Decrease in retail sales

Published:

The seasonally-adjusted volume index of retail sales decreased by 4.9 percent from July to August 2020. This follows an increase of 0.6 percent from June to July.

Written by: Marie Karoline Skjeldås / Anders Falla Aas

New figures from the retail trade index show a substantial decrease in the seasonal adjusted volume for August. Despite this decrease the sales volume remains considerably higher than before the corona pandemic. The pandemic and regulations imposed to limit infections have contributed to Norwegians changing their consumption pattern in the direction of spending less on services, and more on retail goods. These changes in the shopping pattern of the Norwegian people have made the seasonally adjusted figures more volatile.  

1 March 2020 and the subsequent months are specified as outliers in the seasonal adjustment routine. Hence, the trend figures for the latest months are not included in the figure.

Figure 1. Retail sales volume index, seasonally adjusted and trend. 2015=100

Seasonally adjusted Trend
Aug. 2014 99.9 100.2
Sep. 2014 100.3 100.2
Oct. 2014 100.1 100.2
Nov. 2014 99.9 100.2
Dec. 2014 100.8 100.4
Jan. 2015 100.0 100.5
Feb. 2015 100.8 100.6
Mar. 2015 100.9 100.7
Apr. 2015 103.5 100.6
May. 2015 98.8 100.5
Jun. 2015 100.1 100.3
Jul. 2015 100.4 100.3
Aug. 2015 100.9 100.3
Sep. 2015 100.1 100.3
Oct. 2015 100.8 100.4
Nov. 2015 100.3 100.4
Dec. 2015 100.2 100.3
Jan. 2016 100.8 100.1
Feb. 2016 99.8 99.8
Mar. 2016 99.0 99.6
Apr. 2016 98.8 99.4
May. 2016 99.9 99.3
Jun. 2016 99.9 99.4
Jul. 2016 99.0 99.5
Aug. 2016 99.6 99.7
Sep. 2016 99.8 99.9
Oct. 2016 100.9 100.1
Nov. 2016 100.2 100.3
Dec. 2016 98.3 100.5
Jan. 2017 100.2 100.8
Feb. 2017 101.3 101.0
Mar. 2017 101.4 101.3
Apr. 2017 101.1 101.5
May. 2017 102.6 101.7
Jun. 2017 102.5 101.7
Jul. 2017 102.3 101.7
Aug. 2017 101.9 101.7
Sep. 2017 101.2 101.8
Oct. 2017 101.6 101.9
Nov. 2017 102.9 102.1
Dec. 2017 102.6 102.3
Jan. 2018 102.0 102.5
Feb. 2018 102.5 102.6
Mar. 2018 102.4 102.7
Apr. 2018 102.9 102.7
May. 2018 105.2 102.7
Jun. 2018 102.1 102.7
Jul. 2018 102.4 102.7
Aug. 2018 102.9 102.6
Sep. 2018 102.3 102.6
Oct. 2018 102.3 102.5
Nov. 2018 102.9 102.5
Dec. 2018 101.7 102.5
Jan. 2019 103.3 102.5
Feb. 2019 101.6 102.5
Mar. 2019 102.4 102.6
Apr. 2019 104.2 102.8
May. 2019 102.8 102.9
Jun. 2019 102.5 103.1
Jul. 2019 103.2 103.1
Aug. 2019 103.2 103.1
Sep. 2019 103.3 103.0
Oct. 2019 102.4 102.8
Nov. 2019 103.5 102.8
Dec. 2019 101.1 102.8
Jan. 2020 101.7 102.9
Feb. 2020 103.6 103.1
Mar. 2020 102.5
Apr. 2020 107.4
May. 2020 110.4
Jun. 2020 116.7
Jul. 2020 117.4
Aug. 2020 111.7

Broad decline in retail sales

Most branches of the retail sector experienced a decline in the seasonally adjusted volume index in August. The largest contribution to the overall decline came from grocery stores, stores selling sporting equipment and furniture shops. Clothing stores and electronic stores also had a reduction in the sales volume this month. The only branch that experienced noticeable growth was pharmacies which somewhat dampened the total decline.

Index of household consumption of goods

The index of household consumption of goods, which shows the consumption of goods in Norwegian households, has been published simultaneously with the retail sales index for august. Due to change of the base year the index of household consumption goods will be published in conjunction with the quarterly national accounts November 12 instead of October 28.

The seasonal adjustment routine has been adjusted during the Corona-crisis

Thursday 12th of March 2020 the Norwegian government introduced actions against the spreading of the Corona-virus in Norway. This has led to a change in the shopping pattern since March compared to what we usually observe. The seasonal adjustment routine during the Corona- crisis is done in such a way that the figures from the start of and during the crisis (from March), are not included in the calculation of the seasonal pattern. Technically, in the seasonal adjustment routine, this is done by specifying March and following months as outliers.

This means that the usual trend figures will not be calculated, and instead the trend and seasonal adjusted figures will follow each other.  One important exception is the last observation, where the trend figure which is calculated in the seasonal adjusted routine will only be a projected value and the last observation is therefore not included. The trend figures from March 2020 and the following moths will therefore be difficult to interpret.

The seasonal adjustment routine of Statistics Norway is in line with the recommendations of Eurostat.

Response rate for August

Due to closed shops and layoffs the response rates for the previous months have been lower than normally, which has contributed to less certain indices. This month however the response rate has been normal. The response rate for the sample part of the survey was 95 percent, compared to 96 percent on average in 2019. Statistics Norway also receives data from the biggest retail chains in Norway. The response rate for this part of the survey was 100 percent, compared to 99 percent on average in 2019.

Differences between the volume index of retail sales and the index of household consumption of goods

The volume index of retail sales (DOI) is one of the central sources in the calculation of the index of household onsumption of goods (VKI). There are still usually differences in the development of these two indices, and there are several reasons  or this. VKI covers the households’ consumption of electricity and heating fuel, and the purchases of vehicles. This is not included in DOI. The two indices are also weighted differently. The difference in weighting has a particular big effect when there are large differences between the different industries of the retail sector. The reason behind the difference in eighting between DOI and VKI is that VKI is a measure of the household consumption of goods, while DOI describes the evelopment in the retail sector.

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