(Representational Image)  |  Photo Credit: iStock Images
Key Highlights
- Consumer footfall in markets fell 50% in last week of December
- Seeing around 20% wedding postponement or deferment
With the rise in Omicron cases across the country, followed by government restrictions, the upcoming wedding seasons are hard-hit, as per the industry bodies.
Almost 20% of weddings have gotten postponed to later months, stakeholders said. The wedding season is to start from January 14 and go on in February and March.
Because of rising COVID cases, consumer spending has been significantly hit, said Confederation of All India Traders head Pravin Khandelwal. The spending fell almost 50% in the last week of December as people have been venturing out only to buy essential items, said Khandelwal.
Given the caution among people and subdued consumer sentiment, the upcoming wedding season is likely to be hit.
The last wedding season that went by in Nov and Dec, traders did business of around 3 lakh crores and based on this, it was projected that the wedding season of Jan-Feb would do business of over 5 lakh crores, said Khandelwal. But now it looks, it will be reduced to half, he added.
Echoing the sentiment, Samir Arora, vice president of Delhi Banquet Federation said that given the uncertainty in restrictions around, most people are on wait and watch mode, but few have postponed their weddings to later months.
Around 28-30 different services, like Mehendi, flowers, catering, are catered to during a wedding while various other purchases happen ranging from garments, footwear, jewellery, among others.
Garments being one of the major purchases during a wedding, Rahul Mehta of Clothing Manufacturers Association says that even in December, trade declined a little to around 80% of pre-pandemic levels. And now they are expecting a dip of further 20-25% in January because of subdued consumer sentiment.
Further, restrictions imposed by state governments on store timings are as good as a lockdown. 70-80% of apparel purchases happen in the evening.
