High Street Retail Footfall Drops 4.3% in November

Data from Springboard shows that retail footfall on the UK's high streets declined by 4.3% in November, suggesting that shoppers held off on purchasing until Black Friday promotions began.

Note - sales data from Black Friday - which took place on Friday 29th November - was not covered in the report.

Overall, footfall declined by 3.4%:

- Retail park footfall declined by 1.8%, compared with 1.4% decline in 2018;

- High street footfall declined by 4.3%, compared with 3.8% decline in 2018;

- Shopping centre footfall declined by 3%, compared with a 3.8% decrease in 2018.

Springboard director Diane Wehrle, said: “Whilst the heavy rain will have deterred many shoppers from making trips to retail destinations, the poor footfall in the second half of the month will have been exacerbated by the proximity of Black Friday discounts,”

“Alerts arriving on a regular basis into consumers’ inboxes in the run up to Black Friday enabled consumers to watch the retail market easily and identify the depth and spread of discounts being offered. If they weren’t already planning on doing so, this will have led to many consumers pulling back on trips to destinations causing a spending freeze over the last two weeks of the month in anticipation of big discounts on current stock,” she added.

“The fact that the Black Friday weekend also started on payday heightened the chances of a spending spree which took place after the month had ended. This pent up demand is clearly evident from the fact that footfall in the last week of the month in shopping centres dropped by -5.2%, more than in high streets and retail parks. Having the greatest concentration of retailers heavily promoting discounts, it was not surprising that it was in shopping centres where footfall increased most over Black Friday,”.

Source : Insight DIY Team

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