The sales of apparel products grew by 4 per cent in April 2023 compared to April 2022. This is less than the overall retail sales increase as well as other specific product categories like Quick Service Restaurants (16 per cent), Food and Grocery (15 per cent), furniture and furnishings (14 per cent) and consumer durables and electronics (9 per cent) respectively as compared to sales levels in April 2022.
The sale of footwear also saw growth of just 2 per cent in April 2023 compared to April 2022.
The Retail Business Survey by the Retailers Association of India (RAI) indicates that overall sales in April 2023 showed moderate growth of 6 per cent as compared to the sales levels during the same period in April 2022.
RAI works with all the stakeholders for creating the right environment for the growth of the modern retail industry in India.
Kumar Rajagopalan, CEO, RAI, said, “Retailers witnessed a modest growth of 6 per cent in the month of April 2023. This is possibly explained because they had a super growth of 23 per cent in April 2022 as compared to pre-pandemic period (April 2019) and 41 per cent growth when compared to sales level in April 2021 (Y-O-Y). While the growth of 6 per cent in April 2023 vis-à-vis April 2022 is welcome, we will still have to see if the growth can get into double digits. We would await the results for the coming months to draw definitive conclusions.”
