Singapore’s retail sales increased by 6.2% y-o-y to $4.0 billion in November 2022, extending the 10.3% y-o-y increase seen in October 2022.
Excluding motor vehicles, Singapore’s retail sales grew by 8.7% y-o-y to $3.6 billion.
Of the total amount, 14.8% of the sales were made online. Computer & telecommunications equipment made up the bulk of online purchases at 51.4%, while furniture & household equipment came in second at 34.2%. Supermarkets and hypermarkets rounded up the top three online purchases at 14.5%.
Excluding motor vehicles, a proportion of online sales stood at 16.5%.
The higher online sales proportion was mainly attributed to more sales recorded during the year-end shopping events such as Singles’ Day and Black Friday.
Within the retail trade sector, most industries logged y-o-y growths. This was led by food & alcohol, which grew by 57.6% y-o-y due to higher demand for alcoholic products, including those sold at duty free shops. Wearing apparel & footwear came in next at 34.1% y-o-y. Department stores rounded up the top three at 22.0% y-o-y. The growths were attributed to higher demand for bags and footwear.
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Conversely, sales of motor vehicles fell by 12.4% y-o-y, in line with the lower Certificate of Entitlement (COE) quota in 2022. The supermarkets & hypermarkets and computer & telecommunications equipment industries also recorded declines in sales of 5.8% and 3.9% respectively.
On a m-o-m seasonally adjusted basis, total retail sales fell by 3.7%. Excluding motor vehicles, Singapore’s total retail sales for the month of November 2022 fell by 4.3% m-o-m.
Food and beverage (F&B) sales rose by 24.7% y-o-y in November, while declining 0.1% on a m-o-m seasonally adjusted basis. The large y-o-y growth was mainly attributed to the low base in November 2021 when there were restrictions on dining in at F&B establishments.
The total sales value for the industry stood at $928 million, of which 23.3% came from sales made online.
All industries recorded y-o-y increases in sales, led by food caterers, which saw a surge of 138.4% y-o-y in sales.
Meanwhile, food caterers and fast food outlets recorded m-o-m increases of 2.9% and 2.1% respectively while cafes, food courts & other eating places and restaurants saw m-o-m declines at 1.5% and 0.3% respectively.
