High Street Footfall - June 2008 Commentary

ATCM - Springboard High Street Index

June 2008 Commentary

Whilst all appears to be gloomy within the retail sector, our high streets appear to have a degree of resilience with an annual change in footfall of +1.3% nationally in June.

This contrasts with a decline annually in retail sales of 0.4% in June, as reported by the BRC, however a likely explanation for the difference stems from the exceptionally poor weather last June - the wettest on record - which undoubtedly suppressed footfall in our town centres in June 2007. Indeed in all regions of the UK other than Scotland, rainfall in June last year was between 30% and 65% greater than the average for June during the previous 30 years.

The impact of adverse weather on town centre footfall - and its implications for June this year - is further demonstrated by looking at the trend week by week during June.

Compared with last year, footfall actually decreased slightly in three of the five weeks during the month, and the only significant year on year increase took place in week 2 (+7.4%) which is the week in which the rainfall commenced last year.

So it seems that the positive results for the high street are deceiving - in the absence of last year's adverse weather conditions it is likely that the year on year change in June this year would have been sub +1.0% and more likely less than +0.5%. Indeed, this is substantiated by the BRC which continues to report that consumer confidence has continued to fall and is reaching new record lows.