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Morrisons returns to growth, and Lidl takes its highest market share

Published:  02 June, 2015

Morrison returned to growth for the first time since December 2013, the latest grocery share figures from Kantar Worldpanel have shown, while Lidl rose its highest recorded market share.

Morrison returned to growth for the first time since December 2013, the latest grocery share figures from Morrison returned to growth for the first time since December 2013, the latest grocery share figures from Kantar Worldpanel have shown, while Lidl rose its highest recorded market share.

Of the big four retailers, only Morrisons saw growth, the report said, as the supermarket sector continued its slow growth, up just 0.2% compared to the same time a year ago. There were "marginal" sales increases of 0.1% at Morrison, which Fraser McKevitt, head of retail and consumer insight at Kantar Worldpanel, said would be a welcome boost for new CEO David Potts, although its market share remained at 10.9%.

"A committed core of loyal Morrisons consumers is responding positively to recent initiatives and business has been boosted by online sales," McKevitt said. "Morrisons' performance is an improvement on what was a difficult May 2014, so this is only the first step in any future recovery."

However McKevitt commented that the major supermarkets were finding it difficult to grow, as prices have been declining since September 2014.

"While like-for-like groceries are 1.9% cheaper than this time last year, this is not as steep a fall as last month, when prices were down by 2.1%. This means that if current trends continue, prices will once again start rising by the end of the year," he said.

Sainsbury's sales fell 03%, but it held its share at 16.5%, while Tesco saw its market share slide by 0.4 percentage points to 28.6%, on the back of sales down 1.3%. This was despite an improved start to the year and strong performance from its Tesco Express convenience stores and online channel. Sales at Asda also fell 2.4% as increased footfall failed to compensate for lower prices.

However, it was Aldi who took the largest growth, up 15.7% to 5.4% market share, while Lidl also grew, up 8.8% to a new record high market share of 3.9%, which marked a rise of 3 percentage points higher than a year ago.

"Lidl's growth has been fuelled by a combination of more consumers visiting the stores and the average basket containing more items, demonstrating a consumer willingness to move their bigger shopping trips to the so called 'discounters'," Kantar said.

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