Retail Trade, Australia

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Monthly and quarterly estimates of turnover and volumes for retail businesses, including store and online sales.

Reference period
July 2021
Released
27/08/2021

Key statistics

The July 2021 seasonally adjusted estimate: 

  • Fell 2.7% month-on-month.
  • Fell 3.1% compared with July 2020.

Release Schedule for Retail Trade, Australia

The Retail Trade, Australia publication has moved to a new release schedule to better accommodate data users’ needs following the discontinuation of Retail Trade, Australia, Preliminary.

An additional information release on 3 September 2021 has seen the inclusion of more detailed results for the July 2021 reference period. Additional timeseries spreadsheets have been published, including; state by industry results, state by industry sub-group results, quarterly turnover volumes, and online sales.

To understand more about any changes to the release schedule, as well as changes in this issue, suspension of trend estimates, and COVID-19 in July 2021, please read the survey impacts and changes.

Turnover at current prices
Jul-2021 ($m)Jun-2021 to Jul-2021 (% change)Jul-2020 to Jul-2021 (% change)
Trendnanana
Seasonally Adjusted29,778.6-2.7-3.1

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Total retail turnover

Analysis by industry

Food retailing

Food retailing rose 2.3% ($296.9m) in July, in seasonally adjusted terms.

Household goods retailing

Household goods retailing fell 2.2% (-$123.1m) in July, in seasonally adjusted terms.

Clothing, footwear and personal accessory retailing

Clothing, footwear and personal accessory retailing fell 15.4% (-$354.8m) in July, in seasonally adjusted terms.

Department stores

Department stores fell 11.4% (-$178.3m) in July, in seasonally adjusted terms.

Other retailing

Other retailing rose 0.6% ($26.1m) in July, in seasonally adjusted terms.

Cafes, restaurants and takeaway food services

Cafes, restaurants and takeaway food services fell 12.3% (-$478.7m) in July, in seasonally adjusted terms.

Online retailing

Total online sales were $3,724.7m in July 2021, in seasonally adjusted terms. This was the highest level of monthly online sales in the history of this series. This month's $603.3m (19.3%) rise in seasonally adjusted sales was the second largest rise in this series in dollar terms, following April 2020.

In July 2021, Food online sales were $993.9m, and Non-Food online sales were $2,730.7m, in seasonally adjusted terms. Food sales rose $112.7m (12.8%) in July 2021, the largest increase in dollar terms since the beginning of the timeseries. Non-Food sales rose $490.5m (21.9%) in July, the second largest increase in dollar terms recorded since the beginning of the timeseries, following April 2020.

In July 2021, in original terms, the proportion of online sales for Food retailing was 6.4%, the largest proportion recorded over the history of this series. The proportion of online sales for Non-Food retailing was 20.4%. This was the second largest proportion recorded over the history of this series, following April 2020 (20.5%).

In July 2021, the proportion of online sales for total retailing was 12.6%. This was the largest proportion of online sales for total retailing since data has been collected, eclipsing the previous record of 11.1% recorded in April 2020.

Additional notes regarding the online sales series can be found in the Methodology.

Data downloads

Time series spreadsheets

Data files

Survey impacts and changes

The revised release schedule for Retail Trade, Australia

Changes in this issue

Suspension of trend series

Coronavirus (COVID-19) in July

Previous catalogue number

This release previously used catalogue number 8501.0.

Inquiries

For inquiries about these and related statistics, contact the Customer Assistance Service via the ABS website Contact Us page. The ABS Privacy Policy outlines how the ABS will handle any personal information that you provide to us.

Post release changes

3/09/2021 - As advertised in the main release of this publication on 27 August 2021, the time series spreadsheets for tables 5 through to 23 are now available under the Data Downloads section. This includes July results for: State by Industry Subgroup, Completely Enumerated (large) and Sample (small) businesses, and Online Retail Turnover.  The June quarter result for Quarterly Consumer Sales (Tables 17 and 18) is now also available. 

In addition, an online retailing section has been added to this publication, which shows the most up-to-date online retail sales, with three graphs included.

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