Consumers and retailers are finding that conditions are getting worse in the run-up to Christmas, the British Retail Consortium (BRC) has said following the release of Office for National Statistics (ONS) sales figures.
After the ONS found that sales values grew by 3% year-on-year in September, the BRC said that there will be a real-term sales fall, even though the new figures are at odds with the consortium’s own statistics.
Director general Stephen Robertson said: “The official figures rightly confirm overall sales growth is slowing and conditions toughening for customers and retailers as the crucial run-up to Christmas begins.
“With almost all sales growth confined to food many non-food retailers are under huge pressure. Not only are sales hard to come by but deep and widespread discounting is putting margins under tremendous pressure as costs rise.”
He added that food sales growth is also slowing as food inflation starts to come down.
This stance came after the KPMG/SPSL Retail Think Tank found that year-on-year sales values are likely to drop in the last few months of the year. Overall, retail health will deteriorate, it said.
Moreover, Verdict research has said that people will spend less on food in the run-up to Christmas, but they will buy less of it, as inflation has pushed prices up.
Commenting on the disparity between the two sets of figures – the BRC said sales values grew by only 1% in September – Robertson said the UK Statistics Authority has recommended the ONS puts greater emphasis on long-term trends in the future, rather than month-to-month changes.
