According to new data from BDO’s High Street Sales Tracker, total UK in-store and online sales fell by 2.2% in March, marking the sixth consecutive month of negative sales results – the longest consecutive period of negative growth outside of the COVID-19 pandemic. BDO’s data, which looks at sales across discretionary spend categories, highlighted that in-store sales were negative for the fourth month in a row (-1.8%) and pulled down by sharp falls in both fashion and homewares sales. After three successive months of positive results, non-store sales were also negative (-2.3%). Fashion was the only non-store category to see positive results in March, but the growth of 1.5% failed to offset the negative in-store sales, which declined by 6.0%. The homeware sector also performed poorly, falling by 10.9%, the lowest monthly result for this category since May 2022. To read BDO’s news release, go to https://www.bdo.co.uk/en-gb/news/2024/retailers-report-six-months-of-negative-sales.