UK shopper footfall in central London drops 30% versus last week

LONDON - Shopper numbers in central London on Christmas Eve were 30.3% lower than the previous Friday as the spread of the Omicron variant of the coronavirus kept many people from high streets, according to data from Springboard.

City centres outside London saw a 10% drop in shoppers in the hours up to midday versus a week earlier, the data showed. Footfall across all destinations rose 13.9% on a week ago, but was 21% lower than on Christmas Eve 2019, Springboard said.