A tale of two Christmases

With retailers reporting mixed Christmas results, ranging from entering administration to recording strong sales, it is clear that making predictions about Christmas is for the birds.

Overall, UK spending in December fell by 1.1% from the previous month while it dropped by 0.8% compared with December 2010.

Waitrose delivered a 3.8% rise in sales over the Christmas period, continuing in it’s growing sales over the last few years. However, Sainsbury’s emerged the victor in the Christmas Supermarket war between the 4 major players with a 1.2% increase in comparison to last year’s figures.

Argos’ like-for like sales fell 8.8% while high street fashion retailer New Look saw a 3.4% increase. JD Sports also saw a good rise in sales and has confirmed its takeover of Blacks leisure, who went into administration at the beginning of January.

John Lewis saw sales rise 6.2% in the five weeks to New Years Eve, which included a record £133million for the week ending December 17.

Alternatively, sales at Thorntons dropped 4.2% while Mothercare reported a 3% drop in sales for the 13 weeks to January 7.

Mild weather was said to have affected sales at Halfords, with total like-for-like sales falling 4.8%. Car maintenance made the deepest impact falling 12.8% in comparison with the previous year’s sales.