We are starting to see the price of some consumer goods start to fall or at least remain static as higher interest rates work their way through the system.
That is translating into falling revenue volumes farther up the supply chain.
We have just seen February’s wholesale numbers. They are down across the country and it is largely on goods destined for consumers.
Whether that is demand softening and retailers are not purchasing as much or that they are actually buying the same amount but the price of the items of lower is not clearly evident.
But we are, for example, seeing lower numbers on food. It is likely we are not buying less food, it is probably just prices coming down. Beverages are in decline too but that one could be a result of consumers buying less or cutting back on their patronage of bars or coffee shops. The amount of money we’re shelling out for clothing is also falling.
But we’re seeing less movement on things destined for end-users in business. A good example is farm inputs. They are still going up alongside wholesale farm outputs.
