Tech revolution sounds the alarm for traditional goods

ALARM clocks and traditional door knockers are falling out of fashion as UK households increasingly embrace technology, an annual rundown of sales trends from John Lewis suggests.

The department store has reduced its range of alarm clocks by 30% after sales fell by 16% over the last year as people turn to mobile phones for their wake-up call.

Sales of traditional door knockers have fallen by 9% as homeowners invest in smart doorbells with features such as live video streaming and wi-fi-enabled apps.

The store said sales are up 367% since it started selling them in July last year.

The trends are the latest sign of the increasing dominance of technology such as smartphones and tablets.

Gone are the days when a road map was an essential at the start of a journey, or a photo album a necessity to store photographic memories – all thanks to the omnipresent mobile phone.

The days of small televisions also seem to be numbered, with the most commonly sold screen size doubling to 70in from 2010’s 36in.

When it comes to DVDs, while last year marked 20 years since Sony and Toshiba launched the new home video format, growing demands for live-streaming and downloads mean predictions are already being made for their extinction date.

By comparison, the sale of digital cameras has fallen 29% between 2006 and 2011, while iPod sales fell 52% in 2014 alone.

Next year, the final Yellow Pages will be delivered after 50 years, accompanied by the falling popularity of diaries and address books as numbers are searched online and stored on Sim cards.

With a quarter of today’s children aged six or under owning a smartphone, traditional skills are also being replaced by a new digital literacy.

In April this year a headteachers’ union justified the decision taken by schools to remove analogue clocks from examination halls, following complaints from GCSE and A-level pupils unable to tell the time.

Meanwhile, with people spending more time glued to a screen than in the great outdoors, map-reading skills also feature highly on in a list of skills studies have shown to be dying out

In the late 1980s, the Ordnance Survey was selling almost 3.5 million maps a year. In the 1990s, the figure had fallen to 3 million, and in 2016 it was at 1.9 million.

Yet while the rise of smartphones and tablets continues unabated, there are at least some sale declines in the latest John Lewis figures that can’t be laid at their door.

The trouser press may have been cutting edge in the 1960s, but sales at the store have fallen 36% in the last year alone.

John Lewis said the year was “one of the toughest retailers have seen” – the partnership reported a 98.8% profits crash for the first half of the year – as uncertainty around Brexit and difficult trading conditions dominated the high street.

However, a number of major events encouraged consumers to keep spending.

Sales of the Mulberry Darley bag saw a 327% spike after the Duchess of Sussex was pictured carrying one, while her choice of a bright yellow dress for a Your Commonwealth reception in July resulted in sales of yellow dresses quadrupling.

The year’s series of extreme weather events spelt good news for sales of boots, up 63% in February and March, and inflatables, up 316% during the summer heatwave.

In the four months after the final episode of Blue Planet II, sales of reusable coffee cups, travel cups and flasks were up 71% on last year.

The Love Island show also made its presence felt at the high street stalwart, spurring a rush of sales of inflatables and water bottles similar to those featured in the programme.

However, the “biggest surprise” for the retailer was a resurgence in popularity of the thong after years of declining sales, with sales up 72% alongside suspenders, which were up 132%.

Meanwhile, for the first time the majority of online shoppers (42%) visited the John Lewis website via their smartphone, while the number of orders placed on mobile phones increased by 35%.

Simon Coble, trading director at John Lewis & Partners, said: “It is fascinating to see what trends our customers have fallen in and out of love with this year and how big events like the World Cup and the royal wedding have such a significant impact on what we buy.”