This month’s Greene King Leisure Spend Tracker includes a special report on consumer spending plans for Christmas.
It shows that 27% expect to spend less on food and drink out of the home this festive period year-on-year. This compares to 15% who plan to spend more and 58% who think it will be roughly the same. The figures for eating and drinking at home show 20% think they will spend less, 21% more and 59% the same.
The rest of the tracker showed household leisure spend fall for the second consecutive month. Total leisure spend fell 10% year-on-year in October to £187.99 – 9% down on September.
Occasions
Eating Out was once again the only activity to see an increase year-on-year - 2% up to £76.68 per household – but was still down 12% vs September. Drinking out spend fell 8% year on year and 9% on last month. Other leisure plummeted 22% year on year and 7% against September.
The report said the figures reflected a trend towards households increasingly favouring food-centred occasions over drink-led ones. It said it would be “interesting to see how long the ascendency of eating out as a leisure pursuit can continue before plateauing.”
Regional breakdowns showed that year-on-year consumers in London and the South East reduced spend more than in the rest of the country down 16% (£39) and 7% (£14) respectively year on year. Diners in the rest of the country also led the growth in eating out spend, with a 25% (£15) hike in spend year on year compared to 5% (£4) for London and the South East.
Fragile
Steve Jebson, Greene King’s commercial director, said: “It has been another tough month for leisure spend, falling 10% compared to October last year. With Christmas just around the corner, Brits yet again limited their leisure spend last month. And, with consumer confidence still fragile, it is not surprising that many are hesitant to loosen the purse strings.
“We saw that households in London and the South East reduced their spend more than elsewhere – down 16% compared to 7% in the rest of Britain. This could be due to the recent slowdown in the London property market, which may have temporarily hit the confidence of households in the capital. But, London and the South East still remains the biggest spending region with £214 spent on total leisure in October, over 21% more than the average for the rest of GB.”