After the end of the corona lockdown, the shopping streets will fill up again.
There is still no reason to celebrate for retail in the city center, because the competition from online retail continues to grow.
Berlin - Germany's shopping streets are filling up with visitors again.
Inner-city retail, which has been badly shaken by the corona pandemic, is taking a deep breath.
According to an industry survey by the German Retail Association (HDE) published on Wednesday, almost half of stationary clothing retailers expect better business in the second half of the year than in the previous year, and only 16 percent expect a decline in sales.
Nevertheless, according to HDE Managing Director Stefan Genth, it is too early to give the industry the all-clear.
"The crisis is not over yet, the situation is still very difficult for many retailers," he said in Berlin.
The positive development in recent weeks should not hide the fact that the first half of the year was lost, especially for downtown retail.
Inner cities: Off for up to 50,000 stores
According to the HDE survey, more than half of downtown retailers expect sales for the current year to be below the previous year's level.
The clothing trade suffered extremely and its revenues had shrunk by around a third.
Genth is therefore sticking to the forecast that the pandemic could mean the end of up to 50,000 businesses - even if this has not yet been reflected in the insolvency figures.
"We keep the prognosis upright because the retail industry is dying quietly," he said.
Often times, stores would simply close without bankruptcy proceedings.
At the same time, large retail chains thinned out their branch networks.
“You see a lot of vacancies when you walk through city centers,” emphasized Genth.
Forecast: Doubts about the concept of downtown retail
In fact, it is uncertain whether downtown retail will ever return to pre-pandemic sales.
Genth himself obviously has his doubts.
“There has been a shift in consumer behavior during the pandemic.
Shopping has become and will remain more digital, ”said the industry expert.
On Wednesday, the HDE even increased its forecast for sales growth in online retailing in the current year from 17 to almost 20 percent.
This would increase e-commerce sales this year from 72.8 to more than 87 billion euros.
The stationary retail trade, on the other hand, will probably have to accept a drop in sales of 1.1 percent for the year as a whole and still sell goods worth 499 billion euros.
There are serious differences between the industries in stationary retail.
While sales in the stationary grocery trade, according to the HDE, will grow again this year by 3.1 percent, sales outside the grocery trade are likely to be 4.2 percent below the previous year's figure - in the particularly hard hit clothing trade by 13.2 percent .
Compared to the pre-crisis year 2019, sales in the fashion industry may even decline by 37 percent.
Online retail: growth continues unabated
Even if the pedestrian zones are currently filling up again, there will probably not be a return to the old days before the crisis and the online boom. On the contrary: there is a lot to suggest that e-commerce will continue to bother inner cities. The Federal Statistical Office found this week that the Internet and mail order business are "unaffected by the resurgent growth of stationary trade". And the e-commerce industry association bevh also observed: "Although the restrictions in stationary retail have now been relaxed and more people are going into stores again, the growth trend in the industry is unbroken".
Of course, many stationary retailers also expanded their online business during the crisis. But there is a catch: the success of the classic retailers' own online shops is limited. In the second quarter of this year, according to a market study by the bevh, they were able to increase their e-commerce sales by an impressive 8.2 percent at first glance. Nevertheless, they lost market share. Because they remained far behind the growth rates of the online marketplaces of 22.5 percent and the pure internet retailers of 21.1 percent.
(dpa)
