According to the Lebanese Franchise Association (LFA), retail sales activity witnessed a positive yearly performance during the first six months of 2015, on both consumer goods and services levels.
Retail indicators of the LFA’s survey resulted from data mainly collected from the largest shopping malls and the biggest payment systems’ operators in Lebanon. In details, the semi-annual report examines the performance of six consumer goods and four consumer services starting January 2013.
Starting with the retail sales of consumer goods, a 2.2% yearly increase was recorded in H1 2015 mainly driven by the progressing levels of retail sales in food & beverages, cosmetics, luxury items and sports & hobbies. This increase was largely affected by the partial political inertia, the impact of advertising expenditures and the improvement of the consumer’s confidence during this period. In contrast, the study showed that clothing and household goods’ retail sales witnessed yearly decreases of 8.7% and 14.6% in the first half of 2015, respectively.
Moving to the retail sales of services, the overall indicator posted an 11.4% upturn mostly boosted by the improvement of both hospitality and tourism industries. This mainly resulted from the progressing number of tourists by 15% in H1 2015 coupled with the 7% increase in their spending. In details, retail sales of tourism services edged up by a substantial 28.8% y-o-y in H1 2015, while those of the hospitality sector increased by a yearly 20%.
Source: Lebanese Franchise Association