Cold snap drives London sales

Cold weather and heavy discounting encouraged Londoners back to the shops last month, new research reveals.

Bringing good news for worried retailers in the run-up to Christmas, data from the London Retail Consortium (LRC) shows like-for-like sales were up 2.1% in November compared to the same month last year.

The increase was the first year-on-year rise since the terrorist bombings in July and more than the 0.8% hike recorded by retailers nationally.

Amid November's cold weather the attention of the capital's shoppers turned to winter and Christmas shopping bringing a particularly good month for clothing and footwear sales. The many promotions and special sales also attracted cash conscious customers.

The BRC pointed out, however, that while up on the past few months, shopper numbers remained down on a year ago.

The figures also mean the average monthly change so far this year is still a 1.7% decrease, much worse than the 2.6% increase for the same months in 2004.

Helen Dickinson, from KPMG - which helped compile the figures - said: "After a very disappointing run in central London for the last four months, November's growth will come as a welcome boost to retailers in the run up to the crucial Christmas trading period, particularly as it is on the back on stronger comparatives than we have seen for a while.

"However, it will be a challenging task to continue this growth through December with the warmer and wetter weather we have seen so far, but at least it gives some basis for a degree of optimism."