Grocery Market Share Ireland - Christmas Cheer For the Major Retailers

The latest grocery market figures from Kantar Worldpanel in Ireland, published today for the 12 weeks ending 25 December 2011, show the market returning to growth with value sales increasing by 1%. However, this growth rate remains significantly below the 3.4% food inflation rate as Irish shoppers continue to manage their purse strings over the festive season.

David Berry, Commercial Director at Kantar Worldpanel, explains: “The big three’s battle for market share has resonated well with shoppers with each retailer performing ahead of the market. Tesco saw sales growth of 3.6%, helping it grow its market share from 27.2% to 28%. Dunnes also saw an increase in share from 23.5% to 24%. SuperValu maintained its recent positive performance with 1.2% growth, keeping it just ahead of the market and nudging its share to 19.9%.”

Aldi continues to post the strongest performance of all the retailers with sales growth increasing to 27.2%. This resulted in an impressive 0.9 point increase in share to 4.5%. Lidl’s performance remains ahead of the market with a growth rate of 1.6%.

David continues: “The German discounters have put in a record performance over the Christmas period with their combined share moving above 10% for the first time.

“Behind these figures, Kantar is also seeing some key changes in the way that people are shopping. Consumers are now exerting more control on how much they spend by making more shopping trips but having smaller sized baskets. There has also been a move to private label products, which have seen growth of 5%, while branded goods sales have declined by 1%.”

An update on inflation

Grocery inflation is at 3.4% for the 12 week ending period 25 December 2011, down from 3.7% in the previous period.