Growth in retail footfall slows - BRC

Retail footfall growth softened in February, industry data published on Friday showed, as shoppers tightened their belts after Christmas and the January sales.

According to the latest BRC-Sensormatic IQ Footfall Monitor, total UK footfall was up 10.4% on February 2022 but down 2.1 percentage points on January’s 12.5% hike.

Within that, footfall on high streets declined month-on-month by 2.4 percentage points. Year-on-year it jumped 17.8% although that remains below the three-month average of 18.4%

In shopping centres footfall improved 11.7% year-on-year but declined 0.7 percentage points on January. In contrast, footfall fell 3.3% year-on-year in retail parks, which was 0.2 percentage points better than January.

Helen Dickinson, chief executive of the British Retail Consortium, said: "Growth in footfall slowed after the rush of Christmas shopping and January sales.

"Some people are making fewer visits as the cost of living continues to bear down ahead of April’s energy price rise. Consumer demand remains fragile."

Andy Sumpter, retail consultant, EMEA, for Sensormatic Solutions, said: "While the fluctuations in footfall are no less volatile, creating a new baseline against which to benchmark performance, it doesn’t mean the footfall recovery has yet fully turned a corner.

"Retailers are still grappling with underlying uncertainty as they try to keep pace in the context of multi-faceted challenges."