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Christmas rush carries through to the Sales
Archived article dated Tuesday December 30th 2008
Retail Traffic Index figures released by Synovate Retail Performance today confirm that the number of non-food shopping trips made in the UK during Christmas week (21st to 27th December) was up on 2007 by 3.2%.
This represents the first increase on last year in nine weeks (since w/c 26 Oct). Best of the regions was Scotland & Northern Ireland, where retail traffic was up 4.9% on the same week last year.
The last minute Christmas surge that began on Friday the 19th carried right through to Christmas Eve, when retail footfall was 0.3% higher than last year. Newly released data for the period after Christmas reveals that the pre-Christmas rush became a post-Christmas Sales surge. The day after Boxing Day, (Saturday the 27th), just as it had last year (when it was a Thursday), turned out to be the busiest shopping day of the year, with retail footfall levels up 3.6% on the previous week and up even by 3.5% on 'Mammoth Monday' (22nd December) which until then had been 2008's busiest day in the shops all year, as recorded by Synovate. It was, however, slightly quieter than last year (down by 1.8%), but this was partly reflective of more retailers beginning their Sales earlier than last year.
Synovate retail psychologist Dr Tim Denison explained, “After an extremely lacklustre mid-month period, Christmas week finally produced the last minute rush of shoppers that retailers had hoped for, but not all had expected. It was the final six days before Christmas, when shopper numbers were overall 2.2% higher than last year, which made all the difference. Shoppers, holding back for throw-away prices, finally realised that it simply wasn't going to happen that side of Christmas, so they went present-hunting at the last minute. Just as we had anticipated, the pre-Christmas surge that we had detected did, indeed, carry through to the first few days of the Sales.”
Denison continued, “Retailers will be hoping that the busy start to their post-Christmas Sales continues at a pace through the current week, but I think it will be conditional both on the quality of merchandise on Sale and the level of discounting. Shoppers are by now very conscious of the economic downturn and its likely impact on them personally. Just recently they have become far more selective in their purchases and the prices they're prepared to pay. Personal indulgence, it seems, is something that the masses have largely assigned to the past. Their todays and tomorrows are firmly rooted in buying necessities now, not novelties.”
Tagged as: christmas | sales | synovate
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