JSAIY J Sainsbury Plc (QX)

By Razak Musah Baba

LONDON--U.K's top four supermarket chains all recorded sales growth but lost market share as shoppers seeking lower prices patronized German retailers Aldi and Lidl, a survey showed Wednesday.

Aldi's market share rose to 6.9% in the 12 weeks ended June 18, compared with 6.1% a year earlier, while Lidl's share rose to 5.0%, from 4.4% , Kantar Worldpanel said. Kantar monitors the household grocery purchasing habits of 25,000 demographically representative households in the U.K.

Tesco PLC's (TSCO.LN) market share fell to 27.8% in the 12 weeks, from 28.2% for the comparable period. However, sales in the 12 weeks were up 3.5% at 7.40 billion pounds ($9.42 billion).

J Sainsbury PLC's (SBRY.LN) market share in the 12 weeks ended June 18 fell to 16.0%, from 16.3%, while sales rose 3.1% to GBP4.25 billion.

Asda, a subsidiary of Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (WMT), saw its market share fall to 15.1%, from 15.6%, with sales 2.2% higher at GBP4.03 billion. Wm Morrison Supermarkets PLC's (MRW.LN) market share fell to 10.6%, from 10.8%, while sales rose 3.7% to GBP2.83 billion

Up-market retailer Waitrose maintained its market share at 5.2% in the 12 weeks ended June 18 and increased sales 5.3% to GBP1.37 billion, Kantar reported.

Aldi's sales in the 12 weeks climbed 18.7% to GBP1.84 billion, while Lidl's sales rose 18.8% to GBP1.33 billion.

"The market's robust performance this period is partly down to particularly weak sales growth last year and a continuing increase in like-for-like grocery inflation, which is now running at 3.2%. At this rate, that's an extra GBP133 on the average household's annual shopping bill, or the equivalent of seven additional shopping trips a year," said Fraser McKevitt, head of retail and consumer insight at Kantar Worldpanel.

-Write to Razak Musah Baba at razak.baba@wsj.com; Twitter: @Raztweet

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

June 27, 2017 03:59 ET (07:59 GMT)

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