Despite a 7.2% year-over-year decline in B.C. retail sales in November, many retail sectors increased sales in the month before the Christmas shopping season.
Home electronics and appliance stores, clothing stores and general merchandise stores all reported higher sales, according to aggregated monthly estimates from Statistics Canada.
Home electronics and appliance sales rose 12% to $1.17 billion from $1 billion in October. Clothing sales rose 6.9% to $1.7 billion from $1.6 billion. General merchandise stores rose 10% to $4.8 billion from $4.4 billion. Shoe retailers, sporting goods and jewelry stores and home furnishing stores also saw sales increases in November.
British Columbians appeared to slow their home renovation activities as sales at home centres were down 12.8% to $1.77 billion from $2 billion in October. Building materials and garden store sales fell 16.7% to $369.4 million from $443.5 million.
The bulk of the monthly sales declines came in gasoline and new cars. Sales at new car dealers fell 14.7% to $4.97 billion from $5.8 billion in October. Oil prices dropped rapidly in November, which resulted in a 21.9% drop in gasoline sales revenue to $3.5 billion from $4.5 billion in October.