Prepare to shop - until you drop!
MANCHESTER is launching a huge campaign to push its late-night shopping revolution, on the back of bumper evening sales figures.
Dozens of shops are already signed up to 8pm closing - with trade as busy in the evening as it is during the day in some stores.
Now Manchester City Centre Management Company is planning an advertising blitz to get more shops open and more shoppers in the city after work.
The managers have been encouraged by a seven per cent increase in turnover over Christmas, compared with a 2.6 per cent rise across Britain.
Shops closing at 8pm reported as much as 20 per cent of their trading taking place in the last two hours of the day.
Trafford
The M.E.N. revealed earlier this year how MCCMC had drawn up plans for shops across the city centre to adopt new evening trading hours up to 8pm from the summer. The move was seen in part as a way of clawing back customers from the Trafford Centre, which opens until 10pm.
There were fears the experiment could fail when it emerged a number of leading stores, including Kendals and Harvey Nichols, had decided not to introduce later hours.
But 61 shops did take part, including 75 per cent of outlets in the Arndale and virtually all of Market Street.
Paul Rice, city centre manager, said: "It was understandable in the current climate that a lot of stores may not have been willing to sign up straight away. But we have constantly made the point that this is an inevitability, like the introduction of Sunday trading.
"Those companies that are already trading late have reaped the rewards."
Hannah Cox, manager of H&M in Manchester Arndale, said: "We've been a little surprised by the shoppers we've attracted in the evenings. At first we thought we'd just get stragglers mooching around after work without really buying anything.
"What we actually get are groups of girls who are making a night of it, either shopping after they've been out for a bite to eat or before they start their night out. And they are certainly spending money."
Social trends expert Professor Cary Cooper, of Lancaster University said: "We have the longest working hours in the EU and the second longest in the developed world. We need to have urban areas opening later to fit in with peoples lives."
COULD Manchester become a late-night shopping city?
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