STORES are bouncing back as the number of shoppers visiting the high street rose by a third.
Customers have been turning out in force after England’s retail parks, high streets and shopping centres re-opened on Monday following a the three-month shutdown.
Springboard, a data firm monitoring footfall in shops, said 33.6 per cent more people visited high streets yesterday than last week.
And shopping centre visitor numbers were up 23 per cent.
At Arcadia, owner of Topshop and Burton, bosses are said to be pleased with stronger than expected trading.
And a spokesman for Sports Direct said on Monday “queues were two or three hours long”.
John Lewis, which has only opened two department stores so far in Kingston and Poole, said of the post-lockdown bestsellers: “Both shops saw strong sales of TVs which could be linked with football returning to our screens this Wednesday and Ascot being screened on TV this weekend.”
Facemasks were hugely popular across both its shops. Kingston enjoyed “really high demand for buttons and fabric, showing a clear trend for customers making their own facemasks at home”.
But independent retail analyst Nick Bubb cautioned that it was still “early days” to judge how retailers are faring after stores were shuttered in lockdown, causing sales to plunge.
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