This year won’t be an easy ride for retailers, but there will still be winners.

This year won’t be an easy ride for retailers, but there will still be winners.

So it’s farewell to 2012. How was it for you? Growing a business on the web was a lot easier than bricks and mortar.

The luxury sector was relatively more immune to economic conditions - people who are wealthy are still wealthy and the less well-off still aspire to owning that luxury item; low price caught the mood and attention of the consumer; the mid-market was probably a bit of a nightmare.

Inside the M25 was a lot better than outside. And 2012 brought the disappearance of a number of fascias that frankly didn’t have a clear proposition, which in these tough times means certain eventual death.

Let’s look at some of the factors that will affect 2013.

The macroeconomic environment will still be difficult, particularly in the UK domestic market. However, to be cynical, with the next general election due no later than May 2015, the ruling politicians will be desperate to show some signs of economic growth to boost confidence before the start of the run-up. So perhaps we can expect a small improvement to emerge by the end of 2013.

The seismic change needed to restructure many retailers’ store estates has only just begun. To take an example of a fashion multiple, 10 years ago you could cover the UK with, say, 200 to 250 stores. Today you need only 100 to 150, plus a website. Virtually every mature retailer is wrestling with diminishing returns because of an increasing tail of loss-making or underperforming stores.

Consumer footfall continues to polarise in favour of the stronger locations: in London, the West End formed by Oxford Street, Bond Street and Regent Street (surely in combination the greatest shopping offer in the world); the Westfield shopping centres in Stratford and White City; Covent Garden and similar.

Away from the capital, Manchester, Birmingham and Glasgow all have shopping centres in and out of town that consumers increasingly want to spend time in at the expense of weaker locations.

It is particularly galling for a successful retailer to find that he now has a poor performing or even loss-making store, not because he has done anything wrong, but simply because other stores are failing around him, leading the consumer to the conclusion that they should shop in another location.

The need for structural change in the use of high streets is now on the agenda but there is little evidence that sufficient action has been taken.

Market forces should ultimately adjust retail rents, but there remains a reality check for the Government over rateable values and business rates.

For retailers with mature store estates, even achieving modest retail growth will be seen as a success.

The shift to online continues but still no one knows what maturity will look like.

One potential spark though is that we are now starting to see an increase in the number of small retailers surfacing.

With only a few stores and a strong internet emphasis from inception, they are emerging as the new retail.

  • Peter Williams is a non-executive director of Asos and a former boss of Selfridges