| According to the British Retail Consortium, Britain’s high streets suffered their worst January since records began 15 years ago, with total sales increasing by just 1.2% from January 2009.
Like-for-like sales values fell by 0.7% compared to the same period last year, the poorest performance in 14 years.
Although nearly 30,000 more shoppers poured through the doors of the Wellgate last month than the previous January, manager John Morton said the nationwide sales trends looked “about right” for the centre.
The BRC pointed to the horrendous weather in January and the worldwide economic problems being faced as the main factors behind the poor sales figures, something Mr Morton agrees with. He said, “It is difficult to say (why the sales decreased) because the footfall went up.
“I think the weather definitely put people off as it’s so cold — would you come out if you didn’t have to?
“Maybe people don’t have as much money as they did in January last year, or it could be that retail targets are slightly higher than last year.”
Mr Morton said that worse sales figures are expected to arrive in February, but added he was “not overly concerned” about the economic picture facing the city.
“I think we are probably through the worst of it,” he said. “If we take the footfall out and just looked at the weather I would expect a slight drop in the figures.
“I’m not overly concerned about it at this time, we are past the worst of the weather, although we are certainly not past the worst of the retail period.
“There is normally a bit of a fillip with the sales in January, but people start taking stock after that and I expect February to be the hardest month of the year.”
Chairman of Dundee City Centre Action Group Dave Doig said today he thought the weather was a major factor in local shops struggling with their sales figures.
“There is no doubt the weather stopped people travelling,” he said.
“You could see it hit sales, it seemed to be directly attributable to the weather. Even though the streets were fine in the city centre people didn’t want to risk travelling.
“Everybody is hoping things will pick up this month and we can build from there.”
According to the BRC, the snow boosted food sales in the first week of January as people stocked up on essentials, but non-essential items took a big hit.
When the weather improved, food sales slowed, but non-food staged just a partial recovery.
Internet, mail-order and phone sales in January were 14.6% higher than a year ago, with the BRC suggesting this may have been down to shoppers buying online when snow prevented them getting out.
Stephen Robertson, BRC director-general, said, “An awful start to the year and in stark contrast to an upbeat December.
“This is the worst January sales growth in the 15 years we’ve been running the survey.” |
