Brit’s love to complain about the weather. It’s our thing. It’s endearing. And this year we’ve had more cause than ever for complaint. Now we have another grievance to add to the list.
It has been announced that the abysmal summer weather has had a significant impact on retail sales.
Although non-food sales rose, the wettest June in a hundred years saw patrons abandoning BBQ fare in favour of warming treats. Headline retail sales remained predominately static as a result, with heavy discounting propping up depressed spending. This issue was reiterated by Consumer Prices Data which revealed the negative impact of meat prices on overall inflation in June.
Not even gadding about for queen and country during the Jubilee provided a boost for the poor official figures.
The Office for National (ONS) Statistics has rebuffed claims made by the British Retail Consortium (BRC) that June’s retail sales were lifted by the rainy five day holiday. The ONS calculated there had been just 0.3 per cent growth in like-for-like sales, far less optimistic than the figure released by the BRC of 1.4 per cent.
Non-food sales rose 1.2 per cent through June, with sales of clothing and footwear rising by 2.5 per cent on the month; however it is likely that this was due to retailers bringing forward the summer sales usually held in July and August and the situation may be reversed next month.
In this morning’s stream of trading updates the dampening effect of the rain on consumer behaviour was emphasized. The consistently bad weather has done nothing to encourage spending in those already disheartened by tough economic conditions. This has proved a particular issue for pubs. Pub and Brewer group’s Fuller, Smith & Turner and Mitchells & Butlers have reported that the already rapidly diminishing British institutions received a significant knock to sales as pub gardens were rendered unusable.
Whilst some store chains have seen a percentage increase in their like-for-like sales others, like B&Q and Mothercare, have seen a drop.
Ian Cheshire, Chief Executive of the Kingfisher Group, explained why he felt that poor sales correlated with poor weather: ‘The unprecedented wet weather across northern Europe has continued throughout our second quarter so far, clearly impacting footfall and consumer demand for outdoor and seasonal products’.
Overall, feeble sales have contributed to the the weakest three monthly growth since March 2010 and GDP growth over the quarter will be lowered as a result.
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