January 2022 Still Looking Good

We are pleased to see some more positive news this week with reports that the Soho area of London has seen busy crowds eating and drinking and the Bluewater shopping centre reporting strong visitor numbers last weekend.

Also, Both Tesco and M&S have reported strong retail sales over the Christmas period, presumably because so many people decided they were going to have a party to make up for last year.

There is a temptation here to join in the ‘what defines a party?’ discussion but we have decided to leave that to politicians!

However, not surprisingly it is not all good news, as we have read a report that office workers commuting into London remain extremely low, so ancillary support businesses there will still be feeling the pain, something which is undoubtedly replicated across the UK.

We have all read the doom and gloom reports regarding household bills etc but, for now, we want to hang on to the positives – particularly as the numbers of people testing positive for Covid is down 13% on last week and hospitalisations appear to have plateaued.