Retail Sales Fell 0.4% in September as Warm Weather Hit Clothing
Retail sales volumes fell 0.4% in September, after a 0.7% rise in August, though they remain 0.8% higher than a year earlier. Non-food stores drove the decline, with clothing, footwear and sports equipment down on lower footfall. It is the last reading on household spending before the Budget.
The statisticians’ own explanation for the clothing weakness is the weather rather than the consumer: autumn and winter ranges did not perform in what was the joint-fourth warmest September on record. Household goods fell too, on hardware. Set against the month, the quarter looks steadier — sales across the three months to September were still 0.7% up on the previous quarter and 1.5% up on a year earlier — so this interrupts a recovery rather than reversing it. One line is worth pausing on: volumes of fuel sold rose on the month even as pump prices continued to climb, which is an unusual pairing and sits oddly beside the motor-fuel inflation that drove September’s price figures. Online sales values fell 0.4% after a 3% rise in August but are 6.8% above a year earlier, and the online share of all spending slipped only fractionally, from 28.9% to 28.8%. The response rate to the survey was 59.1%, covering 92.4% of turnover. The next reading comes on 20 November, which is to say after the Budget rather than before it.