Discounting fails to entice UK shoppers

Visits to shops and malls by fell 0.7 per cent on December 27, compared to the Tuesday after Christmas last year. Shopper numbers surged by 21.5 per cent on boxing day, December 26, with extended hours helping to boost business limited last year by Sunday trading restrictions. The four-day UK holiday weekend ended on a Tuesday in both 2010 and 2011, Bloomberg reported.Stores including Debenhams Plc, the UKs second-largest department store chain, had price cuts of as much as 70 per cent on items such as a 50-piece Christmas tree ornament set reduced to 4.50 pounds ($7). Gap Incorporated. (GPS), the clothing chain, had discounts of up to 60 per cent in the UK, alongside Comet, the electronics chain owned by Kesa Electricals Plc offering a Prestige microwave cut to 87.99 pounds from 219.99 pounds.Although minus 0.7 per cent looks like were struggling, its pretty much level and thats a better performance than this year so far, Neil Bennett, product manager at Experian Footfall, said by phone. Declines in customer numbers of about 1.6 per cent have been typical this year through the middle of December.The depth of discounting would put pressure on retailers margins, already hit by above-average temperatures, Maureen Hinton, a retail analyst at Verdict Research, said. The UK has had fairly widespread mild temperatures, in contrast to the coldest December in more than a century in 2010, according to the Met Office.Shoppers did leave it to the last minute and it was worse because there was a lot more stock to begin with, after mild weather held back pre-Christmas spending on winter clothing, she said. Most people have just held off spending until after Christmas because they do know January sales will be good.Parts of Londons busy West End shopping district remained cordoned off on Wednesday after an 18-year-old man was stabbed to death on December 26 outside a Foot Locker store on Oxford Street. The Metropolitan Police said 11 people had been arrested.Its a very rare occurrence, said Jace Tyrrell, a spokesman for the New West End Company, said. Shoppers were stunned but were pleased with the way it was handled.
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