Hot weather, higher prices see retail footfall decline

A hot July and higher price tags saw Brits making less visits to shops last month, according to fresh industry data on Friday, with total UK retail footfall decreasing 14.2% over the pre-Covid comparative period in 2019.

The figure from the BRC-Sensormatic IQ footfall monitor was 3.7 percentage points worse than June. and worse than the three-month average decline of 12.3%.

“Following four months of steady progress, UK footfall stalled in July as record temperatures and the rising cost-of-living deterred people from visiting local shops,” said Helen Dickinson, chief executive of the British Retail Consortium.

“There was some respite in the last week of July, ahead of the women’s Euros finals, as people stocked up on food and drink to watch the Lionesses bring footfall home.

“Meanwhile, footfall in Northern Ireland bucked the UK trend and improved slightly on the previous month.”

Footfall on high streets declined 15.9%, which was two percentage points worse than last month's rate, and worse than the three-month average decline of 14.4%.

Retail parks saw footfall decrease 9.1% - one percentage point worse than last month's rate and worse than the three-month average decline of 8.2%.

Shopping centre footfall declined 24.8% - 0.7 percentage points worse than last month, but above the three-month average decline of 25.1%.

Geographically, Northern Ireland saw the shallowest footfall decline of all nations at 12.3%, followed by England at 14.0% and Wales at 15.8%.

Scotland again saw the steepest decline, at 16.5%.

“A new prime minister offers a renewed opportunity for the Conservative Party to meet its 2019 pledge for fundamental reform of the broken business rates system,” Helen Dickinson added.

“The first step is scrapping the ‘downwards phasing’ part of transitional relief - a flawed system that prevents retailers paying what they owe, and instead would force them to overpay more than £1bn between 2023 and 2026.

“This money could be better used to help limit price rises for customers, curb the rising cost-of-living and invest in the vitality of towns and cities around the country.”

Andy Sumpter, retail consultant at Sensormatic, added that July delivered a “smorgasbord of summer disruption” for retailers, with ongoing rail strikes derailing footfall gains and the record-breaking heatwave seeing shoppers “shun the shops” for several days as temperatures soared.

“Add to this the ongoing cautiousness we’re seeing among the cost-of-living consumer, it made for a bumpy month for shopper traffic performance,” Sumpter said.

“And amidst the tailwinds of economic uncertainty, comes possible policy changes as the Tory leadership contest plays out; retailers will be listening closely to how the next Tory leader plans to help the high street, whilst hoping shoppers vote with their feet in August.”

Reporting by Josh White at Sharecast.com.