UK retail sales volumes drop by 0.2% in Sept 2021: ONS

Non-food stores reported a fall of 1.4 per cent in sales volumes in September due to falls in household goods stores (minus 9.3 per cent), such as furniture and lighting stores, and other non-food stores (minus 1.7 per cent) like sports equipment stores, ONS said in a release.

Despite relaxation of COVID-19 restrictions in summer 2021, in-store retail sales remain subdued; the proportion of retail sales online rose to 28.1 per cent in September 2021 from 27.9 per cent in August, substantially higher than the 19.7 per cent in February 2020 before the pandemic.

Retail sales volumes have fallen each month since April 2021 when non-essential retailing re-opened and retail sales reached levels substantially above those before the pandemic. This is the longest period of consecutive monthly falls in the history of this series (which began in February 1996). However, sales remain 4.2 per cent above the level seen before the pandemic (February 2020).

Non-food stores were the largest contributor towards the monthly decrease at 0.5 percentage points. Within this, household goods stores, such as furniture and lighting stores were the main contributor which fell by 9.3 per cent over the month.

Clothing and department stores reported an increase in monthly sales volume of 4.3 per cent and 0.2 per cent respectably. Sales volumes were 5.5 per cent and 5.1 per cent below their pre-pandemic February levels.

Online spending values increased in September 2021 by 0.5 per cent when compared with August 2021, largely because of an increase in department stores sales values (3.8 per cent).

The monthly increase in online spending values resulted in a slight increase in the proportion of online sales, which increased to 28.1 per cent in September 2021, from 27.9 per cent in August.

Fibre2Fashion News Desk (DS)