But as one of the BRC authors, he also has the knowledge to solve them.
The total value of sales in June rose 1.5% versus a year ago, the BRC said.
The BRC data comes after official figures revealed that UK retail sales fell last month.
"The feel good factor from the Olympics failed to inspire spending, " the BRC said.
The BRC said these marked the highest like-for-like sales increases on a quarterly basis since December 2009.
In terms of fashion, the autumn-winter ranges in womenswear did not attract many shoppers, the BRC said.
The BRC says consumer spending is being hit hard by higher inflation, job losses and low wage growth.
In particular, online shopping grew 4.8% in August, the lowest increase since the BRC started collecting the data in October 2008.
The BRC says 95% of its members' products have been checked, including all minced beef lines used by the UK's largest supermarkets.
"Underlying conditions are still tough, " said the BRC's director general, Stephen Robertson.
The BRC data follows a number of high profile High Street casualties.
The BRC figures contrasted with a recent CBI survey which reported that food stores suffered their worst performance for five years in February.
BBC: UK retail sales grew at fastest rate for years in February
The BRC report comes after official figures released last week showed that retail sales grew only slightly in July, up 0.2% from June.
"It is very clear that overall the Olympics did not deliver any benefits to UK retailers in August, " said Richard Dodd from the BRC.
But the BRC questioned the report's link between promotions and food waste, highlighting a UK government survey that showed buy-one-get-one-free offers were becoming rarer.
The official series should be the more reliable because it is more comprehensive than the BRC's, which mainly picks up sales by large retailers.
The BRC has told the Treasury that legislation would put a burden on business because of the need to train staff to charge for the bags.
On a geographical basis, the BRC said that Wales saw the biggest fall in shopper numbers, down 11.5%, followed by the east of England, 7.1% lower.
"Christmas hasn't been a boom time for UK retailers, but it hasn't been complete doom and gloom either, " said Helen Dickinson, the BRC's new director general.
The BRC said that the decline for the month as a whole came despite a rise of 7.5% in shopper numbers in the immediate week before Christmas.
The BRC said that, after allowing for inflation, overall sales were flat in December, which, together with rising costs, meant retailers were "running fast to stand still".
Although retail sector employment rose 0.6% in the final quarter of 2012 compared with the same period a year earlier, all these jobs were part-time, the BRC said.
The Bank of England has been sceptical about figures that jar not just with the BRC survey but also with other information, including reports from its own regional agents.
But although footfall numbers were sharply lower, last week the BRC said sales for the month were 1.9% higher in March than a year ago, a situation it described as "encouraging".
The BRC figures also showed that footfall was down when compared to February, but the situation in Scotland was better than the rest of the UK where shopper numbers fell by 5.2%.
"In the face of falling consumer confidence, retailers' efforts to generate sales with Easter discounts were key to holding back prices on non-food goods, " said Stephen Robertson, director general of the BRC.
The BRC said that the worst affected regions were the east Midlands and the south west of England, with "footfall", the number of people entering retail spaces, down by 8.1% and 7%.
The BRC acknowledged this, but said that the net effect of the Games was minimal as "lower footfall in London was offset by a better performance in the rest of the country".
The Office for National Statistics (ONS) has not yet published its figures for retail sales in November, but for some time it has been painting a more reassuring picture than the BRC (see chart).
Clothing and footwear - particularly for women - showed no improvement, with the BRC suggesting this may be because shoppers already did much of their clothes shopping for the year during the warm weather seen in April.
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