The number of people walking through the doors of Scottish stores was up last month but still remains well below pre-pandemic levels, according to a Scottish trade association.
In October, footfall rose 1.4% compared with the month before, the Scottish Retail Consortium said on Friday, but was down by 12% compared with the same month before coronavirus wreaked havoc on the economy. David Lonsdale, director of the retail body, described it as a “modest but nonetheless slightly more chipper set of results for shopper footfall in the early part of what is the critical ‘golden quarter’ of festive trading”.
The figures meant Scottish stores recorded their second-best monthly performance of the year, but were still down an eighth on pre-pandemic levels, making them slightly worse than the average UK decline of 11.8%. According to data from the retail body, shopping centre footfall was 18.6% lower in October than compared to the same month three years ago, an improvement from a drop of 19.7% in September.
