UK’s Super Saturday store footfall disappoints with the peak “going to the wire” – Sensormatic

It’s going to be a case of Super Monday or Super Tuesday as the usual Super Saturday before Christmas didn’t materialise. It was a weekend that failed to sparkle with store visits on 20 December falling 6.9% year-on-year, according to Sensormatic Solutions ShopperTrak Analytics.

It has to be said that anecdotal evidence from the FashionNetwork.com team also suggests that stores weren’t as busy as usual on Saturday. And given that Christmas Day is a Thursday this year, perhaps the Saturday just felt like too early for consumers to be panicked into a last-minute dash to the shops. That’s especially the case as many people will have taken days off this week and that now the schools have broken up, they’ll be able to take their children shopping with them as well.

High Street destinations saw the most resilience, with a less pronounced decline of 3.7% compared to 2024.

But the good news is that while weekend shopper counts didn’t match 2024 levels, retail traffic in the week preceding Saturday rallied 11.2%, and store visits on the 20th did at lease rise 1.5% week-on-week. Retail Parks saw a marked uptick of 10.9% versus the week prior.

However, that lack of Saturday activity means spending hesitancy is expected to push festive demand “to the wire” with the peak in footfall landing in the final few days before Christmas with Tuesday (23 December)  expected to be the third busiest in-store shopping day of Peak Trading as retailers brace for the last-minute rush.

“As one of the ‘make or break’ days of Christmas trading, soft footfall performance on Super Saturday will have dealt a blow to retailers who would have been hoping to capitalise on trade,” said Andy Sumpter, EMEA Retail Consultant at Sensormatic Solutions.

He added: “Throughout this year’s festive trading season, we’ve seen consumer caution cause spending hesitancy and upend usual demand patterns. Shoppers are taking longer to validate purchases, with many still holding out and hoping that retailers may bring forward Boxing Day promotions pre-Christmas, as they did last year.

“We expect the usual last-minute rush to be particularly pronounced, with shoppers leaving purchasing right up to the wire,” he added.