Retail Sales, November 2014

18 Dec 2014 03:37 PM

Key Points

• Year-on-year estimates of the quantity bought in the retail industry continued to show growth for the 20th consecutive month. In November 2014, the quantity bought increased by 6.4% compared with November 2013. This was the highest year-on-year increase since May 2004 when it grew by 6.9%.
• The underlying pattern in the three-month on three-month movement in the quantity bought continued to show growth for the 21st consecutive month increasing by 1.1%. This was the longest period of sustained growth since November 2007 when there were 25 periods of consecutive growth.
• On the month, the quantity bought increased by 1.6% compared with October 2014. There was growth in all main store types for the first time since December 2013.
• Average store prices fell by 2.0% in November 2014 compared with November 2013, this was the largest fall since August 2002 when prices also fell by 2.0%. The largest contribution to the year-on-year fall once again came from petrol stations, however, prices in food stores showed their largest fall since June 2002, decreasing by 1.0%.
• In November 2014, the amount spent in the retail industry increased by 4.3% compared with November 2013 and by 1.2% compared with October 2014. Non-seasonally adjusted data show that the average weekly spend in the retail industry in November 2014 was £7.9 billion compared with £7.5 billion in November 2013 and £7.1 billion in October 2014.
• The value of sales made online increased by 2.9% compared with October 2014 and accounted for 11.5% of all retail sales in November 2014. Online sales increased by 12.9% compared with November 2013.
• Revisions in this release were caused by the incorporation of late data. More information on revisions can be found in the background notes.

Get all the tables for this publication in the data section of this publication.