Easter eggs and hot cross buns bring in the dough for grocers

● Sales rise at fastest rate since late 2013, with all ten major chains seeing growth

0 Shoppers spent £325 million on Easter eggs this year Britons’ taste for Easter eggs helped supermarket sales rise at their fastest rate since September 2013, new figures have shown. All ten major grocers are in growth for the first time in three-and-a-half years, with the overall grocery market rising at 3.7 per cent over the 12 weeks to 23 April, Kantar Worldpanel said.

British shoppers bought 20 million packets of hot cross buns in one week alone and splashed out £325 million on Easter eggs, upping the average price they paid for an egg by 8.6 per cent to £1.65.

Tesco returned to growth with sales up 1.9 per cent to £7.26 billion over the quarter, although its market share fell to 27.5 per cent from 28 per cent, while Sainsbury’s sales rose 1.7 per cent to £4.25bn, the biggest increase since June 2014, despite a drop in market share to 16.1 per cent. Sainsbury’s positive figures come as it cautioned over “challenging” trading, posting an 8.2 per cent fall in annual profits.

Asda saw its market share fall to 15.6 per cent from 16 per cent even though sales rose to 0.8 per cent to £4.1bn, its first year-on-year sales increase since October 2014.

Morrisons was the fastestgrowing Big Four grocer, with sales up 2.2 per cent to £2.76bn – although its market share fell 0.2 points to 10.4 per cent.

Waitrose’s market share was unchanged at 5.2 per cent in the 12 weeks ended 23 April, while sales climbed 3.1 per cent to £1.36bn. Iceland, Aldi and Lidl all saw sales rise, at 9.3 per cent, 18.3 per cent and 17.8 per cent respectively, with Aldi and Lidl hitting new record market shares of 6.9 per cent and 5 per cent.

Fraser Mckevitt, from Kantar Worldpanel, said: “While prices do look set to rise further, the current inflation rate of 2.6 per cent is still below the average level experienced by shoppers between 2010 and 2014.”