Retail sales for December rose 4.6 per cent, reports the Mastercard SpendingPulse, which measures in-store and online sales across all forms of payment. Better yet, the crucial month’s sales were up 10.4 per cent on pre-pandemic 2019 levels.
Household goods were the top performer, increasing 11 per cent by contrast to the same month in 2020. Clothing sales rose 7.7 per cent and food retailing inched up 1.2 per cent. But overall department store sales declined 3.7 percent in December.
Victoria saw the highest jump in retail sales of 8.5 per cent compared to the same period last year. NSW posted a gain of 1.5 per cent, compared to Queensland (+4.4%), WA (6.3%), ACT (+8.1%), NT (+3.5%), Tasmania (+8.5%) and South Australia (+0.2%)
Paul Zahra, CEO of the Australian Retailers Association (ARA), warned that January sales would feel the impact of the on-going Covid-19 pandemic. “The new year has delivered new challenges for retailers in the form of Omicron with tens of thousands of people forced into isolation every day. Whilst Christmas and holiday spending has held up well in December, and improved on last year, we had yet to reach the peak of Omicron and consumers were feeling more confident while going about their shopping.”
In spite of the December fall in department store sales, Myer reported a “particularly strong” run up to Christmas in the five months to January 1st.
Over 27 per cent of the company’s bricks-and-mortar trading days were lost over the reporting period because of Covid restrictions and lockdowns, but Myer enjoyed sales growth of 12.3 per cent year-on-year and a 17.1 per cent upsurge in the two months to the end of December.
Online sales now account for 27.7 per cent of group turnover and e-commerce revenues were up 54.3 per cent during the five months to January 1st by contrast to the same period a year earlier.
While we are seeing Omicron impact sales post-Christmas, we will continue to focus on growing our strong online business, ongoing engagement across our Myer one program and disciplined management of costs and inventory, noted John King, CEO of Myer.