Easter heatwave expected to boost high street footfall by 17 percent

With a mini ‘heatwave’ expected to blaze across the UK over the Easter holiday, footfall will be buoyed by the good weather and the first Easter without restrictions in two years.

For the UK’s high street the holiday weekend looks especially rosy, with a 6 percent rise in footfall expected on Good Friday, 17 percent rise on Easter Saturday and 5 percent on Sunday. Easter Monday is the only day forecast with fall in shoppers at -8 percent.

Diane Wehrle, Insights Director at Springboard, said: “Springboard is forecasting that footfall will rise by 6.2 percent over the Easter weekend from the weekend before, and by 13.3 per ent on Saturday.

Saturday will drive the greatest uplift of 13.3 percent from the week before and 17 percent in high streets. High Streets and retail parks are likely to benefit more than shopping centres over the weekend as a whole; high streets will be supported by the forecast warm and sunny weather which will draw people to outdoor destinations, and shoppers are likely to head to retail parks to purchase garden products and food and groceries for home entertaining of family and friends.

“The forecast rise in footfall over the week will mean that footfall in retail parks will be just -1.4 percent below the 2019 level and -11.6 percent in high streets. Although footfall in shopping centres is not forecast to increase as much as in high streets, the gap from 2019 will be smaller at -8.4 percent which is due to a poorer performance in shopping centres in 2019.”