Mystery Shoppers

Featured Article June '09

O.N.S. Change

The Office for National Statistics has changed the way it measures retail sales. The previous system was regularly criticised. With the new method, known as ‘chain-linking’, the estimates of sales values will be revised downwards.

Overall the volume of retail sales in April 2009 was 0.7% higher than a year ago. This is the smallest increase since 1996. The statistics now available suggest first quarter growth of just 0.3%. The monthly figure masks large differences between sectors of the retail market.

Predominately food stores’ sales volume increased by 1.5%. While the largest increase was in textile, clothing and footwear stores which saw a rise of 11.9%.

Household goods, a sector that’s had a particularly torrid time of late, continued to suffer declining sales, with a drop of 7.9% on the previous year.

Non-specialised stores, such as department stores, reported surprisingly strong growth at 2.4%, the highest level since June 2008. This made them the strongest sector after textile, clothing and footwear stores.

In short, news from the dismal science just got a bit more accurate, but no less dismal.

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