Retailers holding on to staff and hope for June recovery

Australian retailers are attempting to weather the downturn by holding on to employees, with new figures revealing 65% of retailers are maintaining current staff levels.

The new figures from the March Australian Retailers Index, compiled by the Australian Retailers Association, shows that 23% of retailers have reported staff decreases and 11% have reported increases in staff levels.

ARA executive director Richard Evans says the result is “optimistic news”.

“About 23% of retailers have dropped their staff. I think that’s expected because March is always the lowest month, and because of lower demand retailers are going to put staff off.

“But in spite of that I think they’re optimistic and can see a turnaround,” he says.

The new figures also show that while 14% of SME retailers are considering cutting staff, over 35% are using cost-cutting initiatives to retain employees, and nearly 20% are adding new products. 

But while Evans says that retailers are suffering due to higher unemployment rates and what he calls a “negative narrative” about the downturn, retailers will begin to improve once stimulus package funds flow through.

“We’re anticipating that once interest rate decreases start flowing into the economy and the stimulus packages start flowing through, we will see improved growth in the September quarter.

“If you recall the pre-Christmas stimulus, a lot of families paid off credit cards, but once they see things being paid off they’ll start using them again…so it takes about a three or four month lag. You don’t see the effect immediately,” he says.

“And we operate six months ahead of the rest of the economy anyway. If we see recovery first, in June, the rest of the economy will see it towards the rest of the year.”

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