Small business sales are growing as the country emerges from coronavirus restrictions.
Auckland had the strongest improvement in sales, followed by Otago, Bay of Plenty and Waikato Photo: 123RF
The accounting software firm Xero says small business sales for November were up nearly 16 percent year-on-year, nearly double the October levels.
Auckland had the strongest improvement in sales, followed by Otago, Bay of Plenty and Waikato.
Xero's New Zealand managing director Craig Hudson says the result was likely spurred on by the reopening of in-store retail shopping in Auckland early in the month.
"As soon as retailers who could observe social distancing opened on the 10th of November, it's been clear that Aucklanders are ready to get out of their homes and back to living their lives.
"It's encouraging to see local small businesses included in this spending, especially as we head into the summer holiday season."
Construction, retail trade and manufacturing were the stand out sectors in small business sales, Hudson said.
"Broadly speaking, these figures point towards a recovering small business economy - both regionally and across industries. While there are still areas suffering, it's encouraging to see the dial shifting in the right direction," Hudson said.
With many hospitality businesses still closed for the majority of the month, November sales were down 5.9 percent year-to-year, however, when compared to October and September (down 10.2 percent year-to-year, 20.4 percent year-to-year respectively), the November result is a step in the right direction, he said.
Xero said job growth slowed in November, with a 2.4 percent increase year-on-year, down from 3.8 percent in October.