From July to September 2012 like-for-like retail sales increased by 2.37%. During the same period high street sales, reported by the British Retail Consortium, grew by 0.5%, making this the ninth consecutive quarter station retail results have out outperformed the high street.
Gifts performed best in stations this quarter, reporting a 30.77% increase. Food and beverage offers continued to perform strongly, with sales in specialist food catering growing by 18.5%, bread growing by 9.75% and hot food by 8.12%.
Top performing stations include London Bridge (+10.8%), followed by Manchester Piccadilly (+9.7%) and London Victoria (+7.7%), compared to the same period last year.
David Biggs, director of property at Network Rail, said: “These are excellent results, and show that the high levels of footfall guaranteed in stations continue to give our retail partners the edge over the high street. Income from retail is a vital funding stream for Network Rail and strong results will allow us to deliver even great value for the British people.
“The launch of our new retail space at Waterloo was a crucial milestone in delivering our vision for retail, as we work to improve environments for passengers and shoppers, creating stations that are destinations in their own right with shopping that’s on the way not in the way. Waterloo gave us the opportunity to work with some exciting retail partners, and we look forward to continue working with new and existing brands as we build on recent successes with new developments across our portfolio of stations.”
Earlier this month, Network Rail also won a gold award from the British Council of Shopping Centres (BCSC) for retail at King’s Cross station, beating major shopping centres across the country to take home the top prize in the refurbishment and extension category.