Season's Greetings

From all of us at My Fashion Connect Global.

Have a festive and joyful Christmas season!

Festive decor in the Peninsula Hotel, Hong Kong, December 2018. Photo by Alan Tyler.

 Deloitte reports record pre-Christmas discounts in the UK

According to Deloitte business services and research specialists, discounting during this pre-Christmas season is at record levels in the UK, having had analysed 800,000 products while revealing that discounts is on average around 44%, and possibly rising to 48% by Christmas eve, well ahead of the traditional clearance period.

Deloitte is expecting discounts to hit on average 52% from Boxing Day.

The experts feel that the recent mild weather has affected consumers' buying appetite for merchandise associated with the cold such as coats and boots, as well as knitwear which are traditionally desirable gifts.

 "We expect retailers to ramp up their discounting

 earlier than normal in an attempt to clear stock.”

Deloitte also said that the markdowns stores have applied as a result of the weak Autumn/winter 2018 season are spread "very wide" across the market.

Jason Gordon, Deloitte's lead consumer analytics partner, has reported that in recent years consumers have come to expect retailers to heavily discount products in the lead-up to Christmas which this year will fall on a Tuesday.  This means the shopping season will be shorter as consumers will use the preceding weekend to travel, thus resulting in potentially fewer crucial trading days for retailers. 

Retailers to get great Christmas boost

All this fuss about Black Friday, an American import dreamed up as a marketing exercise to drum up retail sales after Thanksgiving, and it is taking root in the UK.  Retailers here are all going for it.  

Indeed consumer spending leading up to the forthcoming festive season is driven up a gear by the promotions and retailers should benefit from stronger sales this Christmas, at least that’s what business advisory firm Deloitte is predicting in a recent report.  It states that consumers will spend over 42 billion pounds this Christmas, up 4 percent on last year.  That’s around £1.5 billion more than they did last year. 

The new report released by Deloitte also  states online sales are expected to account for 13 percent of December takings, and the growing importance of click & collect will see 2.5 billion pounds in sales this Christmas ordered online and collected in-store.  At 45 percent of all online transactions, this is almost double the level seen in December 2013.

Deloitte head of retail Ian Geddes said: "Growth in the influence of digital on physical retail has been driven by consumers' desire to access information on products and services, compare prices and increasingly pay and transact via digital devices.

"Those retailers that have invested in developing apps may now find that if these are only optimised for use as a separate channel, rather than an integrated part of the shopping experience, they will not be fit for purpose."

Sales via mobile devices are expected to account for 45 percent of UK online purchases during the festive season, according to online retailers' association IMRG.

By Alan Tyler

Managing Editor, My Fashion Connect