Irish shoppers’ grocery spend in the three-month period ending on February 25 increased by €96 million in comparison to the same time-frame last year.
This is according to the latest grocery market share figures from Kantar Worldpanel in Ireland – which show continued positive momentum among Irish supermarkets, with growth hitting 3.9% – announced this morning.
Commenting on the matter, director at Kantar Worldpanel David Berry said: “Shoppers have spent an additional €96 million on groceries over the latest 12 weeks compared to last year and two factors have led to this growth.
“First, shoppers are choosing to buy slightly more expensive items and this is reflected in continued sales growth for brands. Second, customers have picked up more items during their weekly shop, with the cost of the average trip 60c more than this time last year.”
Dunnes Stores remains in top spot
Meanwhile, it was confirmed that Dunnes Stores retained pole position – capturing 23.1% of shoppers’ grocery spending. Growth remains strong at 5%, but this has dipped from a high of 5.7% in the previous period.
Continuing, Berry said: “Tesco tops the charts in terms of growth this month, with sales increasing by almost 7% and market share hitting 22.3%.
This time last year the retailer was facing a number of store closures due to strike activity and its most recent performance is reflective of this.
“The strongest performance for Tesco has been among younger shoppers, with share among the young family demographic increasing from 26.5% last year to 29.3% this year,” he said.
With a market share of 22%, SuperValu sits in third position – this places it just 0.3 percentage points behind Tesco.
SuperValu continues to build performance outside of its traditional base. According to Kantar, two areas that stand out are young families – where market share has increased by almost 2% – and Dublin – where sales have increased by 3.5%.
An increase in shopper loyalty is behind this, with shoppers returning to the store more frequently – resulting in an extra 780,000 trips for Lidl this period compared with last year, Kantar added.
Having previously reported a decline in sales, Aldi’s performance is back on track. Sales have increased by 1.3% and market share stands at 10.6% – just 0.2 percentage points behind Lidl, the statistics show.