Shoppers splash out more in April

There may have been fewer people in town over a wet Easter Weekend than usual but those who ventured out were spending up, figures show.
The Easter spend-up has been likened to Christmas spending and statistics from Paymark, the company that processes 75 per cent of all electronic transactions in New Zealand, said spending was up 6.6 per cent in the Bay of Plenty compared with last April.
Last month Paymark said Bay of Plenty had a 6.8 per cent increase in spending compared with March last year.
For some, the figures reflected signs of new life in the economy.
Chamber of Commerce chief executive Max Mason said he was not surprised the figures showed an increase in spending.
"I think there's a general sense that there are some green shoots starting to reappear in the economy. Certainly business confidence surveys are showing growing confidence," Mr Mason said.
"It is of course still early days but barring any more disasters the trend for some economic indicators to track upwards will happen slowly but steadily.
"Some sectors are still struggling but there is a general sense of growing optimism."
Downtown Tauranga manager Kirby Weis said retailers were telling him that although there were fewer people in town than expected for the annual National Jazz Festival at Easter Weekend, there was a surprising increase in retail spend.
"It was as good as Christmas spending. We noticed there were fewer people around but the people who were there seemed to be spending more."
Mr Weis said he and retailers hoped May, like April, would reflect an increase "purely because of season change".
"In April and May we get a new season so you have a lot of sales or bargains to be had from old season stock making way for new season stock."
The busiest day for spending in New Zealand so far this year was Thursday April 21, the day before Good Friday.
Paymark figures showed the 3.38 million transactions on the day represented a total spend of $184 million.
Mr Weis said that was reflected in Tauranga where people also tended to "shock shop" the day before shops closed for the long weekend.
John Albertson, CEO of the New Zealand Retailers Association said there was a increase in clothing and footwear sales figures in April, which reflected the colder season.
The annual spending increase for footwear and clothing outlets amounted to 9.5 per cent and 7.2 per cent respectively.
Nationally, Paymark recorded an increase of 6.3 per cent in retail spend. Paymark head of sales and marketing Paul Whiston said this was buoyed by a pick up in Canterbury's spending, plus other factors such as growth in clothing and footwear sectors.
"The improvement between March and April was a major contributor to the faster national spending growth in April, though clearly spending is still constrained," Mr Whiston said.