Fall in value of sterling 'driving Irish consumers online'

Conventional shops are seeing a drop in sales, as Irish consumers spend online to take advantage of the weakness of sterling.

The weakness of sterling has seen Irish consumers spend online and less in conventional shops, it was claimed today.

The new Visa Irish Consumer Spending Index indicates "face-to-face" spending in shops fell -0.4% year-on-year. Online spending jumped 15%, however.

Expenditure across all payment types (cash, cheques and electronic payments) rose +4.3% year-on-year, down from +5% in September and the weakest increase since May 2015.

Overall, the Consumer Spending Index is showing its weakest growth in nearly a year and a half.

Wide divergences were also registered among the broad sectors monitored.

Recreation & Culture remained the star performer, seeing spending rise 15.1% year-on-year.

Transport & Communication was the only other sector to see growth accelerate, with expenditure up +9.6% year-on-year. Solid, but slower increases in spending were also seen in the Hotels, Restaurants & Bars, Household Goods and Food & Drink categories.

Spending in the Clothing & Footwear sector continued to fall in the year to October.

The latest reduction ( down2.8% year-on-year) was the third in as many months and the sharpest in two years.

Philip Konopik, country manager, Ireland, Visa said: "While it is very positive to have recorded the twenty sixth month of consecutive consumer spending growth, there were a couple of negative milestones in October.

"The fact that face-to-face spending recorded the first decline since the Visa Consumer Spending Index began is worrying for the Irish retail community, in particular for Clothing & Footwear experiencing a third month of contraction in a row.

"However, one of the busiest trading periods lies ahead, with Black Friday and Christmas offering a potential for bounceback."

He added: "With a general downward trend in concumer expenditure … e-commerce is essentially bucking the trend so we assume that sterling had ghad a significant impact there."