Shopper numbers fall again, BRC-Springboard footfall data shows

Numbers of people popping into UK shops continued to fall last month, according to a survey of the industry published on Monday, while another report found around a third of retailers have scrapped or delayed investment due to Brexit worries.

Footfall in October declined 0.4% compared to a year ago, the BRC-Springboard monitor report found, which was better than the 0.9% slide in September.

With recent total sales growth data showing positive growth, this indicates an increasing amount of retail spending done entirely online.

High street footfall fell for the second consecutive month, down 0.4% after the 0.5% fall previously, while retail park numbers bounced 1.1% after a flat month in September and shopping centres fell for the ninth month in a row, though the 1.8% drop was better than the 2.5% in the previous month.

The report also found the quarterly shop vacancy rate in national town centres was 9.5%, an improvement from 10.1% per cent in July after two quarters of consecutive growth, which was partly put down to an increase in short term lets in the run up to Christmas.

British Retail Consortium chief executive Helen Dickinson said the figures underlined some of the challenges facing bricks and mortar retailers.

“Interestingly, October’s BRC-KPMG Retail Sales Monitor showed a 1.7% increase in like-for-like sales growth across the country, which perhaps suggests that shoppers may still be prepared to shell out for a bargain, but they are increasingly doing so from their laptops or mobile devices," she said.

The footfall picture was mixed across the country, she added, with most areas seeing a decline in shopper numbers, but the North and Yorkshire region showed a 0.5% year-on-year increase.

Analyst Clive Black at Shore Capital said, "More broadly, what this survey point reminds us is that there is little easy trade in UK retail at the moment.

"Channel shift, with more than one in five non-food transactions online, continues to mould the nature and extent of stores."

He said that while pressures and uncertainty persists, other lead indicator into the 2016 peak period have looked more sound, with consumers "collectively have a bit of a blast" in the seasonal period… "before seeing what the New Year, Article 50 and all, brings".

Meanwhile, research also published on Monday by the Centre for Economics and Business Research (CEBR) and Hitachi Capital found that UK businesses have delayed or canceled investments worth £65.5bn since the vote to leave the European Union.

However, retail was found to be the third least pessimistic sector, with less than a third of companies surveyed having delayed investment, compared to nearer 40% for IT & telecoms and construction & real estate industries, according to YouGov who conducted the polls.