Food and drink sales up despite economic gloom

Date: 15th October 2008

Sales of food and drink across the retail sector increased during September, despite market-wide doom and gloom.

Statistics from the British Retail Consortium (BRC) revealed that while like-for-like sales fell 1.5 per cent from September last year, food and drink showed substantial improvement.

In other sectors, clothing and footwear remained poor while furniture and homewares were significantly down over 2007.

A statement from the BRC read: "Turmoil in financial markets hit consumer confidence while increasing demands on household budgets meant shoppers looked for value and discounts and planned spending carefully."

The consortium added that weakness in the housing market had worsened sales of "big-ticket homewares" and high-price furnishings.

Statistics from this time last year had shown that sales for September 2007 had risen three per cent over the same month in 2006.

An expert at e-consultancy.com last week recommended that small business start-ups never reduce their advertising spend during an economic crisis.