December bar sales down 4%

Bars fared less well than other retailers in December according to seasonally-adjusted provisional retail sales figures from the CSO.

Sales volumes were down 4.0% in December when compared to December 2017, with values down 1.4%.

Compared to the previous month, November, bar sales volumes were down 1.7% while values were down 1.6%.

Across the three months October to December 2018 bar sales showed a decline of 3.2% in volumes and 1.1% in values when compared to the same three-month period in 2017.

Comparing the last Quarter of 2018 with the second-last Quarter, bar sales volumes were down 2.3% while values were down 1.5%.

Final seasonally-adjusted CSO figures for November show bar sales volumes down 0.7% compared to November 2017 with bar sales values up 1.2%.

Comparing last November with last October bar sales volumes were up 4.0% while values showed growth of 2.8%.

Overall retail sales volumes were up 3.7% in December compared with December 2017 while they were up 0.4% on November 2018.