Bar sales fell substantially in July compared to the previous month, according to seasonally adjusted figures from the Central Statistics Office today. The value of sales was down 5.3% while the amount sold was down 6.4%.
Bar sales, for CSO purposes, cover all turnover in a bar, including alcoholic beverages but also pub food and snacks.
The long term trend, which compares July 2004 with July 2003, also looks bleak for publicans with the value of sales down 6.1% and volumes down 8.1%.
Davy Stockbrokers said that sales volumes in bars are down 9% since the workplace smoking ban was enacted.
However, Davy's chief economist Robbie Kelleher says it would be wrong to blame the smoking ban as the start of the decline in bar sales predates the smoking ban.
Separately, overall retail sales were up 2.7% in value terms and 1.2% in volume terms in July 2004 compared with July 2003.
Commenting on the figures, Eugene Kieran from Irish Life Investment Managers said that not too much should be read into one month's volatile retail sales figures.
'Consumer confidence continues to improve and there has been a clear improvement over the past 12 months on how Irish consumers view current conditions. The job market is still very healthy - more than 43,000 jobs have been created in the past year alone - and this is supporting the increase in consumer spending,' he said.
He points out that Irish spending is comfortably ahead of most of the country's EU neighbours with sales in Germany actually down 1% on the year.
