Clothing and footwear market forecast to decline by £14bn

The UK clothing and footwear is anticipated to plummet in 2020, falling 26.1% versus 2019, a loss of around £14bn according to data analytics company GlobalData.

The firm predicts that with clothing stores expected to gradually reopen in June, footfall will remain low as consumers will be “cautious” about visiting crowded areas, and will instead prioritise catching up with family and friends that they have been unable to see during lockdown.

It also anticipates that spend will also be slow to recover as consumers will also prefer to spend time outside enjoying the summer weather rather than browsing retail stores, and will focus spend on experiences over fashion items.

In contrast to offline clothing and footwear sales, online sales are estimated to fare better, only declining by 7.9% in 2020, however this will not be enough to offset the loss in spend from physical stores.

Chloe Collins, senior retail analyst at GlobalData, said: “As the government has extended the UK lockdown for at least three more weeks, we expect that offline clothing and footwear sales in 2020 will further contract, falling 33.6% on the year, as the demand for fashion is increasingly decimated.

“With other European countries, such as Austria and Italy, gradually loosening their restrictions and keeping most non-essential stores closed, we expect fashion stores in the UK to remain shuttered for a number of weeks once the lockdown is eventually lifted, and not begin reopening until June.”

Collins added: “We expect several retail casualties within the fashion sector in the coming weeks, with Debenhams, Oasis and Warehouse already entering administration, and Arcadia said to be considering more store closures. Therefore, more empty spaces are anticipated on the high street, limiting physical fashion spend further.”