The new Retail People Index, published by the Retail Trust and global consulting firm AlixPartners, has found that the rates of presenteeism – where people work with a physical or mental health condition – were higher before Christmas than at any other time since the index began tracking wellbeing in retail 18 months earlier.
Nearly half (46%) of retail staff worked while unwell at the end of last year, +5% higher than at the end of 2023, as fears around job cuts following the Autumn Budget’s tax rises took hold.
Retail workers’ wellbeing levels also dropped to their lowest in 18 months and there was a steep rise in the number of employees at risk of leaving their jobs due to feeling depressed and anxious about work, says the Retail Trust, which provided £878,935 in financial aid to retail workers in need in 2024 – an increase from £664,349 in 2023, with the number of requests for help to pay for food increasing threefold by the end of the year.
Chris Brook-Carter, chief executive of the Retail Trust, says: “The festive period always brings added pressures for retail workers but there was a noticeable increase in the number of people suffering last Christmas compared to the year before. We must put some of this down to the economic uncertainty facing the country and retail jobs in particular following the tax rises announced in last autumn’s Budget.
“It remains to be seen whether wellbeing will improve this spring, as it did last year, or if insecurities around jobs, finances and the political climate will continue to take their toll on employees’ physical and mental health. Either way, it’s clear that employers need to ensure staff have the right resources and reassurance to recover and rebuild their resilience following a difficult autumn and winter.”
Employees aged 35-54 saw the sharpest rise in presenteeism, up from 41% between July and September to 53% in the final three months of the year.
Shop workers were unhappier than their head office-based colleagues, by +6%, and men in non-manager roles had a +6% bigger ‘flight risk’, or propensity to quit, than women in comparative roles at the end of 2024.
Scores for the Retail People Index are calculated using responses to a happiness assessment, delivered with the Retail Trust’s data partner WorkL, from nearly 6500 retail workers.
Laura Bond, a director at AlixPartners, comments: “Retailers are facing into a perfect storm, with squeezed discretionary consumer spending, higher business rates, rising National Insurance contributions, and a rise in the national minimum wage all either continuing or about to bite. As our index shows, the uncertainty that this is creating is a key contributor to the decline in confidence of the people that work within retail, which in turn impacts business performance.
“In the wake of the Government’s Spring Statement, business leaders have an opportunity to address uncertainty felt across the industry and engage with their teams. Employee engagement has never been more vital for those looking to drive retention, and in turn, growth and greater resilience.”
The Retail Trust runs a wellbeing helpline and provides counselling and financial aid for retail workers, and works with more than 200 retail employers to improve the mental health of their staff. A generative AI-powered happiness dashboard was launched by the Retail Trust last year to help retailers better track staff wellbeing trends and improve the effectiveness of support.
Assistance with rental payments remained the most common reason retail workers requested financial aid from the Retail Trust in 2024, making up 26% of enquiries. Help paying for food leapt from the sixth to the second most common reason for people requesting financial aid by the end of last year, accounting for 22% of requests compared to 7% in 2023.
Click here to download the Retail People Index.
