THE results of yesterday’s CBI retail survey caused an initial flurry of excitement when they were published.
The initial word was that the CBI’s distributive trades survey showed the strongest period of year on year growth in the sector since May. According to the employers’ organisation, a positive balance of 9% of retailers reported a rise in sales in the first weeks of December compared to the same period a year ago.
One group that was not benefiting from any uplift was big ticket items like furniture and white goods, but early discounting of clothes has helped boost sales. The Christmas trading period is probably not as bleak as feared.
Locally, its hard to be certain what is going on. Liverpool City Central Business Improvement District yesterday reported a 29% rise in footfall, but that news has to be interpreted in the context of last year’s big freeze, which kept shoppers at home for the best part of two weeks. Indeed, some of the stores closed early.
What is interesting is that footfall in Liverpool city centre this year is 6% up on 2009. That seems to indicate that Liverpool continues to attract fresh trade in the wake of the opening of Liverpool One.
THE OFFICE for National Statistics publishes economic output data for the 37 sub-regions of Britain this time every year.
This year’s figures contained a surprise. Liverpool and Merseyside had withstood the 2009 recession better than most other parts of Britain. Economic output for Merseyside did fall by 1.5%, only half of the fall suffered by the UK as a whole. Liverpool did even better, falling just 0.6%.
The obvious causes of the resilience of the local economy have to be the first full year of trading at both Liverpool One and the Arena and Convention Centre.
Another factor will have been the cushion provided by the city region’s usually much lamented over-dependence on the public sector for employment. The statistics covered the period before the 2010 general election and, therefore, before public spending cuts started to bite.
2010 was a period of tentative economic recovery, with all regions of Britain showing some gain. What this means for Merseyside and Liverpool will not be known for another 12 months, while the statisticians crunch the numbers.
What’s for certain is that when 2011’s figures are published they will reflect fresh lean times. Nor will there be the benefit of new developments adding to Merseyside or Liverpool’s output, so our performance won’t look so strong.
A SURPRISING feature of the current tough conditions is the very different ways they are affecting firms and their behaviour.
Big ticket furniture chain DFS should be a prime example of a business adopting a defensive posture at the moment. Far from it, DFS is currently investing to expand its chain.
Construction group Morgan Sindall is also in a sector that is badly affected by the downturn, but last week it told us that its order book had almost doubled.
Indeed, hardly a day goes by that there isn’t some nugget of good news to be found among the otherwise gloomy outlook.
It’s probably a question of winners and losers. Firms that survive get to pick off the best business from those that fail, meaning it can actually be a good time for the leanest, fittest and best.
If that’s true, it should bode well for the future. When things pick up again, the lean will thrive.
