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High inflation and rising interest rates did not impact consumer activity across UK retail destinations last month, according to Springboard, who reported both the highest month-on-month and annual increases in footfall for June in any year since 2009.
Footfall rose by +3.7% over the month from May to June, against only +1.1% from April to May. Footfall also strengthened against last year, with an annual rise of +4.2%, against +3.3% in May. Furthermore, the gap from the pre-pandemic footfall level also narrowed to the smallest yet at -8.6%, down from -10.8% in May.
Springboard said that some of this uplift was due to seasonal factors, with more light and warmer weather encouraging consumers to visit retail destinations during daytime trading hours, as well as restaurants and bars in the evening.
What it found most surprising, however, was that, excluding the Covid period, the increase in June this year was greater than in any June since 2009, exceeding the previous record of +3.4% in June 2013.
A further boost was provided by consumers making evening trips to towns and cities, enabling food and beverage operators to “reap the rewards of shoppers keen to dine out”, with high street footfall post 5pm rising by +6.3% from May, against an increase of +3.6% during daytime trading hours.
Diane Wehrle, Marketing and Insights director, said: “Whilst many consumers are clearly already being hit hard by the government’s measures to control inflation, the volume of shopping activity in stores and destinations clearly continued to increase in June.
“A proportion of trips will have been made for price comparison purposes, with consumers trading down and looking for bargains where possible. However, those consumers who still hold fixed rate mortgages remain insulated from the full impact of the rise in interest rates, providing them with some breathing space to continue to shop ahead of the end of their fixed rate period.”
