First Boxing Day unaffected by Covid sees footfall declining from pre-pandemic levels

The UK in-store footfall on Boxing Day was down by 15.3 per cent compared to pre-Covid levels while the Friday-Monday festive period experienced an 18.4 per cent decline in traffic compared to 2019, retail intelligence company RetailNext has reported.

However, the shopper cumbers climbed 55.1 per cent year over year, while traffic for the Friday-Monday period climbed 30.9 per cent, RetailNext, a technology platform that brings e-commerce style shopper analytics to brick-and-mortar stores, added.

“After a challenging end to the year, a drop in footfall on Boxing Day compared to 2019 will be a blow for retailers across the UK. In the first festive period unaffected by the Covid-19 pandemic, the sector would have been hoping for a bounce in footfall, but rail strikes and the cost of living crisis have compounded to create a hugely challenging time for retailers,” commented Joe Shasteen, global manager at Advanced Analytics, commented.

“Despite the return to some kind of normality, which is reflected in the positive traffic trends against 2021, retailers have still had to contend with a huge amount of disruption over December. As the rising cost of living continues to impact the amount of discretionary spend for consumers, this perhaps highlights how important pricing and promotions will be over the next 12 months.”

Store traffic in the South East and London reflected the smallest footfall decline on Boxing Day over 2019 (-8.0%), but was up year over year (+61.2%) for the day. From a category perspective, Clothing and Shoes attracted the highest traffic on Boxing Day compared to 2019 (-6.3%), and was up almost 71 per cent over last year.