Olympic success and the hot weather has helped deliver the best supermarket results in nearly three years says market analysts, Nielsen.
New retail performance data, released as the GB Olympic team return to Britain, show a 0.9% rise in sales value for the four weeks ending August 13, versus the same period a year ago. This is the best figure (excluding Easter and Christmas-inflated periods) since the four weeks ending November 9, 2013.
Sales volumes similarly increased by 1% during the same 12 weeks, registering the best volume figure for over 16 months.
“Brexit seems to have been replaced by an Olympic ‘feel-good’ factor among shoppers,” said Nielsen’s head of retailer and business insight in the UK, Mike Watkins.
“There were more visits to buy food and drink in the last four weeks than this time last year, with most retailers benefitting from an increase in shopper penetration.”
The figures also revealed that the amount of sales on promotional items fell further to 28%, reflecting the big four supermarkets’ move to “simplify the overall customer offer in response to the growth of the discounters by lowering the level of promotions and reducing multi buys, instead moving to permanent price cuts”.