(Ottawa) The COVID-19 pandemic left a strong mark on retail sales in May in Canada, causing many losers but also winners, depending on the sector.
Statistics Canada reported on Friday that sales fell 20% from the same month a year earlier, to $ 46.2 billion, and that sales were down in 15 of 19 commodity groups.
The monthly decline observed is mainly due to the 44.8% drop in sales of motor vehicles. Sales of fuels for vehicles were 51.3% lower.
Statistics Canada also observed that clothing and footwear sales suffered respective decreases of 56.3% and 56.4%.
In contrast, since homebound consumers ate less at restaurants, increases of 11.1% and 6.9% were recorded in the food and beverage categories, respectively.
And as weather conditions improved in May, there was an 11.5% increase in sales of live plants, seeds, and other home and garden accessories and supplies; of 10.2% of sales of lawn mowers, snowblowers and gardening tools and 46.4% of household outdoor furniture.
The federal agency also noted an 18.6% increase in sales of sporting and leisure goods in May.
