John Lewis sales up 4.5% last week
John Lewis increased its sales by 4.5% year-on-year last week despite the snow in some parts of the country impacting trade in the shops.
Online sales climbed by 18.6% driven by a 22% increase in traffic. Looking at the shops, Ipswich, Swindon and Ashford all achieved double-figure increases while the big stores in Cardiff, Stratford City and Leicester posted solid uplifts.
Maggie Porteous, director of selling for North and New Format at John Lewis, said: “The first week of the new financial year dawned cold across the country, with snow hitting a number of regions over the course of the week, causing minor disruption to trade in some of our shops. But that is where the strength of our omni-channel trade comes to the fore – with customers shopping across all channels we saw an increase last week of 4.5% on last year.”
Fashion sales climbed by 7.7% with childrenswear putting in a standout performance. In addition, haberdashery returned to form as customers were inspired by the new series of The Great British Sewing Bee.
In the home directorate, trade was boosted by the new Fusion range which helped sales to rise by 6.6%. Sales of beds and bedroom furniture were particularly buoyant and flooring also enjoyed strong sales.
Meanwhile, electrical and home technology sales edged up 0.3% helped by a solid increase in sales of vacuum cleaners and heating products.
