Retail footfall in the UK saw stability return in the final week of February as the country experienced more consistent weather conditions. Data from Springboard revealed that visits to retail destinations increased by 11.1% compared to the previous week, which had seen a decline of 3.8% due to storms Dudley and Eunice. The rise in footfall was primarily driven by higher numbers on Friday and Saturday, with footfall averaging 43.3% higher than the previous week. However, footfall dropped by an average of 0.2% from Sunday to Thursday, with decreases on three of those days.
Footfall experienced a notable rise on Tuesday and Wednesday, especially in UK high streets, which saw a 13.4% increase. Shopping centres witnessed an 8.9% rise, while retail parks saw a more modest increase of 2.6%. All types of towns saw an increase in footfall last week, with Central London experiencing a 17% increase and Springboard’s ‘Back to the Office’ benchmark seeing a 20.3% rise. These figures suggest that more workers are gradually returning to the office following the lifting of Covid restrictions by the government. However, footfall in city centres outside of London saw a smaller increase of 10% and only a 0.4% increase over four days from Monday to Thursday. This indicates that footfall in London was likely boosted by families taking advantage of the school break.
Despite the day-to-day fluctuations, the overall rise in footfall narrowed the gap from 2019 levels. The decline compared to pre-pandemic footfall reduced from 26.3% to 17.2% in the preceding week. However, Ipsos reported that footfall in the non-food retail sector was down 18.6% during the week of February 21-26 compared to the same period in 2019. Towns performed better than cities by 5.2% during this week, with Northern England emerging as the best-performing region, experiencing only a 13.2% decline in store visits.
While these numbers show some improvement, it is clear that visitor traffic to UK retail destinations still has a long way to go before returning to normality and pre-Covid patterns. The retail sector will likely continue to face challenges as it navigates through the ongoing impact of the pandemic.
Useful Links:
1. Springboard Research
2. Ipsos
