Investment special: Which shops to bet on as recovery begins

After a long, cold and sometimes lonely winter for shopkeepers, at last there are glimmers of sunshine. Retail sales volume surged in May as shoppers shelled out £6.8 billion a week, the highest figure since records began.

Although the rise was partly a recovery from a miserable March and April, depressed by the coldest spring for 50 years, it was also seen as the result of rising consumer confidence buoyed by better economic news and less fear of unemployment.