US Monthly Retail Traffic and In-Store Metrics Report: Traffic Recovers After an Early-December Lull

Key Points

• In store-based traffic and sales shrank in December. Retail traffic declined 5.9% year over year during December. While the conversion rate declined by 0.7 percentage points, average transaction value grew 3.1%, and product returns increased by 1 percentage point.
• That said, the lull in early December was partly compensated in the second half of the month: Traffic increased 11.9% in the fourth week and 9.1% in the fifth week (which includes Christmas to New Years), year over year. In-store net sales increased 9.8% in the fourth week and 13.3% in the fifth week. Average transaction value (ATV) stood out as the only metric that registered growth in each week of the month.
• Regionally, the Northeast experienced the largest year-over-year decline in traffic at 9.6%, while the Midwest registered the smallest decline at 2.8%. The South experienced the largest year-over-year in-store sales decline, down 8.8%, while sales in the Midwest dipped 3.0%, the smallest regional decline.