Restaurant business fell 28% in Dec. 2022, retail dropped 45%

Restaurants and similar establishments registered a year-on-year fall in receipts in December 2022, a Statistics and Census Service release shows.

According to the same release, the receipts of the interviewed restaurants and similar establishments dropped 28.4% year-on-year in December, with the receipts of Chinese restaurants decreasing even further by 38.8%.

Concurrently, retail trade establishments also saw their sales dip 44.5% year-on-year in December. Leading the highest drops were the department stores (-60.4%) and watches, clocks and jewellery retailers (-57.7%).

Comparing the results month-on-month with November 2022, receipts of the interviewed restaurants and similar establishments went down by 9.6%, a drop led by the receipts of local style cafes, congee and noodle shops, which fell by 12.7%. Contrary to the trend, western restaurants rose by 2.6% in the same period.

As for the retailers, their business grew by 22.1% month-on-month in December, with all types of retailers registering an increase in sales. Growing more were the cosmetics and sanitary articles retailers (+47.6%), adults’ clothing retailers (+32.2%), and department stores (+29.9%).

While December 2022 was not a very positive month for the F&B and retail sectors, some 84% of those interviewed said they expected their receipts to increase month-on-month in January this year, taking advantage of the reopening of the border without restrictions to both the mainland and to Hong Kong.

More hopeful that there would be a significant business improvement were the Chinese restaurants (93%) and western restaurants (92%). On the other hand, 5% of the interviewed establishments still predicted that their receipts would decrease month-on-month in January.

Meanwhile, regarding the retail sector, 67% of the interviewed retailers forecast month-on-month sales growth in January.