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15 Apr 2025

Retail Crime Remains Alarming - Bira's Latest Survey Reveals Urgent Need for Action

11 Apr 2025

Bira has cautiously welcomed the Prime Minister's announcement this week on plans to put 'thousands of Bobbies back on the Beat' with a new neighbourhood policing guarantee.

11 Apr 2025

Cycling UK has called for greater, targeted investment in cycling infrastructure across the UK to help more women feel safe and confident to cycle, with the charity urging Government to commit...

10 Apr 2025

Graeme Stickells, Head Trainer at South Africa’s only Cytech training centre Torq Zone Academy, is recovering from a life-threatening hit-and-run incident — and a crowdfunder has...

9 Apr 2025

Seven in ten cyclists in the UK have had their bike stolen, with the average cost of a stolen bike at £612.80 bringing the total estimated cost of thefts to £2.4 billion, according...

8 Apr 2025

MPs from multiple parties are pushing for Cycle to Work scheme to be expanded to include more people, including pensioners and freelancers, with the aim of encouraging more people to cycle.

2 Apr 2025

New regulations around recycling, known as ‘Simpler Recycling’, will soon require non-household municipal premises, including businesses, schools, and hospitals, to separate food...

2 Apr 2025

WorkNest has provided ACT members with essential resources covering statutory employment rates and the upcoming Employment Rights Bill, with the updates aimed at helping independent...

1 Apr 2025

Bira has voiced serious concerns over the latest figures from the BRC-NIQ Shop Price Index for March 2025.

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Retail Think Tank outlines key growth opportunities for 2024

Posted on in Business News , Cycles News

With the UK economy set to tread water in 2024, the KPMG/RetailNext Retail Think Tank (RTT), an independent board of retail experts, expects this will impact growth within the retail sector.

Retail

The RTT’s latest quarterly whitepaper – Retail outlook for 2024: What are the opportunities for retailers in a year of stagnation? – sets out its 2024 retail outlook, and includes key growth predictions, including re-invigorated retail formats and innovation trends, as well as its forecast for category winners and losers and predictions for the year ahead.

With monetary and fiscal policy remaining a dead weight on the UK economy in 2024, the RTT report highlights several challenges that will impact retailers into 2024.  These include rising cost pressures on their businesses, including National Living Wage and Business Rate rises; weakened consumer demand due to the ongoing squeeze on households through higher interest rate mortgage refixing for homeowners or rising rent costs for renters, wage growth rising against static tax brackets, and household debt servicing costs.

As reported by The Retail Bulletin, despite these challenges, the RTT predicts several growth opportunities in 2024, including: exploring growth models, such as retail media, or adopting platform business models following the success of Next and M&S and reassessing asset classes, such as retail park settings; investment in tech, including Gen AI, as well as innovating across commercial functions and the supply chain; tapping into new growth cohorts of consumers and moving away from a GenZ focus to acquire and retain older, more affluent consumers.

When it came to its property outlook, the RTT expects retail parks to become the standout retail setting in terms of growth, predicted to improve relative to other assets classes, such as High Street and Shopping Centres.

Outside of retail park success, bricks-and-mortar will see a renaissance in 2024, the RTT predicts, driven in part by consumer demand as well as revenue driving opportunities.

Retailers should also ensure that economic stagnation doesn’t stifle innovation, according to RTT Co-Chair and KPMG’s Head of Retail, Paul Martin: “Even if the economic outlook remains muted, one thing history teaches us is that following a downturn we often experience an upturn, and retailers should be doing everything now to prepare for this.”

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