Hospitality spending rebounds: Worldline

Spending in April shows encouraging signs for the hospitality sector. Photo / Getty Images

New figures from Worldline show hospitality spending has rebounded, with spending in April showing encouraging signs for the sector.

Consumer spending at accommodation, cafes, bars, restaurants, and fast food outlets reached $892m in April.

While this spending was down 6.8 per cent on April 2021 and 0.4 per cent on April 2019 before the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic, these figures mark a sharp improvement on the previous eight months.

Relative to April 2019, spending at hospitality merchants was up 31 per cent or by $8m in Wairarapa and 27 per cent or $22m in Taranaki, as opposed to small annual declines seen during March.

Spending in the South Island, however, was still down 10 per cent or by $229m, although an improvement on the 32 per cent down recorded in March.

Worldline head of data George Putnam said the new freedoms around the Covid traffic light system appeared to be encouraging more people to resume dining out.

"The increasing relaxation of Covid restrictions in April and the general shift towards more personal responsibility around risks of Covid did appear to prompt consumers to make the most of their new freedoms for autumnal dining opportunities.

"As was the case last year during less restrictive periods, the Hospitality spending boost was more noticeable in the North Island regions outside of the two major centres than in the South Island, consistent with the larger population of the North Island moving around."

Spending through Worldline's payments network amongst the rest of the core retail sector was $2.9 billion in April - up 4.1 per cent on the same time last year and 15.4 per cent on April 2019.

Worldline said these growth rates were similar to those seen in the previous five months.

"Spending in the rest of the Core Retail sector, which overall is far larger than Hospitality, is maintaining a growth momentum at present, at least in terms of total dollars being spent," Putnam said.

He said the average value of a payment transaction had increased since 12-months ago - consistent with generally higher prices.

The average value of April transactions through all core retail merchants in Worldline's network (excluding Hospitality) was $52.84, a 8.9 per cent increase since April last year and 11 per cent since April 2019.

"In April this year we saw spending at merchants selling discretionary products – such as clothing and footwear, or electrical goods – showing growth patterns very similar to earlier months, suggesting that any inflation-induced cutbacks in spending have been modest so far."