Official figures show that the volume of retail sales rose again in July as the economy continued to reopen, though some sectors have yet to recover.

The Central Statistics Office (CSO) said retail sales rose by 1.5% in July compared with June and were up 6.4% compared with July last year.

Bouncing back

The volume of sales had slumped by 35.8% in April before bouncing back with increases of 32.4% and 38.6% in May and June respectively. The CSO said retail sales in July were 4.7% higher than they were in February, before COVID-19 restrictions were introduced.

The biggest monthly increase was in bars, where there was a jump of 138.5% in the volume of sales, but the CSO pointed out that this was from a very low level in June.

Bar sales are still 53% below pre-pandemic levels as those which do not serve food have still not been allowed to reopen.

Online sales

Sales of clothing, footwear and textiles were up more than 25% in July, while electrical goods recorded a 12.6% rise.

The CSO says sales volumes in most categories are now higher than in February. As well as bars, however, sales in the department stores, fuel and books categories are still lagging behind pre-pandemic levels.

Sales online accounted for 4.5% of the total in July, down from 6.7% in June, as more shops reopened to the public.