Advances in technology and increased staffing costs are two of the prime drivers in the decline of the High Street retailer and job opportunities in the sector, according to the latest report from the British Retailers Consortium – BRC.
In her introduction to the first of 3 reports: Retail 2020: Fewer but better jobs, BRC Chief Executive Helen Dickinson OBE writes: “Retail is an important industry to the UK economy. It is the largest private sector employer, providing employment and services in communities across the country. It’s also a changing industry. Retailers are the most directly customer-facing of all businesses and as our behaviour as customers changes, so too do retailers.
“As an industry we expect the years ahead will see accelerating change. Retailers will develop better propositions and compete harder across an increasing range of business models from modern multi-channel formats through to discounters and online businesses. Recent policy announcements, in particular the National Living Wage and the introduction of the apprenticeship levy, will increase the pace of some of these changes.
“Against this backdrop, the industry has come together and undertaken detailed research to consider the implications for jobs in the industry, to understand the profile and aspirations of the workforce and to look forward to 2020 and beyond.”
This report is the first of three the BRC will publish.
Retail 2020: Fewer but better jobs – sets out how the BRC expect the retail workplace landscape to change and how it will affect people and places across the country. The BRC have led and drawn on research and modelling across the industry, involving the most senior executives in retail businesses.
The BRC second report, Retail 2020: What our people think – will include the detailed findings from a survey of those working in retail across the country.
The third report, Retail 2020: Solutions – will describe how the industry plans to tackle these challenges and opportunities.
In 2014, 191,000 fewer people worked in retail than in 2008.
Numbers employed in retail have declined since 2008 but the incidence of low pay have been rising in retail for several years. Cost pressures have increased markedly at a time when growth in consumer expenditure has been subdued.
The rate of change within the workforce is now set to quicken as the digital revolution reshapes the industry, assisted by many more leases being up for renewal and accelerated by the diverging costs of labour versus technology. The retail industry is supportive in principle of the National Living Wage but the effects on employment have been underestimated.
Together these effects could mean there are as many as 900,000 fewer jobs in retail by 2025 but those that remain will be more productive and higher earning. However, the effects will be uneven across the country and in how they impact on different sizes of business and groups of people within the industry.
Areas that are already economically fragile are likely to see the greatest impact of store closures and some of the people affected by changing roles will be those who may find it hardest to transition into new jobs that are created.
Retailers will work both individually and collectively to improve productivity and the customer offerings. The BRC would like to work with Government both to ensure the successful implementation of policy and to mitigate the impact of the changes we expect to see in places and on people who may be most vulnerable.
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