Western Europe

Apparel accessories is recovering in 2023, following a noticeable decline in 2022 as consumers shifted away from buying face masks in the post-pandemic era. Whilst retail volume sales remained in decline, apparel accessories reported positive current…

After the slump in demand and retail current value sales in 2020, due to the outbreak of the Coronavirus (COVID-19) crisis, womenswear rebounded in 2021 and 2022. The category moved towards a full recovery, as pandemic restrictions gradually eased…

Womenswear is in a volume slump following an uptick in sales immediately following the pandemic. The uptick was reactionary following the abnormal era of store closures and is not persisting due to budgetary pressures and inflation. Whilst e-commerce…

Overall, sportswear is expected to see healthy growth in retail current value terms in 2023. All categories of sportswear are predicted to continue their retail current value growth trajectories, albeit at a slower rate, compared with 2021 and 2022.…

Sportswear is a winner in 2023, thanks to strong and ongoing athleisure and streetwear fashion trends, such as the popularity of sports-inspired footwear (eg sneakers), and hybrid styles whereby consumers mix sports-inspired apparel with more formal…

Menswear is set to see a strong single-digit rise in retail current value sales over 2023 to exceed the 2019 pre-pandemic level, following the slump recorded in 2020 due to the outbreak of Coronavirus (COVID-19) and fast growth rebounds in both 2021…

Menswear continues to perform fairly well in 2023, despite seeing lower volume growth than witnessed in the previous two years – which can be attributed to a normalisation effect following the steep declines seen during the era of the pandemic store…

Jeans is expected to see a low single-digit growth in retail current value terms over 2023, to return to the 2019 pre-Coronavirus (COVID-19) level. Jeans started to recover in 2021, having suffered a downturn with the pandemic, as Italians limited…

Jeans is in a volume slump in 2023, following a strong rebound after the pandemic era declines. This can partly be attributed to budgetary reasons, evidenced by the fact that economy jeans is showing the best performance, along with the fact that…

Hosiery continued on its way towards recovery in 2023, after the steep decline in retail volume and current value sales recorded in 2020. The recovery started in 2021 and continued throughout 2022 as the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic gradually…

Hosiery is another category in negative volume growth, while value is better supported by inflationary factors. Both sheer hosiery and non-sheer hosiery are showing such slumps, with sheer hosiery performing slightly better by a tiny margin. That…

Footwear is projected to see healthy, if slower than in 2021 and 2022, retail current value growth and a slight, and similarly slower, retail volume increase over 2023. This is set to enable footwear to slightly exceed its 2019 pre-pandemic retail…

Footwear volume is managing to stay in very small positive growth in 2023, which is expected to pick up slightly in 2024, then slump again over the forecast period. Meanwhile, value is being better supported by inflationary pressures pushing up unit…

Childrenswear suffered a disruption, but less so compared with menswear and womenswear, in 2020, in the wake of the outbreak of Coronavirus (COVID-19). This was partly because parents tend to prioritise goods for their children, but also because…

One would think that childrenswear would be resilient, due to the necessity of replacement needed for growing infants and children. However, both value and volume sales are in a slump in 2023. One key reason for this is the declining birth rate in…

Apparel and footwear is projected to record strong retail current value growth over 2023, albeit slower than in 2021 and 2022, when sales rebounded from a lower base following the slump caused by the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. Nonetheless, most…

Apparel and footwear in France is seeing an overall volume slump in 2023, while value is supported by inflation pushing up unit prices, thus giving an artificial perspective of positive performance. Whilst we did see a robust volume uptick in the…

Apparel accessories is projected to see slight retail volume and strong retail current value growth over 2023, with the recovery of all categories, except for “other” apparel accessories. This category continued to suffer steep declines due to the…

Apparel accessories has slumped in volume in 2023, to just under 1% growth. This is in contrast to the more promising performance seen over the past two years, as the category rebounded from the double-digit volume decline seen during the pandemic.…

In the upcoming years, consumers and businesses face an array of challenges, with rising income inequality being among the key ones. Nevertheless, addressing the income inequality through catering to the Bottom of the Pyramid and the Middle Class…