What happens when you play classical music in a wine shop? Which type of independent retail store hit a 10-year high last year? How much do window displays even matter anymore?
We’ve rounded up 21 interesting UK retail industry statistics (plus a few from further afield!), along with proven merchandising facts and surprising scientific outcomes. Read on to find out the answers to the questions above (and 18 more!).
- In 2022, the total number of retail outlets in the UK was 317,005.
- It’s estimated that UK retail sales volumes rose by 0.5% in April 2023, following a fall of 1.2% in March 2023 (🥳)
- Now here’s a stat we can definitely relate to: over 70% of people claim to be more likely to shop in locations which play music they enjoy — although what they want from their shop music differs; apparently ‘women often prefer oldies, pop, and R&B in their shops, while men frequently prefer rock, blues, and bluegrass.’
- Sticking with the musical theme, this fact was a real highlight of our research: a scientific experiment carried out in a wine shop showed that classical music influenced customers to spend more money, with the classically-serenaded shoppers choosing pricier bottles of wine.
- 29% of sales are expected to take place online by 2026.
- Turns out we’re judging shops by their covers. 52% of us won’t return to a store if we don’t like the aesthetics 💅
- Research has proven that window displays influence purchases an average of 24% of the time.
- Pick a channel, any channel! …or don’t, that’s fine too. Two thirds of us prefer omnichannel shopping, with 66% of shoppers saying they ‘felt happiest’ shopping a hybrid of both in-store and online. 25% picked in-store only, and 8% said online.
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A merchandising hack we love: shoppers scan horizontally to find product type, and they then prefer to find the specific product by scanning vertically.
- Let’s hear it for our bookselling pals: the number of independent bookshops in the UK and Ireland hit a 10-year high in 2022.
- 93% of independent retail businesses described sustainability as a focus for the next 12 months.
- 41% of independent brick and mortar stores claim changing working patterns (namely the increase in working from home) have led to reduced footfall.
- Show me the money value; 83% of millennials expect brands to align with their values.
- Amazon accounts for 37.8% of ecommerce sales, giving it the highest market share of any ecommerce company.
- 79% of shoppers shop online at least once a month. Some of us are on first-name terms with all our local delivery drivers, but that's a stat for another day.
- Mobile cart abandonment rates are higher than desktop ones: 84% of people abandon their shopping cart on mobile, and 72% abandon their cart on desktop. Get those abandoned cart emails scheduled or updated, stat!
- High shipping costs are the most popular reason for cart abandonment, closely followed by ‘discount code not working’. Check your discount codes, double stat!
- 81% of us do some online research before we buy something🕵️
- 23% of all ecommerce orders are fulfilled using dropshipping. Take a look at our dropshipping guide for more information on this popular fulfilment method.
- Eye level really is buy level: apparently you’ll capture most attention with products placed 14.7 inches below eye level and upward to eye level.
- But what is eye level, we hear you ask? For very tall people, it’s around 1.8 metres. For wheelchair users, around it’s 1.15 metres.
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