Springboard records increases across the board
UK footfall rose by +1.9% over the week, with positive results for all three destination types. However, this seemingly good news needs to be evaluated against the same week last year when the rise in footfall from the week before was more than double this, at +5.5%.
Inevitably, this weaker uplift in footfall over the week was reflected in an annual decline of -1.3%, compared with a rise of +3.2% between 2016 and 2017. The drop over the year emanated from a decline of -1.9% in high streets and -1.8% in shopping centres, whilst rising very marginally by +0.3% in retail parks; and in both high streets and shopping centres the decline was virtually universal, spanning nearly all geographies.
In fact, in high streets, further disappointing news was the fact that the drop was greater than -3% in half of all areas of the UK, and more than -5% in four areas (East, Scotland, the South West and Wales). The results for shopping centres were not as extreme, with drops of more than -3% in only two areas (East Midlands and the South West). However, even in retail parks where the overall result was a rise from last year – albeit a marginal one – footfall declined in half of all UK geographies, and by as much as -3% in the South West.
