THE RETAIL BULLETIN - The home of retail news
Click here
Home Page
News Categories
Commentary
Department Stores
Electricals and Tech
Entertainment
Fashion
Food and Drink
General Merchandise
Grocery
Health and Beauty
Home and DIY
Interviews
People Matter
Retail Business Strategy
Property
Retail Solutions
Electricals & Technology
Sports and Leisure
Christmas Ads
Shopping Centres, High Streets & Retail Parks
Retail Events
People in Retail Awards 2024
Retail HR Central 2024
The Future of The High Street 2024
Retail HR Summit
THE Retail Conference
Upcoming Retail Events
Past Retail Events
Retail Insights
Retail Solutions
Advertise
About
Contact
Subscribe for free
Terms and Policies
Privacy Policy
January footfall best in two years

UK retail footfall rose by 1.2% year-on-year in January which was a significant improvement on the 2.2% decline seen in December. The figures released by the… View Article

GENERAL MERCHANDISE NEWS

January footfall best in two years

UK retail footfall rose by 1.2% year-on-year in January which was a significant improvement on the 2.2% decline seen in December.

The figures released by the British Retail Consortium and Springboard in their monthly footfall monitor show that this was the best performance since January 2014, excluding Easter distortions.

Footfall in retail park locations climbed by 5.2% year-on-year which was the biggest increase in two years.

High Streets reported their first rise in footfall since July 2013 with an uplift of 0.2%.

Meanwhile, shopping centre footfall was broadly flat to mark the best performance since January 2014.

Helen Dickinson, BRC chief executive, said: “The improvement in shopper footfall witnessed in January provided a timely and welcome fillip to retailers at the start of the year, with retail parks once again recording a stellar performance. Indeed, this was the best overall footfall performance for two years, and well ahead of the 3-month average.”

The figures also show that the national town centre vacancy rate was 8.7% in January, down from the 9.1% rate seen in October 2015. This is the lowest reported rate since the BRC and Springboard began reporting the data in July 2011.

Diane Wehrle, marketing and insights director at Springboard, said: “The improved vacancy rate is an encouraging sign, but there needs to be caution about being too optimistic as evidence shows the driving force to be an increase in pop-ups and temporary lets in the run up to Christmas and which are still occupied.”

Subscribe For Retail News