post Christmas (week 5), this year footfall fell less than it did in 2007.
Diane Wehrle, director of Springboard who conducted the research, comments: “While it is heartening to see that retailers’ tactic of bringing forward the sales period paid off with the post-Christmas rush and an increase of shoppers on the high street, it does raise concerns about the likely performance of our high streets in January.
“Retailers may have used up their ‘bag of tricks’ too early and could be left with nothing more to offer consumers to coax them back into the shops during January and February.”
