Would you like to visit a Fourth regional site closer to you?
The latest figures from the Garden Centre Association’s Barometer of Trade, released this week, show that the sector soared in August. Sales followed July’s positive trend, charting +1.13% year-to-date.
The Garden Centre Association (GCA) measures monthly performance across 13 categories. Seeds and bulbs were the top performer for August. CGA Chief Executive Peter Burks commented, “[This suggests] our customers were taking advantage of the cool and damp conditions to keep planting; with large, strong, early displays of autumn colour helping.”
He also noted that, “…the benefits of having a broad retail offering came into play on those wetter days.”
August was something of a mixed bag for retail more broadly. BDO’s high street sales tracker shows total like for like sales on the high street grew 3.8% in August, while data from Revolut puts retail debit card spending up 12pp.
Despite this apparent increase in consumer confidence, clothing and footwear sales generally suffered. KPMG’s Retail Sales Monitor (RSM) shows a fall of 0.2% for non-food sales, which covers clothing.
By contrast, clothing in garden centres performed particularly well, up 20.84% compared to August 2022, making it the second top performing category. “As diversified as they are, garden centres have very well-defined category offerings,” explains Fourth’s EMEA MD, Sebastian Sepierre. “The clothing lines they carry – even premium high street brands like Joules – tend to be practical and hardwearing, and appeal to their customer base.”
But it’s not all rosy for garden centres on the retail front. The impact of July’s 41% drop in furniture and BBQ sales is still apparent, with sales also down 40.8% in August as well.
Catering saw another month of impressive growth – up 17.53% for August – but it wasn’t quite enough to hold on to its July crown as the single biggest category.
“Demand volatility is something the entire industry is grappling with,” says Sebastian Sepierre. “The GCA’s figures are some of the best for demonstrating how the weather shapes consumer demand in the sector. A wash out July helped to bolster catering sales in Garden Centres, which posted slightly lower growth in August as the sun shone.”
While unusual in the retail sector for their level of diversification – which does offer some protection from changeable consumer demand – garden centres are far from immune to the ongoing volatility plaguing the industry at large.
Many operators have responded to this environment by increasing their reliance on data, aiming to understand and model demand better so they can employ resources more effectively – and avoid situations where they’re holding excess BBQ stock going into the autumn trading period.
Fourth’s forecasting and analytics can help garden centres get to grips with changing demand across every department.
Give us a call today +44 (0) 207 534 3700, or click the button below.
Save time, reduce costs, and increase profitability with Fourth’s intelligent solutions.
By