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Evening Standard
Evening Standard
National
James Morris

John Lewis: Fish kettles, cocktail shakers and women's suspenders fall out of fashion as sales of jumpsuits and headbands soar

A file image of the John Lewis store in Oxford Street (Picture: Kirsty O'Connor/PA)

Fish kettles, cocktail shakers and women's suspenders have fallen out of fashion as British shoppers sent sales of luxury loungewear and sports headbands soaring, according to a new John Lewis report.

The department store's annual Retail Report said sales of women's suspenders fell eight per cent as customers opted instead for comfortable underwear, "modest" longer hemlines and looser silhouettes.

Clutch bags were also removed from the retailer's own-brand accessories range.

​Meanwhile, the retail giant said sales of landline phones plummeted by 20 per cent last year - and are down 45 per cent since 2014 - as customers increasingly rely on their smartphones to communicate.

The increasing quality of smartphone cameras is also thought to be responsible for a 33 per cent drop in camcorder sales. Sales of mantel clocks - once the centrepiece of the living room - are also down 30 per cent as people turn to their voice-activated speakers for the time.

In the kitchen, the boom in artisan tonics is thought to be behind a drop in sales of cocktail shakers, while John Lewis stopped selling fish kettles - a dish used for cooking a whole fish - entirely as formal dinner parties fell out of favour.

The retailer also revealed it stopped selling drones in May this year following disruption involving the devices at Gatwick Airport in December which affected roughly 140,000 passengers and 1,000 flights.

On the rise are items inspired by cult television shows such as Fleabag and Peaky Blinders.

The report said sales of black jumpsuits - as worn by Phoebe Waller-Bridge in the wildly popular Fleabag - went up 66 per cent.

Flat cap sales also went up 25 per cent amid the success of Peaky Blinders. Tommy Shelby, played by Cillian Murphy, famously wears the caps in the BBC series.

Sales of reusable water bottles jumped by 15 per cent in the week before the Glastonbury Festival, which had announced a ban on single-use plastic, while sales of sports headbands and goal posts surged as the nation cheered on the Lionesses in the Fifa Women's World Cup.

Simon Coble, trading director at John Lewis & Partners, said: "As a destination for customers during key life moments and big decisions, understanding how the nation shops, lives and looks remains at the top of our agenda."

Additional reporting by PA.

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