A record £13.7 billion passed through UK supermarket tills in the run-up to Christmas, with the average household spending an all-time high of £477 during the month as a continuing shift to cut-price offers failed to fully offset high food inflation.
According to figures from data and analytics company Kantar, Friday December 22 was the most popular shopping day during the four weeks to December 24. More than 25 million trips were made with consumers spending £803 million in physical stores - 85% more than the average Friday in 2023.
There were 488 million trips to the supermarkets during the four-week period, 12 million more than in 2022 and the largest at Christmas since pre-pandemic.
READ MORE: Cost of living: Food inflation falls to single digits
The value of take-home grocery sales was up by 7% while the number of items purchased rose by 2%, reflecting the continuing impact of surging food inflation which officially hit a peak of 19.6% in March, the highest since 1977. Figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) show that food prices in rose by 27% during the two years to November.
Kantar pegged the annual rate of grocery price inflation at 6.7% in December, down from 9.1% in the previous four weeks. Head of retail and consumer insight Fraser McKevitt said the rate of inflation is coming down at the fastest pace ever recorded by Kantar, but consumers are still facing "hefty pressures" on their budgets.
"Retailers were clearly working hard during the festive period to offer best value and win over shoppers, and promotions were central to their strategy," he said. "Nearly one-third of all spend in the four weeks to Christmas Eve was made on items with some kind of offer, the highest level since December 2020 and £823m more than last year.”
Tesco, Sainsbury’s, Asda, Morrisons and Waitrose accounted for a combined market share of 70% during the 12 weeks to 24 December. The traditional supermarkets saw especially strong performances for their own-label lines, with sales of premium ranges like Sainsbury’s Taste the Difference and Tesco Finest surging by 11.9% compared with last year to hit £790m, accounting for 5.7% of all grocery sales. Branded sales rose by 6.0% during the same period.
READ MORE: ‘Worst inflation in a generation’ dominated household budgets in 2023
Sainsbury’s reached its highest market share since December 2020 at 15.8%, pushing up its sales by 9.3%. Tesco gained 0.1 percentage points of share to now hold 27.6% of the market and grew sales by 7.5%.
Lidl and Aldi continue to be the fastest growing grocers year-on-year and the discounters hit their highest ever market shares for the Christmas period.
Lidl increased sales by 13.8%, while Aldi saw growth of 9.9%. Lidl’s market share rose by 0.5 percentage points to 7.7% and Aldi’s grew 0.2 percentage points, meaning its market share now stands at 9.3%.
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