PwC comments on May 2025 ONS retail sales figures

Commenting on the Office of National Statistics retail sales index for May 2025, Jacqueline Windsor, Head of Retail at PwC UK: 

"We said last month that the better-than-expected retail sales performance over Easter may have pulled forward sales from later in the spring, and so it has proven. Headline sales excluding petrol fell by 2.8% in May compared with April in volume terms, which translates into 2.2% less money in the tills of the nation’s retailers. Compared with last year, sales volumes were down by 1.3%, with pounds in the till broadly flat."

"Sales fell across every segment of retail compared with the previous month, but particularly for grocery with the double impact of the higher grocery price inflation announced earlier this week and poorer weather dampening shoppers’ appetites."

"After the unusually warm and sunny April, the great British weather reverted to its characteristic norm with cooler-than-average bank holiday weekends and a rainier-than-average half term, which in turn also led to falling footfall on Britain’s high streets."

"The gloomier weather also impacted demand for new season’s fashion, with clothing retailers reversing a quarter of improving sales performance with sales falling by 3.4% compared with last year, making it the worst performing category in May."

"While shoppers avoided the high street, neither did they turn to their mobile phones, with online sales falling for the second consecutive month, albeit penetration increasing slightly from 26.8% to 27.2%."

"The fact that retail sales fell back in May was not a surprise given the unusually strong performance the previous month. However, it does underline the fragility of consumers’ spending power and the retail sector in the current economic climate. With retailers also grappling with higher employee costs and business rates increases in the new financial year, they will be hoping that May’s sales were an outlier and that June’s heatwave heralds a more sustained improvement in consumer spending in line with the earlier months of 2025."