Overall restaurant Spending Increases 9.7%
The online spend for restaurants totaled to 28.7% whilst in-store sales increased 8%.
Latest data from Barclaycard reveals that consumer spending grew 3.8% year-on-year in February, marking the third consecutive month in which growth rose above the prevailing rate of inflation.
Consumer spending growth held steady in February – up 3.8% year-on-year and in line with the three-month rolling average (3.9%) – as consumers made small adjustments to their budgets to make room for the ‘nice-to-haves’. Data from Barclaycard, which processes nearly half of the nation’s credit and debit card transactions, shows that supermarket spending (3.2%) returned to levels seen over the past six months after a spike of 4.4 per cent in January. As consumers continued to prioritise the ‘experience economy’, spending on non-essentials reached 3.8%.
Restaurants and pubs, meanwhile, remained healthy at 9.7% and 10.0% growth respectively, albeit not quite matching the strong spells of double-digit rises seen in 2017.
Barclaycard managing director Paul Lockstone said, “This is the third consecutive month that we’ve seen household spending growth above the prevailing rate of inflation suggesting that, while consumers remain cautious about their household finances, they continue to strike a balance between spending on essentials and on luxuries, whether that’s a holiday abroad or tickets for the latest blockbuster.
“With a year to go before Brexit, consumers are cautious about the potential ramifications of whatever settlement the UK achieves, and half of us fear that the outcome will leave us worse off than we are now. As negotiations continue it’s likely that this will continue to weigh on sentiment.”
