UK fashion sales recorded their biggest decline in six months during March, hit by chilly weather and fewer discounts.
Sales of clothing fell 5.5% in the month, according to advisory firm BDO. Its monthly high street tracker measures the performance of 85 mid-sized chains such as Gap, French Connection and Hobbs.
Poor fashion sales affected the high street as a whole, dragging underlying trading down by 4%, the worst monthly drop since September 2011
BDO said shoppers were staying away from the high street because there were less discounts around to tempt them.
The trend was underlined by a tough week at John Lewis. Sales at the department store slumped 5% in the week to 28 March with fashion the hardest hit – down 11.6%. The retailer said performance was largely affected by comparison with the same week last year when John Lewis was price-matching a sales event at rival House of Fraser.
BDO’s figures are in sharp contrast to figures released by Marks & Spencer on Thursday in which it said it had enjoyed a strong start to 2015. The retailer delivered its first quarterly rise in clothing underlying sales in more than four years, albeit by just 0.7%.
“Some consumers may have been delaying purchases until the extended bank holiday weekend this week when they will have more disposable time,” BDO said. However, Easter is two weeks earlier this year than in 2014.
The figures look particularly bad because they are set against a strong period of trading a year ago when retailers enjoyed the best performance for fouryears. Last March, much of the country was bathed in unseasonably balmy temperatures following floods in February.
Even online sales growth was affected. While retailers rang up 17.6% more sales in March than last year, that was the lowest pace of growth since November 2011, when the economy was still suffering from the biggest recession since the 1930s.
