How consumer behaviours changed in response to COVID-19 lockdown stringency measures: A case study of Walmart.

Walmart is a major player in the US retail sector and was one of the grocery corporations that bucked the trend of declining retail sales at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. Particularly in the initial stages of the pandemic, governance priorities focussed on restricting the movement of people and closing non-essential retailers and service providers to slow the spread of the virus and keep people safe. This paper investigates the impact of non-pharmaceutical interventions, in the form of lockdown stringency measures, on consumer purchasing behaviours for essential goods over the onset of the pandemic.

Using unstable data from mobile phone applications to examine recent trajectories of retail centre recovery.

The COVID-19 pandemic has changed the ways in which we shop, with significant impacts on retail and consumption spaces. Yet, empirical evidence of these impacts, specifically at the national level, or focusing on latter periods of the pandemic remain notably absent. Using a large spatio-temporal mobility dataset, which exhibits significant temporal instability, we explore the recovery of retail centres from summer 2021 to 2022, considering in particular how these responses are determined by the and characteristics of retail centres and their regional geography.

Ageing in Place Classification: Creating a geodemographic classification for the ageing population in England.

Population ageing is one of the most significant demographic changes underway in many countries. Far from being a homogenous group, older people and their experiences of ageing are diverse. A better understanding of the characteristics and geography of the older population, including the older workforce, is important.

An open source delineation and hierarchical classification of UK retail agglomerations.

Town centres and high streets typically form the social and commercial cores of UK cities and towns, yet, there is no uniform definition of what a town centre or high street is. In this study the spatial delineations of retail agglomerations are generated using open-source data for England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. The extent and boundaries of these physical retail areas are identified based on the density and connectivity patterns of individual retail units over space.

Archetypes of Footfall Context: Quantifying Temporal Variations in Retail Footfall in relation to Micro-Location Characteristics.

The UK retail sector is constantly changing and evolving. The increasing share of online sales and the development of out-of-town retail provision, in conjunction with the 2008-09 economic crisis, have disproportionately impacted high streets and physical retail negatively. Understanding and adapting to these changes is fundamental to the vitality, sustainability and prosperity of businesses, communities and the economy.