John Lewis sees sales fall in Indian summer
John Lewis saw a 7.9% downturn in sales last week as the unusually warm September weather discouraged its customers from going shopping.
Fashion sales were down 13% on the same week last year as customers delayed their purchase of autumn clothing. Electrical, Home and Technology sales were also down with a decrease of 2.2%.
Sales in the Home directorate were 5.8% down although furniture saw an improvement on recent weeks with fitted furiture recording an increase of 22%.
Online sales were ahead of last year but the percentage increase was down on recent weeks at 14%.
The retailer opened its new Chester at home branch during the week. However, all branches recorded a fall in sales compared to the same week last year with Edinburgh, Sheffield and Peter Jones achieving the smallest declines.
Lesley Ballantyne, director of operational development at John Lewis said: “Over the next few weeks we have ongoing refurbishments coming to fruition in many of our branches and we will launch the pilot of our new ePOS system in Leicester. As the temperature returns to autumnal norms we are well set to take advantage when customer footfall increases.”
