MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

London beats New York, Tokyo and Paris as the leading shopping city

The UK capital has 26.000 stores and 138 leading retail brands

London has beaten New York, Tokyo and Paris to become the world's highest grossing shopping city.
The UK capital, which boasts more big-name stores than any other, had the highest retail sales last year, with shoppers spending £62.4billion.

This compares with £61.4billion for Tokyo, £47billion for New York and £46.6 billion for Paris. The figures were reported in a study of 22 worldwide shopping destinations by Britain's Centre for Retail Research.

It also found consumers spent more in London than the combined totals of Los Angeles, Milan, Rome, Madrid and Berlin. London's 26,000 stores house 138 of the world's 250 leading retail brands, against an average of 90 elsewhere.

It attracts about 14.1 million overseas tourists, four million more than its nearest rival. It was also the top city for internet shopping, with £9.9 billion sales last year.

Chris Simpson, marketing director of comparison website Kelkoo, which commissioned the research, said: “The key to London's success appears to be the quality and quantity of shops, combined with revenue generated by the huge volume of tourists”.