Sales up by 13.9%

BULLISH: SHOPRITE BEATS COMPETITORS

Retail giant Shoprite is continuing to outperform its peers with the group reporting a 13.9% surge in sales for the half-year ended 31 December last year, to R121 billion, yesterday. This comes on the back of the group extending its “period of uninterrupted market share gains” in its core South African supermarket business to 58 months. It is clearly benefitting from woes at Pick n Pay and Massmart, and beating competitors like Spar and Woolworths by achieving double-digit sales growth.

“The 14.6% increase in sales from our core business segment equates to R12.4 billion in additional customer spend with us on the same period last year,” Shoprite group CEO Pieter Engelbrecht said yesterday.

All three of Shoprite’s major retail store chains – Shoprite, Checkers/ Checkers Hyper and Usave – delivered double-digit sales growth for the period.

Interim results financial and operational highlights:

Group sales of merchandise increased by 13.9% to R121.1 billion.

Supermarkets RSA sales of merchandise increased by 14.6% to R97.5 billion.

Diluted headline earnings per share increased by 7.6% to 621.4 cents (2023: 577.5 cents).

Interim dividend per share increased by 7.7% to 267 cents (2023: 248 cents).

Shoprite Group opened a net number of 369 stores during the past 12 months.

The group’s supermarket operations created 2 202 new jobs over the six months.

The Checkers and Checkers Hyper division delivered 13.7% growth in sales.

On-demand delivery by Checkers Sixty60 increased sales by a further 63.1% over the six months. Shoprite increased sales by 13.1%. Shoprite, with the inclusion of 51 (Cambridge) stores acquired from Massmart Holdings, raised sales by 13.2%.

The group’s limited assortment discounter, USave increased sales by 12.3%.

“Despite reporting against an exceptionally high base of sales growth of 17.5% for the same period last year, the 14.6% increase in sales for this interim period compares admirably to the restof-market growth in South Africa, per NielsenIQ, for the same period of 7.6%,” said Engelbrecht.

“While the operating context in South Africa remains challenging and costly, especially taking into consideration the ongoing cost of diesel generators during load shedding, we are most pleased to report an increase in profits and dividends for the period.”