Bank holiday boost for UK retail footfall says Springboard

By

Nigel TAYLOR

Published
Aug 31, 2021

Footfall across all UK retail destinations rose 4.9% week-on-week for the seven days from August 22 to 28, boosted by the lead up to the summer’s final bank holiday weekend.

Footfall rose 6.9% in high streets and by 4.8% in shopping centres, with a modest rise of just 0.8% in retail parks, according to Springboard.

Central London rose 5.5% week-on-week and was up 67.6% year-on-year. That means it’s down only 28.4% compared to this time in 2019.

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Springboard said patchy weather conditions held back some consumer enthusiasm, especially on the bank holiday Monday, just before the new school term begins. 

Footfall across all retail destinations rose by an average of 3.9% from Sunday to Friday compared to the week before, but lifted by an average of 8.2% over the August bank holiday weekend.

Coastal towns were up by 19.8% over the bank holiday weekend, and footfall rose 20.1% in historic towns. 

Despite the bank holiday weekend uplift in footfall, there was a sharp dip of 11.7% on bank holiday Monday. A large proportion of this decline came from shopping centres where footfall dipped 10.8%, but rose by 4.5% in retail parks as shoppers headed to food stores to restock on household essentials. 

Last week, visitor traffic was also 14.2% higher than in the same week in 2020, and 23.4% higher in high streets.