Morrisons has kept up the pressure on its supermarket rivals after reporting further sales growth in 2008.
The supermarket chain yesterday unveiled a 7 per cent hike in like-for-like sales, excluding fuel, over the 13 weeks to May 4, the first quarter of Morrisons’ financial year.
The latest figures show an increase on the 4.6 per cent reported for the financial year to February 3 but down on the 9.5 per cent rate achieved by the retailer over the Christmas period.
Analysts said that the growth achieved was likely to be far higher than the rate achieved by Tesco and J Sainsbury, which are due to report sales numbers over the next fortnight.
They added that despite the current economic climate an improvement in customer numbers highlighted how Morrisons was benefiting from its positioning as a value brand .
Morrisons chief executive Marc Bolland said an extra 500,000 shoppers were passing through its checkouts each week compared to last year, and claimed that it was poaching customers from all of its competitors.
“This isn’t down to particular promotions or heavy advertising,” he said. “Customer footfall is up and we are outperforming the market .”
A recent study on the average prices of staple foods across the four major supermarket groups claimed a typical basket of goods in Morrisons was cheaper than in 2007 despite food price inflation on products such as bread and milk .
Leave a Reply